# Serving from localhost / another process

**URL:** <https://devforum.zoom.us/t/serving-from-localhost-another-process/88323>\
**Category:** Zoom Apps\
**Created:** [May 12, 2023, 2:00pm UTC](https://devforum.zoom.us/t/serving-from-localhost-another-process/88323 "2023-05-12T14:00:05Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![sam2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9de0a6/32.png) [@sam2](https://devforum.zoom.us/u/sam2)\
**Post date:** [May 12, 2023, 2:00pm UTC](https://devforum.zoom.us/t/serving-from-localhost-another-process/88323/1 "2023-05-12T14:00:05Z")

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We’re unsure of the guidelines here.

I know that here it says we can communicate via. e.g. websockets:

[https://developers.zoom.us/docs/zoom-apps/guides/layers-manipulating-ui/#using-controller-mode-with-all-modes](https://developers.zoom.us/docs/zoom-apps/guides/layers-manipulating-ui/#using-controller-mode-with-all-modes)

But we also know localhost is explicitly not allowed elsewhere.

We’d like to know if we can (with adequate review) serve files over websockets from a local process of some kind. The Zoom App would be paired with another running tool and would render from that tool. The mechanism would be http, WebRTC, or websockets on a given port.

The logic is simply that keeping media on the same PC is more privacy-preserving and more efficient than going via. a server.

We’d like to check this is permissible now, rather than invest resources before finding out.

Thanks in advance for the clarification.

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**Author:** ![henry2](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/devforum.zoom.us/henry2/32/20443_2.png) [@henry2](https://devforum.zoom.us/u/henry2)\
**Post date:** [May 16, 2023, 2:59pm UTC](https://devforum.zoom.us/t/serving-from-localhost-another-process/88323/2 "2023-05-16T14:59:15Z")

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What are you trying to do with websockets?

An example of when I use websockets in my app is to broadcast messages/data between the various instances - which means that the web-socket server needs to be accessible to all instances. If these instances are on the internet that means that your websocket service need to be visible to those instances.

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**Author:** ![sam2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9de0a6/32.png) [@sam2](https://devforum.zoom.us/u/sam2)\
**Post date:** [May 16, 2023, 3:04pm UTC](https://devforum.zoom.us/t/serving-from-localhost-another-process/88323/3 "2023-05-16T15:04:57Z")

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Our tool (DemoTime) creates magic highlights after every sales demo.

We want to make these highlights available immediately, so you can end the meeting by recapping organized sped-up clips from earlier in the demo/meeting.

To do this we need to record and process video (with another program) - and serve this video back.

It’s possible with the cloud but super expensive - making a free offering impossible. We’d need to stream everything - discard most of it - and somehow get it back in a low latency, and low resource-usage way.

Cost aside - to go via. the cloud to access local media files we’d need to stream the input and stream the processed output back again simultaneously while the meeting is already running - so tripling the bandwidth needs of the meeting.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![henry2](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/devforum.zoom.us/henry2/32/20443_2.png) [@henry2](https://devforum.zoom.us/u/henry2)\
**Post date:** [May 16, 2023, 7:28pm UTC](https://devforum.zoom.us/t/serving-from-localhost-another-process/88323/4 "2023-05-16T19:28:22Z")

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You have a more complicated scenario than mine. I assume you have another app/process running on the local machine, perhaps you could save the video to a file locally as it may be possible to read files using JS in a browser? Just a suggestion, no idea it that gets you what you want.