WebCast: Web Communication Revolution – an Overview of HTML5 WebSockets

Posted on February 7, 2012 by

Watch Part 1 of our webcast series: Web Communication Revolution – an Overview of HTML5 WebSockets.

In this recorded presentation we walk through the challenges the legacy Web is posing and how HTML5 and WebSockets are changing it into a new, living Web. In the webcast we discuss questions like HTML5 and WebSocket support in older browsers, the WebSocket API and protocol, trends how the full duplex low latency messaging will change enterprise topologies, and how higher level business protocols can be extended all the way to desktop browsers and mobile devices.

Posted in html5, Kaazing, WebSocket | Leave a comment

VNC over WebSockets

Posted on February 1, 2012 by

What makes WebSockets especially compelling is that they allow you to extend the reach of enterprise protocols, like JMS, XMPP, AMQP, all the way to the browser. In this demonstration I show an example of implementing the VNC protocol, RFB, over WebSockets.

This 3 minute demo features a windows machine running a VNC server. The Windows desktop is accessed remotely from a vanilla Safari browser, simply leveraging the canvas tag and WebSockets.

First you see an environment Windows running as a virtual machine, then I show two physical machines connected, and last I walk through the building blocks used for the demo.

Posted in html5, Kaazing, WebSocket | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

The Simplest Way to Use Your Smartphone as a Game Controller: A WebSocket Race Car Demo

Posted on January 26, 2012 by

There are some solutions out there that turn your smartphone into a Wii-style controller, but many of them require a dedicated app on your phone and even a browser plugin on your desktop. With HTML5 and WebSockets you can achieve this very quickly and easily without the need of pre-installing anything on your machine or your phone.

All you need is:

  1. A desktop browser: The game is “hosted” by the desktop browser. It renders the UI of the game using HTML5 canvas and WebGL.
    Note: You can check here if your desktop browser supports WebGL.
  2. A smartphone (with a browser): Smartphones can take a variety of input source, like touch, tilt, GPS, proximity, compass, camera, microphone. Many of these input sources are accessible from JavaScript, allowing you to easily control your game.
  3. A WebSocket server: The desktop and the smartphone(s) have to communicate through a fast, low latency channel – exactly what WebSocket was designed to do. The WebSocket standard doesn’t provide peer-to-peer connectivity, so you’ll need a server that routes the messages between the smartphone(s) and the desktop.

If you use a WebSocket server, like the Kaazing WebSocket Gateway that provides higher level protocols on top of WebSockets, your architecture can be kept very simple. You don’t need to write a single line of server-side code, the JavaScript code running in the desktop browser and the smartphone do all the work.

To demonstrate the power of no server-side code, we built a demo using the Java Message Service (JMS) edition of the Kaazing WebSocket Gateway. The advantage of using JMS in your JavaScript code directly is that with the pub/sub model of JMS you can very easily direct the messages between the smartphone(s) and the desktop browser.

The flow for the player is very simple:

  1. Bring up the game in your desktop browser: http://demo.kaazing.com/racer
  2. Enter the URL in your smartphone browser, as shown in the bottom of the desktop browser: http://demo.kaazing.com/racer/ws
  3. Enter the unique ID when prompted by your smartphone. This unique ID connects the game instance running in your desktop browser to the smartphone you use as your remote controller.

The race car is controlled simply by tilting your phone. Tilting the phone triggers JavaScript events which result in JMS messages sent through the WebSocket gateway to the desktop browser.

Note: For this demo to work you need a smartphone that supports the JavaScript tilt APIs. We tested the demo with devices running iOS 4 and above.

After watching the video how it works, take it for a test drive.

Posted in Gaming, Kaazing, WebSocket | 1 Comment

HTML5 Live 2011 New York: HTML5 In the Enterprise – A Panel Discussion

Posted on January 25, 2012 by

Hear industry experts and executives talk about their HTML5 vision, the role of WebSockets, client technologies, browser plugins, and more in the enterprise. The discussion is moderated by Arik Hesseldahl from All Things Digital.

Panelists:

  • John Page: Director of Business Development, Messaging, TIBCO
  • Eric Newcomer: Chief Architect, Investment Bank, Credit Suisse
  • Paolo Pelizzoli: Vice President of Architecture and Development, Broadridge Financial
Posted in html5, WebSocket | Leave a comment

HTML5 Live 2011 New York: There is Just One Web

Posted on January 16, 2012 by

Jen Simmons, freelance designer, front-end developer, Drupal expert, trainer, teacher, conference presenter, and host of The Web Ahead pod cast presented about the mobile Web at HTML5 Live 2011, in New York: There is Just One Web.

Mobile is all the rage these days — and it should be. Many website owners believe creating a separate mobile website is the solution, with browser sniffing to redirect all “mobile” traffic to a separate m.example.com domain. But it turns out that most of the time this is a terrible solution. Come hear Jen Simmons talk about how there’s only one web — not a mobile web separate from the desktop web. And learn how you can use HTML5 and responsive web design to create one unified website or web app for your project and Just Have It Work™ on a wide range of devices.

Posted in Events, html5 | Leave a comment

HTML5 Live 2011 New York: A Snapshot of The Mobile HTML5 Revolution

Posted on January 13, 2012 by

At HTML5 Live James Pierce from Sencha presented A Snapshot of the Mobile HTML5 Revolution.

The premise and the promise of using web technologies for building mobile apps is well understood. But are we there yet? This presentation takes an honest look at the state of the art of mobile standards and implementations. We discuss what can be built, what has been built – and of course what will soon be possible – with these exciting tools and approaches.

 

Q&A: Why attend James Pearce’s talk at HTML5 Live in New York 2011

Q. Tell us a little about what you will be talking about at HTML5 Live

A. Are we there yet? We’ll take an honest look at the state of the art of mobile standards and browser implementations. We discuss what can be built, what has been built – and what to stay tuned for.

Q. What will people who attend your talk learn

A. How HTML5 is changing the way we can develop sites and apps for the mobile platform – and also how it isn’t. What frameworks, tools, techniques and approaches are valuable.

Q. What will they take away that they can apply right away

A. Recommendations, framework suggestions, useful resources & tools. Even code fragments ;-)

Q. In your opinion, why should people attend HTML5 Live

A. Cut through the hype and learn what it can really mean from a practitioners’ point of view.

Q. Why is HTML5 exciting for web developers? Architects?

A. Because it’s a badge that represents many of the innovative & exciting developments in the web right now. Change is good.

Posted in Events, html5, Kaazing | Leave a comment

HTML5 Live 2011 New York: Explore Canvas

Posted on January 11, 2012 by

Kevin Hoyt from Adobe gave a great talk on canvas in New York at the HTML5 Live conference. The abstract of Kevin’s presentation:

Learn about programming charts and graphs, animations, drawing applications and other early use-cases for the HTML5 canvas element.  Come explore the canvas API including shapes, styles, transformations, compositing, images and animation.  Along the way we’ll explore examples on both the frivolous and more practical sides of the scale.

Posted in Events, html5 | Leave a comment