websocket-refresh - a simple WebSocket refresh server

This repository provides a server that can be used to refresh all connected clients at once. It’s useful in intranets, where each of connected kiosks would require manual refreshing otherwise.

Code in server.js is a bit ugly, but it’s been used in production already.

Setting up

1. installing
   1. Clone this repository
   2. npm install
2. Setting up clients
   1. Add client.js to each client page
3. Running (and using the server)
   1. Run server.js with node.js
   2. Type enter in the terminal window to send refresh command to every connected client

In order to achieve best results, your HTTP server should be set up to not send Expires with a future date in headers. Refer to documentation of the HTTP server you use. Without that, even private or incognito mode in client browsers won’t help.

This server assumes it’s running on the same machine on which the HTTP server is running. By default it uses port 8888, but that can be customized by changing value of the constant port in client.js and server.js.

If refresh server is unavailable, clients will try to reconnect after 10 minutes by default. This time can be customized by changing value of retryTime in client.js.

client.js is written in ES6, but it can be transpiled with babel to work with older browsers. Since it uses WebSocket, browsers need to have support for it to work.