How to make Apache and Node.js with Socket.io setup work?

Question

Just starting with Node.js/Socket.io. Ultimately I want to serve the pages from Apache while pushing and augmenting some of the content with Node.js server. This is just a little test to see how it all works. Here is my setup:

• Apache running on port 8080
• Node.js running on port 8000

I copied the index.html page (see below) to their respective root directories.

1. When I open http://localhost:8000 everything works as expected and I can see the complete message exchange.

2. When I open http://localhost:8080 everything appears to work (based on request and response headers, and Node.js log compared to 1.) but I can see no message exchange in either Node.js or Firebug log.

3. When I first open the page served by Node.js, close it, then open the page served by Apache it works. I can see "CONNECTED", "DISCONNECTED", and then "CONNECTED" messages in the Node.js terminal.

The question is: how to make case 2. work?

Page:

<script src="http://localhost:8000/socket.io/socket.io.js"></script>
<script>
    var socket = io.connect('http://localhost:8000');
    socket.on('server calling', function(data) {
        console.log(data);
        socket.emit('client response', {my : 'data'});
    }); 
    socket.emit('client calling', {foo : 'bar'});
</script>
Hello!

Server:

var app = require('http').createServer(handler);
var io = require('socket.io').listen(app);
var fs = require('fs');

app.listen(8000);

function handler(req,res) {  

    path = req.url == "/" ? "./index.html" : "." + req.url; 
    fs.readFile(path,
        function(err, data) {
            if(err) {
                res.writeHead(500);
                return res.end('Error loading page.');
            }   
            res.writeHead(200);
            res.end(data);
        }   
    );

    io.sockets.on('connection', function (socket) {

        console.log('CONNECTED');

        setInterval(function() {            
            socket.emit('server calling', { hello: 'world' }); 
        }, 2000);

        socket.on('client response', function(data) {
            console.log(data);
        });
        socket.on('disconnect', function() {
            console.log('DISCONNECTED');
        }); 
        socket.on('client calling', function(data) {
            console.log(data);
        }); 
    });
};

I'm aware of the following questions on SO:

• Node.js + Socket.io + Apache
• node.js and apache on different servers

but I still cannot make it work...

I've tried:

• "change the path to /socket.io-client/dist/socket.io.js"

In the browser: ReferenceError: io is not defined. When I go to http://localhost:8000/socket.io-client/dist/socket.io.js I get Welcome to socket.io. response.

In the server log: info - unhandled socket.io url

• "serve the socket.io.js from your Apache static server"

How would that work? Apache does not know how to handle the /socket.io/socket.io.js and node_modules automagic?

• dark_ruby suggested setting up a proxy

I changed the script source in the index.html page in Apache root directory to:

<script src="http://localhost:8080/socket.io/"></script>

In Apache config, I added:

LoadModule proxy_module modules/mod_proxy.so
LoadModule proxy_http_module modules/mod_proxy_http.so
ProxyPass /socket.io/ http://localhost:8000/socket.io/socket.io.js

With such configuration opening http://localhost:8080 had the same result as in 2. above:

$ node node-server.js
   info  - socket.io started
   debug - served static content /socket.io.js
   debug - client authorized
   info  - handshake authorized U9xPRw_0rRpsv-K9qVkS
   debug - setting request GET /socket.io/1/websocket/U9xPRw_0rRpsv-K9qVkS
   debug - set heartbeat interval for client U9xPRw_0rRpsv-K9qVkS
   debug - client authorized for 
   debug - websocket writing 1:: 
   debug - emitting heartbeat for client U9xPRw_0rRpsv-K9qVkS
   debug - websocket writing 2:: 
   debug - set heartbeat timeout for client U9xPRw_0rRpsv-K9qVkS
   debug - got heartbeat packet
   debug - cleared heartbeat timeout for client U9xPRw_0rRpsv-K9qVkS
   debug - set heartbeat interval for client U9xPRw_0rRpsv-K9qVkS
   ... 
   info  - transport end (undefined)
   debug - set close timeout for client U9xPRw_0rRpsv-K9qVkS
   debug - cleared close timeout for client U9xPRw_0rRpsv-K9qVkS
   debug - cleared heartbeat interval for client U9xPRw_0rRpsv-K9qVkS
   debug - discarding transport

i.e. no messages.