WCF (or alternative) Controller-worker setup on machines across the internet

Question

We have a .net monitoring service that runs on several PCs installed across the UK at client locations. We need to be able to communicate with these pc's from a central web application in order to send them individual commands and request data from them.

These PCs all have internet connectivity but may be behind firewalls. Because these PCs may not be contactable directly from a URL, we need some way for these "workers" to connect to the centralised sever, identify themselves, and then respond to commands from the server.

We are looking at WCF P2P as a solution, but have a few concerns about this (can you target an individual worker with this, and will we suffer problems with NATs and firewalls). We also considered using XMPP as a protocol to communicate.

Is P2P the way forwards, or is there a better solution (either WCF or otherwise).

Thanks

Answer 1

I suggest using netPeerTcpBinding .

There is a good article here .