I hate replying to my own post, but I just want to point out that the Node.js server is running on a Prgmr.com VPS with 128 MB RAM. The server is currently using 1.5 - 2.7% CPU and holding steady at about 43 MB of RAM with 70 connected users.
Have you tried stressing the server with thousands of clients? I'm curious how Node.js holds up and how much RAM it uses per connection without (or with?) major TCP/IP tuning of buffer sizes, Nagle, etc.
I ask because you have no scale-out capability given that all the users are stored in a simple JS object (great for a demo of course). Any plans on this front?
I think this has to do with how the page handles more friends and not how it handles the actual chat. There is probably a way to fix this... I'll have to look at the code later.
Great service... Although I'm not sure that enabling guest chatting on the home page is a great idea, professionally speaking, for the following reason, which appeared 5 seconds after I loaded the page:
# Guest126627853584
05:59 PM • cock
edit: also, in Firefox 3.5.8 Mac, the tab title seems to flicker every time the client polls the server. Not sure if this is a fixable bug or just an artifact of all those HTTP requests.
I actually used AjaxIM a few years back when the facebook platform first launched (Imessenger app). The app quickly grew to 18k users in 3 weeks, then we just stop working on it for reasons I can hardly remember. Very nice and easily customizable app.
Bug report: when reading a website, I typically click the middle mouse button once in some whitespace, then gesture around to scroll slowly. The polling mechanism used here seems to dismiss the autoscroller. Firefox 3.6 / Windows XP.
