[hybi] Interface for Large Frames

["Bob Gezelter" <[e-mail]>]

The FILE methods in stdio.h include a "number of bytes" parameter. In
the context of the WebSocket protocol, the natural unit would appear to
be the frame. Once the frame has been retrieved by a user, then a
character-by-character state machine may (emphasis MAY) be appropriate,
however, the interface is best (most efficient) if entire frames can be
transferred at a time.

If programs must pull one character at a time, the efficiency will be
poor, with a large amount of overhead being consumed moving up and down
the call tree.

For an example of how a past message-based protocol deal with this
issue, Digital's NSP (see citation below) is an example. NSP handled
long messages by segmentation, passing the segments in order to user
program.

- Bob Gezelter, http://www.rlgsc.com

Digital Equipment Corporation (1984, July) “DECnet DIGITAL Network
Architecture NSP Functional Specification, Phase IV, Version 4.0.1”,
Retrieved from http://linux-decnet.sourceforge.net/docs/nsp401.txt on
March 23, 2011