Hi,
As some may know, the original Coronium Server was largely shaped from community input. It has been little over 3 years since that release and the app services landscape has changed dramatically, with a 3rd party service for about anything you could imagine. I’m looking to start an open discussion about what possible Coronium solutions would be beneficial to your Corona development needs, and also discuss the solutions currently in development.
The Big Picture
If you’re new to the Coronium platform, what follows is an overview of the Coronium philosophy.
The What
Coronium, the word, is an overarching title (or brand I suppose) of solutions that enable you to expand your applications into the cloud space. Where other services may support Corona among other clients, Coronium solutions are specifically created to work with Corona applications. In particular, Coronium solutions use Lua on the server-side when scripting is required. This enables you to use the same language both in your app, and in the cloud. In some sense, Coronium is to app services development, as Corona is to app development.
The Why
So why would you want to use Coronium over other services? The main reason, besides ease-of-use, is the ability to “own” your services and data. The fact is that 3rd party solutions come and go, which can wreak havoc if your applications depend on them. And they can be big players too.
As an example, after building a giant user base, the infamous Parse service (owned by Facebook) was discontinued, leaving a huge amount of developers scrambling for replacement solutions. And while Google and Amazon may not suffer this fate, it can at times be difficult to not only implement those services, but development can be tricky, often times requiring a “bridging” server that you must implement yourself, with languages you may not be familiar with. Let alone the task of properly scaffolding the server itself.
The How
All Coronium solutions are built with a few main principles in mind, these being; easy to use APIs, the ability to use Lua for development, out-of-the-box full server deployments, and detailed documentation. Additionally, all Coronium solutions are built upon industry standard platforms and tools. The idea is to remove as much friction as possible, while providing powerful tools for extending your Corona applications beyond the device. And again, you “own” the services and data, removing any doubt as to the sustainability of 3rd party integrations.
As an example, the soon-to-be released Coronium Core not only supports users, data, files, image manipulation (and more), but also includes a plugin system to “bridge” into other services like email and push. The core plugins will always try to support the best free services that are available. For instance, the core email plugin currently supports Mailgun, with 10,000 free emails a month. In the event that Mailgun were to be discontinued, a new core plugin would be released, and in most, if not all cases, you would need to change nothing, except establishing an account with the new service. Other developers can also create and share plugins, built easily with Lua, and even have them compiled into the core if found popular among other users.
This brings me to one of the most important aspects of Coronium based solutions, which is community involvement. Coronium has always been driven heavily by the Corona community. Every voice is heard, and every suggestion is considered, with the goal of creating finely tailored solutions for the Corona developers. When you adopt Coronium as a platform, you gain unprecedented access to help shape the products, not only for your personal needs, but for the community at large.
The Roadmap
The recent releases of both Coronium SkyTable and Coronium ChatterBox are meant to be no-to-low management solutions for specific use cases, and require no server-side scripting. But, for more advanced needs, the following solutions are soon to be released.
Coronium Core
Coronium Core is a complete rebuild of the functionality found in the original Coronium Server (and more). Nearly 2 years in the making, it is a robust one-stop server-side solution for Corona applications that need cloud support. Generally these applications are more in the business category, but games can benefit as well. As mentioned above, Coronium Core supports users, data, files, image handling (and more), with an open plugin system, allowing the community to contribute to its feature set. The API is deep, and of course all of it is scriptable using the Lua you know and love.
Coronium Versus
Coronium Versus is a real-time, multiplayer, turn-based, authoritative game server. Authoritative game servers allow you to script your game logic in the cloud, which not only makes cheating difficult, but eases the pain usually associated with multi-player games which are driven by the client. Issues like data synchronization and client negotiation are easily handled in an authoritative environment. These types of solutions are generally expensive, and rarely allow the ability to be scripted using Lua. Coronium Versus benefits from years of refinement, is robust, and deploys literally in minutes. Developing your logic on the server-side using Lua is ridiculously simple.
The Roundtable
While the solutions listed above are on the way, the functionality is always open to community suggestions, and more importantly their use cases. If you have specific needs, please share them. If you have a specific type of solution you are looking for, drop it in this topic, everything is considered.
In closing, I would like give a hearty “thank you” to those who use, have used, and (hopefully) will use Coronium solutions for your cloud needs. The feedback, support, and community involvement over the years have been crucial in creating these solutions, and confirms that not only do they actually work as intended 
but more importantly, they provide useful functionality for Corona developers.
-dev