| Industry voice: Embedding web real-time communications: tips for busineses Jun 25th 2014, 13:00, by John Riordan 
Implementing real-time voice, video, chat, and data flow in web applications used to be hard. It required building or licensing and maintaining sophisticated audio and video plugins. Web Real-Time Communications (WebRTC) is here to change that. Currently being standardized by the W3C, WebRTC is an API created by Google that enables RTC within web browsers without plugins or downloads. The API implements all the complicated infrastructure to allow browsers to establish direct peer-to-peer connections with each other for voice, video, chat, file sharing, and generalized data sharing. The availability of the API dramatically reduces the cost, difficulty, and time to deploy RTC on the web. For that reason, WebRTC is considered to be a truly innovative technology. Business opportunities that did not exist yesterday are suddenly here today because of WebRTC. While there is disruption, there is also some hype. Developing with WebRTC can be as simple as adding a few lines of JavaScript to any web page, but there are some realities to consider in real world deployments. Deploying WebRTC in the real world: challenges and tipsChallenge: Not all web browsers and platforms currently support the WebRTC API. Chrome, Firefox, and Opera browsers all support WebRTC on desktop and Android devices right out of the box. For other browsers and mobile operating systems, today, there are third party plugins and libraries that can be installed to enable RTC functionality. Some may feel this defeats the purpose of WebRTC, but if you'd like your application to be supported by all major browsers, you'll need to consider a plugin for now. As WebRTC API definition moves through the standardization process, native support is expected to become more ubiquitous in web browsers, mobile devices, appliances, and other systems. Challenge: A signaling mechanism, intentionally not defined by WebRTC, is required to allow peers to exchange messagesWebRTC cannot create peer-to-peer connections without some sort of server in the middle that provides a signaling channel by which peers can exchange the information needed to set up a connection. Technically, the signaling channel could be any sort of channel— email, post, or carrier pigeon. The reality is that, for all but toy and demo applications; signaling is hard and much harder than it might appear at first consideration. From a practical standpoint, the choices boil down to whether to leverage a proprietary signaling platform or an open, standards-based (SIP or XMPP) signaling platform, as well as whether to utilize a licensed platform or hosted platform-as-a-service. Organizations should make these decisions based on many factors, including: functionally, performance, scale, cost, and other business considerations. Perhaps the best drivers for an organization to decide on a closed proprietary signaling platform are functionality and performance. Closed applications that do not require interoperation outside an island of WebRTC may be best served by a proprietary "walled garden" signaling solution, especially applications that are heavily focused on a particular use case. There may be a proprietary solution that hones in on and optimizes a single function. A good example of such a use case is publish-subscribe, wherein a solidly fitting, proprietary signaling provider is PubNub. On the other hand, vendor lock-in is potentially a downside with proprietary solutions. Proprietary solutions, cloud based or not, required the use of proprietary libraries and SDKs, which make it difficult to migrate an application utilizing one platform to another. Organizations that have long-term cost and increasing functional needs on the mind may be best suited for an open, standards-based platform. Challenge: WebRTC does not interoperate with existing systems, including the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN)As there are billions of people using the PSTN, it's not unlikely that an organization will want to build a WebRTC application that sends calls to and from it. If you are building an application that simply will send calls to and from the PSTN, you can accomplish this using a voice application platform such as Twilio or Tropo. A more flexible solution, however, is to consider your choice of signaling layer. If you would like your WebRTC endpoints to communicate with each other (voice, video, messaging, data) in addition to being able to call the PSTN, this consideration actually brings us back to signaling. Choosing a SIP signaling platform is likely your best option here because it works well for both peer-to-peer scenarios and endpoint-to-PSTN scenarios. SIP has become the de facto standard for VoIP, and the majority of VoIP systems have integrated with the PSTN. Challenge: In networking scenarios involving firewalls and NATs, servers are often needed to facilitate WebRTC connections.Lastly, while WebRTC aims to create true peer-to-peer media and data streaming once a session is established, the reality is that most devices today live behind one or more layers of NAT, and many are behind corporate firewalls. WebRTC apps use a framework called ICE to successfully overcome the complexities of real-world networking in most cases. But, there are a non-trivial number of cases where ICE cannot succeed to create true peer-to-peer media connections. In these cases, ICE relies on the availability of media relay servers (TURN servers) in the cloud, on which it can fall back to relay data between endpoints. Conceptually, media relay servers have the simple task of relaying a stream. Media relay servers have public addresses, so they can be contacted by peers even if the peers are behind firewalls or proxies. It's important to note that media relays require reliable congestion-free Internet connectivity to effectively operate. Poorly operated media relay servers can introduce quality issues such as choppy media and disconnected sessions. Based on their bandwidth requirements, media relays can be rather costly to operate. Tackling media relays is, like signaling, a hefty task, but it is necessary to enable WebRTC applications to perform to enterprise-level standards. You can choose to operate a media relay solution or find a hosted solution. If you are selecting a hosted signaling solution, be sure to investigate whether they handle media relaying and, if so, how they ensure QoS. With the right approach, you can take advantage of the disruptive business opportunities WebRTC promises today.        |  | Analysis: Future proofing: Mozilla's top 5 technology predictions Jun 25th 2014, 11:01, by Marc Chacksfield 
