I'm looking for any reference projects or key learning from anyone who has implemented XMPP/Jabber to successfully send notifications to iOS devices (iPhone/iPad).
I'm considering using an XMPP server (OpenFire specifically) to provide a single cross platform mobile push system. C2DM for android has a number of annoying requirements like users having Google accounts. This is what got me started looking at XMPP. I also need to support pushing to iOS devices. I know all about APNS, however I'm wondering if I could use the XMPP server for both Android and iOS platforms (and possibly more like Black Berry).
The things I feel might come up are:
iOS killing any persistent connection to the XMPP server. Will it
auto reconnect?
iOS preventing access to certain ports or protocols.
Anything to be aware of here?
Other gotchas one would only discover
by trying this?
Here you can find the answer to your first question:
when your app goes in background you (the client) close the connection
with the xmpp server. When your app comes back into foreground you
reopen the connection. If your server need to send messages to your
client, it must use push notifications. When the client receives the
notification can (it depends on the user action) go back to
foreground.
(source: iOS Backgrounding & XMPPFramework)
Related
I have a client - server IOS application. In addition, I need to write an application for it on WatchOS. So I have 2 questions:
When I send a command from Apple Watch, do I need to connect to the server from the watch or transfer information to the IOS application and connect to the server from the phone?
If I have to connect to the server with an IOS application, then how can I connect in background mode?
As an example, you can take any messenger, for example Telegram
If I reply to a message with AppleWatch, how is the message being sent to the server (Via iPhone or directly via AppleWatch)
For connection to the server, I use the "Starscream" framework
Maybe I don't understand something, but Apple made it impossible to establish a connection in background mode
I would be grateful if you tell me or provide examples and articles, so that I could understand what to do.
Apple Watch apps can connect directly to servers using URLSession ... no need to go via the phone.
Here is an example on using URLSession in Combine, which is the "latest and greatest" way of doing things.
Otherwise this example shows using it in a more conventional way, with the bonus of SwiftUI.
Otherwise
I want to develop an application which sends a Message from iPhone to other iPhone over the internet, I want to receive the Message from other iPhone even if my iPhone is running in the background.
I have seen the WiTap application, but socket will get disconnect when application is closed or if there is screen lock.
So is that possible to develop the application so that I can receive the message even if my app running in the background forever?
From my little Knowledge, You can't do it through WiFi.
When a screen lock happened, device will automatically OFF the wifi connection for increasing battery life.Thats why socket connection getting disconnected.
In iOS, apps can’t do a lot in the background. Apps are only allowed to do limited set of activities so battery life is conserved.
But what if something interesting happens and you wish to let the user know about this, even if they’re not currently using your app.
For example, maybe the user received a new chat. Since the app isn’t currently running, it cannot check for these events.
Luckily, Apple has provided a solution to this. Instead of your app continuously checking for events or doing work in the background, you can write a server-side component to do this instead.
You can do it using Apple Push Notification Service.
It uses push technology through a constantly open IP connection to forward notifications from the servers of third party applications to the Apple devices; such notifications may include badges, sounds or custom text alerts. In iOS 5, Notification Center enhanced the user experience of push and local notifications.
More details are here
Note: details and screen shots are taken from raywenderlich website/blog.
I am currently writing an iPhone application that sends and receives JSON data from a remote server to essentially display realtime information. Me and my partner started the project using Google App Engine (Python) for the server-side implementation mostly because it was easy to pick up and seemed suitable for our needs at the time. However, we're only just now starting to see the downsides of the framework for realtime iPhone apps - APNS is not at all supported, and neither is the GAE Channels API. So our only option for displaying the realtime server data on our app is to continuously poll the server, which certainly seems like horrible design.
We'll have to port our server-side code to a new framework. My question is, which one do we use? From numerous searches, I still have yet to find a satisfactory answer.
I should mention that I don't necessarily want the server to send push notifications. I just want to be able to push data to clients in real-time, and then manipulate that data on the iPhone client-side code. We're fine with setting up the framework on a local server if we have to.
