1. Synchronizing user updates across different internet services.

2. Sending real time notifications about user updates to user contacts.

For real time notification sending Synchrona will utilize Openfire server ( an opensource XMPP server - http://www.igniterealtime.org/projects/openfire/).

We started development of the Real Time Component (RTC) of Synchrona by extending the functionality of Openfire server. One extension was to connect Openfire with Synchrona webservice to enable the data synchronization with different internet services. The other extension was to expand the real time notification facilities of Openfire. We needed broadcast user updates to all the users contacts, no matter what service they are on (fb, twitter, msn, gmail etc..).

Starting work..

I worked on extending the RTC in Openfire. First I installed the IM Gateway Plugin ( a plugin provided by Openfire community) on Openfire server. Next I modified the broadcast functionality of Openfire server to broadcast message sent to 'synchrona' XMPP address on server to all contacts of the user (this includes Spark, Gmail, Yahoo and MSN contacts). The packet interceptor method of the server was modified to capture messages sent to 'synchrona' XMPP address and the broadcast method was modified to broadcast these messages to all contacts.

I have uploaded the code to the Synchrona Google Code project here.

IDE used for development was Eclipse. The main development guide followed is listed below..