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SwiftSMS - Simply sending Beautiful Webtexts

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    #32
    Kavrocks
    Registered Users Posts: 2,343 ✭✭✭Kavrocks


    Saw
    Store saved SMS messages in your Sent Box (pre Android KitKat/4.4 only)
    and now I won't be downloading. I have Cabbage which I've been able to configure to do this on Kitkat.


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    #33
    robtec
    Registered Users Posts: 24 ✭robtec


    Kavrocks wrote: »
    Saw and now I won't be downloading. I have Cabbage which I've been able to configure to do this on Kitkat.

    Thanks Kavrocks,

    On initial investigation of this feature, we concluded it's not as straight forward as pre Android versions to implement. However we won't rule this feature out just yet, our backlog has more pressing features at the moment, like o2 support.

    I do still think it's worth a download, even to see the beautiful UI we worked so hard on :)

    Thanks again :)


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    #34
    Kavrocks
    Registered Users Posts: 2,343 ✭✭✭Kavrocks


    robtec wrote: »
    I do still thinks it's worth a download and try, even to see the beautiful UI we worked so hard on :)
    To me this is useless without that regardless of how nice the UI is sorry. Why would I want several apps to manage my texts or not have my sent texts stored somewhere?

    Everything is possible. I looked into it and there are ways to do it but have to many other things on at the moment.


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    #35
    robtec
    Registered Users Posts: 24 ✭robtec


    Kavrocks wrote: »
    To me this is useless without that regardless of how nice the UI is sorry. Why would I want several apps to manage my texts or not have my sent texts stored somewhere?

    Everything is possible. I looked into it and there are ways to do it but have to many other things on at the moment.

    Thanks anyway for the feedback, regardless of its negativity :)


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    #36
    madmoe
    Registered Users Posts: 4,364 ✭✭✭madmoe


    I really like your UI guys, much much better and cleaner than Cabbage and the Tesco Mobile app! If you can get sent SMS into it then I think you should absolutely try but for me not having it is no big deal as I didn't have it in the Tesco Mobile app anyhow!

    All the best,
    M


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    #37
    Fluffy88
    Registered Users Posts: 1,414 ✭✭✭Fluffy88


    madmoe wrote: »
    I really like your UI guys, much much better and cleaner than Cabbage and the Tesco Mobile app! If you can get sent SMS into it then I think you should absolutely try but for me not having it is no big deal as I didn't have it in the Tesco Mobile app anyhow!

    All the best,
    M
    Thanks madmoe!!
    We appreciate the support.
    Kavrocks wrote: »
    To me this is useless without that regardless of how nice the UI is sorry. Why would I want several apps to manage my texts or not have my sent texts stored somewhere?

    Everything is possible. I looked into it and there are ways to do it but have to many other things on at the moment.

    Kavrocks, would you mind sharing your insight into this?
    I have also extensively looked into it and I haven't been lucky enough to come across any solution other than being the default SMS app.
    Android developer blog explaining the new 'feature' - http://android-developers.blogspot.ie/2013/10/getting-your-sms-apps-ready-for-kitkat.html
    The only known hack - http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2551072 (I kindly direct your attention to the first comment)

    The only way I know to do this is become the default SMS app or maintain our own database of sent messages, both of which bring with them problems of their own.
    However as robtec mentioned, we aren't finished regarding this issue and we will endeavour to find a good solution.


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    #38
    RangeR
    Registered Users Posts: 7,265 ✭✭✭RangeR


    Fluffy88 wrote: »
    Thanks madmoe!!
    We appreciate the support.



    Kavrocks, would you mind sharing your insight into this?
    I have also extensively looked into it and I haven't been lucky enough to come across any solution other than being the default SMS app.
    Android developer blog explaining the new 'feature' - http://android-developers.blogspot.ie/2013/10/getting-your-sms-apps-ready-for-kitkat.html
    The only known hack - http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2551072 (I kindly direct your attention to the first comment)

    The only way I know to do this is become the default SMS app or maintain our own database of sent messages, both of which bring with them problems of their own.
    However as robtec mentioned, we aren't finished regarding this issue and we will endeavour to find a good solution.

    Stop thinking difficult.

