isobit/ws-tcp-relay

A simple relay between WebSocket clients and TCP servers

ws-tcp-relay

An extremely simple relay/bridge/proxy between WebSocket clients and TCP servers. Data received from WebSocket clients is simply forwarded to the specified TCP server, and vice-versa. In other words, it's websocketd, but for TCP connections instead of STDIN and STDOUT.

Usage

Usage: ws-tcp-relay <tcpTargetAddress>
  -b	Use binary frames instead of text frames
  -binary
    	Use binary frames instead of text frames
  -p uint
    	The port to listen on (default 4223)
  -port uint
    	The port to listen on (default 4223)
  -tlscert string
    	TLS cert file path
  -tlskey string
    	TLS key file path

Binary Data

By default, golang.org/x/net/websocket uses text frames to deliver payload data. To use binary frames instead, use either the b or binary flags.

WSS Support

To use secure WebSockets simply specify both the tlscert and tlskey flags.

Installation

go get -u github.com/isobit/ws-tcp-relay

Binaries are also available on the release page.

ws-tcp-relay's Issues

General questions

I have been testing the combination of ws-tcp-relay and websocket-nats using a simple web client.

In my particular scenario, I'm using Docker to launch several ws-tcp-relay instances and connect them to a single NATS server. Then, I have a webapp that uses websocket-nats to connect to a ws-tcp-relay instance randomly and open a websocket session.

I have some general questions about ws-tcp-relay and I'm wondering if you can share some insight.

1. do you have any info on how many connections a single ws-tcp-relay instance can handle?

2. at what point does ws-tcp-relay relays the NATS connection?, when a client first connects to the relay? [via nats.connect('ws://localhost:4223')] or when the client first subscribes to a NATS topic?

3. does ws-tcp-relay keeps the relay session to NATS alive? or is this the responsibility of the client using websocket-nats?

I'm interested in evaluating the scalability of ws-tcp-relay in combination with websocket-nats and I'm wondering if you might have any suggestions or feedback.

Thanks,

A.

Benchmark against Websockify

This would make a really good higher performance alternative to Websockify since their C implementation is not quite developed and suffers from security issues.

binary data isn't working

Sending binary data returns client error (chrome) "WebSocket connection to 'ws://127.0.0.1:8008' failed: Could not decode a text frame as UTF-8." How can i force relay to use binary websocket frames?

Please provide a concrete example

Could you provide an example how to use this tool? Let's assume that I'm having a websocket connection already initialized and it is running on port 5000. Relying on the code I assume that it should create a tcp connection on the specified tcp address and should look at the websocket connection specified with the -p flag. My expectation is to receive the values (for example using netcat (nc) sent over the websocket to be consumable over tcp, in other words to receive the values from the websocket connection. But unfortunately is not happening.

General question

How do I approach securing the connection to the ws-tcp-relay ?
I have a web app (react) that needs to connect the ws-tcp-relay but i dont want any old person on the internet to access the websocket

Add support for TCP TLS

Currently only the Websocket side supports TLS (through the -tlscert and -tlskey options). Support should be added for TLS on the TCP side.

This could be done by adding a flag (e.g. -tcptls or -tls) which causes ws-tcp-relay to use crypto/tls to dial the connection instead of net. Additional options may need to be added for configuring the connection (see https://golang.org/pkg/crypto/tls/#Config), such as specifying the root CAs.

Care should be taken to avoid confusion between client-side (TCP) and server-side (WSS) TLS. This may mean renaming the -tlscert and -tlskey options, although the old ones should be retained for backwards-compat.

Proposed new usage:

Usage: ws-tcp-relay <tcpTargetAddress>
  -b	Use binary frames instead of text frames
  -binary
    	Use binary frames instead of text frames
  -p uint
    	The port to listen on (default 4223)
  -port uint
    	The port to listen on (default 4223)
  -wsscert string (also -tlscert)
    	Path to a certificate (PEM file) to use for serving WebSockets using TLS. If the certificate is signed by
        a certificate authority, the file should be the concatenation of the server's certificate, any
        intermediates, and the CA's certificate. Must also specify -wsskey.
  -wsskey string (also -tlskey)
    	Path to a private key (PEM file) to use for serving WebSockets using TLS. Must also specify -wsscert.
  -tcptls
        Use TLS for outgoing TCP connections
  -tcptlscert
        Path (or multiple paths) to a certificate (PEM file) to use for outgoing TCP connections using TLS. 
        May be specified multiple times Only used when -tcptls is specified.
  -tcptlsrootcert
        TODO

Listen port issue

Hi,

-p 1515
run and Listening port 4223?

Have a good day.

Send data from WebSocket to TCP Server successfull but fail with vice-versa

Use io.CopyBuffer() instead of io.Copy()?

Thanks for writing a useful tool! I've run into this: https://go-review.googlesource.com/c/go/+/9399 and I think it may be a good idea if you use io.CopyBuffer() to improve the relaying performance.

