WebSocket: How to automatically reconnect after it dies

Question

Here is what I ended up with. It works for my purposes.

function connect() {
  var ws = new WebSocket('ws://localhost:8080');
  ws.onopen = function() {
    // subscribe to some channels
    ws.send(JSON.stringify({
        //.... some message the I must send when I connect ....
    }));
  };

  ws.onmessage = function(e) {
    console.log('Message:', e.data);
  };

  ws.onclose = function(e) {
    console.log('Socket is closed. Reconnect will be attempted in 1 second.', e.reason);
    setTimeout(function() {
      connect();
    }, 1000);
  };

  ws.onerror = function(err) {
    console.error('Socket encountered error: ', err.message, 'Closing socket');
    ws.close();
  };
}

connect();

This worked for me with setInterval, because client connection can be lost.

ngOnInit(): void {
    if (window.location.protocol.includes('https')) {
        this.protocol = 'wss';
    }

    this.listenChanges();
}


listenChanges(): void {
    this.socket = new WebSocket(`${this.protocol}://${window.location.host}/v1.0/your/url`);

    this.socket.onmessage = (event): void => {
        // your subscription stuff
        this.store.dispatch(someAction);
    };

    this.socket.onerror = (): void => {
        this.socket.close();
    };


    this.socket.onopen = (): void => {
        clearInterval(this.timerId);

        this.socket.onclose = (): void => {
            this.timerId = setInterval(() => {
                this.listenChanges();
            }, 10000);
        };
    };
}

Don't forget to call clearInterval when the socket has been opened.

This isn't explicitly a react question but here is a react style answer:

TLDR: You can use setInterval to periodically check the websocket connection status and try to re-connect if the connection is closed. https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/WebSocket/readyState

class TestComponent extends React.Component {
  constructor(props) {
    super(props);
    this.state = {};

    this.connect = this.connect.bind(this);
  }

  componentDidMount() {
    this.interval = setInterval(this.connect, 1000);
  }

  componentWillUnmount() {
    if (this.ws) this.ws.close();
    if (this.interval) clearInterval(this.interval);
  }

  connect() {
    // https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/WebSocket/readyState
    if (this.ws === undefined || (this.ws && this.ws.readyState === 3)) {
      this.ws = new WebSocket(`ws://localhost:8080`);

      this.ws.onmessage = (e) => {
        console.log(JSON.parse(e.data));
      };
    }
  }

  render() {
    return <div>Hey!</div>;
  }
}

A too interesting wrapper above the native Websocket api to add that and nicely

https://github.com/joewalnes/reconnecting-websocket