Built.io, has announces that it is releasing unprecedented realtime capabilities to subscribers of its flagship mobile Backend-as-a-Service (mBaaS). With this major enhancement of its architecture, Built.io Backend becomes the enterprise mBaaS to offer full support for cross-platform realtime integration.
Built.io Backend previously enabled near-realtime communication for web applications and select mobile use cases via its support for WebHooks. This upgrade, by contrast, introduces a massively scalable realtime platform specifically optimised for mobile. Any application powered by Built.io Backend can now tap into bi-directional, event-based communication, which greatly enhances the power of mobile applications and is a prerequisite for many IoT use cases.
“In the past, developers had to choose between a mobile backend lacking realtime, or a dedicated realtime system without the capabilities required for serious mobile app development,” said Nishant Patel, CTO at Built.io. “Now, developers can leverage realtime communication right alongside essential mobile backend capabilities, such as built-in notifications, analytics, and content management – all with the premium security and reliability demanded by enterprises.”
By implementing the increasingly popular WebSocket protocol, events – such as changes to data in an application, or conditions reported by a sensor – can be immediately communicated across systems. Built.io Backend obviates the need for common, inelegant workarounds – such as manual polling – which are particularly poorly suited for devices with limited battery, processing and bandwidth capabilities.
“Realtime in Built.io Backend saved us many hours of learning sockets and debugging our Node.js stack. Built.io Backend allowed us to upgrade our application features to realtime with just a few lines of code,” said Eric Nelson, co-founder of TouchFreight, an award-winning logistics application and recent recipient of the Washburn Prize for Innovation.
“From fleet management a la TouchFreight, to live heatmaps indicating a gathering crowd, messaging clients using a ‘presence’ indicator, and data syncing – realtime use cases are endless and extremely powerful,” said Matthew Baier, COO of Built.io. “Case in point, we use realtime on our own campus to connect our HV/AC infrastructure to an array of environmental sensors. By enabling a direct feedback loop via a realtime app, this deceptively simple use case ended up slashing our energy costs by 70 percent.”
Realtime support is available immediately. Developers can take advantage of the new capabilities by downloading the updated SDK from the Built.io developer portal at https://docs.Built.io.