Segmentation fault in AMD64 and Intel X86 on OSX M1 chip

Darwin x86 on M1
(run via: arch -x86_64 ./ws-tcp-relay -p 4222 nats.messaging:4222)

Process:               ws-tcp-relay [21401]
Path:                  /Users/USER/*/ws-tcp-relay
Identifier:            ws-tcp-relay
Version:               ???
Code Type:             X86-64 (Translated)
Parent Process:        zsh [19543]
Responsible:           iTerm2 [535]
User ID:               502

Date/Time:             2021-04-12 15:05:39.982 -0400
OS Version:            macOS 11.2.3 (20D91)
Report Version:        12
Anonymous UUID:        DDCA91AB-B8CA-98E1-CCD5-DFD5664B2528


Time Awake Since Boot: 82000 seconds

System Integrity Protection: enabled

Crashed Thread:        0

Exception Type:        EXC_BAD_ACCESS (SIGSEGV)
Exception Codes:       KERN_INVALID_ADDRESS at 0x0000000000000018
Exception Note:        EXC_CORPSE_NOTIFY

Termination Signal:    Segmentation fault: 11
Termination Reason:    Namespace SIGNAL, Code 0xb
Terminating Process:   exc handler [21401]

VM Regions Near 0x18:
--> 
    __TEXT                        1000000-1413000      [ 4172K] r-x/rwx SM=COW  /Users/*

Application Specific Information:
dyld2 mode

Thread 0 Crashed:
0   runtime                       	0x00007ffdffed0bb0 0x7ffdffebf000 + 72624
1   ws-tcp-relay                  	0x00000000010579cd runtime.bsdthread_register + 29 (sys_darwin_amd64.s:392)
2   ws-tcp-relay                  	0x000000000102bfb1 runtime.schedinit + 161 (proc.go:482)

Thread 1:: com.apple.rosetta.exceptionserver
0   runtime                       	0x00007ffdffec1238 0x7ffdffebf000 + 8760
1   runtime                       	0x00007ffdffecb354 0x7ffdffebf000 + 50004
2   runtime                       	0x00007ffdffecc1f8 0x7ffdffebf000 + 53752

Thread 0 crashed with ARM Thread State (64-bit):
    x0: 0x800000010000fb90   x1: 0x0000000001057970   x2: 0x0000000000000000   x3: 0x0000000000000000
    x4: 0x0000000000000000   x5: 0x0000000000000000   x6: 0x0000000000000000   x7: 0x000000c42000e000
    x8: 0x00007ffdfff34a00   x9: 0x00007ffdfff34a08  x10: 0x0000000000000000  x11: 0x0000000000000080
   x12: 0x0055555555555555  x13: 0x00000000000000f5  x14: 0x0000000000000075  x15: 0x0000000000000028
   x16: 0x000000000000016e  x17: 0x0000000000000000  x18: 0x800000010000fb90  x19: 0x0000000100000000
   x20: 0x00000000000007ff  x21: 0x0000000100014fc0  x22: 0x00000002058bbbf8  x23: 0x00000000018ad224
   x24: 0x0000000001026e60  x25: 0x00000000015041ec  x26: 0x00000000014f9ad4  x27: 0x0000000000000000
   x28: 0x00000000010579cd   fp: 0x00007ffdffed0b98   lr: 0x00000000018ad254
    sp: 0x000000010000fb90   pc: 0x00007ffdffed0bb0 cpsr: 0x80000000
   far: 0x0000000000000018  esr: 0x92000006


Binary Images:
         0x1000000 -          0x1412fff +ws-tcp-relay (???) /Users/USER/*/ws-tcp-relay
       0x1017a5000 -        0x101840fff  dyld (832.7.3) <0D4EA85F-7E30-338B-9215-314A5A5539B6> /usr/lib/dyld
    0x7ffdffebf000 -     0x7ffdfff32fff +runtime (203.30) <C98E75A6-BDC8-3D5C-B95B-6422005E96D8> /Library/Apple/*/runtime

External Modification Summary:
  Calls made by other processes targeting this process:
    task_for_pid: 0
    thread_create: 0
    thread_set_state: 0
  Calls made by this process:
    task_for_pid: 0
    thread_create: 0
    thread_set_state: 0
  Calls made by all processes on this machine:
    task_for_pid: 8534930
    thread_create: 0
    thread_set_state: 0

VM Region Summary:
ReadOnly portion of Libraries: Total=5860K resident=0K(0%) swapped_out_or_unallocated=5860K(100%)
Writable regions: Total=150.7M written=0K(0%) resident=0K(0%) swapped_out=0K(0%) unallocated=150.7M(100%)
 
