# Spring Session - WebSocket

This guide describes how to use Spring Session to ensure that WebSocket messages keep your HttpSession alive.

|   |Spring Session’s WebSocket support works only with Spring’s WebSocket support.<br/>Specifically,it does not work with using [JSR-356](https://www.jcp.org/en/jsr/detail?id=356) directly, because JSR-356 does not have a mechanism for intercepting incoming WebSocket messages.|
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[Index](../index.html)

## HttpSession Setup

The first step is to integrate Spring Session with the HttpSession. These steps are already outlined in the [HttpSession with Redis Guide](./boot-redis.html).

Please make sure you have already integrated Spring Session with HttpSession before proceeding.

## Spring Configuration

In a typical Spring WebSocket application, you would implement `WebSocketMessageBrokerConfigurer`.
For example, the configuration might look something like the following:

```
@Configuration
@EnableScheduling
@EnableWebSocketMessageBroker
public class WebSocketConfig implements WebSocketMessageBrokerConfigurer {

	@Override
	public void registerStompEndpoints(StompEndpointRegistry registry) {
		registry.addEndpoint("/messages").withSockJS();
	}

	@Override
	public void configureMessageBroker(MessageBrokerRegistry registry) {
		registry.enableSimpleBroker("/queue/", "/topic/");
		registry.setApplicationDestinationPrefixes("/app");
	}

}
```

We can update our configuration to use Spring Session’s WebSocket support.
The following example shows how to do so:

src/main/java/samples/config/WebSocketConfig.java

```
@Configuration
@EnableScheduling
@EnableWebSocketMessageBroker
public class WebSocketConfig extends AbstractSessionWebSocketMessageBrokerConfigurer<Session> { (1)

	@Override
	protected void configureStompEndpoints(StompEndpointRegistry registry) { (2)
		registry.addEndpoint("/messages").withSockJS();
	}

	@Override
	public void configureMessageBroker(MessageBrokerRegistry registry) {
		registry.enableSimpleBroker("/queue/", "/topic/");
		registry.setApplicationDestinationPrefixes("/app");
	}

}
```

To hook in the Spring Session support we only need to change two things:

|**1**|Instead of implementing `WebSocketMessageBrokerConfigurer`, we extend `AbstractSessionWebSocketMessageBrokerConfigurer`|
|-----|-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
|**2**|                      We rename the `registerStompEndpoints` method to `configureStompEndpoints`                       |

What does `AbstractSessionWebSocketMessageBrokerConfigurer` do behind the scenes?

* `WebSocketConnectHandlerDecoratorFactory` is added as a `WebSocketHandlerDecoratorFactory` to `WebSocketTransportRegistration`.
  This ensures a custom `SessionConnectEvent` is fired that contains the `WebSocketSession`.
  The `WebSocketSession` is necessary to end any WebSocket connections that are still open when a Spring Session is ended.

* `SessionRepositoryMessageInterceptor` is added as a `HandshakeInterceptor` to every `StompWebSocketEndpointRegistration`.
  This ensures that the `Session` is added to the WebSocket properties to enable updating the last accessed time.

* `SessionRepositoryMessageInterceptor` is added as a `ChannelInterceptor` to our inbound `ChannelRegistration`.
  This ensures that every time an inbound message is received, that the last accessed time of our Spring Session is updated.

* `WebSocketRegistryListener` is created as a Spring bean.
  This ensures that we have a mapping of all of the `Session` IDs to the corresponding WebSocket connections.
  By maintaining this mapping, we can close all the WebSocket connections when a Spring Session (HttpSession) is ended.

## `websocket` Sample Application

The `websocket` sample application demonstrates how to use Spring Session with WebSockets.

### Running the `websocket` Sample Application

You can run the sample by obtaining the [source code](https://github.com/spring-projects/spring-session/archive/main.zip) and invoking the following command:

```
$ ./gradlew :spring-session-sample-boot-websocket:bootRun
```

|   |For the purposes of testing session expiration, you may want to change the session expiration to be 1 minute (the default is 30 minutes) by adding the following configuration property before starting the application:<br/><br/>src/main/resources/application.properties<br/><br/>```<br/>server.servlet.session.timeout=1m # Session timeout. If a duration suffix is not specified, seconds will be used.<br/>```|
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|   |For the sample to work, you must [install Redis 2.8+](https://redis.io/download) on localhost and run it with the default port (6379).<br/>Alternatively, you can update the `RedisConnectionFactory` to point to a Redis server.<br/>Another option is to use [Docker](https://www.docker.com/) to run Redis on localhost.<br/>See [Docker Redis repository](https://hub.docker.com/_/redis/) for detailed instructions.|
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You should now be able to access the application at [http://localhost:8080/](http://localhost:8080/)

### Exploring the `websocket` Sample Application

Now you can try using the application. Authenticate with the following information:

* **Username** *rob*

* **Password** *password*

Now click the **Login** button. You should now be authenticated as the user **rob**.

Open an incognito window and access [http://localhost:8080/](http://localhost:8080/)

You are prompted with a login form. Authenticate with the following information:

* **Username** *luke*

* **Password** *password*

Now send a message from rob to luke. The message should appear.

Wait for two minutes and try sending a message from rob to luke again.
You can see that the message is no longer sent.

|   |Why two minutes?<br/><br/>Spring Session expires in 60 seconds, but the notification from Redis is not guaranteed to happen within 60 seconds.<br/>To ensure the socket is closed in a reasonable amount of time, Spring Session runs a background task every minute at 00 seconds that forcibly cleans up any expired sessions.<br/>This means you need to wait at most two minutes before the WebSocket connection is closed.|
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You can now try accessing [http://localhost:8080/](http://localhost:8080/)You are prompted to authenticate again.
This demonstrates that the session properly expires.

Now repeat the same exercise, but instead of waiting two minutes, send a message from each of the users every 30 seconds.
You can see that the messages continue to be sent.
Try accessing [http://localhost:8080/](http://localhost:8080/)You are not prompted to authenticate again.
This demonstrates the session is kept alive.

|   |Only messages sent from a user keep the session alive.<br/>This is because only messages coming from a user imply user activity.<br/>Received messages do not imply activity and, thus, do not renew the session expiration.|
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