Adding an "Enterprise" layer to Growl to support networked applications

[tsrela...@gmail.com]

Summary: I created centralized service to receive multiple messages from applications throughout a network, then broadcast those messages to multiple Growl clients in the network.

I scanned postings for over the last couple of years and couldn't find anything that addresses this topic.  I thought I'd post information about an application we developed to see if there was any interest, and perhaps get some critical feedback.

Anyway over a year ago, at my company we evaluated Growl for Windows, and liked the UI, and wanted to use that in our production system.  We had a several Windows services distributed in our network, and wanted them to report status through Growl messages. We found that while Growl has some networking ability, it is was oriented to single user, single platform.  We needed some additional "Enterprise" capabilities, such as:

1. Collecting and storing Growl messages within a centralized Growl service on the network.

2. Having multiple services send messages to a single point of contact (the Growl service).

3. Have the Growl service broadcast messages to a list of assigned machines hosting Growl clients.

4. Have the Growl service store messages when no client is available, and later forward the queued messages when a client becomes available.

Here, by Growl client, I mean the Growl for Windows app, out-of-the-box.  By Growl service, I mean an application we developed in house.  If there is interest in this capability, I can provide more information upon request.  Furthermore, is there is interest in sharing the service we developed, I can check and see if we can release the source code.