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Asked: 2026-05-17T01:45:13+00:00

I am looking for open-source linux-based Comet server. Currently, looking at Hookbox – but

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I am looking for open-source linux-based Comet server.
Currently, looking at Hookbox – but as it’s in Python, I am concerned about performance.
Does Python instead of C++ have big impact on performance here?

Developer estimated it’s performance to about 100 of requests per second when having 100 channels… Not really fast 😐

Could you suggest the most actively supported/used comet server which is binary(=faster), easy to integrate and (kinda) lighweight? Also, Java/.NET is no-go here.

Our goal is some 10k+ connections per server, about 2000-5000 messages per second across 10-20k channels.

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  1. Editorial Team

    What about Go?

    Here’s a possible – if slightly “alternative” approach – as

    • you seem to be very focused on performance,
    • you want something Linux based,
    • and don’t want a JVM language but probably something more bare-bone,
    • and I assume it’s for a personal project or something where you are free to pick technologies.

    Have a look at Google’s Go language, and in particular their webserver example, which presents pretty good performance benchmarks.

    They also have a web-application development code-lab for training.

    Some interesting discussions on web-frameworks for Go and Comet-support. You’ll also find another http-server implementation.

    Like I said, maybe not exactly a ready-made solution, but I thought you might be interested in exploring that.

    Really, no Python?

    If you were to reconsider Python, you could have a look at Tornado.

    Really, no (J)VM-Languages?

    If you were to reconsider your position on VM languages, I’d also recommend you have a look at Scala and the Lift web framework, which has great support for comet with a very expressive syntax and good performance (that’s used by Foursquare, Twitter, Novell Pulse, so you can bet on its performance)

    Fine, let’s be conventional…

    Last but certainly not least, have a look at LightHttpd, which is developed in C and should satisfy all your needs. Look at the LightHttpd page on Wikipedia for a brief.

    (but really, have a look at the other ones, especially at Go and Scala/Lift, even if only for educational purposes)

    If you need more…

    Actually, I just noticed someone seems to have already done the legwork. So if you want more details or to do some more research, have a look at the Comet Servers for Single Dealer Platforms article and Comet Daily‘s Comet Maturity Guide.

    EDIT: I just realized I din’t answer the first part of your question. yes, using Python might have an overhead over a C/C++ implementation, especially if you don’t use pre-compiled Python files. And considering what you want (in terms of numbers of connections per seconds and concurrent connections), I think you more importantly need something that can scale than something that would necessarily be “just” fast in terms of execution speed.

    The Comet for highly-scalable applications presentation may also interest you.

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