Difference between http.request({keepAlive}) and http.request({agent: {keepAlive}})

[vvo]

Hi,

I have been playing with keepAlive in io.js and node 0.12. Something strange is that the documentation states that one could use:

http.request({keepAlive: true})

But this line did not trigger keepAlive on my requests. I could not find a code path using it in the nodejs codebase.

Is this a mistake or am I missing something? Maybe agent keepAlive and request keepAlive are not the same thing, then maybe we could clarify things.

Using:

http.request({agent: http.Agent({keepAlive: true})})

works, as shown in the tests https://github.com/joyent/node/blob/857975d5e7e0d7bf38577db0478d9e5ede79922e/test/simple/test-http-agent-keepalive.js
https://github.com/iojs/io.js/blob/v1.x/test/parallel/test-http-agent-keepalive.js

[Fishrock123]

keepAlive and keepAliveMsecs are wrongly indented in the docs. They should be indented one more level, since they are for http.Agent.

[Fishrock123]

Fixed in 69bc138, thanks for reporting! :)

[vvo]

awwww now it makes sense.. the nodejs docs as the same issue.

[vvo]

@Fishrock123 You sure this is the right fix?

Reading this is confusing, it explains that agent: can take value keepAliveMsecs which is not true.

I think we should just remove keepAlive and keepAliveMsecs from here and link to the Agent constructor where they are explained.