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October 17, 2024
Real-time chats are everywhere, and of course, why not? They are a convenient way to connect people worldwide. As a result, chat apps are evolving in popularity.
Since chat is central to people’s communication, this demand puts unusual pressure on chat app operators to ensure that every message reaches its destination every time.
But have you ever thought about how does these work?
Well, let us tell you that’s all possible with the chat application architecture. Yes! It affects a chat application’s reliability, scalability, and user experience. It’s the design of a chat app’s components and how they interact. Want to know how?
Let’s understand it in depth! Keep reading this post. Below, we have provided every detail about the architecture of a chat application and discussed the chatbot application architecture.
What is Chat Application Architecture
Well, here, chat application architecture refers to the design and structure used in chat app development. It includes the front-end and back-end components and their interaction to enable the delivery and receiving of messages in real-time.
The architecture manages and stores the messenger, handles user authentications and authorizations, and distributes messages to an accurate audience.
A well-designed chat app architecture is crucial for creating a seamless and efficient user experience. It must handle a large volume of messages, ensure message delivery in real-time, and provide robust security and privacy features to protect user data.
Key Considerations For Chat App Architecture
Since your choices will impact the project in a long-lasting way, it is essential to consider the challenges you might experience while designing your app.
That’s why we have shared this section to help you understand the considerations for chat application architecture:
1. Ability to Scale
As user demand fluctuates, a chat application must be able to scale seamlessly. This involves designing a system that can handle increasing users and messages without compromising performance.
Utilizing cloud services and microservices architecture can facilitate horizontal scaling, allowing you to add more resources dynamically as needed. Load balancing and database sharding are essential strategies for effectively distributing traffic and data.
2. Fault Tolerance
A reliable chat application must be resilient to failures. Implementing fault tolerance means designing systems that can continue to operate even when components fail.
This can be achieved through redundancy, duplicating critical components, and failover mechanisms automatically switching to backup systems. Regular backups and a well-defined disaster recovery plan are crucial to minimizing data loss and downtime.
3. Latency and Global Reach
Low latency is vital for delivering real-time communication in a chat application. To achieve this, consider using Content Delivery Networks (CDNs) and strategically placing servers in various locations to reduce the distance between users and the server.
This enhances performance and ensures a smooth experience for users worldwide. Additionally, optimizing the data transmission protocols can further reduce latency.
4. Message Synchronization and Queuing
Ensuring that messages are synchronized across devices and platforms is essential for a seamless user experience. Implementing a robust message queuing system can help manage message delivery and ensure that users receive messages even offline.
Techniques like message acknowledgment and retries can enhance reliability while using unique identifiers for messages helps maintain order and consistency.
5. Transport Mode
Choosing the right transport mode for message delivery is crucial for performance and reliability. WebSockets are often preferred for real-time communication due to their low overhead and full-duplex capabilities.
However, HTTP/2 or traditional HTTP polling can suit different use cases. The choice of transport mode should align with the application’s speed, reliability, and complexity requirements.
6. Implementing Push Notifications
Push notifications are a powerful feature in chat applications, keeping users engaged and informed even when they are not actively using the app.
Implementing a reliable push notification system involves integrating platform-specific services (like Apple Push Notification Service for iOS and Firebase Cloud Messaging for Android) to ensure timely delivery.
It’s essential to manage user preferences for notifications to enhance user experience while avoiding notification fatigue.
Components of Mobile Chat Application Architecture
Since the chat application architecture design uniquely addresses distinctive business requirements, it can always be divided into two major components: the chat client and the chat server.
Chat Client
This is the primary component of users’ experiences. In a desktop, web, or smartphone chat application, the chat client is responsible for interacting with the operating system (for example computer, browser, or smartphone).
The chat client’s interaction includes push notifications, data display to the user, and messages and files. When the user types and sends a message, the chat client transfers it to the other major component: the chat server.
Chat Server
And here we start our other key component—the chat server! The chat server is the hot spot for all the software, frameworks, and databases required for the chat app to work efficiently.
This server responsibly receives a message securely, addresses the accurate recipient, queues it, and forwards it to the recipient’s chat client.
However, the chat server’s resources can include a REST API, a WebSocket server, an AWS instance for media storage. Here are the resources:
- Chat Rest API
A Chat REST API is most often used to facilitate the functionality of the chat app outside of messaging. For example, authentication, profile, and notification settings can all be managed through a REST API. All these functionalities are built into RichestSoft ’s SDKs and Chat APIs.
