Question

I’m thinking about developing an iPhone/Android app which will include a server side.

For some parts, I don’t mind retrieve the data from the server just getting the info in a regular request. But one of the functionality I want to implement is a Whats-app like (but with groups…) Which will be the best way to implement it? (push notifications?)

Which will you choose and what’s your experience with both: GAE vs AWS?

Thanks!

Answer 1

Let’s start from the WhatsApp-clone perspective:

1. If a client does not have your app then the only way to engage him in chat is to send him a SMS.

2. If client does have the app, but the app is inactive then you can use a push notification to engage him in chat.

3. If app is active, then you need some kind of real time two-way communication to exchange chat messages. On the low-level this would be TCP sockets.

Now on to technology:

1. Both GAE and EC2 can not send SMS messages on its own. You’d need to use a SMS gateway service. There are plenty to choose from.

2. To send push notifications to iPhones via APNS you need sockets, for Android C2DM you only need Http POST. So EC2 can do both, but GAE can only do android (since it does not support sockets). Anyhow push can be complex so you might want to use and external service like Urban Airship or Xtify, but they tend to get pricey when traffic goes up.

3. To have real-time two way chat you need sockets. Only EC2 supports sockets.

So for this particular case you’d be better off with EC2.