Microsoft Push Notification Service is a service for Windows Phone which provides a resilient, dedicated, and persistent channel to send data to a Windows Phone app.
Microsoft Push Notification Service (MPNS) is a service for Windows Phone which provides a resilient, dedicated, and persistent channel to send data to a Windows Phone app.
The general flow of the service :
An app requests a push notification URI from the Microsoft Push Notification Service (MPNS).
The app sends the notification URI to a 3rd party server.
The 3rd party server uses the notification URI to send a push notification to MPNS.
MPNS routes the push notification to the app.
There are three types of push notifications that can be sent to a Windows Phone app :
Toast Notification - Displays a toast notification if the app is not running. Tapping on that notification launches the app.
Tile Notification - Visually updates the app's tile.
Raw Notification - Delivers raw data to the app. Available only when the app in already running.
Microsoft Push Notification Service (MPNS) Documentation.