- WebSocket Server
A WebSocket server and client library are valuable components for a chat app. Typical communication between a client and server uses HTTP and requires the client to request server data. The server itself can’t push data to the client without the client’s first request.
This quickly leads to inefficiencies in a chat app since the client must poll the server every second for new messages. A WebSocket is a persistent connection between client and server that provides a bidirectional communication pathway.
- Media Storage
Finally, you might know that every mobile or web app requires some kind of data storage. Profiles, messages, and media files need to be accessible at all times, thus, chat apps require both data storage and media storage.
Businesses can choose a database for their chat app development. The choice depends heavily on the use cases, what’s important to the users, and what the development team is familiar with. Businesses can use reliable and robust relational databases for generic data like profile settings and a NoSQL database for messages.
While businesses must know these components of the chat application architecture, they can develop an MVP for their chat apps to gain an overall understanding of the mobile chat application architecture before the actual app development.
However, you can explore the popular messaging app trends that made buzz this year to develop the best of the app.
Chat App Programming Languages
Based on the chat application architecture design, the front end (chat client) and the back end (chat server) are most likely to be written in different programming languages.
This is because if you are developing a mobile chat app, iOS and Android have their programming languages: Swift and Kotlin, respectively.
There is one exception: if you’re using React Native and Node.js. In this case, you can use JavaScript as your key programming language. React Native can be compiled into an iOS and Android app, allowing you to use the same codebase to create a cross-platform application.
Keep reading below and understand the programming languages used for both front-end and backend:
Front End Language
So, we are starting with the front-end language. However, remember that the Swift and Kotlin languages mentioned below require additional codebases to create a cross-platform chat app.
- JavaScript
React and React Native can be used to create cross-platform applications for the web, iOS, and Android.
- Swift
This is the iOS programming language for creating mobile apps for iPhones. It’s the best choice if you want your application to have the most native iOS feel.
- Kotlin/Java
Kotlin is an Android programming language, and it’s an ideal choice for providing a native experience to targeted users.
Backed language
Compared to the front-end, the back-end has more programming languages. While the options below are great for backend chat applications, remember that your programming language choice only matters when operating on a large scale. You can use any server-side programming language to get the MVP status for your chat app.
- Erlang
It is not a popular language, but it emphasizes scalability, reliability, and concurrency, e.g., WhatsApp and Facebook.
- Scala
An obscure language is known for its scalability and multi-threaded functionality. Commonly used by X, earlier known as Twitter.
- PHP
An excellent option for web applications, specifically those developed on WordPress.
- Java
An age-old and popular language used by many developers.
- JavaScript
Node.js makes server-side coding with JavaScript a breeze. The front-end and back-end both can be written in the same language.
Options To Develop Real-Time Chat Applications
So, whether you are integrating chat into an existing app or have decided to develop a chat app, choosing how to build a server-side chat application architecture might be frustrating.
If so, you must consider reading the below-mentioned 3 options available to develop a real-time chat application:
🡆 Build It All In-House
Developing everything from scratch with the help of a top-rated mobile app development team like RichestSoft is a tempting choice. On paper, it looks like you get complete control of the experience you deliver to users, and there’s less to pay out in software licensing fees.
Seen from a different angle, though, that freedom comes with the responsibility to plan, build, and maintain everything in-house.
🡆 Integrate Proven Third-Party Tools
Alternatively, you can retain control without dividing your team’s attention between the competing and varied requirements of every unique part of your chat app architecture.
Using a CDN for rich media and a real-time PaaS are two ways to hand off some of the most challenging aspects of chat delivery.
🡆 Use A White-Label Chat Platform
Suppose your chat needs are relatively straightforward and you are happy to trust the future direction of your functionality to another company’s product team.
In that case, you can integrate a white-label chat platform into your existing application.
When you consider any 1 of these three ways to develop a chat application, consider how well each one can help you deliver on the key considerations we looked at earlier, such as low latency delivery, global reach, high uptime, and rapid scaling.
So, you’ve decided to develop a chat app. But remember, knowing the investment cost is essential. Thus, you can explore the development cost of messaging apps like Snapchat to answer all your queries.
