Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with SMS

Help me receive text messages from people on all cell networks.

needs more cowbell — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 13:39:50 -0800

After porting a number from Virgin Mobile to Page Plus, I don't receive text messages from people on the AT&T network. Page Plus is a small MVNO cell phone provider that "rents" space on the Verizon network. This is all in the US.

I ported my number to them from Virgin Mobile about two months ago. Everything seemed to have gone OK until I figured out that texts from people who have AT&T were not coming through. (I have tested this several times with several people. They get no indication that the text has not gone through, and I get no indication that a text has been sent.) Texts from Verizon and US Cellular are fine; I don't seem to know anyone on Sprint or T-Mobile, so I'm not sure about those. People on any network seem to *receive* my texts just fine.

Strange thing: after porting, I was still able to log in to my Virgin Mobile account online. And whaddya know, I could see a record of texts received from those AT&T numbers there. (Incidentally, Page Plus has no such online account management feature where you can see that someone with a particular cell number has sent you a text.)

I called Page Plus about my problem and mentioned what I'd noticed about seeing the record of the texts in my VM account online. They told me that I needed to speak to Virgin Mobile to have them fully close and delete the account, and that would solve the problem. I have since called Virgin Mobile several times. They swear to me that they have closed and deleted the account, and I can no longer log in to account management online, but the texts from people with AT&T still do not come through.

I've called Page Plus customer support again numerous times. They have "reset my account" and "reprogrammed my phone" a bunch of times, neither of which helped. Then they told me there was nothing else they could do because I use an unlocked CDMA phone/handset rather than a phone I purchased from them, and insisted that the issue must be my phone's software, which they cannot troubleshoot. That seems pretty ridiculous to me - it seems pretty apparent that it's a network issue.

ANYWAY - after pushing and threatening to contact the Better Business Bureau, I finally got tech support there to acknowledge that it might not be an issue with the phone/handset I use, and agree to troubleshoot what they can on their end, but without guarantees since "it could still be your phone." They're doing that now, but I suspect I still may need to make some suggestions for how they proceed in order to get this resolved. I'm supposed to call them back tonight.

SO - what could be causing this issue? Are there any concrete suggestions I can make to them (either Page Plus or Virgin Mobile's customer service) for how to resolve it? Do you think there is a snowball's chance in hell that this is an issue with my phone (Samsung SCH-i760)? If all else fails is there some intermediary inter-carrier text-directing entity I can speak to directly to try to get this fixed? I've googled and read and posted a bunch on HowardForums, and seen some people with similar issues, but that hasn't gotten me anywhere.

Sending an SMS via email to a Google Voice number?

jaimev — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 17:23:49 -0800

I used to have an ATT mobile number and someone could send me an SMS via email by sending a message to XXXXXXXXXX@txt.att.net. I now have a Google Voice number. Can someone still send me an SMS via email? My googlefu seems to indicate a 'no' answer - which seems surprising to me.

How to get robots to send texts?

Chairboy — Sat, 28 Nov 2009 11:13:38 -0800

Interactive art filter - how to get cute robots to send sms messages? Asking this question for a friend. He's designing an interactive art installation that uses small mobile robots which are infrared tracked by a Wii to trigger events in Pure Data. The next step is to find a way to get Pure Data to send text messages to participants in the project , probably using Frontline SMS. We are both a little tech savvy but not really coders - does this sound workable/do-able? what would be the best way to proceed here?

Online system for group SMS (Europe)?

Josh Coe — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 05:48:18 -0800

I want to put on an urban murder-mystery-like game in Portugal. The system would use SMS to communicate with players. Is there an online system that could send an SMS to every player at once, or to different combinations or groups within the large group (preferably free)?

