Compare WebSocket, SSE, and long polling

Q: Compare WebSocket, SSE, and long polling

This question evaluates understanding of real-time web communication protocols, OSI and TCP/IP networking models, and transport-layer trade-offs among WebSocket, Server-Sent Events, TCP and QUIC.

Q: How do I approach Software Engineering Fundamentals interview questions?

Software Engineering Fundamentals questions require understanding of core concepts and practice. PracHub provides solutions with explanations to help you master software engineering fundamentals interviews.

Question

In the context of building real-time features for a web application, answer the following networking fundamentals questions:

WebSocket vs. Server-Sent Events (SSE): Compare them in terms of communication direction (uni/bidirectional), transport/protocol, browser/client support, reconnection behavior, scalability/load balancers, and typical use cases.
OSI model: Briefly describe the purpose of each OSI layer and give common examples of protocols/technologies that map to each layer. Also explain how the OSI model relates to the practical TCP/IP model.
TCP vs. QUIC: Compare TCP and QUIC in terms of where they run (kernel/user space), handshake latency, TLS integration, multiplexing and head-of-line blocking, connection migration, and when QUIC is typically preferred (e.g., HTTP/3).

Compare WebSocket, SSE, and long polling

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