Quick question about HttpClient

[FlanGrande]

Simply put: should we favour Godot's HTTPClient over std/httpclient's HttpClient?
I'm not sure which one should be better to go with.

At the moment I'm thinking of Nim's standard library, but is there any reason to use Godot's instead? (Better implementation, signals or whatever). I've never done networking on Godot.

[panno8M]

There is not much difference, so you can use whichever API you prefer.
If compatibility is important, use Godot; if speed and ease of writing are important, use Nim.
I would use std/httpclient.

I don't know about HttpClient-specific issues, but Godot's and Nim's implementations each have something in common.

Performance is basically higher with the Nim implementation.
This is due to the overhead of calling the Godot function. It includes marshalling by both Godot and gdext-nim, reference counting callbacks, and notifications.
If it is not a process that is called frequently (every frame or many times in one frame), you don't need to worry about it.

If you intend to target a web platform, you should be aware that some functions in the standard library will no longer work.
So far the only one I have been able to find is std/random. This is completely dead for web platform.

[FlanGrande]

Hi there,

Thanks for the reply! I've been on holiday so I couldn't reply until now.
Are you saying that if my game targets browsers, I'd be better off using Godot's implementation?

It's early on this project so I have no idea yet how important compatibility with Godot will be. I feel like the implementation will be similar enough that if I need to refactor to use the other it wouldn't be too much hassle anyway, what do you think?

[panno8M]

Hello, nice to talk to you again.

Are you saying that if my game targets browsers, I'd be better off using Godot's implementation?

Yes. I would use Godot HTTPClient if the game targeting browsers as well.

I have created a flowchart to help you decide which one to use:

if it targets browsers?
  if stdlib works well on browsers and the part requires performance?
    stdlib
  else:
    godot
else:
  if the part requires performance?
    stdlib
  else:
    godot

The reason you should be wary of the web platform is that it is because there is no official support by Nim. Therefore, if you are going to use the Nim library on a web platform, you should test the library ahead of time to see if it works on the web.

[FlanGrande]

Hi there, thanks for the reply!
That flow chart is very helpful, I will make sure to follow your advice. Thanks for your time I really appreciate it.

[FlanGrande]

I'm not sure if this it's worth mentioning, but in case someone lands here. In order to make https calls, SSL certification is needed. From Nim docs:
https://nim-lang.org/docs/net.html#newContext%2Cstring%2Cstring%2Cstring%2Cstring

In order to use the SSL procedures defined in this module, you will need to compile your application with the -d:ssl flag.

You can simply use gdext build -d:ssl as you would with the nim command!

[panno8M]

You can also write --define:ssl in config.nims.