TheRealTimeWeb.com - Collaboration

LiveCycle Collaboration Service Gets a New Lease Of Life

Wed, 17 Oct 2012 07:26:00 +0100

Adobe's LiveCycle Collaboration Service has been rescued and given a new lease of life by Influxis. Now called the Influxis Collaboration Service (ICS) it gives existing LCCS customers the chance to migrate their applications over to ICS. If you recall, Adobe previously announced that they would shut down and discontinue the LCCS service without any obvious ways for existing customers to keep their LCCS based products and services online - ICS is therefore good news for many of those customers.

ICS will be comprised of two different account types, dedicated and shared accounts, with various price points starting at $25/month for a 10connection shared account. An extensive FAQ can be found on the Influxis site.

As you may know, LCCS (or now ICS) enables you to build real-time collaborative applications quickly using a variety of pre-built modules including FileShare, Chat, Whiteboard, Webcam and of course - dare I mention it - screensharing.

Let me know if you're building any applications with ICS and I'll link to them here.

Adobe To Shut Down LCCS, Customers Badly Affected

Fri, 23 Mar 2012 08:34:00 +0100

After several recent announcement around Adobe's LiveCycle platform, it may not come as a surprise to some that the LiveCycle Collaboration Service (formerly Cocomo, formerly Flash Collaboration Service) will be shut down at the end of 2012. What may be a surprise however is the relatively short notice that Adobe is giving existing customers and a total lack of a migration path, leaving many people in a real tight spot.

Remember that LCCS is a hosted collaboration service, effectively cloud based, that allows developers to build real-time communications right into their Flex applications. The work that has gone into LCCS is impressive, and the platform offers a range of great features such as room provisioning APIs, live and audio and video communications (both over RTMFP and RTMP) and even screensharing capabilites (but let's not warm that topic up again...).

Put yourself into the shoes of an existing LCCS customer who has made a significant investment into the product - they are pretty much on their own going forward. It is no mean feat to engineer a similar service on top of FMS (a suggested migration path by the LCCS Product Manager), irrespective of the license fees that FMS would attract. Says one poster on the Adobe forum: "Companies may very well go out of business because of this decision. It's a pretty shameful act."

Make no mistake, FMS is not a straight forward alternative if you are used to LCCS, and suggesting so only confuses people. This is already evident in the forums where one user asks: "Will you be offering the code/installation instructions so that we can get this set up on FMS?"
Clearly the complexities of building a large scale collaborative application on top of FMS is not being grasped by some. There is no way to simply 'install' an LCCS app on FMS. Instead you are looking at weeks, more likely months, of engineering effort.

Some of my readers may know that a large part of my time is spent developing and maintaining Scribblar.com, a live collaboration app built on top of Flex and FMS. When LCCS first launched I carefully considered whether or not to port my product away from FMS to LCCS - I decided to stick with FMS. With hindsight that was the right decision - had I ported to LCCS then Adobe would just have introduced major costs and headaches at best, or killed my entire product at worst. What a mess.

I do need to add a few words about screensharing since forum users have asked about it. The screensaver add-on for Flash Player is not simply a feature of LCCS, it also requires Flash Player hooks to work. This means that even if Adobe was to open source LCCS (which they have stated already they will not do) you would not simply have screensharing features magically appear and work with FMS. No doubt this could be done with if Adobe wanted to make it happen, but I doubt very much that they have any interest in this.
Remember we have been asking for screensharing support for FMS for more than 10(!) years (remember my post about vendor lockout?). Yet FMS has stood still since its 1.0 launch as far as real-time communication features are concerned - instead time and effort was spent on the LCCS side to build an entire new platform plus component set, something we have not had in FMS since FCS 1.0.

I am gutted about the missed opportunities and I feel sorry for those businesses affected by the LCCS shutdown. If there is one positive takeaway from this then it should be the lesson of caveat emptor when building a business around a hosted service. If reliance on a single provider can make or break your product or service then it is time to make some backup plans.

Have you been affected by the LCCS shut down? What are your plans going forward? Please leave a comment below.

Stratus 2 Released, Takes Peer to Peer in Flash to New Levels

Sat, 23 Jan 2010 16:33:00 +0100

Adobe have just announced the immediate availability of the version 2 of Stratus, an update to the existing Peer 2 Peer rendezvous service that was launched in 2008.

