Push notifications services - general

#1

Hey guys,

Anything you recommend reading regarding push notifications?
I was wondering why there are services but you have to pay for them, can’t you send straight from your server to a phone the notifications?

This is quite a broad question, feel free to share good reads on that :smile:
Thanks

#2

i implemented my own push service in nodejs…
So, yes it is possible.

#3

There is parse.com that’s easy to implement.
I need some service that will allow me to use both push notifications and real time chat. I need BaaS that’s combination of parse and firebase, so if anyone have some tips about that it would be nice to share with me.

#4

Hi Commandantp,
I’ll start with a disclosure, I’m a co-founder at PushApps so my answer is going to be about why you should consider working with one of the push notifications providers.

I saw Mladen recommendation of Parse, and there are many more great solutions such as urban-airship, pushwoosh, xtify and more. I’m not going to tell you which one to choose.

Of course you can develop it yourself but then you will waste lots of time which you could invest in your main business development - what about special features (scheduling, segmentation etc.)? statistics? OS updates? are you going to support all of it by yourself?
Does it worth the few bucks you can pay to get it all off your shoulders?
think about it… and after that you should visit PushApps :smile:

#5

Sure I’m happy to consider a service but before that I like to understand why so many services have been created? What’s the deal with push notifications, is it technically too complicated or …?
Also in all the plan I see remote API, what is that exactly ?
Here is my use - app with an API backend on my server, chat system in it that must send a push notification when user has a new message and on a status update basically.

I see free plans that could work I guess to start but what is that API thing not included? Does this mean I can only have them sent from the app itself rather than from my back end?

Thanks!!

#6

Hey,

I’m working in my application with back-end built in Laravel (PHP Framework), and after you understand how works the concept of push notification, you will be able to do it yourself! It’s very simple.

I suggest you to read:
http://developer.android.com/google/gcm/gcm.html

But resuming what you need to do is:

  • Implement the conversation with GCM on your app. http://ngcordova.com/docs/plugins/pushNotifications/
  • Send de Registration ID that returns of GCM to your Back-end app.
  • Receive one post of your mobile app to persist the register id that return of GCM.
  • After that you can create some services to send the messages to GCM and then, they will send the pushs notifications.

Simple like that.

#7

I agree with the others that it’s fairly simple if you have a fairly stable backend already anyway. Mine is in RoR and I just installed pushmeup gem and got it working. Initially I had some frustration getting the certificate properly set up for iOS and so tried a push service, but the service can’t help solve that problem, anyway :slight_smile:

#8

Thanks for the feedback! My backend is also Laravel :slight_smile:
Do you have to save in your DB something about the user’s device or not (like the token or so) ?
I will look into doing it myself, found two packages on github that could be interesting

#9

Yeah, I have to.

Because, when your client receive the TOKEN in the response from Google. You call a post with this token to your back-end app.

Then you need to save this token for send the push notification!

#10

Ah cool!
Thanks :slight_smile:
It works the same for iOS?
Anything special I should be careful with or you recommend doing?

#11

Hi @commandantp , I’m also very interested in this service, could you please share this two packages?

#12

Sure,
this one is dedicated for Laravel: https://github.com/davibennun/laravel-push-notification
this one is for PHP in general : https://github.com/Ph3nol/NotificationPusher

Haven’t tried them yet thought :slight_smile:

#13

Yes! Simple like that.

Happy to help!

#14

:smile: Thanks for sharing

#15

Just to chime in here, we are about to release an alpha version of Ionic Push which will make push notifications a lot easier for everyone. I will reply on this thread once it’s ready (~3 weeks). We have a few people testing now.

It’s going to be the first ionic.io service, I hope you like it! :smile:

If any of your friends/colleagues/etc. want to get on the list, have them create accounts here: https://apps.ionic.io/landing/push. You guys are already good to go.

#16

Has anybody tried the push notification services that Azure offers? I’ve started using their mobile services for a back end, but have not gotten to push notifications yet. They usually have straightforward tutorials though on the basics: http://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/documentation/articles/mobile-services-javascript-backend-ios-get-started-push/

#17

Any dates when you guys gonna launch full suite of features under the http://apps.ionic.io/ ?

Also is it possible to add to this site some FORGOT PASSWORD feature :wink:

#18

Struggling a bit with all of it… would you mind sharing the code you use inside the app? I’m not sure to understand how to get the token

#19

I used devgirl’s github project and tutorial on angular/cordova push notifications, and it worked like a charm.
http://devgirl.org/2014/12/16/push-notifications-sample-app-with-ionic-and-ngcordova/

She has the full working project code on github:

#20

@max thanks for the heads up, have a quick question…I’m about finished with my entire front end and am about to begin on doing push notifications. I need to finish them up within two weeks so i’m wondering if I should just start from scratch (we use django for our backend), or should I hold off and wait for you guys? I’d love to use your solution but need some more info on availability, especially cutting it close like this :smile: