Peer-to-Peer between desktop and mobile app

Question

Starting to build an app where we will have a desktop and a mobile client applications. These two apps will exchange messages/info on frequent basis. The idea is not to have any server/central entity for this communication. We want to send/receive messages without any server implementation. I googled on these and got peerjs.com, openpeer.org and google project apprtc. Peerjs and apprtc are kind of web based applications which are not in our kind of.

But still it's not very clear on how this things works out as they involve any server or not. Kind of stuck and not sure where to start and how. Is it possible at all?

We are not yet tied to any platform, so open to any kind of implementation. Please share if you have any similar experiences of any applications using this kind of technical stack?

Phil

Unless they are on the same local WiFi network, or they both have public IP addresses with no firewalls (eek!), what you want is not possible. – Undeniable

Yes a big question to understanding the problem is: are all devices on the same network? – Demavend

Yes, both scenarios could may happen. Those two devices may or may not be on the same network. – Phil

webRTC still needs a server to connect the devices together, then it's P2P from there. webRTC can work through firewalls or across different networks. – Reborn

Answer 1

use webrtc ios project, and its what you need https://github.com/gandg/webrtc-ios

Marlow

Answer 2

Sockets is what I'd use, assuming the network requirements mentioned above

Jasik

Answer 3

Those two devices may or may not be on the same network.

Then you need a server of some form, whether you want one or not. That server may simply be a data broker (see PeerJS) or provide more functionality, but it must exist. That server may be one that you host yourself or be some common cloud provider, but it must exist.

Undeniable