WebSockets

HTTP is a stateless protocol as noted previously. This means that a new connection is established for every request and closed after every response. An HTML5 WebSocket is a communication interface that allows for a permanent bidirectional connection between client and server.

A WebSocket is opened by the client through a GET request such as the following:

GET /chat HTTP/1.1 
Host: server.example.com 
Upgrade: websocket 
Connection: Upgrade 
Sec-WebSocket-Key: x3JJHMbDL1EzLkh9GBhXDw== 
Sec-WebSocket-Protocol: chat, superchat 
Sec-WebSocket-Version: 13 
Origin: http://example.com 

If the server understands the request and accepts the connection, its response would be as follows:

HTTP/1.1 101 Switching Protocols 
Upgrade: websocket 
Connection: Upgrade 
Sec-WebSocket-Accept: HSmrc0sMlYUkAGmm5OPpG2HaGWk= 
Sec-WebSocket-Protocol: chat 

The HTTP connection is then replaced by the WebSocket connection, and it becomes a bidirectional binary protocol not necessarily compatible with HTTP.