Overview of gcm:
You send a request to google server from your android phone. You receive a registration id as a response. You will then have to send this registration id to the server from where you wish to send notifications to the mobile. Using this registration id you can then send notification to the device.
Answer:
- To send a notification you send the data(message) with the registration id of the device to https://android.googleapis.com/gcm/send. (use curl in php).
- To receive notification and registration etc, thats all you will be requiring.
- You will have to store the registration id on the device as well as on server. If you use GCM.jar the registration id is stored in preferences. If you wish you can save it in your local database as well.