2014 has been one of the busiest years ever for Mozilla, the creator of Firefox. Not only have we seen a new, refreshed browser but the company recently revealed it has created a full-blown HTML5 toolkit for developers and it is forging ahead with Firefox OS - an open ecosystem for phones that is set for the developing world. Given this is a company at the forefront of technology, we thought it right to ask the experts at Mozilla what technology changes we should keep an eye out for over the next year and they came back with their top five predictions – now we just need to wait and bide our time to see if they become reality… 1 Unlocking the mobile ecosystemThe mobile ecosystem has been often interpreted as a fairly closed market dominated by a few key players: Android, iOS and the Windows Phone. Open alternatives like Firefox OS will gain traction across multiple devices (from smartphones to tablets to TVs) and bring new capabilities that were previously only possible on the desktop. These truly open alternatives to the three dominant smartphone OS platforms will break down the walls that lock people into incompatible platforms and make content easier to share across devices. 
2 Open ecosystem will growMany players have widened the mobile and web arena, fostering trends of innovation within the ecosystem. Mobile leaders including Deutsche Telekom, Telefonica, Telecom Italia and Telenor launched their first Firefox OS powered smartphone handsets (Alcatel One Touch and ZTE Open) in Europe and Latin America respectively. More devices, markets and partners will follow soon. This year we will see more industry leaders join the open ecosystem and bring more devices based on the open web to market. 3 Beyond the smartphoneMore devices than ever are becoming internet-enabled: it's estimated that there will be 30 billion wirelessly connected devices in 2020, three times as many as today. These are moving beyond the smartphone to clever gadgets including wearable technologies such as smartwatches and fashion accessories. Fuelled by web and app developments, there will be more expansions from the smartphone towards smart 'things' that leverage HTML5 and web technologies. At CES
this year, Panasonic announced a partnership with Mozilla to release next-generation smart televisions powered by Firefox OS. 
4 More developersCreating mobile apps powered by web technologies will become significantly easier and millions more app developers will start to code in HTML5. The number of mobile app developers building for Firefox OS is set to triple over the next year driven by the ease of developer participation – they do not need to learn a different programming language or new form factors to create applications for. The adoption of mobile web standards and APIs across the industry will provide access to more device capabilities such as cameras, SMS, Near Field Communications (NFC), Location and Bluetooth. 5 The rise of gaming The gaming industry will start to develop and distribute more commercially successful games over the web using open technology. Video chat and content sharing will become more accessible through the browser, without the friction associated with plugins. These will all create new opportunities for personalising and enriching the online experience. Watch out for titles powered by the Java optimised Unreal Engine 4 running in Firefox.        | | iPhone 6 release date touted again for September 19 Jun 25th 2014, 10:47, by John McCann 
We've already seen the September 19 date rumoured for the official iPhone 6 release date, and it's reared its head again so you might want to put a mark against that Friday in September. The September 19 date has been supposedly confirmed by the Chinese media, although we still can't be 100 per cent sure that it's on the money. If it does transpire to be correct we'd expect this to be the date that the iPhone 6 hits stores, with Apple's announcement coming earlier that week, or in the middle of the previous week, which is what has happened before. Price matchIt wasn't just the iPhone 6 release date the report leaked though, with possible pricing for the 4.7-inch handset also appearing. According to the report the 32GB iPhone 6 could cost 5,288 yuan (around £500, $850, AU$900), which matches that of the 16GB iPhone 5S - is there a slight saving to be had? A price for the 64GB iPhone 6 of 6,288 yuan (around £590, $1000, AU$1060) has also been put forward, which falls in line with the general storage inflation we're used to seeing from Apple. There's no mention of the mooted larger 5.5-inch iPhone 6 in the report, so there's still a chance it may arrive at a later day after rumours suggested that production had been delayed.        | | Is Android Key Lime Pie still alive and kicking? Jun 25th 2014, 10:09, by John McCann 
Do you know about the Android Easter Egg you get by tapping the Android version in the settings menu? If so, have you viewed the KitKat one and really studied the icon tiles carefully? If so you may have noticed a few extra logos which don't relate to any version of Android that has been launched thus far. We spent some time staring at the dreamy tiles on our Nexus 7 (running Android 4.4.3), and managed to spot a new style of doughnut, a candy cane, a Crème Caramel, some square layers, the head of the old Android logo and perhaps the most intriguing, what appears to be a Key Lime Pie. Key Lime Pie was originally touted as the sweet treat nickname of Android 4.4 which was eventually dubbed KitKat. 
