I want to write an Firefox mobile addon, which needs to communicate or invoke some android program with some data. I want to know what is the best way to communicate between an Firefox addon and android process. One way I can think of is to write data on Clipboard from addon, and continuously poll for clipboard from the android process, but that is not the efficient way. So any other ideas, please.
Unfortunately, there isn't a public way to communicate between Firefox and Android. We have been discussing how to expose such a mechanism.
In the meantime, I have been able to communicate with other applications using sockets. For example, the Android Scripting Layer (http://code.google.com/p/android-scripting/) can act as a RPC server. I have been able to open a socket to the server and communicate that way.
The FoxToPhone allows to send data from the browser to android device. Could be a good example to follow.
In the meantime, the cloud to device allows to send data from the cloud to a phone.
Maybe a combination of both services could do the trick?
You could use WebSockets in your FF extension and Sockets in your android app.
Or another solution is to include a servlet (appengine) between the extension and the app.
Related
I want to develop a system in which data is being shared between DESKTOP app and Android app.
After searching I have found that I need a server in between them. But I can't figure out what the server is? How do I create it? And how will it help me connect my two platform devices?
Desktop App will receive data from android app. And manage data. It will also be used to send notifications/messages to android apps.
Android App will be used to input data and send it to desktop app. It will receive updates/notifications from desktop app.
Now how do I connect these two? I basically need a common database for real-time data sharing and notifications.
Edit: I am building the desktop app using C# and android app using Java.
Edit2: Maybe I can host the database on CPANEL or 000webhost using PHP. And then connect it with both android and C#. Is this the correct way to do it? Is it possible to connect it with C#? I know it can be connected with Android, not sure about C#.
You don't necessarily need a database. You need a common network protocol between two applications.
All network communication is done via sockets. You need a library that allows you send data over sockets. For example, here's an Android guide that is about sockets.
A socket binds to a specific port of a computer, essentially making it a "server". Much like how web servers all expose port 80, and communicate over a protocol called HTTP. Which is important because it is up to you to decide what protocol your applications communicate between each other, because the socket just sends bytes - it doesn't care what you send or how, as long as it travels to a port on a particular server. It also won't parse the data for you, that's up to your application to handle. For example, how would your desktop app know the Android device sent it a text message, or some image to be displayed, or an address to show a map?
All in all, your reason for wanting a desktop application rather than a web application is not entirely clear. Parsing only the body of HTTP payloads from different HTTP paths that are mapped to different methods (which is typically referred to as a REST API) is much simpler than building your own protocol. You might as well build a desktop GUI over top of a web server.
Making the desktop app send updates back to your mobile application is basically impossible using a bi-directional socket architecture. Your Android should not be running an open server socket continuously just for your application, mostly because battery drain, but because its network address is subject to change frequently, and you therefore additionally need a registration server from which your device would reconnect to. Such a service exists as Firebase Cloud Messaging, which is a rebranding of the GCM technology made by Google, and it can be used to send push notifications to devices, but only with small data payloads.
See here about what activities occur on an Android device for notifications. How does push notification technology work on Android?
Back to the question about databases. Suggesting one to use is too broad. And you only need one of those if you want to store and/or query or join datasets. The same computer running the desktop app can install and run whatever flavor of database you prefer, whether it's a relational database or noSQL database, entirely up to you. The only realtime databases I know of are RethinkDB and Firebase.
You could also just hold a SQLite file which is as good as a small scale database (even the SQLite documentation recommends it for low traffic web sites).
Firebase supports web interface, so you can develop html code and integrate in desktop app, something like web integration in windows form application
I am new to mobile applications. I am basically from a web development platform. I am just playing around mobile frameworks like App Framework, LungoJS, Jquery Mobile, kendo etc to gain some knowledge in this vertical.
The app I am developing is still in UI level. All I need is to fetch data from the server and populate in my app.
I need some ideas to establish server communication between the smart device and the server. My questions are
What kind of server needed for mobile applications ? A cloud or a
regular web server is enough ?
What are the ways to connect the app with the server ? ( on cross
platform mobile development )
What is the secure way to communication with the server ?
What kind of server needed for mobile applications ? A cloud or a regular web server is enough ?
Because you are creating a hybrid mobile application you can use any type of server side technology, it doesn't matter is it a classic web server technology (using Java, PHP or .NET) or some kind of cloud technology like Parse.com.
You also don't need to create anything from scratch. Best course of action would be to use some kind of micro RESTFul framework(like PHP Falcon or Java Play Framework). Read more about them here.
But, there's always a but. You can't use server side technology for classic content generation, you only need to use it to send data to your hybrid application. I will explain this later.
There's also an alternative to RESTFul services, you can create a webservice, again using Java, PHP or .NET.
What are the ways to connect the app with the server ? ( on cross platform mobile development )
You would use AJAX as a technology (in case of RESTFul), rest depends on you. You would probably do it in JSON format (or JSONP if you are doing cross-domain calls, but you don't need to think about JSONP when creating a hybrid application).
If you intend to use a web service then you would use a SOAP connection and communicate via XML format.
No matter which server side technology you use you will always use AJAX on a client side.
Now let me tell you why you should not generate your content on server side. Basically nothing can prevent you from doing that, you can generate your complete page on web server and just show it in PhoneGap app, it would still be a hybrid app. But, if you try to put this app in Apple store you will get yourself rejected.
