I want to have multiple clients that connect to a server over LAN and access/modify the mySQL database in the server.
How would i go about doing this? Can you guys provide some resources/links that i could research on the topic
To answer your question, you should be able to connect to a mysql database by adding the jdbc driver to your project as a jar file in Android Studio.
Now for a real app that you plan to distributed to thousands of users there are Security issues, Performance issues, and Scalability issues.
Security issues:
You expose your database directly to the internet by opening its port to public access for the apps to connect. A web app adds a layer in the middle, keeping the database access inside the intranet.
You expose your data directy to the public by providing at least one public account known by everybody (I assume this would be the way to access because managing one account per user wouldn't be realistic). A Web app isolates the user account from the database accounts.
By providing access this way, as android mobile devices can be rooted, you are potentially granting anonymous access to your data.
Performance Issues:
With a web app in the middle, it is the webapp who manages the
connections to the database. This enables sharing connections
amongst different users vs. one dedicated connection per user would
have if the different devices estable separate connections.
For the same reason, you can't take advantage of connection pooling,
which saves the overhed of establishing a connection to the database
for each incoming request.
Scalability issues:
As connections are not shared the number of concurrent users will be bound to the number of connections you can open at the same time to the database.
EDIT 1
I am adding an alternative I thought of which involves using a web application but it is not implemented using a webserver. It is a java NIO framework that runs on its own. The limitations of this solution is you need shell access to the server and java, which is not common in traditional hostings. Checkout Netty.
There are 2 ways how to do perform your task. You can either add the JDBC driver in android studio, or better implement a REST API that connects to your database, and all the android clients can send HTTP requests to the server and the server will add the information for you. Here you can implement the create, update, delete methods. For HTTP requests you can use Retrofit or Volley libraries.
If you want to use JDBC, check out the answer here How to Mysql JDBC Driver to android studio
But the best and most correct solution for this type of problems would be a REST Service
In the long run, you really need a "client" application between "users" and the database. It is usually done via a webserver, plus PHP/Java/VB/.... Yes, it requires you learn yet another language, but that is not something to avoid in a serious application.
The client can help (and hurt, if done adequately) with security. The client can insulate users from database changes, which will eventually happen. The client should 'abstract' the interface to the DB so that the users do not have to be SQL-savvy. Etc.
You have might installed WAMP Server / XAMPP Server for mySQL Database
Click on WAMP icon and select Apache, Open "httpd.conf" and find tag starts with
<Directory "c:/wamp/www">
...
</Directory>
and update the code as below
<Directory "c:/wamp/www">
AllowOverride All
Require all granted
Order Deny,Allow
Deny from none
Allow from all
Allow from 127.0.0.1
Allow from ::1
Allow from localhost
</Directory>
Now Create REST APIs in your local server as you might use PHP or whatever,
and connect android app with apis with assigned IP Address to your computer in LAN.
It is not one single answer, but a group of answers. Firstly what you need is the concept of data forwarding through introspected tunnels over the network. At the end of the day, your database is always listening on certain port, that is local to your machine, meaning only you can access and modify the contents of the database. For example if you access PHPMyAdmin, you can go the MySQL address on your local machine.
What you need to do is make that access public to the internet, what you need is to broadcast your existence(internet protocol address) to the web. Thus making a public hub, in short, Local-tunnels allows you to easily share a web service on your local development machine without messing with DNS and firewall settings.
By tunneling your local machine to web , anyone with the assigned IP address can access your machine(database) over any connection,not just LAN or WI-FI. There are many options to choose from, There is ngrok,which exposes a local server behind a NAT or firewall to the internet.
Features are,
Don’t constantly redeploy your in-progress work to get feedback from clients. ngrok creates a secure public URL (https://yourapp.ngrok.io) to a local webserver on your machine. Iterate quickly with immediate feedback without interrupting flow.
Test mobile apps against a development backend running on your machine. Point ngrok at your local dev server and then configure your app to use the ngrok URL. It won't change, even when you change networks.
Building web hook integrations can be a pain: it requires a public address and a lot of set up to trigger hooks. Save yourself time and frustration with ngrok. Inspect the HTTP traffic flowing over your tunnel. Then, replay web-hook requests with one click to iterate quickly while staying in context.
Own your data. Host personal cloud services on your own private network. Run web-mail, file syncing, and more securely on your hardware with full end-to-end encryption.
Its really great, however there is a side note, because this procedure opens up your local machine and renders it IP accessible on the internet, many different security challenges arise, so it is only recommended for testing purposes with none sensitive data.
Hope this helps:)
Related
I made an application which connects to SQL Server and write/read data and it works only on my IP address. I could can allow every IP address, is this risky or is there no way someone can see my database log in data?
It is 100% dangerous.
According to tags, I guess you are connecting to a SQL Server via an Android app. If that's the case, there are TONS of ways to find the credentials. For example, one can intercept the requests, decompile your code, or...
Even if you hadn't an Android app published, your server will be under heavy brute-force attacks on the Internet.
At least, you need a webserver to handle authentication, on your web server and then the web server connects to your database in a very limited and safe way.
I have made a rest api with database for an Android app. I have made this in php in my localhost. Now I want to access it from my Android app. How can I access it through URL in internet. I am totally new to this, plz give me in details.
