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    by | 3

    Google Cloud Messaging Update Boosted by XMPP

    As you know, ProcessOne is about realtime messaging. Our core component is XMPP ejabberd scalable and ubiquitous server. We recently acquired Boxcar to use a familiar and popular brand for our large scale push notification service for mobile as well.

    From this perspective, Google’s huge update on its Cloud Messaging service is the biggest announcement from this year Google I/O, as it mixes our two core strengths. We strongly believe this is a big deal for mobile developers and we will explain why.

    Continue reading →

    by | 1

    Google I/O 2013: Services, services, services

    Today was the keynote of Google I/O developer conference. The keynote is usually the place where major announcements are made regarding the Google ecosystem.

    Despite impressive announcements, the most important thing that strikes me is not what has been released, but what has not been mentioned.

    Services, services and more services

    First, what are the main areas of focus this year ?

    Either on Android, on Chrome or on the Cloud and server engine architecture Google is showing its consistency in pushing further existing services, adding new ones, and integrating all the pieces together. Here is the impressive list of highlights to their service stack:

    • Google Maps API V2 and location API improvements, with:
      • Fused location = faster, more accurate and more battery friendly.
      • Geofencing, ability to save up to one hundred location triggers per application.
      • Activity recognition based on the phone accelerometer. Device can know if your are walking, cycling, walking, driving. This is a battery efficient, not relying on GPS.
    • Google+ Sign in, brings deep integration between website and Android apps with Google+ service.
    • Google Cloud Messaging, Google Push Notification service, with three major highlights:
      • Persistent connections are supported between developer backend and Google, allowing sending a larger number of notifications faster.
      • Upstream messaging: This allows the device to send back notifications to the developer server, through Google platform.
      • Notifications synchronization between devices. Basically, this allows a developer to remove a notification from a device when it has been read / processed on another device.

    Google Cloud Messaging is one our main area of interest. We are already working on the new features and we will have announcements to make soon under our mobile Boxcar brand. Stay tuned :)

    • Google Play Game Service, with:
      • Cloud Save to synchronize your game progress across devices.
      • Achievements and Learderboard, integrated with Google+.
      • Multiplayer API to help developer with networking part.
      • Matchmaking to find players to play with.
      • Cross-platform experience on Android and iOS.
    • Google Wallet: low profile (aka not really promoted in the keynote) improvements, like GMail payments, or easier checkout on mobile.
    • Better developer console to analyse how Android apps are doing and optimize their performance, more specifically:
      • Optimization tips
      • App Translation Service.
      • Referal tracking
      • Usage metrics (Google Analytics from the developer console).
      • Revenue graph
      • Beta testing and stage rollout management

    There have also been announcements focusing on Google services improvements or addition for main users (as opposed to developers):

    • Google Play Store improvements to better promote apps to users.
    • Google Music subscription service (US only for now).
    • Huge Google Maps rework and redesign.
    • Search improvements with focus on:
      • more knowledge graph integration in search.
      • more integration of personal information and Google+, circle based personnalisation in search results.
      • Better conversation (aka iteratively refined voice search), with conversation-based queries coming to Chrome on the desktop.
      • Google Now improvements with more cards, to anticipate your search needs on the go.
    • Google+ improvements, mostly for end users:
      • Stream redesign
      • Hangouts chat system, which is a cross platform merge of all Google chats. It is cross-platform, focus on conversation, realtime, photo sharing and video group calling.
      • Photos management, with impressive auto-enhancement and sorting features.

    Note from an XMPP developer perspective: Does the new Hangouts mean Gtalk and XMPP will disappear, along with interoperability ? There was not word about it, but I think so.

    Impressive, isn’t it ?

    Still, as a developer, that first day strangely leaves me with a feeling of unfullfilled expectations. Why ? I think to understand it, we need to list what Google did not talk about.

    What Google did not talk about

    In previous Google I/O, the center stage is usually taken by:

    • Android updates: There was none announced today.
    • Shiny new devices, usually prerelease to developers. Nothing on this part as well.
    • New unexpected projects, like Chrome, Google Glasses, Google TV, or even the now dead Wave.

    On this side, nothing has been announced. No mention of Android for home or TV. No successor for the now dead Nexus Q. No update on Android Accessory Developement Kit. No glasses push. No new wearable computer.