Chatbot Application Architecture
Okay, so after a detailed understanding of chat application architecture diagram, its time to understand the AI chatbot application architecture.
It is a great business investment for entrepreneurs. But you need to know that choosing an accurate chatbot depends on the type of domain it will have.
Let’s understand by the example—suppose a user interacts with the chatbot, but in the mid-conversation, they leave the conversation to continue later.
However, based on the type of chatbot you build, it may or may not save the conversation history. Thus, a pattern-matching architecture is known to be an excellent choice for narrow domains.
However, a broader domain makes a perfect choice for chatbots with multiple domains or services. In such situations, sophisticated, state-of-the-art neural network architectures, such as reinforcement learning agents and Long-Short-Term Memory (LSTMs), are the best choice.
In fact, as per the varying nature of chatbot utilization, the app architecture will change according to the chatbot’s unique requirements. To understand in depth about this chatbot concept, must get in touch with a top AI chatbot development company.
Different Types of Chatbot Applications
Chatbots can be classified into several categories based on functionalities. However, each type serves a specific objective and meets multiple users needs. Here we are discussing 3 among those:
🡆 AI-Powered
These chatbots use AI and NLP (natural language processing) to easily understand user intent and provide more conversational responses. They use machine learning algorithms to analyze and interpret user input, providing users with the correct and relevant answers. The AI-powered chatbots constantly learn and improve their responses over time.
🡆 Rule Based
Talking about a rule-based chatbot follows predefined rules to provide pre-programmed responses. These chatbots are usually designed to handle specific tasks or resolve frequently asked questions. Compared to other chatbots, these are straightforward and do not need complex algorithms or machine-learning models.
🡆 Virtual Assistant
Well, chatbots like Siri and Google Assistant fall into this category. They provide information and also perform tasks like appointment scheduling, message delivery, and online purchases. The chatbots in this category are designed to be more interactive and provide several functionalities. These chatbots understand complex queries very well and execute tasks on behalf of the user.
Components Of Chatbot Application Architecture
Like chat application architecture, chatbot architecture also includes components. It typically includes these components:
1. User Interface
This component enables users to interact with the chatbot. Whether it’s a web-based interface, a mobile app, or even a voice-based interface, it plays a crucial role in facilitating seamless communication between the user and the chatbot.
2. Natural Language Understanding (NLU)
NLU processes the user’s input and extracts intent and entities. It helps the chatbot understand what the user is saying and what they want to achieve. NLU algorithms have advanced significantly in recent years, leveraging machine learning techniques to improve accuracy and handle complex language structures.
3. Dialog Management
Dialog management handles the flow of conversation and manages context. It ensures the chatbot maintains a coherent and meaningful dialogue with the user. Dialog management systems employ techniques such as state machines or rule-based approaches to guide the conversation flow.
4. Natural Language Generation (NLG)
NLG helps generate human-like responses based on the chatbot’s understanding. It takes the output from the dialog management component and converts it into a natural language response that is easy for the user to understand. NLG algorithms use techniques like template-based generation or even more advanced approaches like neural networks to generate high-quality responses.
5. Custom Integrations
This component allows chatbots to connect with external systems or APIs to retrieve data or perform actions. Integrations can range from simple tasks like retrieving weather information to more complex tasks like processing payments or updating customer records. The integration component is crucial for chatbots to provide valuable and personalized information to users.
RichestSoft’s Approach to Mobile Chat Application Architecture
After reading this informative blog about chat application architecture, you must know something important: contact a reputable custom app development company like RichestSoft.
Knowledge will help you analyze whether your chat app architecture diagram is fine, but you have also needed expertise and technical support lately.
Choosing us here is one of the most valuable decisions businesses can ever make. We help businesses make informed decisions about the architecture of chat applications, including how to plan features and connect them through layers.
However, whether you have decided to develop a chat app from scratch or a chatbot clone app, we provide you with excellent services to get a white-label and customized app. We provide AI-driven app, with other technologies like crypto, metaverse and so on.
Conclusion
So, finally, we hope we’ve answered all your questions about designing a chat application architecture and building a messaging app.
If not, maybe contact our professionals and gain unlimited information about what this chat application architecture means in your app development.
RichestSoft knows how essential it is to keep it’s clients updated about the trends and technologies in the project. So the client get the best of the app.
