How to update content based on user actions [like the facebook wall] - php

For my next application i would like to implement something that has a feature like the facebook wall but let me explain a bit. For those of you who used facebook you know that when somebody posts a message on your wall, and you are logged in to your account, you will get a notification immediately somewhere in the lower left corner. Lately they even pushed this a little bit further and if somebody comments on it the comments are updated as you visualize the page, it's like an instant chat.
My application will be developed in PHP, I will use Zend Framework to do it. I'm interested in the basic principle that makes the facebook wall behave like that (updates in real time). I know there is ajax involved but I can't really tell how is the javascript triggered when the user is doing something. Or even more, how to push back to a user some info that was added after he viewed the page. For example, let's say that a somebody adds me as a friend. I would like to see a notification saying "X has added you as a friend" if i am logged in. I hope you understand what I'm trying to do.
If you can tell me some basic ideas, maybe provide some links that have this information I would be very grateful.
Thank you for your time in reading this.

you need to look at comet , reverse ajax , ajax polling

If some event is triggered, then store the event on database (with ajax or without ajax).
You will be needing a script in server to check if some event has been triggered or not. This script should be able to check events that are stored in database.
You need to execute script in step 2 periodically. This can be acheived with with ajax (javascript or jquery) and a function settimeout (on javascript) to send ajax request to server periodically.
Changes are sent from server. So parse the response and update in page using javascipt and jquery.
So, it can be summarized as
Register an event (for one user)
Check the event (for other user)
Parse the response and update the page
There are several elegant ways to do this as answered by others.
The best would be the start the project and ask for help where ever stuck.

It is only partially possible to keep an HTTP connection open, so the best option is probably to poll for changes. You can send a request each second to see if anything is changed since time 'x'. On each response you send along the server time. With the new request you send the time of the old request and the server can return any events that happened inbetween.

Also you can read something about AMQP. You can send a message to recepients inboxes (after some actions in your system) and then read inboxes after start or with some time interval.

Related

force reload/refresh a second webpage through php

I'm trying to force to reload a (second) page if a criteria is met in php
But if the criteria is met, i want the page to force reload everywhere, even if 10 people have it open at once for example.
for simplicty lets say the code is like this:
in /filelocation/script.php:
if {$data == "ok"}{
reload/refresh "reload.php" if it's open somewhere;
}
I came across a software that basicly does this, and i want to understand how this is done.
(it works cross device somehow, so i asume its done through php somehow)
Well, in your PHP code, you cannot simply reload/refresh something for all the users connected. This is simply because the PHP code is only executed when your browser requests a page on the server so it's only executed to build the HTML response and then it stops executing. Once the browser has the HTML response it will render the page and then it waits for an action from the user to do something else (such as clicking on a link or posting a form).
I imagine that you would like that when a specific user does something, like posting a comment or buying a product, you would like all the other visitors to be notified that a new comment has been posted or that the number of products available has been reduced.
To do that, you need to implement some JavaScript which is executed in the browser of each visitor. The idea is to keep a connection with the server with the help of web sockets. This way, you can inform the browser that something has changed.
You could google to find some examples of PHP apps using web sockets. The first example I found:
https://www.twilio.com/blog/create-php-websocket-server-build-real-time-even-driven-application
Another solution could be to have some JavaScript doing some pooling, meaning that every N seconds, it executes an Ajax request to the server to ask if something has changed. This can be done with the help of setTimeout(yourFunction, 10000) to call a JavaScript function every 10 seconds. This function will do the Ajax request and then update the part of your page that needs to change. Just be carefull that if you get a lot of users on your site then you'll produce quite a lot of load on your server. So this wouldn't be a good solution, but it could be an alternative to the web sockets.

php running separately avoiding time out for user

I would like to find a way to have my user not having to wait for the output of a php script and being redirected to a page while the script is running on the server.
Basically the user submits a form which takes quite long to process and I would like to redirect the user to a page notifying him that the form is being processed and that its output will be later available (I thought about opening a tab when the output is ready).
Basically I would like something like this, which I tried without success, the
if ($form_valid) {
process_form(); // this would need not to be running on the current page so that the user don't have to wait for it to be ready (timeout problems)
header('Location: http://example.com/form_submitted_output_coming_soon.html');
}
I hope that it is not too vague.
Thank you in advance for any help / advice on how I could do that.
It really depends on the time the script takes to execute if it's seconds, under 10 I would do an ajax request and have a modal progress message
If they take extended amounts of time my approach would be to create or use an existing task scheduler/ report generator
a single system scheduled task entry calling a central management script ( probably not optimal )
You mark a task/report for execution
Concurrency. Count, limit the number currently executing ( so you don't over load the server)
users pool via ajax for their tasks / reports or push to the clients with web sockets
Example on how to fork php to background
Update
I think you would get better performance out of a bot continuously check a database or file for work to do and submitting results back to the database. Alerting users via ajax, web sockets and or email when the work that they need is done / updated.
Here is a good introduction on how to build a web crawler in php
The best approach for solving this kind of problem is to use AJAX to make the request to the server in the background and then update the user once it has finished processing.
You may submit the form with an asynchronous request (ajax) and handle the page forward also with javascript. This way your form is handled asynchronously - you may even wait for the response to tell the user once you have an answer. This asynchronous request will not block the UI.
Just for completeness if you really really want to use php only for this:
Run PHP Task Asynchronously