In Adobe's words: "Adobe Stratus 2 enables peer assisted networking using the Real Time Media Flow Protocol (RTMFP) within the Adobe Flash Platform. The most important features of RTMFP include low latency, end-to-end peering capability, security and scalability. These properties make RTMFP especially well suited for developing real-time collaboration applications by not only providing superior user experience but also reducing cost for operators."

While this sounds like the same capabilities that the previous version of Stratus offered it contains some significant updates, the main one being support for RTMFP Groups.As you can probably guess from the name, Groups allows you to target a specific group of connected Flash Player peers and treat them like - for example - a particular room of users in a chat application. Groups will allow for FMS-like real-time enabled applications to be developed on top of Stratus, in a peer to peer environment, but without requiring a server technology to manage or relay the data that is being sent from user to user.
Other updates include the support for direct routing, which is comparable to a Client.call on FMS. Direct routing allows for data messages to be sent to a specific user within a group. Posting and Object Replication are now also supported.

Another major feature update is that of Application-Level Multicast. This feature essentially makes high bitrate broadcasts such as video and audio streaming infinitely scalable, provided that there is a large audience of peers available to re-transmit the data. This can potentially mean immense savings on bandwidth costs since data is being broadcast through a mesh of connected Flash Player peers rather than through a cluster of servers.

Lastly, an upcoming version of Flash Media Server will also support a rendezvous service such as the one that Stratus 2 offers - remember that a rendezvous service is always needed before peer connections can be made. However once the peer connections are established no more data will flow through the server.

RTMFP Groups is a massive feature, and so far hugely underestimated in terms of the potential it offers. I've seen very few mainstream technology blogs picking up on this yet, but if Adobe executes this properly it could be a real game-changer for real-time collaboration and large scale live streaming, in particular given the pervasiveness of the Flash Player. Moreover, there are already several examples of basic P2P file sharing with Stratus and Flash/AIR. Oh yes.

The Stratus page on labs is here, and there's more info on Groups here.

Making Sense of Stratus, LCCS and FMS

Wed, 07 Oct 2009 22:44:00 +0100

There has been a bit of confusion around which one of Adobe's collaborative platforms offers or will offer certain features. In particular many people have asked if a developer always needs to rely on a hosted service such as Stratus or Lifecycle Collaboration Service (aka AFCS aka Cocomo) when wanting to use the new RTMFP protocol which will deliver (partly is delivering already) new and exciting features to the Flash Player.

To clear thing up, Kevin Towes, FMS Product Manager at Adobe, just posted the following information to the FlashMedia List:

STRATUS - this will always be ahead of the curve, providing a way to help us roll out new features that are in Flash player, before we can have a server offering. The service is and will remain as a free non-commercial service from Adobe. This service is not FMS, and has no ability for Server side scripting, or customization.

AFCS/LIVECYCLE COLLABORATION SERVICE - this will be a commercial option for customers interested in building a business that includes RTMFP. We introduced a pricing model, and it has support for the features found inside Stratus 1.0 (supporting Flash player 10.0). Key advantage with this service is the framework, which is an option for developers to get started, and leverage RTMFP to RTMP failover technology. You still will not have access to server side scripting, but there are lots of APIs in the framework to get you going. The goal for this service is to provide developers an option to bring this technology into your solution.

FLASH MEDIA SERVER - we have not announced any new version of FMS yet that will support RTMFP. We did hint yesterday that we'll be updating FMS3.5 to version 3.5.3 later this year to support the new FP 10.1 features - and in a future version after that release - FMS may be one of your options to host a local service to build your own P2P applications - including introductions, and supporting server side programming.

Thanks Kevin, I think this clears things up somewhat.

Making Sense of Stratus, LCCS and FMS

Fri, 10 Jul 2009 22:44:00 +0100

To clear thing up, Kevin Towes, FMS Product Manager at Adobe, just posted the following information to the FlashMedia List:

Thanks Kevin, I think this clears things up somewhat.

Behind-the-Scenes Peak at ConnectNow and AFCS Architecture

Mon, 18 May 2009 12:46:00 +0100

InfoQ has an interesting article about Adobe's Collaboration Platforms including ConnectNow and AFCS. In it Raffaele Sena who is a Senior Computer Scientist in Adobe's Business Productivity Unit talks about the scalability challenges of a system such as Connect and how the team has addressed them.
In particular he mentions the use of Terracotta and how it helped scale the system by providing the cluster with distributed memory that also makes failover scenarios much easier to handle. It's an interesting read.