    Just create your own "Sent Items" folder and store them in your own DB. Don't worry about real SMS folder integration just yet. Just record sent messages. It's that easy.


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    #39
    Kavrocks
    Registered Users Posts: 2,343 ✭✭✭Kavrocks


    Fluffy88 wrote: »
    Kavrocks, would you mind sharing your insight into this?
    I have also extensively looked into it and I haven't been lucky enough to come across any solution other than being the default SMS app.
    Android developer blog explaining the new 'feature' - http://android-developers.blogspot.ie/2013/10/getting-your-sms-apps-ready-for-kitkat.html
    The only known hack - http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2551072 (I kindly direct your attention to the first comment)

    The only way I know to do this is become the default SMS app or maintain our own database of sent messages, both of which bring with them problems of their own.
    However as robtec mentioned, we aren't finished regarding this issue and we will endeavour to find a good solution.
    You already appear to know how to accomplish this.

    What's wrong with becoming the default SMS application? So long as you do it right for your use case and give people the option?

    What's wrong with on Android 4.4/4.4.1 using AppOps?

    I would also reiterate what RangeR said 'Stop thinking difficult' and perfect.

    If you are looking at becoming the default SMS app and maintaining a database of sent messages with both having problems then I'm not sure what other good solution you will come up with.

    You are never going to please everybody and in this case that's me but I don't see why both of your suggested solutions have problems? Yes they aren't perfect but they don't need to be they just need to be an option for people to use.


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    #40
    The Corinthian
    Closed Accounts Posts: 19,777 ✭✭✭✭The Corinthian


    First of all, I should disclose that I wrote an SMS client replacement app a few years back, it's on the Play market, but it was my first published app and I've always treated it more as a hobby/sandbox than a serious product so it's as buggy as Hell and make no apology for that. Someday I may rewrite it, if I get time.

    Anyhow, SwiftSMS...

    One Client to Rule them All... What Kavrocks says about a default app is very true. No one wants to have to use multiple clients to send to people and then go to another to read incoming messages.

    Thing is that I discovered it can get very complicated, very quickly; for example you're using one outgoing provider as your default, but it doesn't work well (or at all) for certain networks, or alternatively you can send for free to a certain network. So you want to be able to handle that you can override your default outgoing provider, without having to fiddle with settings, which is another turn-off.

    Also, doing the various views is a bit of a pain, and require that you think carefully about how your user interacts with your app - do you show group chats as a group thread or as seperate threads to multiple contacts? And under what circumstances?

    Integrating with the default SMS database. This is a bit of a nightmare as Google doesn't publicly expose the full SMS database, and so while you can access messages, how you group them can be very fiddly, especially if you're trying to list out all conversation threads, as it can result in serious performance issues, from experience, due to lack of visibility on the database structure, thus resulting in some very inefficient SQL queries.

    One solution is to grab a copy of all the messages from the default database and copy them into your own database, where you can have better control. However, if you do this keeping them in sync becomes an issue.

    So you can either use the default database (performance issues) or a custom one (synchronization issues).

    Writing SMS without being the default app on KitKat. I've not examined the changes in details, but yes, it appears it can be done. Twenty seconds on Goggle will find you a fix for that issue.

    Allow for lots of providers. First thing I noticed about SwiftSMS is you have to register an account before you can do anything. Thing is the phone can already send out and receive SMS, so really you shouldn't have to. Even then, you give a limited number of potential providers (from what I can see, you're just copying Cabbage) and ignore the international market and cheap providers like Clickatell (most of my downloads are from places like Saudi Arabia, where the incumbent telco is raping everyone on the cost of SMS).

    As almost all of these providers use some sort of HTTP or HTTPS, GET or POST API, you should be able write a solution that you can apply to all with the right 'script'. Only advice I'd give is don't try to be too clever about managing providers, just include them as part of the APK. I set up a system for remote updating, via pre-Froyo 'push', and it was way more trouble that it was worth.

    Features, features, features, but not too many features. Be careful about how many you put in, as it can make the whole app into an unmanageable monster before long.

    Some I've found were popular and genuinely useful were:
    • Having the phone act as a Web server over a WiFi network, allowing you to send (and ideally read) SMS using a Web interface.
    • The option to silence incoming notifications during certain hours (e.g. at night).
    • Dynamic sending options; for example that you over-ride the default send provider for another, based upon the recipient, if you're roaming or if you lack internet connectivity (or the server you're connecting to is down).

    You've a good UI. At least from what I have seen, it's clean and friendly, but there's not much there - more correctly, outside of sending SMS it doesn't do much. TBH, the UI on it's own isn't going to attract that many people. For them to adopt SwiftSMS, you need to convince them to dump their current client and you're not there yet.


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    #41
    ongarite
    Registered Users Posts: 8,200 ✭✭✭ongarite


    I see a new update has been pushed out with write support for KitKat.
    Working without any issues in Hangouts.
    Cheers


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    #42
    jgbyr
    Registered Users Posts: 1,371 ✭✭✭jgbyr


    ongarite wrote: »
    I see a new update has been pushed out with write support for KitKat.
    Working without any issues in Hangouts.
    Cheers

    Thanks for letting us know. Just updated there & it's working perfectly with Handcent, my default sms app.
    Nice work from the devs.


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    #43
    Fluffy88
    Registered Users Posts: 1,414 ✭✭✭Fluffy88


    As mentioned by ongarite, we have released a new version of SwiftSMS last night that will now record sent messages in KitKat.
    Sent messages are being written to the SMS database and therefore will show up in whatever 'Default' SMS app you use on your device.

    Thank you for all the feedback, it has been noted and we will consider all suggestions for future releases.


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    #44
    RangeR
    Registered Users Posts: 7,265 ✭✭✭RangeR


    Not wanting to sound ungrateful. New features are usually always welcome. However, this doesn't fix the problem for those of us running this from non phone devices.

    An alternative method, would be to save the SMS to gmail and tag it with a user defineable label, SMS for example. This will have the sent messages on all devices.


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    #45
    Fluffy88
    Registered Users Posts: 1,414 ✭✭✭Fluffy88


    RangeR wrote: »
    Not wanting to sound ungrateful. New features are usually always welcome. However, this doesn't fix the problem for those of us running this from non phone devices.

    An alternative method, would be to save the SMS to gmail and tag it with a user defineable label, SMS for example. This will have the sent messages on all devices.

    This feature wasn't designed to fix or even address the problem of cross device synchronisation.
    It was purely to make SwiftSMS act as you would expect it to act, i.e. SwiftSMS sends texts and just like every other SMS app it should save sent texts in the devices Sent box.

    We realise that cross device sync would be a very worthwhile/valuable feature but it's not one of the basic features anyone would expect to get with an SMS app therefore it's more important to get some other things completed first.
    Hopefully in another release we will provide cross device sync.
    For now though, since your sent messages are finally being recorded properly by SwiftSMS you can use the SMSBackup app you previously mentioned to achieve this.


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    #46
    The Corinthian
    Closed Accounts Posts: 19,777 ✭✭✭✭The Corinthian


    Fluffy88 wrote: »
    Hopefully in another release we will provide cross device sync.
    Not sure it can be done with the same release.

    Once you add uses permissions such as android.permission.READ_SMS, then you're telling the app that it requires a device that can accommodate such permissions and even if the app is willing to gracefully fail on a device without such functionality, without crashing or throwing an ANR, the Play Market may not and simply rule any registered devices without SMS functionality as incompatible.

    My feeling is that you most likely need a second version of the app, with that SMS functionality, and uses permissions omitted, so that it can be used by such devices.


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    #47
    RangeR
    Registered Users Posts: 7,265 ✭✭✭RangeR


    Fluffy88 wrote: »
    This feature wasn't designed to fix or even address the problem of cross device synchronisation.
    It was purely to make SwiftSMS act as you would expect it to act, i.e. SwiftSMS sends texts and just like every other SMS app it should save sent texts in the devices Sent box.

    We realise that cross device sync would be a very worthwhile/valuable feature but it's not one of the basic features anyone would expect to get with an SMS app therefore it's more important to get some other things completed first.
    Hopefully in another release we will provide cross device sync.
    For now though, since your sent messages are finally being recorded properly by SwiftSMS you can use the SMSBackup app you previously mentioned to achieve this.

    Not really, no. This has nothing to do with cross device sync, well maybe indirectly.

    My point being, my tablet doesn't have an SMS Sent Items folder. It's incapable of sending regular tests. The same goes for my Android STB.

    When I send a text through your program, from my tablet, I have no record of what I sent, anywhere, ever. There is no sent folder.


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    #48
    RangeR
    Registered Users Posts: 7,265 ✭✭✭RangeR


    The Corinthian wrote: »
    Not sure it can be done with the same release.

    Once you add uses permissions such as android.permission.READ_SMS, then you're telling the app that it requires a device that can accommodate such permissions and even if the app is willing to gracefully fail on a device without such functionality, without crashing or throwing an ANR, the Play Market may not and simply rule any registered devices without SMS functionality as incompatible.

    My feeling is that you most likely need a second version of the app, with that SMS functionality, and uses permissions omitted, so that it can be used by such devices.

    Interesting idea. To test, I removed SwiftSMS from my tablet. I then searched for it on the store. It showed up AND installed. I definitely only have a WIFI tablet [Note 10.1]. There was a permission about accessing SMS/MMS but it installed fine.


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    #49
    The Corinthian
    Closed Accounts Posts: 19,777 ✭✭✭✭The Corinthian


    RangeR wrote: »
    Interesting idea. To test, I removed SwiftSMS from my tablet. I then searched for it on the store. It showed up AND installed. I definitely only have a WIFI tablet [Note 10.1]. There was a permission about accessing SMS/MMS but it installed fine.
    I'm surprised, but that's good to hear. All they need to do then is trap any potential errors and/or detect for such functionality or lack thereof and amend the business logic accordingly.


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    #50
    Fluffy88
    Registered Users Posts: 1,414 ✭✭✭Fluffy88


    The play store doesn't use the apps declared permissions to decide what devices to open your app to, it uses the apps declared features. Declared or implied features.

    The WRITE_SMS and READ_SMS permissions imply your app uses the Telephony feature.
    So if the app doesn't require Telephony to function you can declare the feature as optional in your manifest. This will then leave your app visible to devices that don't have the Telephony feature. It is then up to the developers to handle this scenario.

    SwiftSMS has always gracefully handled devices that don't have the Telephony feature. But we didn't know the above, if you look at our change log on the play story you'll notice version 1.01 added tablet support.
    It was released 2 hours after version 1.0 and the only change was we declared the Telephony feature as optional so tablets could download the app.


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    #51
    RangeR
    Registered Users Posts: 7,265 ✭✭✭RangeR


    Fluffy88 wrote: »
    version 1.01 added tablet support

    OK, cool. Is the below feature on the horizon? Not cross platform but Sent Item History on non phone devices [tablet/stb]

    RangeR wrote: »
    My point being, my tablet doesn't have an SMS Sent Items folder. It's incapable of sending regular tests. The same goes for my Android STB.

    When I send a text through your program, from my tablet, I have no record of what I sent, anywhere, ever. There is no sent folder.


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    #52
    Fluffy88
    Registered Users Posts: 1,414 ✭✭✭Fluffy88


    Okay, so this is how I see it.
    SwiftSMS has a problem, it doesn't record/store messages that are sent on non-phone devices.

    This is what I am currently thinking over in my head as a proposed solution.
    • All sent messages temporarily stored to a web server somewhere (hopefully we can use a Google service for storing the messages).
    • All sent messages get sync'd down to all connected devices.
    • Each device then is responsible for recording the sent message.
    What this means is when you send a message using SwiftSMS on your tablet, it will be saved to your phone and displayed along side all your other text messages.

    I think this is a neat and tidy solution because it will keep your messages in one place. On your phone, where all your other messages are. As was said before "One Client to Rule them All...".

    My reasoning for this is simple. Currently if you send a normal text message from your phone, it's not displayed on your tablet.
    I don't want to see just a list of sent messages on my tablet, it's not much use. I would rather have a single place I can go to see all my messages. That place is and will remain as your phone.
    How does that sound?


