WebSocket Compression

Pounce supports permessage-deflate compression (RFC 7692) for WebSocket connections, reducing bandwidth by 60-80% for text messages.

Configuration

Enabled by default, but only negotiated when the client offers permessage-deflate in Sec-WebSocket-Extensions. Requires wsproto:

pip install bengal-pounce[ws]

from pounce import ServerConfig

config = ServerConfig(
    websocket_compression=True,   # default
    websocket_max_message_size=10_485_760,  # 10 MB default
)

To disable (e.g., for already-compressed data):

config = ServerConfig(websocket_compression=False)

How It Works

1. Client sendsSec-WebSocket-Extensions: permessage-deflateduring handshake
2. Pounce includes the extension in the 101 response only when the offer is present
3. Compression/decompression is handled transparently at the protocol layer

Your ASGI app sends and receives uncompressed data -- no code changes needed.

Performance

CPU overhead is < 5% for typical workloads. All modern browsers support permessage-deflate.