    Despite a few talks on Google glasses tomorrow, there have been little mention of the progress so far in the keynote.

    This year, Google is focusing on services for several (valid) reasons:

    • Those services are updated directly on the devices through Google Play Store. They can more easily push the updates to the end users.
    • Services are perceived are Apple’s Achille heel.
    • Services are a way to put Google at the front stage and differenciate the Google experience from the various Android forks. It also allow Google to differenciate from device manufacturers that are increasingly trying to get the front stage with their Android devices.

    But as Google focus on Services, the story they tell is increasingly about themselves.

    For Android developer, on the most major highlight (outside of Google Services) was Android Studio, a development environment based on Jetbrains Intellij, release today in early preview (version 0.1!).

    Google have even been heavily promoting Chrome on Desktop, but now also on Android and iOS, focusing on bringing the same experience from all the environment. Along with the fact that both Chrome and Android and under the unique direction of Sundar Pichai, this leave a strange confusing impression.

    My conclusion is that for Google, devices do not matter. When Larry Page says that he wants the technology, the device to disappear, he actually means it in the proper sense. Google Glasses and conversational search are a steps in that direction. They are the most straightforward access to Google services. Ideally, they should not even be needed.

    It does not matter if you use Chrome, Glasses, Android or iOS to access Google Services. What matter are the services themselves and the contextual data that can be gathered to improve relevance and personnalisation of the service.

    Sundar Pichai said two days ago that Google I/O will not be centered on the devices. It is because devices are not an end but a mean for Google.

    I feel at this Google I/O, the goal of Google has never been more clear (if you look through the confusion I mentioned earlier).

    At this very moment, the path of Apple and Google may split there:

    Google wants to improve people lifes with services, making the technology totally hidden. Apple wants to improve people life by focusing on how people interact with the technology (touch, voice, and more). This goes through devices improvements (lighter, faster, easier to use), not making the devices disappear.

    Today, I feel that we are at a turning point, I am really looking forward WWDC to see what will be Apple move.

    by | 3

    Why did ProcessOne acquire Boxcar ?

    As founder of ProcessOne, I’ve promoted since 10 years a vision made of real-time messages exchanged at an Internet scale. Together with ProcessOne team, we stayed true to that vision using the best technologies to make that ambition happen. Erlang is a dream environment to build fast and scalable real-time system. XMPP (eXtensible Messaging and Presence Protocol) is a protocol of choice to make people communicate over a federation of servers and a de facto standard today.

    What we did is that we combined those two technologies to build the de facto standard component available to build Instant Messaging, Group Messaging, Social Messaging on a large scale. The software we have built is deployed on the largest chat deployments across the world. We have seen ejabberd in tens of thousands of deployments. We have seen ejabberd being adopted by large, renowed brands. We have invented protocols and extensions to push the messaging system further. We have traveled around the world to get those companies get the best of the tools we produced.

    In a few years we’ve built the reference XMPP server, a tool that cannot get you fired for your choice because it is scalable and versatile. We are a small team, but we achieved something which still amaze me when I think again about it. We’ve been working in messaging for more than 10 years, delivering large scale highly scalable real-time platforms. I’m always proud to say that numerous renowned brands have trusted us to build their messaging services.

    But, if you looked at what change in those ten years, what will strike you is that we went from a world where mobile phone where for most part just phones to a world of ubiquitous smartphones. The world of development quickly had to adapt to build apps, either native or HTML based, that were rich, interactive, able to tolerate for slow networks and changing conditions.

    This evolution had been critical for us in several ways:

    • wireless: We had to build our server platforms for different needs. Messaging was primarily done between servers and desktop connected by cables. Now the world is wireless. Our platform had to embrace mobility by offering network mechanism that add fault tolerance to make overall behaviour reliable and predictable.
    • even more massive: With mobile devices in the picture, scale in term of number of devices that can connect to our platform immediately got more massive.
    • ubiquitous: People expected not only chat, but information coming to them in real-time in a contextually relevant fashion, to any devices, from any system.
    • for every developers: The system we used to build for carriers, device manufacturers,  large brands, media, social networks, are now needed by every one. We need to make our real time service a commodity for developers that every one can use easily to build amazing mobile services in a matter of days. Mobile development is increasingly demanding. We want to allow developers to focus on their core expertise, building great mobile applications with amazing user experience and provide the real-time server missing piece.

