# Connecting via API
Before continuing, select the `modality`, `mode` of your `Stream` and whether you're using `WebRTC` or `WebSocket`s.
### Sample Code
### Message Format
Over both WebRTC and WebSocket, the server can send messages of the following format:
```json
{
"type": `send_input` | `fetch_output` | `stopword` | `error` | `warning` | `log`,
"data": string | object
}
```
- `send_input`: Send any input data for the handler to the server. See [`Additional Inputs`](#additional-inputs) for more details.
- `fetch_output`: An instance of [`AdditionalOutputs`](#additional-outputs) is sent to the server.
- `stopword`: The stopword has been detected. See [`ReplyOnStopWords`](../audio/#reply-on-stopwords) for more details.
- `error`: An error occurred. The `data` will be a string containing the error message.
- `warning`: A warning occurred. The `data` will be a string containing the warning message.
- `log`: A log message. The `data` will be a string containing the log message.
The `ReplyOnPause` handler can also send the following `log` messages.
```json
{
"type": "log",
"data": "pause_detected" | "response_starting"
}
```
!!! tip
When using WebRTC, the messages will be encoded as strings, so parse as JSON before using.
### Additional Inputs
When the `send_input` message is received, update the inputs of your handler however you like by using the `set_input` method of the `Stream` object.
A common pattern is to use a `POST` request to send the updated data. The first argument to the `set_input` method is the `webrtc_id` of the handler.
```python
from pydantic import BaseModel, Field
class InputData(BaseModel):
webrtc_id: str
conf_threshold: float = Field(ge=0, le=1)
@app.post("/input_hook")
async def _(data: InputData):
stream.set_input(data.webrtc_id, data.conf_threshold)
```
The updated data will be passed to the handler on the **next** call.
### Additional Outputs
The `fetch_output` message is sent to the client whenever an instance of [`AdditionalOutputs`](../streams/#additional-outputs) is available. You can access the latest output data by calling the `fetch_latest_output` method of the `Stream` object.
However, rather than fetching each output manually, a common pattern is to fetch the entire stream of output data by calling the `output_stream` method.
Here is an example:
```python
from fastapi.responses import StreamingResponse
@app.get("/updates")
async def stream_updates(webrtc_id: str):
async def output_stream():
async for output in stream.output_stream(webrtc_id):
# Output is the AdditionalOutputs instance
# Be sure to serialize it however you would like
yield f"data: {output.args[0]}\n\n"
return StreamingResponse(
output_stream(),
media_type="text/event-stream"
)
```
### Handling Errors
When connecting via `WebRTC`, the server will respond to the `/webrtc/offer` route with a JSON response. If there are too many connections, the server will respond with a 429 error.
```json
{
"status": "failed",
"meta": {
"error": "concurrency_limit_reached",
"limit": 10
}
```
Over `WebSocket`, the server will send the same message before closing the connection.