I’ve been playing around with Socket.IO and AngularJS. To make things easier I created this service which can be used for transferring data between the client (which could be a web page) and a NodeJS server.

The app is served by NodeJS so the Socket.IO server is listening on same location.

'use strict';

angular
.module('APP')
.factory('$WS', function($rootScope) {
    var self = this;

    self.ready = false;

    self.socket = io.connect(location.host, {
        'connect timeout':       100,
        'reconnection delay':    100
    });

    self.socket.on('init', function() {
        console.log('init');
    });

    self.socket.on('disconnect', function() {
        console.log('socket disconnected');
    });

    self.socket.on('connect', function() {
        console.log('socket connected');
    });

    return {
        ready: function(callback) {
            if(self.ready) {
                callback();
                return;
            }

            self.socket.on('connect', function() {
                $rootScope.$apply(function() {
                    self.ready = true;
                    callback.apply(self.socket);
                });
            });
        },
        on: function(eventName, callback) {
            self.socket.on(eventName, function() {
                var args = arguments;

                $rootScope.$apply(function() {
                    callback.apply(self.socket, args);
                });
            });
        },
        emit: function(eventName, data, callback) {
            self.socket.emit(eventName, data, function() {
                var args = arguments;
                $rootScope.$apply(function() {
                    if(callback) {
                        callback.apply(self.socket, args);
                    }
                });
            });
        }
    };
});

Usage:

angular
.module('APP')
.controller('TestController', ['$scope', '$WS', function($scope, $WS) {

    $scope.messages = [];

    // Connect websocket
    $WS.ready(function() {
    
        // Receive message
        $WS.on('chat/message', function(data) {
            
            // Validate input data
            if(data.message_id) {
                console.log(data);
                $scope.messages.push(data);
            }
        });
    });

    // You can add another ready state listener for the same connection
    // Let's consider we have a method which sends messages
    $scope.send_message = function(msg_title, msg_value) {
        
        $WS.ready(function() {
            // Emit message
            $WS.emit('chat/message', {
                title:    msg_title,
                message:  mgs_value
            });
        });
    };

}]);

This is just basic usage.  Will be back with NodeJS & Socket.IO server example.