DevTools fails to load through proxies that don't support SSE
- Dominant language
- Dart
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Description
I tried to launch DevTools in a cloud editor that doesn't support SSE (its connections will just hang indefinitely) and it failed to load (just leaving a white screen after printing the version number to the console).
The network tab looks like this:

I can't easily confirm, but I think it will be hanging on this `await` here:
https://github.com/flutter/devtools/blob/43b2f5ea102fede6aa4776510858775acc31c6df/packages/devtools_app/lib/main.dart#L28
That `init()` call tries to use storage which will be a `ServerConnectionStorage` because `DevToolsServerConnection.connect` does not return null here:
https://github.com/flutter/devtools/blob/f38f4acde909be516b3de172405d48b6b484ea70/packages/devtools_app/lib/src/config_specific/framework_initialize/_framework_initialize_web.dart#L18-L23
It doesn't return null, because in `connect()` the call to `api/ping` works fine (it's not SSE), which then unconditionally creates an `SseClient`:
https://github.com/flutter/devtools/blob/86102bdec15a0a5fb3fb70ab98e8ff4e5e50141c/packages/devtools_app/lib/src/server_api_client.dart#L28
_If_ we want to support this, I think there are two options:
1. Support WebSockets instead of SSE for this API (DWDS already has some abstractions over SSE+WebSockets that could probably be taken)
2. Change this code to detect that SSE is not responsive and return `null` (this would effectively disable the server though, which may affect some functionality)
@devoncarew @jacob314 I don't know if this is currently worth pursuing, but thought it was worth capturing the issue somewhere perhaps to come back to.
Contributor guide
Research direction
Start in packages/devtools_app/lib/main.dart at the await init() call, then trace DevToolsServerConnection.connect in _framework_initialize_web.dart and the SseClient creation in server_api_client.dart. Determine how a proxy without responsive SSE should be handled, and verify that DevTools no longer hangs on a white screen in that environment.
Written by the indexing model from the issue text.
Assessment
- Tech stack
- dart
- Domain
- devtools
- Issue type
- Bug
- Difficulty
- 4/5
- Estimated time
- 3-5 days
- Activity status
- Stale
- Clarity
- Mostly clear
- Newbie friendliness
- 32/100