persist-proxy

Persist-proxy is a two-part part port-forwarder that will maintain a connection during a network change or outage.

Installing

npm install -g persist-proxy

Usage

On client machine

persist-proxy --client 127.0.0.1:30001:123.45.6.78:30002

On server machine

persist-proxy --server 123.45.6.78:30002:127.0.0.1:30001

Why persist-proxy?

I built this program because I personally run Windows 10 as my main OS, and Ubuntu on a second machine. I use VcXsrv on Windows as a display for my X applications. When I undock my laptop, my connection shifts from ethernet to Wifi, I lose my X connections, and all my Ubuntu applications close. With persist-proxy, instead of connecting directly to the VcXsrv, the apps connect to the proxy instead. When my connection is lost, the applications momentarily freeze until the connection is reestablished. They pick up where they left off.

How does it work?

By default, applications on a client machine will connect directly to the server on another machine.

But when your network changes, or goes down, the applications freak out because they lost their connection.

With persist-proxy, the application connects through the proxy, and the proxy connects to the server.

When a network break occurs, the applications don't know about it. Persist-proxy will cache all data being sent.

Persist-proxy will attempt to reconnect. When it succeeds, all data is flushed, and the applications just think it was lag.