Mass text on the iPhone

dondiego87 — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 20:44:19 -0800

I often have to text a lot of people (as in, 50) simultaneously. The iPhone I'm going to get (don't even try to dissuade me ;-) will make this a very sad experience for me. What can I do? As the president of my fraternity, I often need to send all of the brothers a text message. Right now I have the Motorola V3xx, which allows me to do message lists of 25 people, so it's just a 2-step process. With the iPhone, unless I figure out a better way, I'll have to individually select 10 guys at a time, then repeat that 4 more times. This is obviously not going to work.

My first thought was, to paraphrase, "There must be an app for that." Unfortunately, for some reason (presumably AT&T related), Apple will not allow apps to send text messages to more than 10 people at a time.

Options, as I see them:

1.) Mass text services.
I have only very little experience with such services. I'm using Joopz.com right now, but don't like the fact that messages are limited to 100 words, groups are limited to 10 people, and messages have to originate from the website (ie, not from my phone).

2.) Figure out SMS email addresses for everyone, use email.
I love this idea; I can just set up a listserv so that everyone in the organization can use it AND it's virtually cost-free. Unfortunately, I can't seem to find an up-to-date list of the templates for the major carriers.

Any help would be much appreciated. Thanks everyone!

No phone reception: how to get texts?

fightorflight — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 07:45:11 -0800

How can I send and receive SMSs in a mobile phone blackspot? My new flat is in a total mobile blackspot, at least on my network (iPhone on O2). I can get around the calls problem by diverting them to the home phone, but am tired of missing texts.

Is there any way I can receive them at home, and send them with a number that people can reply to? Super-bonus points if there's any way I can get alerts about incoming ones to my iPhone (which is on wifi at home).

How can I backup my iPhone messages?

Biru — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 04:08:20 -0800

How can I back up message threads on my iPhone (3G, O2-UK) into a text file or PDF? An ideal solution would be that offered by Syphone though it does not appear to support the latest versions of iPhone software. I'm sure there must be a successor to this programme, though I'll be damned if I can find it.

Help, please?

How many chars SMS can I send from Fido to Bell?

ImaginaryFriend — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 18:30:31 -0800

How long of an SMS message can I send, if my phone is on Fido, and the recipient is on Bell? 140 characters? 160? How long of an SMS message can I send, if my phone is on Fido, and the recipient is on Bell? 140 characters? 160? Does it matter what kinds of phones or accounts we have? I have a... uh.... sensitive message I want to send to someone. It's 153 characters and I don't want it to get cut off....

SMSEmail

spacefire — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 21:50:39 -0800

Is there a good, free and reliable email-SMS client that allows two way communication via SMS? I am with At&t and I already get SMS notifications for emails to my Gmail account, as well as Facebook notifications and also use Google mobile for queries. But I want to be able to send emails to people as text messages. I tried one free service, can't remember its name, but the reply feature never worked from my phone, so I canceled.

iphone mms help

zackola — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 19:55:01 -0800

Can I enable MMS messages on my jailbroken, unlocked original iPhone? I have an old 16GB iPhone, first model that came out. A friend gave it to me when she upgraded to the 3GS. It's jailbroken, unlocked and I've installed 3.0 on it. Works great, almost...Can I enable MMS easily somehow? Thanks! T-mobile, USA if it matters. Regular txts work fine at the moment. Need the MMS though too for work related matters.

Sweden Filter: Telenor and SMS to US, and a little more

hipersons — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 14:41:25 -0800

1. Why won't my sms's go through 2. Any way to permanently change all my numbers to have a +1 in the front? 3. Help with roaming charges I just arrived in Sweden and got a Telenor card for my unlocked iPhone. I can sms people in Sweden just fine, but my sms to numbers in France will fail without telling me, and my sms to number in the USA will fail before its even sent out even if I put the +1 in front of the numbers.

Also, is there an easy way with google/iPhone to auto put +1 in front of all my US numbers without me doing it manually? I know t does it for calls, but I want to permanently update the numbers.

Finally, if someone can help me figure out on the Telenor site what happens if I make calls or use the internet with my prepaid card in other countries in Europe, that would be great. I don't speak Swedish, eep!