But perhaps that's not Key Lime, but actually Lemon Meringue Pie, which has been linked to Android 5 (or is that Android 4.5?), although recently it's fallen out of favour with Android Lollipop the new front runner. The Candy Cane has popped up in previous Android Easter Eggs, as it was spotted floating in space with jelly beans in Android 4.1. 
Perhaps these are teasers of what versions could have been called in the past, before Cupcake won out against Candy Cane and KitKat trumped Key Lime Pie, or has Google really given us a hint of the future? We're still pretty confused by that new doughnut icon and the Crème Caramel though - any ideas people? 
If you're not sure how to view the tiles go to Settings > About Phone/Tablet and then repeatedly tap the "Android version" row. You'll see a spinning "K" and you'll need to hold down on this to jump to the next screen (a red background with the KitKat logo) and hold down again to get to the tiles. We used a new Nexus 7 running Android 4.4.3 (and you have to be patient!). Thanks whizzerZero for the tip!        | | The next version of Android will be revealed today Jun 24th 2014, 21:30, by klee 
Google IO 2014 kicks off later today and we can expect some exciting announcements from the company's annual developer conference. How big are we talking here? Try the next version of Android big. In a long form Bloomberg Businessweek profile on Sundar Pichai, the Android chief said he plans to preview the "L" release of Android during the conference's opening day today. The move would be a significant shift towards greater transparency; the search giant has classically withheld its annual operating system updates until fall. In the interview, Pichai said he wants, "the world to understand what [Google is] doing sooner." More importantly, he remarked that manufactures have complained the latest versions of Android have always been revealed too late for device makers to implement. Up until now, Nexus phones were often the only handsets to get the latest software first. With this year's early preview, we could see the latest versions of Android land on all devices sooner. Goodbye, Google TVAlongside an early look at Android "L," Google IO may include an introduction to Android TV. Leaked on April 6, the new entertainment platform will purportedly include Netflix, YouTube, and other video streaming service apps arranged in easy-to-navigate cards similar to the Apple TV set-top box. To help prevent repeating the same mistakes that plagued Google TV into obsolescence, Pichai has supposedly brought everyone working on the TV software into one team to create a single, consistent experience. Given the company's recent success with Chromecast, Google should have an easier time attracting content providers. Additionally, it should have a cache of streaming apps that already work with the new entertainment platform. Don't forget Android WearIn a brief mention, Pichai said he would announce new manufacturing partners and devices utilizing Google's wearable platform, Android Wear. Health tracking was on the Android point man's tongue, which means we will likely see fitness trackers and biosensor-equipped wearable computers.        | | Moto X+1 flaunts a case and dual speakers in leaked shots Jun 24th 2014, 18:35, by klee 
Leaks have spilled the beans on the Moto X+1's looks, specs and now its potential bumper case. Infamous tech hardware tipster @evleaks posted a new image of Motorola's much-rumored next flagship handset donning a full body case. From the front-side renderings of the Moto X+1, we can see that it has adopted some of the Moto E's styling, including dual speaker grills. Around back there's a bit less going on aside from a large porthole window for the camera. Curiously there's no cutout for the handset's built-in flash. There are also two holes that could be for the phone's microphones and its always-on voice command features. 
I really want to know who are you? The device also appears to have a longer chin compared to the last few images we saw on June 16. Because of these discrepancies we're going to take an extra grain of salt with these new images, which could just be a photoshopped Moto E, especially as it seems to be running a fully stock version of Android KitKat. While we're not entirely certain if this is the real Moto X+1, more credible reports have said the next Motorola handset will have considerable upgrades, including a larger 5.2-inch display and Kevlar-patterned back. The Moto X+1 could come with a larger 1920 x 1080 resolution screen, two full gigabytes of RAM and a more substantial Snapdragon 800 processor. Word on the net also suggests Motorola is planning a premium model complete with 64GB and microSD slot.        | |
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