Since you don't want to be pull data in background (lett alone if it is even possible)will have to use APNS.
But why switch away from google app angine, you could use an APNS provider like Urban Airship wich provide there on API to connect with.
You'r not even the fist to run into this problem: Apple Push Notifications on Google Appengine
Probably the easiest realtime framework you can use for sending data to iOS clients in real-time is PubNub (http://www.pubnub.com). It's reasonably priced, and it scales to anything you can throw at it. In my experience, it has no problem delivering a message to an end client in under .25 milliseconds (regardless of the number of clients it's being sent to).
Their latest version also supports APNS functionality for when you app isn't in the foreground.
https://github.com/pubnub/objective-c/blob/master/iOS/README_FOR_APNS.md
If you want to create your own APNS server (since you are running on App Engine anyway), there are examples of how to do that using App Engine's new Socket API. I've written a demo python AppEngine application that people might find helpful in this regard.
https://github.com/GarettRogers/appengine-apns-gcm
It is very usual that an iPhone send data to internet server.
But what if a server wants to connect to an iphone?
I have wondered long about it.
For example, like many web-based apps like Facebook, what is the mechanism/algorithm behind, so that when, for example, any updates on your wall can be noticed to you in a real-time manner?
Hope some can understand my query.
Have a look at this Wikpedia article about Push Technology.
Push technology, or server push, describes a style of Internet-based communication where the request for a given transaction is initiated by the publisher or central server. It is contrasted with pull technology, where the request for the transmission of information is initiated by the receiver or client.
Your iPhone could intermittently 'poll' the server, looking for any data it needs to be sent. Say every 5 seconds, or after some trigger - it would call the server and ask for new data.
You could use push technology: i.e. have a continuous http connection open to your server that allows data to be sent both ways. LightStreamer is a product that does this that i've used before. This is the most elegant and efficient solution for streaming data.
You could use iOS push notifications. The server can trigger a push message and target it at a specific device and send your iPhone something...
Push notifications are the way to go with iOS. I have used push notifications through the cloud-based Cocoafish backend server. This is a great solution as you can 'subscribe' mobile devices to a push notifications channel - for example, a channel for friends requests or a channel for chat etc. Its real easy to set up with all the correct certification. There's good set up instructions in the documentation on their site too.
Background
There are a lot of App Store released iPhone apps that require an IP based server on the desktop so that the iPhone can connect to the desktop as a client. For example, there are many programs that emulate a keyboard, touchpad, or Apple remote on the iPhone so that a desktop computer can be controlled over wifi. However, many of these applications get around writing their own server by requiring the user to install some VNC server variant.
Question
What is the best way to implement a secure (encrypted) IP server on a desktop (Mac and Windows platforms) that allows for simple two way message passing between itself and an iPhone client on a wifi network?
Sample Use Case
An event on the desktop causes the desktop to push a small image or text to the iPhone. An event on the iPhone causes a short text message to be pushed to the desktop. Any single event can happen at any time (doesn't appear synchronized to the user).
1st Follow-Up Question
Would this type of project be best handled using something like XML or JSON over HTTP? Or is there a better protocol, like BEEP or Bonjour(XMPP)?
What is the best way to implement a secure (encrypted) IP server on a desktop (Mac and Windows platforms) that allows for simple two way message passing between itself and an iPhone client on a wifi network?
Not sure if there is a "best" way, but much code is already available to do xyz-over-HTTPS (TLS/SSL). In that case, the "xyz" can be any web-based message exchange protocol, such as XML, JSON, etc. via REST or SOAP, etc.
If you want to be able to push events to a non-jailbroken iPhone you can't do it other than via Apple's Push Server which causes a notification to the client program if it is running or otherwise displays an alert of some kind to the user.
Typical architecture has those notifications handled by the client program as an indication it should go and get some data from the server - Apple insist we do not regard the notifications as trusted delivery.
I suggest a read of this article on using Bonjour and local networking, whilst it's iPhone to iPhone it should apply to desktop OS/X also.