How can I have Google Voice send my SMS to an instant message service such as Google talk?

jesirose — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 18:50:12 -0800

How can I have Google Voice send my SMS to an instant message service such as Google talk? I have no text messaging plan, however I have a google voice account. (Formerly Grand Central). I also have the chat in Gmail and an AIM account. I have an app for my iPhone beejive IM which thanks to 3.0 can now push my messages to the phone.

So. If there is a number I can forward the SMS messages to which will send them to my GTalk chat or an AOL im screenname, I can then be notified instantly, instead of having to check the website for texts.

Googling turned up something about a 406 number for GTalk but I cannot find the info I apparently need.

Thanks!!

(No, I don't have any Google Voice invites, they're not doing them. Sorry :( )

Free SMS to Email

magnoliasouth — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 11:18:51 -0800

How can I send a SMS to an email address for free? Note: I am NOT looking for Email to SMS, nor Voice to Email/SMS, but instead SMS to email.

I've searched for other answers and one thread did pop up. However there was never a decent answer for it.

I'm looking for something similar to this service.The only reason I'm wary of that one is that I don't want to use something that may send infinite spam. In other words, one that probably has a decent reputation. Not to mention having to type the email address every single time!

Hacks like work arounds will be fine. If I can even email myself via SMS I can create a filter while I'm gone to email it to my family.

Bonus: If there is a way to automatically email myself copies then that would be icing on the cake. I have limited storage on my phone.

The reason I need it is we're going to be traveling and I want a way to email my family where we are at any given moment. I don't want to incur charges on my family's cell phone bills, so direct text messaging is out.

Any ideas at all?

Email to SMS short code?

Joleta — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 05:30:23 -0800

How can I send a text (SMS) message to a short code from my computer? I don't have a text messaging plan, so I pay 10 cents for each incoming and outgoing text message. I know how to send a text message by e-mail from my computer. But how can I send a text message from my computer to an SMS short code (such as 414141 for Redbox)? I can't just pop 414141 in the email address field; it's not recognized as a proper address. Or is there some online service that will translate short codes into cellular phone numbers?

Why can't my friend text me?

magicbus — Thu, 14 May 2009 09:26:21 -0800

Why can't my friend text me? (iPhones/AT&T) One of my friends can't text me: his texts appear to send fine, but they never arrive on my phone. I have a first-gen iPhone; he has the newer 3G version. Both phones are unmodified, un-jailbroken, and have the standard service through AT&T. We live in the same city (Austin, TX). He can text other people successfully. I can receive texts from others. We have no problems with voice calls.

I have no idea where to even start to diagnose this issue. Any ideas?

Sending short messages long distance away

london302 — Sun, 03 May 2009 15:01:07 -0800

HTML question: As a complete newbie can someone tell me an easy way to send SMS messages using my account with a service provider which allows me to use a specific string to send text messages? more inside My service provider allows me to send cheap text messages using a string which looks like this [https://xxxx.ssss.com/xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx/usernamexxxxpasswords/message]. Is it possible (with absolutely no programming experience) to set up shortcuts or bookmarks which bring up a page with all fields filled with predetermined fields and a blank filed for message. If I simply bookmark it then as soon as the page loads a blank message goes out causing a lot of confusion.

Thanks

quickly send webpage text to sms?

stupidsexyFlanders — Fri, 01 May 2009 12:32:56 -0800

Is there a quick way to take a snippet of text from a webpage and send it as an sms? Google toolbar used to have this capability, but ended it. The ideal workflow is to highlight the text, select "send to sms" and then select a phone number (either pull from goog contacts, or else input once and save thereafter).

Current workflow is copy the text to clipboard, go to gmail, open a new mail, put my mobile number in the to: line, and past the text in the body. Looking to streamline that. Thanks in advance.