Adobe Wants Your Feedback on AFCS Pricing

Tue, 31 Mar 2009 14:59:00 +0100

The Collaborative Methods blog has seen an update in which Varun Parmar, the AFCS Product Manager, is asking for feedback on the proposed pricing models for AFCS (aka Cocomo). For those not in the know, AFCS stands for Adobe Flash Collaboration Service, a hosted service that provides real-time capabilities to Flex and AIR based applications. It runs on the Adobe Connect backend and provides a similar feature set to Adobe's own product (similar, yes, not identical but let's not go into that now ;-)

The proposed pricing models are, as you can imagine, fairly complex since they aim to support a variety of different usage models as well as data intensive or messaging intensive applications. The proposed models will include par per use pricing as well as a zero upfront costs, both of which are plus points in my book. What remains to be seen is how the running costs of AFCS compare to something like FMS, especially for smaller apps that do not require the infinite scalability of a cloud based service.

I cannot remember a time in which Adobe would ask its customers for feedback on proposed pricing *before* the product was fully released and I would therefore urge everyone to voice their opinions on the proposed pricing models now. Note that actual figures on price points have not yet been made public, but as Varun outlines this will happen in the not too distant future.

Screensharing in AFCS (Cocomo) - Are the Foundations Being Laid?

Wed, 04 Mar 2009 15:46:00 +0100

Don't worry, this is not going to be another episode of me harping on about the need for screensharing in Flash, and AFCS in particular. But it is about a little discovery I made when working with AFCS (top secret project ;) over the last week or two.
I needed to extend the SharedWhiteBoard component and prevent it from connecting automatically when it was added to the display list. That turned out to be pretty easy, and whilst scrolling through the list of AFCS classes in Eclipse to pick out SharedWhiteBoard I found this:

There are several classes which, judging by their names, have some role to play during a screen share session.
Unfortunately the sources for those classes are not included with the AFCS SDK, instead these are baked into the SWC. The source code that is available however also makes a few loose references to screensharing, and the grouping and managing of screenshare-originated streams.

So who knows, maybe the foundations for screensharing are being laid. One can hope.

Bye Bye Cocomo, Hello Flash Collaboration Service

Fri, 13 Feb 2009 12:43:00 +0100

The wait is over: Adobe have just announced the official name for what was the service code named Cocomo. The official name is now Adobe Flash Collaboration Service (which in short would make it AFCS, or even shorter FCS - ring any bells? :).

Adobe describes AFCS as follows: "Adobe Flash Collaboration Service is a Platform as a Service that allows Flex developers to easily add real-time social capabilities into their RIA (Rich Internet Applications). Comprised of both Flex-based client components and a hosted services infrastructure, Adobe Flash Collaboration Service allows you to build real-time, multi-user applications with Flex in less time than ever before. And because Acrobat.com hosts the service, issues like deployment, maintenance, and scalability are taken care of for you."

I personally love real-time capabilities in web apps and AFCS (just like FMS) really excites me. I have a long list of ideas that I'd love to build with it. What's tricky right now is picking the right tool for the job. My current tool of choice is FMS and has 90% of the features I need in a real-time enabled web app. The developer workflow may not be best with FMS still stuck at AS1 on the server side and very limited APIs for the outside world to talk to it, but most of the time I can build what I want with it.

AFCS on the other hand is tempting since I no longer need to worry about scalability, plus Adobe gives me a whle new bunch of Flex components I can use ready to roll. I can also build on top of the underlying data model and come up with my own components. Very powerful stuff.

The questions that remain unanswered (but which will no doubt be answered soon) are those of pricing, amongst other things.
The future for Flash powered RIAs looks bright, and I cannot wait to dig deeper into the new AFCS. Adobe now needs to make it clear to potential customers how AFCS differs from FMS, and when we should use which platform. I cannot help but notice that by renaming Flash Communication Server to Flash Media Server and naming Flash Collaboration Service the way they did they are giving some clear signals of what type of apps they'd like to see on which platform. FMS is getting tons of attention, but 99% of that attention is for streaming video and not real-time apps.

I will feel sad if FMS will be put on the back burner when it comes to developing collaborative apps, but then I guess things change, priorities change and new platforms emerge. Exciting times and exciting apps ahead, I hope FMS will remain part of this ecosystem.

Using RTMFP with Cocomo

Thu, 15 Jan 2009 13:48:00 +0100

Nigel Pegg recently posted about how to use RTMFP in Cocomo. I really want to get more to grips with Cocomo so I spent the morning setting up the provided examples and generally reading up on the docs. Cocomo is a very exciting technology, but I think Adobe *must* add both screensharing as well as recording capabilities to the platform. Without both of those features it will seem like a watered down version of Connect, and not something that's on par.

