HTTP的长连接与短连接

浏览器和服务器每进行一次HTTP操作，就建立一次连接，但任务结束就中断连接。如果客户端浏览器访问的某个HTML或其他类型的Web页中包含有其他的Web资源，如JavaScript文件、图像文件、CSS文件等；当浏览器每遇到这样一个Web资源，就会建立一个http会话。

 

如果浏览器或者服务器在其头信息加入了这行代码

Connection:keep-alive

TCP连接在发送后将仍然保持打开状态，于是，浏览器可以继续通过相同的连接发送请求。保持连接节省了为每个请求建立新连接所需的时间，还节约了带宽。在header中加入 --Connection:keep-alive
在HTTp协议请求和响应中加入这条就能维持长连接。

 

实现长连接要客户端和服务端都支持长连接。如果web服务器端看到这里的值为“Keep-Alive”，或者看到请求使用的是HTTP 1.1（HTTP 1.1默认进行持久连接），它就可以利用持久连接的优点，当页面包含多个元素时（例如Applet，图片），显著地减少下载所需要的时间。要实现这一点， web服务器需要在返回给客户端HTTP头信息中发送一个Content-Length（返回信息正文的长度）头，最简单的实现方法是：先把内容写入ByteArrayOutputStream，然后再正式写出内容之前计算它的大小

无论浏览器 还是 Web 服务器具有较低的 KeepAlive 值，它都将是限制因素。例如，如果客户端的超时值是两分钟，而 Web 服务器的超时值是一分钟，则最大超时值是一分钟。客户端或服务器都可以是限制因素。

 

HTTP1.1和HTTP1.0相比较而言，最大的区别就是增加了持久连接支持(貌似最新的 http1.0 可以显示的指定 keep-alive), 但还是无状态的，或者说是不可以信任的。 以下是协议描述：

写道

Http Keep-Alive seems to be massively misunderstood. Here's a short description of how it works, under both 1.0 and 1.1

HTTP/1.0
Under HTTP 1.0, there is no official specification for how keepalive operates. It was, in essence, tacked on to an existing protocol. If the browser supports keep-alive, it adds an additional header to the request: Connection: Keep-Alive

Then, when the server receives this request and generates a response, it also adds a header to the response:

Connection: Keep-Alive

Following this, the connection is NOT dropped, but is instead kept open. When the client sends another request, it uses the same connection. This will continue until either the client or the server decides that the conversation is over, and one of them drops the connection.

HTTP/1.1
Under HTTP 1.1, the official keepalive method is different. All connections are kept alive, unless stated otherwise with the following header: Connection: close

The Connection: Keep-Alive header no longer has any meaning because of this.

Additionally, an optional Keep-Alive: header is described, but is so underspecified as to be meaningless. Avoid it.

Not reliable
HTTP is a stateless protocol - this means that every request is independent of every other. Keep alive doesn’t change that. Additionally, there is no guarantee that the client or the server will keep the connection open. Even in 1.1, all that is promised is that you will probably get a notice that the connection is being closed. So keepalive is something you should not write your application to rely upon.

KeepAlive and POST
The HTTP 1.1 spec states that following the body of a POST, there are to be no additional characters. It also states that "certain" browsers may not follow this spec, putting a CRLF after the body of the POST. Mmm-hmm. As near as I can tell, most browsers follow a POSTed body with a CRLF. There are two ways of dealing with this: Disallow keepalive in the context of a POST request, or ignore CRLF on a line by itself. Most servers deal with this in the latter way, but there's no way to know how a server will handle it without testing.

  

 

Java应用

client用apache的commons-httpclient来执行method 。
用 method.setRequestHeader("Connection" , "Keep-Alive" or "close") 来控制是否保持连接。

 

常用的apache、resin、tomcat等都有相关的配置是否支持keep-alive。

 

tomcat中可以设置：maxKeepAliveRequests

 

 

写道

The maximum number of HTTP requests which can be pipelined until the connection is closed by the server. Setting this attribute to 1 will disable HTTP/1.0 keep-alive, as well as HTTP/1.1 keep-alive and pipelining. Setting this to -1 will allow an unlimited amount of pipelined or keep-alive HTTP requests. If not specified, this attribute is set to 100.

  

解释1

长连接指建立SOCKET连接后不管是否使用都保持连接，但安全性较差，  
短连接指建立SOCKET连接后发送后接收完数据后马上断开连接，一般银行都使用短连接

 

解释2

长连接就是指在基于tcp的通讯中，一直保持连接，不管当前是否发送或者接收数据。  
而短连接就是只有在有数据传输的时候才进行连接，客户－服务器通信/传输数据完毕就关闭连接。

 

解释3

长连接和短连接这个概念好像只有移动的CMPP协议中提到了，其他的地方没有看到过。  
通信方式  
各网元之间共有两种连接方式：长连接和短连接。所谓长连接，指在一个TCP连接上可以连续发送多个数据包，在TCP连接保持期间，如果没有数据包发送，需要双方发检测包以维持此连接。短连接是指通信双方有数据交互时，就建立一个TCP连接，数据发送完成后，则断开此TCP连接，即每次TCP连接只完成一对 CMPP消息的发送。  
现阶段，要求ISMG之间必须采用长连接的通信方式，建议SP与ISMG之间采用长连接的通信方式。

 

解释4

短连接：比如http的，只是连接、请求、关闭，过程时间较短,服务器若是一段时间内没有收到请求即可关闭连接。  
长连接：有些服务需要长时间连接到服务器，比如CMPP，一般需要自己做在线维持。

 

参考：http://blog.csdn.net/shine0181/article/details/7799754，有改动。