I have an embedded webserver running on a device. Now I want a smartphone app to connect to the webserver. They are on the same wifi network but they don't know each others IP addresses.
I understand that this problem is often solved by implementing the mDNS protocol on the server. But are there any alternatives? Can the server maybe ask for specific IP address or similar?
If it has to be entirely automated, such that the embedded webserver is discoverable, perhaps scan the entire netblock looking for the correct response "http://[IP_address]/yes-im-the-one" from your embedded webserver? Although beware, some network monitors may then consider the IP of your smartphone/device that does that scan "dangerous" and cut it off from the network - this is probably only a "big enterprise" problem.
...after you "find" your server, perhaps the application should cache/remember this, so it doesn't have to scan next time.
Other things you could do: give your embedded webserver a static IP on the LAN, either by setting this on the device itself, or via a DHCP reservation from whatever is the local DHCP server on the LAN.
What allot of emended devices do is come delivered with a static LAN IP already set on it, then it's up to the sysadmin to change their computer's IP temporarily to be in the same range, then they can visit the webserver or telnet into the default IP, and change it to what they want (to match their network's IP range)
