In order to further accelerate the adoption and abilities of WebRTC, Microsoft Open Technologies, Inc. has released a prototype implementation of the CU-RTC-Web Proposal. This prototype on HTML5Labs demonstrates some of the capabilities of WebRTC by allowing voice chatting between different, normally non-interoperable, computers and browsers.
In this case, the prototype will demonstrate interoperable voice chatting between a Mac using Chrome and a Windows computer using Internet Explorer 10 via the API. With it, the company hopes to demonstrate the usability that WebRTC makes possible, and hopefully encourage and inspire others to develop their own ideas and codes.
There are some important requirements for WebRTC browser APIs. They must be able to respond to changing network quality, while still staying true to key Web tenants. Furthermore, they must be deployable on all existing network infrastructures, as interoperability is a key trait of WebRTC, as is flexibility in not only supporting existing media formats and codecs, but remaining open to any that may come later.
The CU-RTC-Web demonstrates just what a completely transparent API can offer, while linking media and networks together. With RealtimeMediaStream, the browsers’ internal MediaStreamTrack objects are converted into flows of packets that can go between networks without difficulty, making it easy to send the data across networks, computers, operating systems and Web browsers.
So here we have a great example of what WebRTC can provide. It’s just a prototype, but it stands for something greater, representing the future of WebRTC and communication over the Internet. Interoperability is no longer as great a concern as it once was, and true communication in real time through the WebRTC standard is closer than ever before.
