使用Azure的Windows 8和Windows Phone推送通知

Question

I've looked into Azure Mobile Services and found its great but does not give me the flexibility I want (Node.js also leaves a bad taste in my mouth coming from C#).

I was using periodic update notifications in Windows 8 and already have an ASP.NET Web API project supplying tile images and tile xml content. I was hoping to use an Azure Worker Role with Azure storage tables for Push Notifications for Windows 8 and Windows Phone.

I found this example but it seems to be for VS2012 Release Preview. I can't find an updated version or any other samples to work with. In particular I want my service to support both Windows 8 and Windows Phone.

http://watwindows8.codeplex.com/wikipage?title=Push%20Notification%20Worker%20Sample

If anyone can outline the references/nuget packages I need. It would be a great help.

EDIT:

Jim O'Neil's blog is a good starting point. I need to use a Azure Worker Role because I want to send my notifications periodically.

I also found the WnsRecipe NuGet package for sending push notifications from the server. Jim O'Neil solution is just as good.

Finally, to save a bit of time, I was hoping to avoid writing data acess code for registering apps channel ID's to a table on the server. The Azure Mobile Services MobileServiceClient class is a great solution to this as it lets you do all of this with a couple of lines of code. The table is available through REST services. However, questions remain:

1. Can I continue using the Mobile Services Table Storage MobileServiceClient with my app and Azure Worker Role or do I have to use Azure Table Storage?
2. If I can use MobileServiceClient, how do I access the table from my Azure Worker Role?
3. If I have to use Azure Table Storage which also provides a REST service for free, how can I access the table from my Windows 8 app?

Answer 1

Strictly speaking, no NuGet packages are needed, they are just wrappers for functionality (it's all REST/OAuth under the covers) to make your life easier. As you observed, the Windows Azure Toolkit for Windows 8 and Windows Phone has been somewhat supplanted by Windows Azure Mobile Services .

If you want to do it all yourself, you can check out a three part blog series I did on using Azure Web Sites for Push Notifications . It's Web Sites, not Web Roles, but that part is fairly interchangeable; although, I'd say that Web Sites are going to be a far more economical option here unless you already have a service implemented that you are using.

I don't have Windows Phone incorporated into that series, and Windows Phone does use a slightly different notification mechanism from Windows 8, but that's on my to-do list, and hopefully what is there will get you going in the right direction.

Answer 2

When you use the MobileServiceClient to store data in Mobile Services, you are actually storing your data in a SQL Azure database. You have a number of options when it comes to accessing this data from your worker role.

• Connect directly using a SQL client. This could be Entity Framework, a different ORM, or even raw ADO.NET. You can get the connection string for your database by selecting it in the Azure portal. On the dashboard tab there is an option to show connection strings.
• Use a client library to access the data via Mobile Services. Unfortunately we do not have an official SDK that can be used from a worker role yet but the good news is that there is an unofficial package on NuGet
• Access the data directly via the HTTP endpoint that Mobile Services provides by making HTTP requests. The API is documented here .

Answer 3

Windows Azure Service Bus just released a new feature that allows to push Windows 8 (and iOS) notifications from C# back-ends (and soon from Mobile Services too), with no need top handle ChannelURIs at all.

Take a look at: http://channel9.msdn.com/Shows/Cloud+Cover/Episode-100-Introduction-to-the-Windows-Azure-Service-Bus-Notification-Hubs

Windows 8 code walkthrough: http://channel9.msdn.com/Blogs/Subscribe/Service-Bus-Notification-Hubs-Code-Walkthrough-Windows-8-Edition

If you try it, let me know what you think!