PubNub is one of Distillery’s most valuable development tools. As one of six certified PubNub Development Partners, Distillery uses PubNub’s connected APIs to build powerful solutions that integrate in-app chat, live notifications, and other critical components of modern apps.
MedX, an Australian iOS- and Android-based secure messaging system for doctors, approached Distillery to rebuild its application. Using PubNub, Distillery implemented a powerful back-end infrastructure to incorporate the secure, real-time features MedX was seeking.
Distillery’s clients don’t just love PubNub – our developers do, too. We caught up with Alexander Yalchik and Nabi Makhmudov, two Distillery developers, who have incorporated PubNub into their projects, for a glimpse into how it impacts their workflow.
The following conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
What’s your favorite thing about PubNub?
Nabi Makhmudov: It just works – it’s as simple as that. I never have issues or bugs with this tool.
Alexander Yalchik: It’s simple for any developer. Without exaggeration, we can say that any third-party API should be well-described, regularly updated, and have a support service. PubNub has it all.
PubNub, with minimal configuration, allows you to quickly and reliably connect any information exchange system. You can always use the same regular queries, so implementing PubNub takes a minimum amount of time. As far as managing the library, there is nothing complicated for developers. For future technologies, the most rapid exchange possible of calculations, data, or learning outcomes is one of the cornerstones.
Since startups are a main driving force of progress, the cool thing is that a free PubNub plan is enough for small projects, which makes it easy to evaluate how much the application needs the proposed ready-made solutions, without wasting extra money and time.
How have you used PubNub?
Alexander: I used the capabilities of PubNub on more than four projects, including two highly-loaded projects (a calendar-like app with family events, and secure chat for doctors), demo projects, and pet projects.
PubNub was used to implement real-time updates (user lists and calendar delivery), instant message delivery, and to display users online. I also tested the chatbot functions, including PubNub + Amazon Translate and PubNub + Amazon Alexa.
Nabi: We built the calendar application with the ability to comment on events and synchronize them between family members. The key to the synchronization between family members is instant updates, so when one member edits the event or comments it, everyone else could see these changes in real time.
Alexander: Through instant updates, we were able to reuse some of the same objects from previously implemented requests, which allowed us to introduce PubNub without major problems or refactoring into an existing project.
We live in the age of high technology and it is very pleasant that these technologies not only serve entertainment, but also solve important tasks. It’s easy to see how important the speed of updates and notifications is in the chat app for doctors. But organizing working and free time for the whole family in the calendar application is no less important.
Looking broadly, it’s hard to deny that for modern solutions, the ability to instantly receive feedback from users, sensors, and other elements of complex systems is unconditionally positive.
Which PubNub features are your favorite?
Alexander: First, instant updates, a feature which is already familiar and used everywhere. Of the new features, I like the interaction of PubNub with Amazon services, as it simplifies the interaction between users and the application and among themselves.
Nabi: My favorites are the PubNub + Amazon Translate and PubNub + Amazon Polly blocks. It’s easy to integrate them with your PubNub ChatEngine, so the first translates the text on the fly with the lowest possible latency, and the second converts the text to speech.
Alexander: PubNub + Amazon Translate can translate from an original language to 20+ common languages and vice versa in real time, which allows us to simplify communication between users of different nationalities and reduce support costs, which is especially cool for small startups.
PubNub + Amazon Alexa, the service for creating voice and text dialogue interfaces in any application, allows you to create all kinds of bots for interaction through natural language. For example, I implemented a bot without any problems which, in a few clicks, allows the user to check available conference rooms for a specific date and time, book them, and notify participants.
If it were entirely up to you, with no limitations, what would you build with PubNub?
Alexander: I would like to try to implement some application with closer interaction between the system and the user. Something like virtual assistants in science fiction, which focus not only on your daily schedule, but also on your character, mood, life, and priorities, and accordingly change the priority, speed, and tone of messages in real time.
It makes it very easy and convenient for any application to set up instant updates of important information, not only database updates, but also any social features. I also think that the implementation of branched onboarding looks pretty tempting with PubNub + Amazon Lex. It’s interesting to try to implement interactions with smart home systems too.
Nabi: Because of how quickly you can integrate PubNub features, it makes you look like the fastest developer your client knows. I’m not always sure exactly I want to do, but I will always consider PubNub solutions first. The reason is simple: when you use PubNub, you can forget about any issues from that part of your project and concentrate on your idea.
Do you have any predictions about how PubNub can and will be used for building future tech (AI, ML, IoT, VR, blockchain, voice, etc)?
Alexander: We can use it now. The PubNub + Amazon bundle can be used for most future tech without any changes; for example, using AI, ML, and instant messaging, you can improve smart home systems. We can train any system much faster using instant notifications of all nodes of the system with certain successful results of any node.
Nabi: We already have everything connected and talking with each other. All of your devices can communicate with other devices, and the key here is the speed of communication. PubNub already knows how to solve the speed issue.
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As a PubNub Partner, Distillery is featured in PubNub’s customer stories. Check out this short video to see why Distillery Founder and CEO Andrey Kudievskiy calls our PubNub partnership “a match made in heaven.”
If you need real-time updates or chat in your application, just use PubNub. Trusted by more than 2,000 of the world’s most successful companies, like Adobe and DocuSign, PubNub makes it easy to add critical features to streamline development.
Distillery’s development pros are certified integration specialists and thoroughly experienced at building apps using PubNub’s solutions. If you’re seeking developers ready to incorporate live updates, real-time translation, and other key PubNub components, contact Distillery today!