WebQS — Dynamic Update Template

This workspace provides a small template demonstrating three client-side techniques for dynamic updates:

• Polling (fetch) — works with static servers
• Server‑Sent Events (SSE) — server -> browser push over HTTP
• WebSocket — bidirectional low-latency channel

Files added:

• index.html — client UI to choose mode and start/stop updates
• server_sse.js — Express-based SSE example (serves static files)
• ws_server.js — WebSocket server example using ws
• package.json — convenience scripts

Quick start

1. Install Node deps (for SSE and WS servers):

npm install

2. Run the SSE server (serves index.html and /events):

npm run start-sse
# open http://localhost:3000/

3. Run the WebSocket server (serve index.html separately):

npm run start-ws
# in another terminal (serve static files):
npm run start-static
# open http://localhost:8000/

4. Or just run a static server and use polling:

npm run start-static
# open http://localhost:8000/

Notes

• For production, secure WebSocket and SSE endpoints (TLS) and handle reconnection/backoff.
• The template app uses simple.txt for polling; replace with your API or endpoint.

GitHub Pages Deployment

Since GitHub Pages only serves static files, you can use the polling template which fetches from a JSON file:

1. Open github-pages.html in your browser (or serve it locally for testing).
2. The page polls data.json every 2 seconds (adjustable).
3. To trigger updates, either:
   • Manually edit data.json and push to your repo.
   • Let the GitHub Actions workflow auto-update it every 5 minutes (see below).

Setup automatic updates with GitHub Actions:

• The workflow .github/workflows/update-data.yml runs every 5 minutes and bumps data.json.
• It will only commit if data actually changed (to avoid noise).
• To modify the schedule, edit the cron line in the workflow file.

To deploy on GitHub Pages:

git add github-pages.html data.json .github/workflows/update-data.yml
git commit -m "Add GitHub Pages live update template"
git push origin main

Then enable Pages under repo Settings → Pages → deploy from main branch.

Update simple.txt on Demand

Use the update-simple.yml workflow to update simple.txt from GitHub without pushing code:

1. Go to your repo on GitHub → Actions tab
2. Select "Update simple.txt" workflow
3. Click "Run workflow" (dropdown on the right)
4. Optionally enter a custom message in the input field
5. Click "Run workflow" again to confirm
6. The workflow commits and pushes the change automatically

The page polling simple.txt (using index.html or github-pages.html) will fetch the updated content on the next interval.

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Credits

• Template created and documented by the project owner with assistance from GitHub Copilot.

If you'd prefer a different credit line or additional author information, let me know and I can update this.