Just a question, if Apple has invested so much time and energy into ActiveSync does anyone have any info on whether or not Apple is using Exchange to run MobileMe? Just curious
Maybe when MM is up and running some outside expert can figure out what back end MM is running on. Knowing nothing about it I would say of course not and Apple wouldn't be so stupid to run their on line push service through black box third party software when they can make their own.
Yeah, it's an interesting question. I highly doubt that MS would let Apple use Exchange in such a fashion. And isn't Apple Mail and Outlook Express just IMAP/POP clients. Not sure how push works there. Anyways, I think mobile me really is all inhouse Leopard Server stuff.
One thing no one mentions about the WWDC08 Keynote is how everything was "push" themed. iPhone OS X v2 push email, contacts, calendar, etc. capable; and 3rd party apps has a push notification service; and Snow Leopard will have Exchange built-in. Apple finally has caught on to the killer app that "push" services are.
Yeah, it's an interesting question. I highly doubt that MS would let Apple use Exchange in such a fashion. And isn't Apple Mail and Outlook Express just IMAP/POP clients. Not sure how push works there. Anyways, I think mobile me really is all inhouse Leopard Server stuff.
One thing no one mentions about the WWDC08 Keynote is how everything was "push" themed. iPhone OS X v2 push email, contacts, calendar, etc. capable; and 3rd party apps has a push notification service; and Snow Leopard will have Exchange built-in. Apple finally has caught on to the killer app that "push" services are.
Yeah I frickin need push stuff man. I love my iPod touch, but push essentially means wireless all-the-time syncing. This is big. BIG.
So from a computer science aspect, push is kinda like a regular poll right? As in, there must be a "listening" process continuously (every few seconds?) checking if a "push" signal comes in... I'm no developer, is this kinda how it works? The key is to have as few as possible "listening" processes, with as small and relevant as possible push content coming through...
Not necessarily in the way nvidia2008 is asking. There are two ways to do notification:
1) Polling (pull): Every time unit, ask the server if there's anything new. This is the model for when you set "Check mail every 5 minutes" in your mail client. The issue that comes up is that this takes CPU cycles and power. For a battery-powered unit, if there isn't often updated info, this is wasted battery life. Works fine for an AC-powered unit, as long as you have the CPU cycles to spare, but it's not great for a battery operated device.
2) Notification (push): The client registers itself with the device, with an IP address, and says "You now know where to find me, let me know when you have something." and then goes quiet. No CPU cycles burned. It basically reverses who-contacts-who-first from the first model. The only time the device has to contact the server is when its contact information (IP address) changes. DynamicDNS can take care of that pretty cleanly.
This isn't such a big deal when you have just one or maybe two services checking for updates, but when you have 15 or 20, a handheld can get bogged down. That's where this comes in handy - Apple announced their Push Notification API for all developers, too, which means that a developer says "Here's my app, and I'd like it to keep in touch with my.apps.server.com, thanks." Now Apple's servers handle the proxy portion, accepting IP updates from the various devices, and checking the dev's servers. AFAICT, it pushes the polling portion off on Apple's servers. The developers don't have to create their own push servers, they can use Apple's. Slick.
If you want to get a packet then something has to be running and listening.
This push service on the iPhone is no big deal. It's not all that innovative to have one service taking all requests and then activating the receiving app.
If you want to get a packet then something has to be running and listening.
Yes, it's a daemon... and assumedly as on MacOS X, it's a single notification daemon. You have one process running to listen, which then pushes (notice a trend?) out to the waiting processes.
Quote:
This push service on the iPhone is no big deal. It's not all that innovative to have one service taking all requests and then activating the receiving app.
from mac.com ([10.13.140.1]) by ms134.mac.com (Sun Java System Messaging Server 6.2-8.01 (built Nov 27 2006)) with ESMTP id <[email protected]> for [email protected]; Tue, 07 Aug 2007 20:31:28 -0700 (PDT)
The above states it's using Sun Java System Messaging Server right now. I'll look at it again when I'm upgraded to MobileMe but my guess is that Apple has ported the push technology to Sun... or maybe Sun will be coming out with a push email upgrade for their software here soon.
Yeah I frickin need push stuff man. I love my iPod touch, but push essentially means wireless all-the-time syncing. This is big. BIG.
I agree. This is a really big story that has been under reported. It's a consumer workflow changing event....no more cables/docks/unsyced computers/handhelds.
Comments
One thing no one mentions about the WWDC08 Keynote is how everything was "push" themed. iPhone OS X v2 push email, contacts, calendar, etc. capable; and 3rd party apps has a push notification service; and Snow Leopard will have Exchange built-in. Apple finally has caught on to the killer app that "push" services are.
Yeah, it's an interesting question. I highly doubt that MS would let Apple use Exchange in such a fashion. And isn't Apple Mail and Outlook Express just IMAP/POP clients. Not sure how push works there. Anyways, I think mobile me really is all inhouse Leopard Server stuff.
One thing no one mentions about the WWDC08 Keynote is how everything was "push" themed. iPhone OS X v2 push email, contacts, calendar, etc. capable; and 3rd party apps has a push notification service; and Snow Leopard will have Exchange built-in. Apple finally has caught on to the killer app that "push" services are.
Yeah I frickin need push stuff man. I love my iPod touch, but push essentially means wireless all-the-time syncing. This is big. BIG.
1) Polling (pull): Every time unit, ask the server if there's anything new. This is the model for when you set "Check mail every 5 minutes" in your mail client. The issue that comes up is that this takes CPU cycles and power. For a battery-powered unit, if there isn't often updated info, this is wasted battery life. Works fine for an AC-powered unit, as long as you have the CPU cycles to spare, but it's not great for a battery operated device.
2) Notification (push): The client registers itself with the device, with an IP address, and says "You now know where to find me, let me know when you have something." and then goes quiet. No CPU cycles burned. It basically reverses who-contacts-who-first from the first model. The only time the device has to contact the server is when its contact information (IP address) changes. DynamicDNS can take care of that pretty cleanly.
This isn't such a big deal when you have just one or maybe two services checking for updates, but when you have 15 or 20, a handheld can get bogged down. That's where this comes in handy - Apple announced their Push Notification API for all developers, too, which means that a developer says "Here's my app, and I'd like it to keep in touch with my.apps.server.com, thanks." Now Apple's servers handle the proxy portion, accepting IP updates from the various devices, and checking the dev's servers. AFAICT, it pushes the polling portion off on Apple's servers. The developers don't have to create their own push servers, they can use Apple's. Slick.
This push service on the iPhone is no big deal. It's not all that innovative to have one service taking all requests and then activating the receiving app.
If you want to get a packet then something has to be running and listening.
Yes, it's a daemon... and assumedly as on MacOS X, it's a single notification daemon. You have one process running to listen, which then pushes (notice a trend?) out to the waiting processes.
This push service on the iPhone is no big deal. It's not all that innovative to have one service taking all requests and then activating the receiving app.
It is for handhelds.
The above states it's using Sun Java System Messaging Server right now. I'll look at it again when I'm upgraded to MobileMe but my guess is that Apple has ported the push technology to Sun... or maybe Sun will be coming out with a push email upgrade for their software here soon.
Yeah I frickin need push stuff man. I love my iPod touch, but push essentially means wireless all-the-time syncing. This is big. BIG.
I agree. This is a really big story that has been under reported. It's a consumer workflow changing event....no more cables/docks/unsyced computers/handhelds.