                                VIRTUAL   REGION 
REGION TYPE                        SIZE    COUNT (non-coalesced) 
===========                     =======  ======= 
Rosetta Arena                     2048K        1 
Rosetta Generic                    584K      143 
Rosetta IndirectBranch              32K        1 
Rosetta JIT                      128.0M        1 
Rosetta Return Stack                20K        2 
Rosetta Thread Context              20K        2 
VM_ALLOCATE                      528.5G        9 
VM_ALLOCATE (reserved)               8K        2         reserved VM address space (unallocated)
__DATA                             640K        6 
__DATA_CONST                        32K        1 
__LINKEDIT                         636K        5 
__TEXT                            5260K        3 
mapped file                        4.7G       12 
===========                     =======  ======= 
TOTAL                            533.3G      188 
TOTAL, minus reserved VM space   533.3G      188 

Darwin amd64

Process:               ws-tcp-relay_darwin_amd64 [21270]
Path:                  /Users/USER/*/ws-tcp-relay_darwin_amd64
Identifier:            ws-tcp-relay_darwin_amd64
Version:               ???
Code Type:             X86-64 (Translated)
Parent Process:        zsh [19543]
Responsible:           iTerm2 [535]
User ID:               502

Date/Time:             2021-04-12 14:58:42.889 -0400
OS Version:            macOS 11.2.3 (20D91)
Report Version:        12
Anonymous UUID:        DDCA91AB-B8CA-98E1-CCD5-DFD5664B2528


Time Awake Since Boot: 82000 seconds

System Integrity Protection: enabled

Crashed Thread:        0

Exception Type:        EXC_BAD_ACCESS (SIGSEGV)
Exception Codes:       KERN_INVALID_ADDRESS at 0x0000000000000018
Exception Note:        EXC_CORPSE_NOTIFY

Termination Signal:    Segmentation fault: 11
Termination Reason:    Namespace SIGNAL, Code 0xb
Terminating Process:   exc handler [21270]

VM Regions Near 0x18:
--> 
    __TEXT                        1000000-1413000      [ 4172K] r-x/rwx SM=COW  /Users/*

Application Specific Information:
dyld2 mode

Thread 0 Crashed:
0   runtime                       	0x00007ffdffe99bb0 0x7ffdffe88000 + 72624
1   ws-tcp-relay_darwin_amd64     	0x00000000010579cd runtime.bsdthread_register + 29 (sys_darwin_amd64.s:392)
2   ws-tcp-relay_darwin_amd64     	0x000000000102bfb1 runtime.schedinit + 161 (proc.go:482)

Thread 1:: com.apple.rosetta.exceptionserver
0   runtime                       	0x00007ffdffe8a238 0x7ffdffe88000 + 8760
1   runtime                       	0x00007ffdffe94354 0x7ffdffe88000 + 50004
2   runtime                       	0x00007ffdffe951f8 0x7ffdffe88000 + 53752

Thread 0 crashed with unknown flavor: 7, state_count: 4


Binary Images:
         0x1000000 -          0x1412fff +ws-tcp-relay_darwin_amd64 (???) /Users/USER/*/ws-tcp-relay_darwin_amd64
       0x1016ba000 -        0x101755fff  dyld (832.7.3) <0D4EA85F-7E30-338B-9215-314A5A5539B6> /usr/lib/dyld
    0x7ffdffe88000 -     0x7ffdffefbfff +runtime (203.30) <C98E75A6-BDC8-3D5C-B95B-6422005E96D8> /Library/Apple/*/runtime

External Modification Summary:
  Calls made by other processes targeting this process:
    task_for_pid: 0
    thread_create: 0
    thread_set_state: 0
  Calls made by this process:
    task_for_pid: 0
    thread_create: 0
    thread_set_state: 0
  Calls made by all processes on this machine:
    task_for_pid: 8479265
    thread_create: 0
    thread_set_state: 0

VM Region Summary:
ReadOnly portion of Libraries: Total=5860K resident=0K(0%) swapped_out_or_unallocated=5860K(100%)
Writable regions: Total=150.7M written=0K(0%) resident=0K(0%) swapped_out=0K(0%) unallocated=150.7M(100%)
 
                                VIRTUAL   REGION 
REGION TYPE                        SIZE    COUNT (non-coalesced) 
===========                     =======  ======= 
Rosetta Arena                     2048K        1 
Rosetta Generic                    584K      143 
Rosetta IndirectBranch              32K        1 
Rosetta JIT                      128.0M        1 
Rosetta Return Stack                20K        2 
Rosetta Thread Context              20K        2 
VM_ALLOCATE                      528.5G        9 
VM_ALLOCATE (reserved)               8K        2         reserved VM address space (unallocated)
__DATA                             640K        6 
__DATA_CONST                        32K        1 
__LINKEDIT                         636K        5 
__TEXT                            5260K        3 
mapped file                        4.7G       12 
===========                     =======  ======= 
TOTAL                            533.3G      188 
TOTAL, minus reserved VM space   533.3G      188