How to choose the right streaming protocol

Author: thepian

README.md

@@ -85,6 +85,7 @@ Building a simple chat app that uses websockets is easy, but rich, non-trivial,
 * Base the application on [Express and SockJS](https://github.com/socketstream/ss-examples/tree/master/express-4-and-js)
 * Make a minimal application like [SocketStream 0.3](https://github.com/socketstream/ss-examples/tree/master/legacy-app)
 * Serve [HTTP resources and pages](http://socketstream.github.io/socketstream/docs/#/tutorials/serving_http_resources)
+* Choosing the right [Streaming Protocol](http://socketstream.github.io/socketstream/docs/#/tutorials/choosing_protocol)
 
 ### Applications using SocketStream
 

src/docs/tutorials/en/choosing_protocol.ngdoc

@@ -0,0 +1,30 @@
+@ngdoc overview
+@name Choosing a Protocol
+
+@description
+# Choosing a Protocol
+
+The state of web protocols is such that WebSockets are supported on perhaps 90% of the devices that reach your
+website. The first question you have to ask yourself is what to do about the last 10%. You can ignore them and
+configure SocketStream to only use WebSockets for streaming connections. This is an option that will be added
+in version `0.7` and be stable in `0.8`.
+
+Otherwise you can support 100% of devices with fallback protocols such as "engine.io" or "SockJS". They are both
+mature but with different approaches. SockJS tries to open a WebSocket and fall backs to various polling techniques
+if it cannot. Engine.io starts with polling and tries to upgrade ultimately to a WebSocket connection. So for
+90% of devices SockJS will connect faster.
+
+However engine.io supports compression and binary data, so you may push more data to the client. This may not
+be relevant for your application, so both are good options.
+
+For streaming connections it is also important to consider Internet proxies and gateways. Many firewalls only let
+through HTTP and stops all other protocols. To support this you cannot use straight WebSockets as the fallback
+mechanisms must always be used.
+
+Over the next year HTTP version 2 will become supported in most web browsers and web servers. It allows some
+advanced data caching techniques that can be used to achieve Real-Time data streaming to clients over HTTP.
+
+Hopefully we will be able to extend SocketStream with the ability to stream over HTTP/2.
+
+Another interesting candidate is WebRTC which allows browsers to talk to each other. This might also be fitted
+into the Real-Time puzzle.