SMS2WEB app help

SMS2WEB app


This app will forward any received SMS on your (spare) Android phone to a user-specified URL on the web, which technically is an SMS-to-web bridge. This is used for websites that process incoming SMS messages but don’t want to mess with all the text messaging details.
This app allows you to setup your own televoting application online, or allows you to create an online SMS screen, to be used for instance for big events. People could send messages to the big screen.
Use cases for this application:
  • Televoting
  • Public messaging to a big screen on events
  • Out-of-office auto-answer on SMS (just reply, don’t forward)
  • Backup SMS’s on 2nd phone or on the web (just forward, don’t reply)
  • Security:  Tap & Forward SMS from employees
  • Process SMS messages from APp4Buck’s SineDroid application (power lost messages will trigger a website)
  • Remotely controlling electronic devices by SMS like the http://www.arduino.cc/ range (switch on your campsite fridge or airco using 1 SMS message FRIDGE ON, check the possibilities online)
  • Receiving and processing any other SMS messages that are processed by a website
  • Any other creative solution – please tell us how you use it!

Principles

  • A received SMS from phone number 1234567 contains the message “VOTE Alicia”
  • You configured the forward URL to
    http://www.mysite.com/sms?phone=&message=
  • The following URL is posted:
    http://mysite.com/sms?phone=1234567&message=VOTE Alicia
  • The website generates an XML output containing the field
    Thank you, your vote to Ms. Keys was processed
  • You configured the app to have in the SMS reply
  • The user with phone number 1234567 gets a reply with
    Thank you, your vote to Ms. Keys was processed

Features

  • The application will automatically startup on SMS reception
  • Play a sound on SMS reception
  • Send the SMS to a website’s URL (the website should support this, using HTTP GET, not POST)
  • Get XML output back from the website (usually a short delivery description, but may contain any information)
  • Fetch certain fields (this is configurable) from the XML and create an answer SMS
  • Reply the SMS with the answer
  • Forward the original SMS (or the answer) to any other phone number
  • All features above are configurable
  • On screen message history with delivery status (red/green)
  • The received SMS is not removed
Restrictions and constraints
  • The app delivers the SMS using HTTP GET
  • HTTP POST is not supported
  • HTTPS is not supported
  • There should be an internet connection available

Requirements

You need Android 2.1, a few 100 kbytes internal storage, 10 Mbyte RAM, and access to SMS and the internet (WiFi, ethernet, SIM data connection or cabled USB to a PC). Using Wifi you con’t need a data subscription, just a cheap SIM is needed with an SMS bundle.
We kindly request these Android permissions during installation:
  • Receive SMS message: a clear requirement
  • Send SMS: to reply or forward the SMS
  • Internet: We deliver the SMS using HTTP to your server so we need internet access. Also, the help pages in the application are streamed from this website. No other internet pages are used. No information is sent to any other party.

Known issues

  • V1.00  Does not forward the original message but always forwards the answer
  • V1.01   None

Future plans

  • Support HTTP POST
  • HTTPS is out of scope yet

Availability

The app is available through the Google Market app. Use the search engine and search for sms2web or app4buck.

Legal notice/EULA

End User License Agreement: By buying, or downloading or using this application the user(s) of the application declare to agree with the following statements:
  • This application is protected by copyright laws and international copyright treaties, as well as other intellectual property laws and treaties.
  • App4Buck shall not be responsible for any damage caused by using the application.
  • App4Buck shall not be responsible for any damage caused by any malfunctioning of the application.
  • The application shall not be used for life-critical applications or any other critical situations.

Support

If you have difficulties setting up the app or see some errors, please make an entry here in the guestbook.
35 Responses to SMS2WEB app
  1. Charly says:

    I want full details
    • admin says:
      POI66 is probably the first user of the app :-) Receive an SMS, post to POI66 using HTTP and reply the result, like “Album created, your password is XYZ”, or “You are in Bruxelles-Ukkel and moved 11 km from your latest waypoint yesterday.”
  2. admin says:
    @Charly: the app is in the market in a few minutes.
  3. Hans says:
    De klacht is “SMS2WEB Forwards the SMS to an URL more than once”.
    Gisteravond vermoedde ik het al maar ik weet nu ook hoe ik
    het kan reproduceren.
    Ik zag op mijn website namelijk messages dubbel binnenkomen.
    Het gebeurt als je -nadat er een sms is binnen gekomen- de hometoets
    bedient. Als je daarna via de ‘lijst met recent apps’ osm2web weer opent
    forard die de sms nogmaals. Hij laat ook in het venster die sms zien(alsof
    die net binnen gekomen is). Met een nieuwe tijdsaanduiding. De oude
    scrollt ie naar beneden.
    Hij blijft dit herhalen bij bediening van die toetsen.
    Het gebeurt ook iedere keer dat je de telefoon kantelt.
    • admin says:
      This is a known issue. The app was meant to work in the background, unattended by some person (other than checking the connection). We did not plan to fix this yet.
  4. Hans says:
    Would like sms2web to have a possibility (user should check) to generate a logfile on the extern sdcard in the format
  5. Siddharth says:
    Suppose my net is off whn msg arrived.. So will it process msg on url aftr reconnection ?
    • admin says:
      This version will not retry. Next version will have basic retry, such as: click the item in the history and it will re-send. Some day – not planned yet – has full retries.
  6. Danilo Rossi says:
    Is possible or planned a feature to start the send of messages on a time basis? I mean every x minutes send a get request to a configurable url and retrieve a list of numbers and messages to send.
  7. ayo says:
    Does this work on android 2.2?
  8. admin says:
    Yes it does work on 2.2
  9. Alex says:
    What If I dont want to send a reply? I mean Just no reply to some messages?
    • admin says:
      Replying is done to all messages or to none of them. An exception is when there is no answer from the xml. This I have not checked I must say.
  10. admin says:
    Please not that on many phones wifi gets unstable after a few days. Installing a separate WIFI on/off switcher app may fix that. Some are available that every night switch wifi off for a sec.
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