Novas arquiteturas Web para aplicações VoIP

Abstract

Com a crescente migração das aplicações do desktop para o browser, a Google decidiu criar uma nova tecnologia para permitir aos browsers o acesso nativo a cameras e microfones, bem como a capacidade de comunicação direta audio e vídeo entre browsers. Desta forma, todo um leque de aplicações, nomeadamente aplicações Voice over IP (VoIP), podem também ser migradas para páginas Web sem a necessidade de utilizar plugins externos e que causam alguma inércia em diferentes browsers e Sistemas Operativos. A WIT-Software S.A., empresa especialista em aplicações móveis e em soluções que convergem vídeo, áudio, serviços de mensagens e de transferências de conteúdos, disponibiliza versões destas soluções para PC, Android, iPhone, iPad, Symbian e Web. Esta ultima foi criada usando a framework Flex e recorrendo ao plugin Adobe Flash. O desafio criado é a definição de uma nova arquitetura para os produtos VoIP web-based, baseados nas tecnologias emergentes Web Real Time Communication (WebRTC) e HyperText Markup Language 5 (HTML5), incluindo a criação de um cliente que cumpra as normas Rich Communications Services.

The appearance of cheap audio and video devices and the fact that they are already included in almost all computers, added to the availability of higher speed Internet connections, have increased the interest in the creation of a system capable of establishing calls in this network (VoIP). Lately, the number of applications that are being migrated from desktop to browsers have increased and so, Google decided to create a technology proposal to allow browsers native access to microphones and cameras, and also the capability to exchange multimedia data between browsers. The created technology is called WebRTC and its main purpose is to allow that a whole new segment of applications, namely VoIP applications, can also be migrated to Web pages without the use of external plugins, that bring problems when dealing with different Operative Systems and different browsers. WIT it’s a Portuguese company focused in mobile applications and solutions that converge video, audio, instant messages and content transfer, offers several applications with such capabilities for PC, Android, iPhone, iPad, Symbian and Web. This last one was built using Flex framework based on Adobe Flash plugin. With the emergence of technologies such as WebRTC and HTML5, a new challenge appeared for the definition of a new architecture for web-based VoIP products, including the creation of a client that follows the RCS specifications. A new Web application was developed in the context of this project, that does not need the installation of any external plugin in the browser, and has the capability to start and receive WebRTC audio and video calls and also some RCS capabilities. The final application was built under a scalable and future-proof architecture and is able to inter-operate with all the current applications of the company and with other standard systems. The built system was demonstrated in several events all over the world.