Enabling Real-time RIA with iPush Server
August 30, 2006, ICE Technology Corp.
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Contents
- In the age of RIA
- How iPush enables real-time RIA
- Easy development of real-time RIA with iPush
- Deploy real-time RIA with iPush
- Further study & demo
In the age of RIA
RIA, Rich Internet Application, is getting more attentions for service development on the web.
We will not go deep into the explanation of what RIA is, or what benefits RIA brings. Instead, we will directly give you the information about how developers can take advantages of iPush Server to enable their RIAs with real-time data distribution capability.
Note: For learning more about RIA, please visit Wikipedia at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rich_Internet_Application
The coverage of RIAs here includes applications in Java Applet (.class), ActiveX Control (.ocx), and Flash movie (.swf). All of them can be run in the web browsers with respective run-time environments.
In the age of RIA, users expect the interface of application can bring enhanced experiences: more friendly, more fun, and more timesaving.
In the age of RIA, an on-line service may need to be accessed by variety of devices or applications which are developed with different programming languages.
RIA achieves timesaving by preventing web pages from reloading. But sometimes it is not good enough. In the cases of RIAs have data continually updated, the way of request-and-response (client-pulling) for retrieving newest data is still making lots of inefficiency.
Adopting server-push technique is a wise decision when your RIA needs to receive or send data in real-time fashion. The technique will present lower operation cost in bandwidth, server capacity, and higher service level of data distribution.
How iPush enables real-time RIA
iPush Server implements the server-push technique and designed for serving massive concurrent connections.
Figure 1. iPush provides variety of client libraries for application development
The native server-push feature of iPush Server allows client application to asynchronously receive streaming date on subscription. Under the same real-time service, client applications, may be developed with different iPush APIs, can receive the subscribed data at the same time.
Every growing on-line service needs a scale-up plan, and the plan should cover both server side and client side.
For client side scaling up, it is quite common to provide both web application and Windows application for accessing the same on-line service. Moreover, porting applications to support different devices, like from desktop to PDA or mobile phone, would be a good strategy for acquiring new users and providing better service for existing customers.
For server side scaling up, consider expanding service capacity painlessly and nonstop, the configure-to-add feature for adding a new host to the serving cluster will be important for the service operator.
iPush Server presents a good scaling up solution for client side and server side respectively. Variety of iPush client APIs help the development of various real-time rich applications that run on different environments. Feature of native message up-linking between servers and clusters makes the expansion of service capacity seamless and painless.
Easy development of real-time RIA with iPush
When you got iPush Server installed and run, you can choose any iPush client library to develop real-time RIA. For the time being (June 2006), ICE Technology provides:
- ActiveX Control for Windows 32
- ActiveX Control for Windows CE
- Java Class for Java Applet or Java Application
- J2ME Class for Java Midlet (proven on Nokia N70 and SonyEricsson Z800i Java Phone)
- Flash Component Library for ActionScript 2
- .NET Framework Library
- .NET Compact Framework Library
- Windows DLL
- Linux C Library
- uClinux 2.6 C Library
Note: An on-line function list of iPush V2 client APIs is available at http://www.icetechnology.com/developer/functions.shtml
By straightforward function calls, the development of iPush application for real-time data sending and receiving can be extraordinarily simple.
Figure 2. illustrates the real-time data distribution flow with iPush Publish/Subscribe messaging model. Table 1. lists the programming skeleton of data sending and receiving with relative function calls.
Figure 2. The real-time data distribution flow with iPush Publish/Subscribe messaging model
Data sender programming skeleton |
Data receiver programming skeleton |
|
1. |
ipushTCPConnect() Connect to iPush Server with TCP. |
ipushTCPConnect() Connect to iPush Server with TCP. |
2. |
|
ipushSubSubject() Subscribe specific subject to iPush Server. |
3. |
ipushSendNPSubjectData() Send data to iPush Server with specific subject. |
|
4. |
|
onSubjectMessage() After receives the data pushed from iPush Server, the client API will trigger this event for data handling in application. |
Table 1. The programming skeleton of data sending and receiving with iPush API
After subscribes specific subject to iPush Server (finish 2.), the data receivers can process their own tasks without waiting for the coming data. When data pushed from iPush Server, the callback function onSubjectMessage() will be executed in event-driven fashion. This is why we say the iPush application development would be an asynchronous programming style.
Follow the Publish/Subscribe (Pub/Sub) programming skeleton with iPush to implement a 1-to-N real-time data broadcasting service is quite simple. An experienced developer definitely can work out an iPush application within several hours.
Deploy real-time RIA with iPush
There are two deployment types for iPush application:
- Type 1: Standalone
- Type 2: Embedded in browser (web application)
A standalone iPush application means it have to be installed at client side first, then start to run with real-time functionality. The standalone iPush application communicates with iPush Server directly, and the iPush Server can be run on any host and listen to any port, such as port 80 or 443 to be firewall-friendly. Figure 1. has illustrated the deployment of standalone iPush applications.
An embedded iPush application (web application) in browser means it have to be downloaded before every time use. The download of iPush web application is completed by web server and browser through HTTP, then the iPush web application initialized and starts to communicate with iPush Server in the respective run-time environment, such as Java virtual machine or Flash Player plug-in.
Under the security restriction of Java run-time environment, the iPush Server requested to run on the same host with the web server which provides download of iPush Java Applet. But iPush web applications for Flash or ActiveX control wouldn't.
Figure 3. The typical deployment for iPush web applications (Flash and ActiveX)
Figure 4. The typical deployment for iPush Java Applet
As Figure 4. shows, usually, the web server will listen to port 80 by default and iPush Server can be configured to listen to port 443 on the same host to keep firewall-friendly. When web server and iPush Server are run on different hosts, both can be configured to listen to port 80 to keep firewall-friendly.
Start to enable your RIA with push technology
Get it on, pick any iPush API you want from ICE Developer Center / Download for developing your RIA, enable it the real-time capability with cutting edge push technology, iPush.
There are some related articles you can read further:
- Push Technology for RIA
- On-the-fly "Hello world" with Eclipse, if you are a Java developer.
- How to develop a Pjax application with Flash, if you are a Flash developer.
Check out the RIA demonstrations ICE provides:
