SMS Gateway

Posted on 2003/01/22 09:17:16 (January 2003) by john.

An evening in nerdy heaven.


[Tom's Technical Notes]

Last night at Tom's house, Tom and I got the SMS to message board gateway up and running. Tom has an old phone of his with an old SIM card attached to one of his servers via a serial cable. We knocked up a visual basic script that is ran on a regular basis. When the script runs, it uses the rather good gnokii to connect to the phone over the serial cable, retrieve all the SMS messages and write them into a file. Our script then parses this file, extracting the index, date/time, sender's number and the message's actual text. We also use gnokii to generate a text file of the phone's phonebook. So then, we do a lookup on the sender's number and turn it into a readable name. With all the information now assembled, we log it locally just to be on the safe side, and then use an ActiveX control to do an HTTP post to the normal message board perl script. Finally the script uses the index number we extracted to delete the message from the phone's SIM card and it's all done. Robert is, indeed, your aunty's live-in lover.

I've not had so much nerdy satisfaction out of a project for absolutely ages. It was absolutely great. It was really fun to set up - (hopefully Tom agrees!) - it just all seemed to come together so smoothly. I guess that is largely to do with the old saying about two heads being better than one. As projects go, it was the epitomy of copy and paste development - just about every bit we needed to do could be found already on the web somewhere. Good old Google Groups.

I love the sheer excess of it - your few characters of text pass through about 20 different technologies before they find their way onto the board. Plus I love the fact that no matter where we are now, we can still keep in touch with the board. No longer do you have to be sitting in front of a computer. You can post from anywhere your mobile can get a signal - on the train, waiting at a station, in the pub, out walking, even whilst canoeing. Maybe we could set up a competition for the message posted from the most remote/unusual location or something like that...

We (probably Tom) will be in touch with all the 'maison regulars soon to let you know the number you can send messages to.

I'd just like to point out I'm adding this comment via lynx.

Posted by John at 2003/01/22 15:15:43.

I'd just like to point out I'm adding this comment via lynx.

Posted by John at 2003/01/22 15:16:24.

Nerdy-overload. I am utterly impressed. Not quite as impressed as I am with Photostudio, but still pretty damn impressed.

Posted by Rob Lang at 2003/01/22 15:45:04.

Doesn't someone have to pay for the SMS's or is it a one way commication??

Posted by Dwain at 2003/01/23 15:11:41.

It's unidirectional. Only to the board!

Posted by Rob Lang at 2003/01/23 16:14:33.

Rob if you want one for Icar I got a spare phone somewhere.

Posted by Dwain at 2003/01/24 10:06:37.

Nice idea mate, but I don't think Icar really needs SMS messaging!

Posted by Rob Lang at 2003/01/24 10:07:58.

I don't think any board needs SMS messaging - but thats not the point of it is it??

Posted by dwain at 2003/01/24 13:16:36.

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