    We’ve done a lot for mobile and on mobile in the past, for example:

    • We have built mobile extensions to make ejabberd work under all conditions and incredible load. We made messaging traceable and highly reliable.
    • We have built push notification service both for native mobile apps and web apps (mobile or not).
    • We have built mobile clients demonstrating those features.
    • We have carried out consulting assignments for large customers to help them make their real-time mobile app perform flawlessly under all networks conditions.

    We have done a lot for mobile and on mobile in the past, …but yet two things were missing:

    • The ability to get the first service and team that comes to mind if you think Mobile + Realtime. For many developers, ProcessOne was still the Erlang server-side company. We are still extremely good at it but we are so much more.
    • The ability to connect our team to developers, to be known as the tool easy to use for every one, not only for large team of developers that want the best for their high-end platform.

    Boxcar acquisition is a great opportunity for ProcessOne to get to the next steps of the same ambitious vision:

    • Boxcar is a mobile service and a mobile brand. Taking over Boxcar service is our way to tell the world that we are really serious about mobile. Expect our company to walk on two legs: ProcessOne represents our excellence on real-time robust fault tolerant services. Boxcar is about mobile. Both brand will strengthen each other. Now if you think mobile and real-time mobile messaging and notification platform, we want to be your first name.
    • Boxcar is a great addition to our real-time service and our push platform. We will merge the best of both systems to make it available to mobile developers of all size.

    Now, mobile developers, you know that we are listening to you. Let’s connect and build great things together.

    by | 5

    Press Release – Kwaga sells Boxcar technologies and intellectual property to ProcessOne

    ProcessOne is entering in an agreement with Kwaga to acquire Boxcar world-class push notification service as well as all technologies, intellectual property and trademark from Kwaga, the editor of WriteThatName.

    boxcar

    Paris, 12 February 2013 – Kwaga, the creator of WriteThat.name today announces the sale of Boxcar technologies and IP to ProcessOne, one of the world’s top real-time messaging provider for the most demanding and popular mobile apps.

    Following this agreement, ProcessOne team efforts would converge to enable the development of Boxcar as follow:

    • Boxcar service is planned to become a key push notification service for developers and service providers for iOS devices and other smartphones.
    • ProcessOne know-how would enable Boxcar to improve progressively the reliability and scalability of the push notification service with their expertise in Erlang and real-time messaging architecture.
    • All present Boxcar push inbox service will remain available in the Apple App Store. Boxcar service will be streamlined, improved and fully managed by ProcessOne. Boxcar app would be optimized for iPhone 5 and iOS 6.
    • Kwaga will continue to collaborate and work with ProcessOne on notifications for its WriteThat.name service and on a broad vision of notification semantic prioritization.

    “We’ve been working with ProcessOne for the last 3 months on rebuilding Boxcar notification infrastructure for the benefits of our user base. In the process, it became clear to me that ProcessOne was uniquely positioned to bring Boxcar to the next level and that it would be better if they were to keep operating Boxcar. We’ll keep working with the ProcessOne team to bring Kwaga smarterEmail algorithm to the notification world and will jointly address Boxcar existing user base.” said Philippe Laval, CEO of Kwaga.

    “We’ve been working in messaging for more than 10 years, delivering large scale highly scalable real-time platforms. I’m always proud to say that numerous renowned brands have trusted us to build their messaging services.” said Mickaël Rémond, CEO of ProcessOne. “The acquisition of Boxcar is an important piece in ProcessOne strategy to enhance our existing push messaging service for mobile developers, product managers and users.”

    About ProcessOne

    ProcessOne is a leader in real-time messaging and push notification for mobile applications and web. Its simple and reliable platform allows developers to focus on application development and integrate social messaging and push features rather than being forced to develop, run and maintain a complex platform by themselves. Appropriate from developers to the largest service providers, real-time and push services can be deployed in a very short time frame. Since 1999, leading companies like BBC, Meetic, Nokia, Orange Vallée et Portugal Telecom use ejabberd, the XMPP and Erlang-based messaging server, to power their real-time messaging apps. The company is based in Paris. For more information, visit: http://www.process-one.net/ and follow us on Twitter @ProcessOne


    About Kwaga

    Founded in 2009, Kwaga is the company behind WriteThat.name, the online service that automatically updates address books and CRMs by identifying useful information with email signatures. WriteThat.name works with Gmail / GoogleApps, IBM Lotus Notes and Microsoft Outlook and is compatible with all major CRMs (SalesForce, Highrise …). For more information: http://writethat.name/

    by | 8

    ejabberd 2.1 vs 3.0 PubSub processor usage

    ejabberd’s PubSub implementation covers most of XEP-0060 specification. This involve some complexity server side, sometimes at cost of performances. So PubSub’s optimizations was one of the main concern on the ejabberd 3 roadmap.