What is the secure way to communication with the server ?
Security of course depends on server side technology. Every framework has its own kind of security handling, but all of them relay on HTTPS so you should not worry too much.
From the client side you can always encrypt JSON/XML data and send them using POST.
Examples:
If you want to use jQuery Mobile then take a look at this tutorial. It will show you basics of client - server side communication.
Since you are new to mobile application, ill try to give short answers
1) What kind of server needed for mobile applications ? A cloud or a regular web server is enough ?
A regular web server is good.
2) What are the ways to connect the app with the server ?
via web-services
3) What is the secure way to communication with the server ?
Use HTTPS webservices (SOAP, REST), HTTPS secures the transmission.
Above is a basic explanation for your quick help, I would recommend you to go through the documentation, and review some sample codes
This will really help you Sample
Please go through this link it will surely help you
http://www.androidhive.info/2012/01/android-login-and-registration-with-php-mysql-and-sqlite/
Webserver,cloud anything is good for restful service
for security purpose you can use POST parameter to send and recieve data or if you want more security then you can encrypt and decrypt data through secure algorithm
what is the best way to create a two way constant communication between a server and an android app?
When I say constant communication, I mean client asking server for data or server constantly pushing data to clients.
From what I saw, I can't use websockets since they are designer for server/browser setups. Is that right? If so, what is the alternative?
Is there free frameworks to work with this in Android?
What I am trying to do is an application that works like a chatting but for multiple people. So they all will get in one "room or channel" on their devices, and then interact with each other, in a way handdled by the server.
Thanks!
As far as I know , one possible way is using a web service where the client can connect to the server , if the web service is RESTFul there are many libraries to access it , one of them is the apache HTTPClient , for the server pushing the only way I know is C2DM for pushing data to clients.
For continuously-open data connection, you may use Sockets. But you should also consider the fact that an always-open connection will drain your battery quickly too. For more details, read this and this
You may want to look at AutobahnAndroid:
https://github.com/tavendo/AutobahnAndroid
which provides native Android/Java WebSocket client framework (plus WAMP = PubSub/RPC over WebSocket .. http://wamp.ws).
This is fully interoperable with WebSocket servers that server browser clients.
The AutobahnXX libraries (where XX = Python, JS, Android) are Open-Source (Apache 2.0). We (Tavendo) are offering a commercial virtual appliance based on Autobahn: http://autobahn.ws
Disclaimer: I am author of Autobahn and work for Tavendo.
But keeping the connection running on the background on iOS and Android devices does drain the battery, for people who have this issue, I suggest using push notifications when the app is not on the foreground.
From what I saw, I can't use websockets since they are designer for
server/browser setups. Is that right? If so, what is the alternative?
Websocket is an IETF/W3C protocol, so it is not confined to a specific client platform. You can use Android websocket to get a two-way communication between Android and server side. For Android websocket client, I recommend using AndroidAsync. It has all websocket API that you need to establish the communication link and exchange data between Android and the server.
I intend to write a multi platform smartphone app (currently only I-phone and android).
Which has to send and recieve information from a web server I intend to create.
The web server will do all the algorithms, and handles also DB connection.
My question, is how is this best accomplished, which kind of web-server technology fit best the scenario, and supports connections from various devices.
Basically, I thought about implementing a simple TCP/IP protocol, making the app (on the phone) the client, and server on the web on the other side. however, I want to deploy the application to an application server (maybe google app, JBOSS, etc.) and I don't want to be stopped by various firewalls.
does anyone has an idea ?
edit: few things are certain, the application server will be written in java, and db will be mysql.
This is a very broad question and any suggestion about which backend technology to use will depend on your language preferences, your other requirements, etc.
For starters, I'd suggest JSON over HTTP as a transport mechanism: it's easy to parse on both client and server-side, and it's directly usable in Javascript should the need arise. XML is another choice, but it can be annoying to parse.
JSON-over-HTTP (or XML) will be completely device agnostic and won't have the firewall/proxy problems you'll run into trying to do a custom-implemented TCP-based protocol.
For the backend, may folks use MySQL or Postgres for their database, and connect to it from Java, C#, Ruby, PHP, or other server-side languages. Use what you're comfortable with or what you want to learn next.
Why not write the server-side as a regular web application - in whatever technology you like (php, asp.net, java)? This way you can deploy the app on any web server and your client apps on the phones would simply establish a connection to an HTTP server. Normally, firewalls would not be a problem in such situation.
I have used this setup for my apps (both android and iphone) - connecting to a web server app written in php with postgres back-end.
Is it possible implement an Android application as a web service?
On the official site I've read:
Note: If you want to develop a server-side application, we recommend
that you implement your application as
a servlet running in a servlet engine
like Tomcat or full-blown JSEE
container like Geronimo. If you prefer
to implement a server-side application
based on our HttpService, we'll assume
that you know what you're doing and
that you don't need help in figuring
out which interceptors need to be
configured.
How can I implement this? Apache TOMCAT can run on Android?
Is it possible implement an Android
application as a web service?
You can create an Android service that will open up some server socket and will listen for HTTP requests. However, Android will eventually kill off that service, either automatically after it is unused or at user request. And, nobody will be able to access the service except on the same WiFi LAN.
IMHO, truly implementing a Web service on Android is pointless.
I think they're saying that you can write a server-side application for an Android user to access, not that you'd run Tomcat on the Android device itself.