CODEWITHSUNDEEP
androidioswindows-mobilewireless
Patrick Doyle
Patrick Doyle

Reputation: 49

How to receive incoming message over wireless LAN network and launch web browser?

I am a little stumped. I've been trying to find a way for a wireless device (i.e. Android/ios/Windows mobile devices) to receive a message from a central server and then launch the device web browser.

The Scenario: a server on a WLAN network monitors a certain system. when something on the system goes wrong, the system stops what it is doing and sends an error message to the server and wait for the user to enter a response on the server before it resumes what it was doing.

Now, I want to send a message from the server(when the system it is monitoring crashes) to the wireless devices, so the user does not have to go to the server all the time to continue the system but can just do it over the wireless device (in the web browser).

Just to clarify, I know how to send a message out from the server to everybody connected to the wireless network, i just don't know what to do with that message on the devices...

Any ideas or solutions would be HIGHLY appreciated... Thanks in advance

Upvotes: 1

Views: 1005

Answers (1)

BonanzaDriver
BonanzaDriver

Reputation: 6452

You can do this a few different ways:

1) Using commercially available Push Notifications (Google & Apple for example). The advantage is your application will work outside of your wireless LAN, but the disadvantage is you're using their platform, which is restricted in its ability and functionality (having designed and built a couple of these platforms myself I can attest to their limitations - they were going for "least common denominator" when they designed and implemented theirs).

2) If your app is only going to run on a LAN (you control the network) you can put your own system together. The advantage here is there is almost nothing that cannot be done (except on iOS which has several limitations related to the topic). The disadvantage, though, is this is a lot of work.

3) Leveraging an existing platform that might have been designed for a different purpose but can easily be used with minimal changes for your own purposes, and offers a nice compromise between options #1 and #2 (this will require some additional backend/middleware servers to add to your mix). Look at XMPP and Jabber as an example.

Once you have this piece of your architecture in place - receiving pushed data - the only missing item is invoking the handset's browser (or browser type component in your own native application) in response to the received payload.

** As possible alternatives it's worth noting that most mobile platforms allow your native application to directly interact with the handset's IMs or e-mails. For example, you can write code that intercepts a specifically formatted IM, with a small payload, and use that as a "poor man's push engine." I have put together little POCs (proof of concepts) for clients using this technique on Windows Mobile, BlackBerry, and Android (not sure what's possible with iOS in this regard) as it's quick and easy.

The hard part is the pushed data (but several available options on how to handle this requirement), the easy part is invoking the browser.

Upvotes: 1

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