Firefox and Chrome Can Talk To Each Other 121
The Firefox and Chrome teams have announced that their respective browsers can now communicate with each other via WebRTC for the purpose of audio and video communication without needing a third-party plugin.
WebRTC is a new set of technologies that brings clear crisp voice, sharp high-definition (HD) video and low-delay communication to the web browser. From the very beginning, this joint WebRTC effort was embraced by the open web community, including engineers from the Chrome and Firefox teams. The common goal was to help developers offer rich, secure communications, integrated directly into their web applications. In order to succeed, a web-based communications platform needs to work across browsers. Thanks to the work and participation of the W3C and IETF communities in developing the platform, Chrome and Firefox can now communicate by using standard technologies such as the Opus and VP8 codecs for audio and video, DTLS-SRTP for encryption, and ICE for networking. To try this yourself, you’ll need desktop Chrome 25 Beta and Firefox Nightly for Desktop. In Firefox, you'll need to go to about:config and set the media.peerconnection.enabled pref to "true." Then head over to the WebRTC demo site and start calling."
Re:So...? (Score:5, Informative)
It is a protocol and API developed at the IETF and W3C for real time communications (RTC) by companies like Google, Mozilla, but also Microsoft.
It's called WebRTC, but it isn't specific to the web. There are also or will be libraries for people who want create desktop or mobile app(lication)s.
You can use it to easily build applications that need some kind of realtime communication like audio- or video-chat.
It uses a peer2peer protocol like VoIP or Skype and encrypted by default.
The peer2peer protocol can also be used for other data and supports NAT-traversal and going through relays.
Re:Putting the pressure on Microsoft - nice! (Score:4, Informative)
Why do I feel like getting safari on board would be even harder than Microsoft ? Remember, old Steve Jobs' determined fight to not use VP8 - which is the core codec for this ?
Re:So...? (Score:5, Informative)
In short yes:
http://www.html5rocks.com/en/tutorials/streaming/screenshare/ [html5rocks.com]
Re:Are you KIDDING me? (Score:5, Informative)
Its hard to tell if you're kidding or not, but on the off chance you aren't, web browsers have been opening sockets to arbitrary end points since the day they were invented.
Re:So...? (Score:4, Informative)
Microsoft? Isn't their role to wait until WebRTC starts to catch on and then introduce their own version in a transparent attempt to undermine the standard?
They've already done that. CU-RTC-Web is their little spanner in the works of compatibility.
"I see that Microsoft decided to wait until the W3C and IETF [standards groups] were close to done before putting together a proposal that, if accepted, would explode most of the current works and create maximal delay on this work," said Cullen Jennings, a Cisco representative on the W3C's Web Real-Time Communications Working Group.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-57494622-93/how-corporate-bickering-hobbled-better-web-audio/ [cnet.com]