Synchronous Web Pages

I have a situation where an event have to affect several web pages on an event is triggered.
Its like in GMail. I am developing a project based on online stocking trading system for my college. There are asking for a facility where the administrator or the dealer doesn't need to refresh his end of the application to view the new orders placed by the customers at the other end of the application.
As I said its like GMail, wait for the event to happen, listen to it and update the page.
I am good at JavaScript and jQuery that I can do this within a page: event listeners. But how to do this across several pages.
You can also consider another situation: A waiter, a cashier and a cook in a hotel, all have a PDA with them, any of them doesn't have to refresh their instance of web page to update the orders placed.
How can I achieve this? Is this possible?
I say I am good at javascript but I have my limits and doubts.
I use jQuery and PHP.
Thanks in advance.
PS: I know how to refresh the page or iFrame for every 5 seconds or so.
Edit 1:
As for additional details, I want to something similar to below that is done in java
synchronised(sync)
{
sync.wait()
}
The code may not be accurate, this was from my lab experiments. But the concept is similar. Server waits till the client made a move and this is repeated for a lot of time.
Edit 2:
Another best example is a situation we always face in the internet: Complete a survey or something to enable a content to be downloaded.
My trading system needs such a thing. The dealer page always listens for the client page to act with the server. Upon such thing, the dealer page is reacted to that action. In this case placing an order.
If there is several page instances on one browser, you can use javascript web worker.
ELSE
Use "Long pooling" OR "ajax quering"
Long pooling demo: How do I implement basic "Long Polling"?
What you do, you always query server for new information. If there is new information, you return it. Then javascript will see that there is new information and it will show it.
Look into a long-polling or "comet" architecture. This is widely used by event driven AJAX applications and will provide what you are looking for.
See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comet_(programming) for more info.

How to speed up a jquery/php/ajax chatroom?

I've created a small jquery and php chatroom with some .get and .post functions and php docs that read and write data to a sql server. It works fine, but the small problem is when someone posts something, it takes about half a second for it to appear (because of the lag).
I fear there's something wrong with my coding.
im using
setinterval (listen, 300)
as my continuous jquery function for reading new db entries, listen is a function with a .get inside. How does stackoverflow or facebook do it so that the user types something in and immediately it pops out?
Maybe try displaying the inputted chat message immediately to the user who posted it, prior to posting it to the database.
Like this:
User enters message, submits
Update users chat window so they see it immediately
POST message to database
GET from db and update all chat windows
This can be implemented using various techniques, which have many names: Long-polling, Server Sent Events, Comet, WebSockets, and others.
Basic idea is this:
Alice opens facebook. Her browser makes a request for updates ($.get, for example), but the server does not respond if there are no new updates and the request remains in 'waiting' state.
Bob opens facebook. He decides to comment on Alice's wall. His browser posts his comment to the server ($.post).
The server accepts this post, handles it properly (saves onto Alice's wall, etc)
But ALSO server checks if there is a waiting update request from Alice. If there is, server renders info about this update into response stream and closes the connection.
Alice's browser finally gets a response to this long hanging request and happily draws a red "1" in the notification area. It also immediately opens another update request (to not miss any).
Alice sees comment from Bob, which was delivered instantly.
The technique described is called "long polling" and it was first introduced by Google in Gmail.
You can use HTML5 sockets, however these are very much in their infancy and not widely supported (i.e. by IE).
Lots of systems use Flash as a middle-man as that can hold a connection open.
With either of these you can use your PHP code that stores the comment to the database to also push this out to every "listener". This will be the quickest way possible. If your system is super clever it'll incorporate all three - HTML5 sockets where it can, Flash where it can't, and your regular polling were there's no Flash either.
http://pusher.com/ might be a good starting point for further learning.
Most sites that have fast chat use a technique called comet. You can read more about it here: http://ajaxian.com/archives/comet-a-new-approach-to-ajax-applications
It essentially is a piece of modified server software that waits to return a response to the user until either a message is sent or it is about to timeout.

How to make notification on message send like Facebook

How a notification can be shown after we are receiving a new message like FACEBOOK is displaying without refreshing a page. ( facebook is showing RED color notification after receiving a new message).
Thank You
There are two ways out there, you poll, or Comet.
Polling means you ask this question to your server periodically: "is there a new message?" with Ajax. If there is a new message, server returns it or the number of new messages.
Or you can implement some kind of Comet. Comet is a technology which contains open connections between client and server. Since there is an open connection, your server can send new information to clients.
After the number of new messages arrived to you, you can edit your DOM via javascript to show a red notification whereever you want.
You need to use setInterval to periodically check for any new updates and then, if they are found, use ajax to pull in the message.
Easiest way is to use jquery to update the content of a div at a sepecific interval...
#idofdivtoupdate
as it says.. the id of the div you want to auto update...
setinterval is in miliseconds.. (so 5000 checks every 5 seconds)
function updatecontent(){
$('#idofdivtoupdate').load('yourserverscript.php');
}
setInterval("updatecontent()", 5000 );
If ive understood you correctly you need to look up a technology called AJAX, its a combination of JavaScript and XML which allows the sending and receiving of data behind the scenes ie without needed to refresh the page. Theres plenty of tutorials/information out there about it and its not difficult to get the hang of, hope this helps.

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