    We’re finally pleased to show some good results on this side.

    PubSub

    This shows ejabberd processor usage while running a Tsung benchmark scenario, which simulated PubSub items published every minute and users subscribing to PubSub nodes on ejabberd 2.1.11 and 3.0.0. The 2.1.11 stopped early during the test by not responding and consumming 100%CPU on a thread with 50000 subscribers, while 3.0 was using 1/4 of processor ressources at the same time and was able to complete the whole test, handling 60000 subscribers with no more than 14% CPU on a dual core system.

    by | Reply

    Amazon Device Messaging API: Another Push Service

    When Apple introduced its push notification service in june 2008 it was received as a very controversial feature. Despite the fact that notification had been at the very heart of RIM’s Blackberry success, it was at that time perceived as a way to workaround the inability of iOS to run applications in background.

    Since that time however, push notification messaging systems have become ubiquitous and it is part of good application design practices to split between mobile and server-side processing.

    Google launched its own push service for Android Google Cloud to Device Messaging (C2DM) in may 2010, replaced in june 2012 by Google Could Messaging.

    Both Nokia and Microsoft also have their push notification services since 2010. Most notable missing players in the mobile push notification area were, up to now, Samsung and Amazon.

    Amazon yesterday filled that gap, announcing dedicated push messaging system for Kindle Fire apps (in beta). This new service could be the missing piece leading to a possible upcoming smartphone device from Amazon.

    Samsung can still use Google infrastructure for notifications, at least for a while, but how long before they need to become independent from Google for notifications ?

    Here is a short video timeline of mobile Push Notification history:

    Download timeline as large size image: Push Notification Services Timeline.

    by | 3

    ejabberd 2.1 vs 3.0 memory consumption

    ejabberd is memory bound as session data is kept in RAM for each connected user. This means that available memory is the factor that limits the number of users an ejabberd node can handle. So memory usage was one of the main concern on the ejabberd 3 roadmap.

    We’re finally pleased to show some good results on this side.

    This shows ejabberd memory usage while running a Tsung benchmark scenario, which simulated users chatting and changing presence using real anonymized rosters, on ejabberd 2.1.11 and 3.0.0. The 2.1.11 crashed early during the test by lack of memory with 45000 connected users while 3.0 was using half the memory at the same time and was able to complete the whole test, handling 60000 users with limited memory usage.

    by | Reply

    Libon 2.0 uses ProcessOne to power smart messaging

    This morning, on Twitter, the hashtag to follow was #LeShowHello. This link referenced the innovation event organized by Orange, one of the largest European mobile giant, owned by France Telecom.

    During this Orange Keynote, Orange CEO, Stephane Richard, revealed the launch of @Libon.
    Available today on iOS, within the AppStore, the app allows users to make free VoIP calls as well as smart chatting and personalize their free smart voice messages.
    The announcement of the new Libon app on its Twitter account, at 10:04 AM CET with the blog post.
    All the main international tech blogging sites buzzed about this new disruptive launch:
    Orange Vallée use ProcessOne to power Libon 2.0, especially the following features:
    • In-app smart messaging – send and receive text messages with all of your Libon contacts for free
    • Push notification – send alerts to your iPhone via the APNS system for VoIP calls or messaging
    • Cloud storage – access to all your interactions with all the messages you’ve had with each of your Libon contacts
    We’re really proud at ProcessOne to be part of this amazing all-in-one OTT communication initiative! ProcessOne provides all the backend messaging service and the push notification capability for Libon 2.0. Check out this video that explains Libon 2.0 service.
    ↬http://gigaom.com
    The France-based operator group is the latest to deploy an app that competes directly with the likes of Skype and WhatsApp, but also potentially steals away its own paying customers. [...]
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