GSOC: Android client potential

[Michael Zangl]

Am 13.04.2013 23:51, schrieb Tobia Tesan:
 > Il 13/04/2013 23:20, Michael Zangl ha scritto:
 >>
 >> * Write something that relays messages from a normal PC to Android, to
 >> not need Android staying connected to all the accounts. This could be
 >> done by writing a stand-alone client for Android and a plugin for
 >> pidgin. Or it can be done by adapting libpurple to support this sort
 >> of synchronisation, so that you do not need an Android client for
 >> testing, but it will work on Android as soon as libpurple works on
 >> Android. This would then also be a nice project for somebody who is
 >> not familiar with the JNI or Android API.
 >
 > Hi Michael, I'm not sure if I understand what you mean here (I've reread
 > the paragraph a hundred times to no avail, I guess I just need more
 > coffee).
 > Why would this be useful?
 > Would this be for testing purpouses?

Hi,

You are right, I should have clarified my Ideas more. This point 
includes two Ideas:
* The Android "proxy" client, see [1]. This is based on a libpurple 
plugin that sends incoming messages on to an Android app.
* A libpurple change (probably you need some more changes than just a 
plugin) that will allow you to do this with any two running libpurple 
instances. Once connected, one then acts as a server, while the other 
one acts as a client and gets all data bundled from the 
libpurple-server. The user of the library does not see this, all 
protocol interactions are just relayed to the server. The moment the 
server is not online, you could fall back to normal protocol 
implementations.
The idea is that this way, you could do a great job minimizing the 
network traffic and therefore the power requirements for libpurple, 
which is great for running it on mobile devices.
This mechanism would also include synchronizing the Account and buddy 
list (and probably chat history), so it is also an useful service for 
normal users.

Michael

[1] https://developer.pidgin.im/wiki/FutureSOCProjects