Is it possible for a desktop application to communicate with a javascript API that will affect the user's browser? For example, I would like to call a JS API of a web service even if the browser is not in focus. The user can select various functions from within the desktop application and it will take effect in the browser. thanks
You probably want to consider automating the browser from your application. As you are using .NET, WatiN is a good option to do that:
WatiN
To get something like that to work you would need to have your web app call for updates on a regular interval and then make the appropriate changes.
Your desktop app can make requests to whatever web interface you wish to access data. It really depends on how you build it out.
Is this an existing app? Are you building something new? More info would be nice to have to get more specific.
Related
I am trying to work with the asana API in my C# Windows Application and have several questions I'd like to ask.
When you register your application with asana, it wants to know APP NAME, APP URL, REDIRECT URL. If it's a windows application, what values might I supply for the second two prompts?
When that is entered, you get a client id and a client secret. Is this completely different than the apikey? Is the former for OAuth and the latter for asana, or does asana work in conjunction with OAuth?
Basically I want to take a request like this: https://app.asana.com/api/1.0/tasks//stories?opt_pretty and get back in my application the same json I see when I issue the request in my browser.
You can provide localhost
You should definitely have a look at https://asana.com/developers
Your answer is there https://community.asana.com/t/can-a-windows-application-be-registered/23381 !
Good luck ;)
I am helping to build Elpis, which is an open source pandora music player, built with C# and WPF.
Now what i want is to add an HTTP API so that the user may control the program through a browser, like play/pause, like/dislike the current song.
The point afterwards is to control the program through a mobile device accessing the HTTP API.
How exactly should i build the HTTP API so that it can control it?
Github for the project: https://github.com/adammhaile/Elpis
Without knowing why exactly you want the user to control a GUI application via the browser, it's hard to give you good advise.
Assuming you are running your GUI on Windows, take a look at OWIN and the project Katana. They allow you to easily host HTTP interfaces in your own application.
It may be overkill for your project but I would suggest using ASP.NET Web API so that you can build backend web services.
The easiest way to do what you want, assuming you really want to "control the GUI remotely" is to just install TeamViewer on your PC and on your mobile device. Then you could remote in and completely control your GUI.
But I what I think you're after is something more like Google Music. Where you can stream your music through the Internet and onto your mobile devices. If this is the case, I recommend you look at the ASP.NET Web API.
It's not hard to build a web server in C#. You can embed it into your application, and expose parts of your application to HTTP endpoints as an API. You can use the HttpListener class which is part of .NET, and do everything from the ground up yourself. Or you could use something like Nancy, which is a lightweight framework that provides a lot of useful scaffolding like URL routing.
Ended up using Kayak(https://github.com/kayak/kayak) for my self-hosted API.
The example of integration can be seen here:
https://github.com/adammhaile/Elpis/blob/master/Elpis/WebInterface.cs
A while ago I created an ASP.NET MVC Web Application for android devices. The application also used jQuery mobile to set up navigation etc.
At the moment, the application is simply being hosted and the androids webview accesses it that way.
The application works as expected, but I was wondering, is it possible to store the MVC web-app on the phone/integrate it into the apk?
I would like to be able to have it run the web-pages while the device is offline. I know it is possible to run simple HTML in the webview but I haven't been able to find anything about something like an ASP.NET MVC web-app. Is this done using phonegap?
Thanks.
I don't think you can do it directly with PhoneGap, from the PhoneGap FAQ
Q: Can you use PHP/ASP/JSF/Java/.NET with PhoneGap?
A: A PhoneGap application may only use HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.
However, you can make use of network protocols (XmlHTTPRequest, Web Sockets,
etc) to easily communicate with backend services written in any language.
This allows your PhoneGap app to remotely access existing business processes
while the device is connected to the Internet.
So if you are going the PhoneGap route, you'll have to write it in HTML/CSS/JavaScript. However if you more comfortable in .NET and C# then there is always Xamarin Android which has a free starter version that you can try out. Do realize though that if you go that route it will be a mobile app and not a wrapped ASP.NET app.
If I understand correctly I think what you want to do is serve your data via a web service (MVC4 web api is pretty simple to setup). Then you'd consume that data with your android app and you could more easily cache that data for offline use.
I am building a Desktop application that interacts with Google Contacts. I have been trying to authenticate the application using google supplied OAuthUtil, but cant get it to work...
it seems it is only suitable for webapplication because of the callback url you have to provide, I think that because the function OAuthUtil.GetUnauthorizedRequestToken returns void...
I'm not that familiar with C# or I'd try and write some example code. However, looking at their docs you have to open a web browser and detect whatever callback you sent. When you detect the callback you then redirect to the client program.
http://code.google.com/apis/accounts/docs/OAuthForInstalledApps.html
It seems they're working on being able to make a REST request to their servers so that you don't have to have a web browser. http://sites.google.com/site/oauthgoog/UXFedLogin/nobrowser/input-capable-devices
Even for things, without a web browser they're current suggestion is to provide a pin, which you then have the user register on a device with a web browser.
http://sites.google.com/site/oauthgoog/UXFedLogin/nobrowser
I've a general design question:
I have a mailserver, written in C#.
Then I have a web forum software, written in for ASP.NET in C#.
Now I'd like to integrate the mailserver into the ASP.NET forum application.
For example, I'd like to make it possible that one can create a mailinglist from the forum, and give users the oportunity to add oneselfs to the mailinglist members in the forum, and then add the new list-members to the respective mailinglist on the server.
Since the server is a separate console/winforms/service application, I first thought I'd best use .NET remoting for this.
But my second thought was, that some users might host their forum on a host where
(a) they don't have a virtual machine where they can do what they want
(b) the admin of the host might not want to install an additional mailserver or charge extra for this
(c) the user might have a service plan that only permits to add a web-application, not external programs (very likely)
Now, I wanted to ask:
Is it possible to fully integrate a mailserver into an ASP.NET application somehow ?
(I have the full source of the server + ASP.NET application)
Well, it probably won't be a page or a ashx handler, but something like a http module ?
Or what's the general way to integrate TCP/IP applications into asp.net ?
(Of course I'm assuming the respecive ports are available/forwarded - and I'll make it possible to also run it with the e-mail server as external application)
In the ideal case I'd do the following:
Set it up on your own server(s) and expose a WCF/web service that your web app will/can interact with.
If you can't or don't want to afford to keep it running on your own, you could then charge a subscription fee for it.
It's probably not a very great idea, but you can start a thread in Global.asax and do background processing while the application pool is running/the web app is not reloaded. So you could start your server there, but you have no control over the lifetime of it
Adding to chris166's comment... you also wouldn't get control over when the application is started. [Since the application won't be loaded until a page is requested...] Its probably a better idea to setup some sort of integration between the web app and the console/service app.
I'd probably tend towards setting up a near-realtime integration where the mailserver polls the forum app for requested changes.