Nginx TCP (WebSockets) Timeout / Keepalive Config

Question

I am using nginx version: nginx/1.0.12

My nginx.conf looks like this:

#user  nobody;
worker_processes  1;  

error_log  logs/error.log;
#error_log  logs/error.log  notice;
#error_log  logs/error.log  info;

#pid        logs/nginx.pid;

events {
    worker_connections  1024;
}

tcp {

     upstream websockets {
      ## Play! WS location
       server 127.0.0.1:9000;
       check interval=3000 rise=2 fall=5 timeout=1000;
     }    

    server {
        listen 80; 
        listen 8000;
        server_name socket.domain.com;

        tcp_nodelay on; 
        proxy_pass websockets;
        proxy_send_timeout 300;

    }   

     # virtual hosting
     #include /usr/local/nginx/vhosts/*;
}

My application seems to be dropping websocket connnections every 75 sec (or so) which I think is because of Nginx's default keepalive config. How do increase the timeout?

Check [wiki](http://nginx.org/en/docs/http/ngx_http_upstream_module.html#keepalive). — Dmitry Verhoturov, May 11 '12 at 12:45
I had tried that earlier: I added keepalive 32 on line 20 (under server 127.0.0.1:9000) and I get nginx: [emerg] unknown directive "keepalive" in /usr/local/nginx/conf/nginx.conf:20 — Sameer Segal, May 11 '12 at 13:19
@DmitryPaskal, if I remove the upstream directive (I am not load balancing yet) and add a proxy pass in the server tag, then what should I do? — Sameer Segal, May 11 '12 at 14:37
Did you added `proxy_http_version 1.1;` and `proxy_set_header Connection "";`? Read link carefully. — Dmitry Verhoturov, May 12 '12 at 06:21
@DmitryPaskal - I tried following your notes but they seem to be for http and not for tcp. Updated nginx.conf (http://pastebin.com/NP9BhFrt) giving similar errors. — Sameer Segal, May 13 '12 at 17:21

score 63 · Answer 1 · answered Jul 24 '14 at 19:49

63

I tried the websocket_*_timeout which are not supported on nginx 1.7.1 (it gives: unknown directive).

However setting a high proxy_*_timeout works:

proxy_connect_timeout 7d;
proxy_send_timeout 7d;
proxy_read_timeout 7d;

7d means 7 days, see official nginx configuration reference

Additionally you probably only have to set the proxy_read_timeout 7d; as that's the one that usually matter unless the server behind the proxy is very slow.

answered Jul 24 '14 at 19:49

Wernight

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I tried the same, and it's working fine... But in Firebug (add on for Firefox), it's giving errors saying - "NetworkError: 404 Not Found - http://localhost/......" and "Firefox can’t establish a connection to the server at ws://localhost/....." – Akash Chandwani Nov 23 '16 at 08:48
The `websocket_*_timeout` requires nginx to be compiled with the `nginx_tcp_proxy_module` module from https://github.com/yaoweibin/nginx_tcp_proxy_module – isapir Mar 21 '17 at 20:44
4

Not sure you really want to set `proxy_connect_timeout` to such a long period as it's not used as a keepalive config. From the manual: `Defines a timeout for establishing a connection with a proxied server. It should be noted that this timeout cannot usually exceed 75 seconds.` – duckboy81 Dec 29 '19 at 01:00
2

`proxy_read_timeout 7d;` should be enough. Don't mess `proxy_connect_timeout` config. It is important. – hurelhuyag Jul 02 '21 at 15:55

score 7 · Answer 2 · edited May 23 '17 at 12:26

these brillant guys had the same problem and solved it ....

NGINX to reverse proxy websockets AND enable SSL (wss://)?

also, here in the original repo for that module is more instructions from the module author.

https://github.com/yaoweibin/nginx_tcp_proxy_module/issues/28

it basically amounts to adding websocket_*_timeout instructions in the server directive:

 server {

     ....

     websocket_connect_timeout ######;
     websocket_send_timeout #####;
     websocket_read_timeout #####;

     ....

         }

Nginx TCP (WebSockets) Timeout / Keepalive Config

2 Answers2

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