This question, brings back so much memories. You need to tunnel your local host packets to the public internet. There are many tools, but the main one i use is NgRok.
Details
Test mobile apps against a development backend running on your machine. Point ngrok at your local dev server and then configure your app to use the ngrok URL. It won't change, even when you change networks.
Don’t constantly redeploy your in-progress work to get feedback from clients. ngrok creates a secure public URL (https://yourapp.ngrok.io) to a local webserver on your machine. Iterate quickly with immediate feedback without interrupting flow.
A note of interest. if your app currently as a https signed certificate you might need to add some extra classes, if not you good to go. Read up here.
Guide lines for local public hosting.
Create your webserver(php,node.js etc) , start it, and verify on localhost:port
Start ngrok, its simple visit the website, the instructions are there
Ngrok will give you a url, that url is public anyone can access it, while your computer is powered on
On android side, use a http client, such as Volley, Http2 or Retrofit.
You have a few reading up to do
So far I think it's a security thing that you're not allowed reading/writing to an Android SQLite database outside of the containing app's process.
But are there advanced techniques or tools that can be used to achieve this?
For instance, I want to make a web interface with a textbox where the Android app would connect to and then I can run SQL queries via said interface to read the database or to insert records into it.
I'm writing this question because I'm really stumped. Usually my search gives opposite results which is accessing a remote database with an Android app.
You will have to develop an API backend. The mobile app ( client ) will communicate with the API and do the desired operation based on the response.
It's not possible to directly connect to the app sqlite database. You can send web request and get the info you want, handle it in your app to store it in the sqlite database
You will have to add security measures, so everyone can't access your API.
So far I think it's a security thing that you're not allowed reading/writing to an Android SQLite database.
Apps can read and write to their SQLite databases. Otherwise, the database would not exist.
I want to make a web interface with a textbox where the Android app would connect to and then I can run SQL queries via said interface to read the database or to insert records into it.
You are certainly welcome to embed a Web server into your app. For example, Stetho does this to integrate with Chrome Dev Tools, offering your SQL interface among other things.
However:
Doing this for anything other than a debug build of your app is very risky, as securing a Web server is difficult enough when it is on a traditional server environment, let alone an Android device
The Web server is only accessible by whatever can reach the device via an IP address, which means it's usually only useful on WiFi (where it could be reached by other devices on the same WiFi LAN segment)
I'm about to start development on app which is designed to communicate information to a server (hosting a web interface and storing the data) inside an intranet. I've had a large deal of programming experience but I'm wholly new to mobile app development, so the whole thing is a learning experience for me.
I guess I have more than one question:
If the intranet offers wifi, will it be easy enough to see a server existing on the same intranet?
Assuming the phone and the server are part of the same intranet network, what are the general mechanisms available to me to have them communicate?
If the intranet is not available through wifi, what's my best option? (maybe just force wifi by setting up a router?)
P.S. I'm a final year undergrad developing an app+web-app for a real organisation, be gentle with me :)
1) If the intranet offers WiFi, you're good to go, any http request will be routed to the correct local boxes.
2) HTTP requests, treat it like you'd treat an external site.
3) If you don't have WiFi, consider setting up a VPN and then in your app guide the user through setting up the VPN. Or, set up a external server (outside the intranet) that acts as a proxy to the intranet server, requiring some sort of auth before it forwards requests for you. Essentially acting as a gate keeper.
I have an wifi named with abc.where in local intranet server will use the abc wifi to access db server and my mobile app will also use the same abc wifi to access intranet server.
Use apis(webservice) of your intranet server on mobile with ip address of intranet server.
I am in need of some help here.
I want to make an Android application that eventually syncs to a web server in order to get information (i.e. user can write a note through the website, and it automatically syncs to the phone).
I am aware that I would need some web servers and hosting, and don't know too much about that so I will look into it later.
MY question, however, is how I can simulate this over a local network?
As in, if I create a basic webpage that has a two text boxes (one for name, one for content) and a 'submit' button, if I run it via localhost WHAT methods can I use to get this information to sync to my handset?
If anyone could be kind enough to give me a laymens terms breakdown it would be seriously appreciated, I feel so lost!
You have some alternatives to achieve what you want, here is a traditional one:
Start with installing XAMPP and run a local server
Write your web pages, store the data in mysql
Write PHP code to extract the data from mysql
Use Android HttpClient to call your PHP
There are other alternatives:
Use the same method but instead of PHP write HTML5 and you have a mobile WEB application
Check out the GCM Demo Application
Check out Google App Engine
Check out Amazon Web Services
There are others
Enjoy :)
Yaron
When you use localhost (meaning you install a server package such as Apache / IIS / XAMPP / WAMP in your computer), your machine becomes a server. So, you can access the localhost from any device which is in the same network.
Say you have a computer connected to a WiFi router. If you setup the server i.e. the localhost in that computer and a laptop and a mobile phone is connected to the same WiFi router, the phone and laptop will be able to get service from the computer.
To access data stored in the MySQL server from the other devices (e.g. the phone), you have to write proper service. Else, you can write a mobile web app in the server that accesses the MySQL data and just access it from the device.