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    #53
    madmoe
    Registered Users Posts: 4,364 ✭✭✭madmoe


    Fluffy88 wrote: »
    Okay, so this is how I see it.
    SwiftSMS has a problem, it doesn't record/store messages that are sent on non-phone devices.

    This is what I am currently thinking over in my head as a proposed solution.
    • All sent messages temporarily stored to a web server somewhere (hopefully we can use a Google service for storing the messages).
    • All sent messages get sync'd down to all connected devices.
    • Each device then is responsible for recording the sent message.
    What this means is when you send a message using SwiftSMS on your tablet, it will be saved to your phone and displayed along side all your other text messages.

    I think this is a neat and tidy solution because it will keep your messages in one place. On your phone, where all your other messages are. As was said before "One Client to Rule them All...".

    My reasoning for this is simple. Currently if you send a normal text message from your phone, it's not displayed on your tablet.
    I don't want to see just a list of sent messages on my tablet, it's not much use. I would rather have a single place I can go to see all my messages. That place is and will remain as your phone.
    How does that sound?

    Excellent mate!!


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    #54
    jgbyr
    Registered Users Posts: 1,371 ✭✭✭jgbyr


    Sounds good to me also.


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    #55
    The Corinthian
    Closed Accounts Posts: 19,777 ✭✭✭✭The Corinthian


    Why don't you store outgoing messages in a simple SQLite database, or even an XML file, as this would allow you to display them if you wanted? You'd be surprised how often you do want to see what you just sent?

    This would also make it easier to include an export option, to a local file on the external SD card, as not everyone wants to start registering online accounts.


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    #56
    Fluffy88
    Registered Users Posts: 1,414 ✭✭✭Fluffy88


    Anything is possible :-)

    As I mentioned before, if we do cross device sync I would hope to use a Google service so there would be no need to sign-up for online accounts.


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    #57
    jgbyr
    Registered Users Posts: 1,371 ✭✭✭jgbyr


    Hi, was using the app a while ago (Vodafone) & after entering the captcha I received a text from Vodafone with the following
    Your My Vodafone webtext verification code is ******. Please continue the webtext process now on our website.

    Tried to send a few texts but they all failed. Any ideas?


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    #58
    Fluffy88
    Registered Users Posts: 1,414 ✭✭✭Fluffy88


    jgbyr wrote: »
    Hi, was using the app a while ago (Vodafone) & after entering the captcha I received a text from Vodafone with the following
    Your My Vodafone webtext verification code is ******. Please continue the webtext process now on our website.

    Tried to send a few texts but they all failed. Any ideas?
    Sounds like you have to register to send webtexts with Vodafone. I'd say if you go to their website and try it from there you should be able to get it sorted.

    I didn't realise Vodafone had such a system in place. We will have to address this in a new release. But for now you will have to login to their website the first time before you can send webtexts to compete the registration.


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    #59
    jgbyr
    Registered Users Posts: 1,371 ✭✭✭jgbyr


    Fluffy88 wrote: »
    Sounds like you have to register to send webtexts with Vodafone. I'd say if you go to their website and try it from there you should be able to get it sorted.

    I didn't realise Vodafone had such a system in place. We will have to address this in a new release. But for now you will have to login to their website the first time before you can send webtexts to compete the registration.
    Thanks, I didn't know that myself as I've been sending webtexts for a few years now with vodafone.


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    #60
    jgbyr
    Registered Users Posts: 1,371 ✭✭✭jgbyr


    Very strange, I can send to Irish numbers, it's for the international number that I'm getting the text from Vodafone to go to the website to complete the process. I've gone to the website but can't see any additional login requirement.


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    #61
    The Corinthian
    Closed Accounts Posts: 19,777 ✭✭✭✭The Corinthian


    jgbyr wrote: »
    Very strange, I can send to Irish numbers, it's for the international number that I'm getting the text from Vodafone to go to the website to complete the process. I've gone to the website but can't see any additional login requirement.
    Probably because it's only doing this in the case of unusual behaviour; access from mobile network IP's, unrecognised clients, lack of referrer or other HTTP headers, and so on.

    Or they may have been monitoring this thread and have updated their system to specifically block SwiftSMS. That happens too in the endless cat and mouse game which is screen scraping.


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