Socket Programming: Receive one complete message with single call

Question

I have a server in PC (written in C#), one client in PC (written in Java), and one client in android phone (same code as PC client). When I send messages from PC client to server, I receive one message with a single receive(). But when I send messages from android client to server, a single receive() ends up having more than one messages.

I'm using TCP and I know it's stream-based protocol. But why PC client always sends 1 message at a time. And how can I achieve it with android client too?

Answer 1

There is nothing whatsoever you can do that will ensure you receive an entire message in a single read() call. There is no such thing as a message in TCP. It is a byte-stream protocol. If you want messages you have to implement them yourself, with an application protocol.