INTERACTIVE SMS DISPLAYS

ashepp — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 11:11:01 -0800

Does anyone know of an affordable solution to display SMS messages on an installation to the general public? Ideally a turn key lcd screen solution or similar. Appreciate any help! Adam.

how to communicate cheaply via sms outside the USA?

helios — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 10:29:18 -0800

I want to obtain a US-based phone number solely for the purpose of easily (and cheaply) communicating with my American friends via SMS. A web interface (or iPhone app) to send and receive the text messages would be perfect. Does anything like this exist? Skype can almost do this, but not quite: It can give you a US number for incoming/outgoing voice calls, and it can send text messages to US numbers, but will not allow you to receive SMS messages on your skypeOut number.

Also, it has to be cheap for the people I'm talking to as well; that is, it should cost nothing for people who have unlimited text plans to send me a text message.

typing SMS from laptop

pompomtom — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 20:16:44 -0800

I have a macbook and I have a nokia N95 8gb. Is there any way I can type SMSs with the big keyboard?

Text message organizing: yes we can?

Ignatius J. Reilly — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 13:40:58 -0800

Does anyone here have any experience working with SMS/Text message broadcast vendors? A client of mine is a very large membership organization (in the US, California if it matters) that is interested in beginning to use SMS to communicate with its members. But the whole scene is hard to get a handle on. I would especially appreciate any input or experience anyone might have regarding the companies Message-Media and Distributive Networks. Of course, any other vendor insight would be welcome. And beyond that, is there a reputable vendor out there that anyone can recommend?

The costs just seem so variable, and the whole enterprise exudes a mild shadiness (though I should note that Distributive Networks, while very expensive, seems completely above-board in every way) that shouldn't be there given that what we'd be doing is completely legal, ethical and opt-in.

Finally, is there anything here I'm likely missing or not thinking about?

website or firefox extension that will notify me when a change is made on a site?

debu — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 15:09:50 -0800

Does anyone know of an easy site/service (something like notify.me) or Firefox extension that will send me a notification (SMS or IM preferred) when a change is made on a site? The site that I want to be notified of a change on doesn't have RSS or I'd just route it from there to IM or E-mail.

Help me be an SMS Master

ZackTM — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 11:27:16 -0800

Can you guide me to some SMS messaging services and monthly recurring payment systems for my new business plan? I have come up with what seems like a really neat business idea for my local area but I need some help with the technology end. I want to basically SMS blast several groups of subscribers each week with information they request. I know how to build my subscriber list, and I know how to get the information they require but there are two steps I need your advice on:

1. Text blasting -- I need a free/low cost service that will let me send text messages to large groups of subscribers without injecting their own ads on my messages. Any recommendations?
2. Taking payments -- I need a way to automate people paying either a 1 time fee or a monthly recurring charge to join the service. Is there a service out there that will automate the billing so my database is always up to date with subscribers who have paid?

My plan is to do this:
Potential subscribers send a text message containing their email address to a number, then the system automatically sends them an email with a link to sign up for the service (how do I acquire a phone number specifically for receiving texts? Especially one of those shorter ones)
Subscriber goes online, fills out their profile and is categorized into groups in my database
The database automatically removes customers who's subscriptions have expired
Each day I want to send the messages, I open up my online database and pull out the numbers for each group. Then I blast the message to each group.
As customers subscriptions are close to expiring, they start getting messages that its time to renew

Can anyone give me any advice/recommendations for services to use?

Zack

OhDontForget to work on O2 in the UK...

skylar — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 07:40:02 -0800

A previous thread recommended OhDontForget.com as a way of scheduling text messages to be sent to one's phone. Though the site makes reference to UK cellphone carriers, tests to my O2 phone have not worked, and the site says it is "currently only working in the US and partly in Canada". Does anyone know of a similar service that functions in the UK?

Election results via phone?

Amanda B — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 21:38:36 -0800

How can I follow election results on my cell phone? I have to work Tuesday from early afternoon to 10pm. Is there a way that I can follow the election results via text message? We don't have cable or internet access available, but I can have my cell phone (if I hide it, that is...)

I'm thinking something along the lines of a text update as each state is declared for a party one way or another.