Re: Network notifications

FROM : Randall Meadows
DATE : Mon Mar 31 21:47:26 2008

On Mar 31, 2008, at 12:34 PM, Hamish Allan wrote:
> On Mon, Mar 31, 2008 at 7:23 PM, Randall Meadows <<email_removed>-
> pc.com> wrote:
>

>> But to use DO, there needs to be a known
>> connection between my app and the remote app, right?  We don't want
>> this connection

>
> What is it that you are averse to? A persistent connection? A fixed
> handle for your service? It's difficult to suggest a mechanism to
> replace DO when you don't say why you don't want to use it...


Ok, well, frankly, the previous versions of these app used Core Data 
over DO (a situation which I understand was never intended), and the 
code is a mess and quite fragile.  So we decided to take a much 
simpler approach for this version 2 rewrite, and use the built-in web 
server as the distribution mechanism.

The two apps that are going to be communicating* will have similar, 
though not identical life times.  In general, my app is going to be 
launched first, and will be gathering data; the remote app will likely 
come online later, and then gather all information collected thus far 
by my app, and then start listening for when my app acquires more data 
to it can keep up-to-date in more or less real-time; this is so that 
the remote can always have the latest data, in case my app quits (my 
user goes to lunch, or is done for the day and leaves the site, for 
example).

So basically, yes, KISS is our motto (or at least KIASAP), so we are 
looking to keep them untethered if at all possible.  An ideal solution 
would be NSNotification that works across a LAN.

Does that help?
randy

*In theory, it could be that more than one remote app is going to be 
interested in retrieving the data that my server app is gathering, but 
in practice, it's likely going to be just one.  Another reason we went 
with the simpler apache delivery system.