Actually this reminds me - I've had two separate clients ask me about the relationship between Connect Pro, Acrobat Connect Now and Cocomo. While I know what Cocomo is and does I never thought about Connect Pro and Acrobat Connect Now. In fact I didn't even know they were two separate products or services... What both clients told me was that they really like the Connect Now UI (I think this is what previously code named Brio) but did not like the more expensive Connect Pro so much. However paying extra to lift the limit on Connect Now does not seem to be possible. Very weird, and a slightly fragmented setup. Adobe is missing a trick here since users are not getting what they want. Maybe connect Pro will be updated to have the Connect Now UI sometime soon? If not then Cocomo may be your best bet - roll your own look and feel - but of course we need those aforementioned features...

Sorry I got sidetracked there... the reason for this blog post is a different one. While I was playing with the Cocomo SDK I followed the instructions to set up Flex Builder (FB). I added the Flash Player 10 Cocomo SWC to my library path and also added the source code to the source path, according to the Cocomo docs:
Setting the source path for debugging
If you'd like to use Cocomo's supplied source code to help with debugging:
1. Choose the Source path tab.
2. Choose Add Folder...
3. Navigate to /src/.
4. Choose OK.

If after that you try and use the protocol property on the AdobeHSAuthenticator class however FB will complain about that property not being present on AdobeHSAuthenticator. I figured that FB was likely looking at the source rather than the SWC, so I removed the sources again from my project. Bingo, that worked and FB stopped complaining, my project compiled and I can now use RTMFP in my Cocomo rooms.
I figured I'd post this here to help others but also ask: is it possible to have both the sources and the SWC added to FB to aid with debugging, but have FB pick the 'right' code, in this case the SWC?

Cocomo Now Out on Labs

Mon, 17 Nov 2008 21:29:00 +0100

Just a quick note in case you've missed it, Cocomo is now up on Adobe Labs. Give it a spin.

Speaking At The European eLearning Summit

Mon, 18 Aug 2008 17:10:00 +0100

Finally a conference on my doorstep! Tomorrow afternoon I will be hosting a session on 'Collaboration with Flash Media Server' at the European eLearning Summit in Nottingham. I am hoping to show lots of examples and allow the audience to join in - may the WIFI be with us.

Later this year (but not much later actually...) I will present a similar session at Flash on the Beach, the main difference being that the session in Brighton will have a bit more of a focus on code as well as a some inspirational pieces.
If you attend either one of the conference then please find me and say hi.

At b.TWEEN08 in Manchester

Thu, 19 Jun 2008 13:06:00 +0100

I've just arrived at b.TWEEN08 in Manchester.

The official line about the event is as follows: b.TWEEN is a unique cross media gathering where interactive ideas are seeded, shared and sold.
(It uses technology in innovative ways and radical formats to deliver cutting edge, interactive events with networking and business at their core.
b.TWEEN is about knowledge sharing, being inspired, learning from peers and doing deals.

My company muchosmedia has built the text chat that runs alongside the live webcast (all the streaming is being handled by our friends at Kinura). What's unique about the chat is that we've come up with and built a gateway to allow the audience to take part in the chat (which is projected onto a big screen at the venue) via sending an SMS text message to a dedicated number. I'll post some images as soon as I can.

New Version of Adobe Connect Announced

Tue, 06 May 2008 10:48:00 +0100

The next version of Adobe Acrobat Connect Pro (I still haven;t figured out why they had to name it Acrobat) has been announced and will be available towards the end of the month. The full press release is here.

As you may know, Connect is built on top of FMS and leverages most of its features. Presenters can also run a special version of the Flash Player which features screen sharing capabilities, amongst other things.

Try BRIO, the Next Generation of Adobe Connect

Fri, 07 Dec 2007 22:00:00 +0100

Adobe have launched the public beta of BRIO, the codename for their next version of Adobe Connect, formerly Breeze. All you FMS heads out there know that Breeze and Connect owe a lot to FMS, upon which it is based.
In BRIO it appears that the Adobe engineers have rebuilt the UI in Flex and so far it looks quite promising. I encountered a few bugs such as my iSight not getting detected and the screensharing addin throwing an error upon first install but these problems are to be expected with an early beta.
You can sign up for the beta here or also try jumping onto the Cocomo (I told you I'd stop camelcasing it) prerelease via this page.