SwiftSMS - Simply sending Beautiful Webtexts

Fluffy88 · 17-01-2014 10:03am #1

Hi all

Myself and a friend have just released our first Android App and would love to get some input/feedback. We are both pretty new to the Android development game so we would be very grateful if anyone has any advice or input on how we could improve the App :-)

Our App is called SwiftSMS. It lets you use your free Network Providers webtexts. We tried to keep the App as Android focused as possible, so it fits into the Android eco-system and feels like a true Android App.
It's still a work-in-progress in some respects as we still have new features and other operators to add.

If anyone has time to take a look we would be so thankful!
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.swift

Happy texting :pac:

RangeR · 17-01-2014 10:26am

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Looks good.

Features I'd like to see, if possible

Sync messages to gMail. Allow user to set a label, say "SMS". In this way, you might not need full SMS integration as apps like SMSBackup+ sync proper SMS's to gMail with this tag. You app would sync down proper SMS's. SMSBackup+ would sync down your SMS's to stock app. In theory, it should be seamless to the user.
Sync with Google Contacts
Optimise for Tablet / TV
Make it damn easy to use
Desktop app with Sync ability as above would be killer.

jgbyr · 17-01-2014 3:11pm

Installed this yesterday. I'm with vodafone & found it loaded the captcha quickly.
Nice & easy to use, though as I'm on kitkat it doesn't keep the Sent messages.
Happy with it so far.

Fluffy88 · 17-01-2014 3:37pm

Thanks jgbyr!
I'm happy to see it fits in well.
We really appreciate the kind words, makes it all worth it :-)

Automatic Captcha recognition will hopefully come in a later version.

I wish there was something I could do with KitKat but unfortunately it looks like from now on the ability to insert sent text messages is gone unless your app is the default SMS app.

Fluffy88 · 17-01-2014 3:46pm

RangeR wrote: »

....
Features I'd like to see, if possible
...
Sync with Google Contacts

Make it damn easy to use

Hi RangeR, again thanks for the suggestions.
We will be looking into integrating your suggestions in a later release.

Regarding the two I quoted above, do you have anything particular in mind?
1. SwiftSMS currently searches your Google Contacts to display a list of suggested contacts as your entering a recipient.
2. Is there something about the interface that you don't like or would like to see improved?

Thanks for your time & your thoughts!

RangeR · 17-01-2014 4:21pm

Fluffy88 wrote: »

Hi RangeR, again thanks for the suggestions.
We will be looking into integrating your suggestions in a later release.

Regarding the two I quoted above, do you have anything particular in mind?
1. SwiftSMS currently searches your Google Contacts to display a list of suggested contacts as your entering a recipient.
2. Is there something about the interface that you don't like or would like to see improved?

Thanks for your time & your thoughts!

Nope. To be honest, I installed your product but have not run it yet. I'm just listing, what I see as, failings in other products.

numorouno · 17-01-2014 4:21pm

RangeR wrote: »

Nope. To be honest, I installed your product but have not run it yet. I'm just listing, what I see as, failings in other products.

no eMobile

Fluffy88 · 17-01-2014 5:05pm

RangeR wrote: »

Nope. To be honest, I installed your product but have not run it yet. I'm just listing, what I see as, failings in other products.

Okay, I was wondering because those were two of the main goals that we set out to achieve with SwiftSMS.

numorouno wrote: »

no eMobile

Unfortunately it's not supported at the moment, no.
The only reason eMobile isn't supported is because I ordered a SIM card but it never arrived. I'm going to order another SIM card right now!

Once I get access to eMobiles webtext service it won't take long to add them to SwiftSMS.

RangeR · 17-01-2014 5:07pm

Yeah, I'm actually on eMobile too. I'll have to wait until that's in.

numorouno · 17-01-2014 5:08pm

That's some service! Keep us updated on this thread

robtec · 17-01-2014 5:19pm

We aim to please

I'm the other developer of SwiftSMS, It's great to start getting feedback early in the game

Thanks Guys!

jgbyr · 17-01-2014 6:20pm

Fluffy88 wrote: »

I wish there was something I could do with KitKat but unfortunately it looks like from now on the ability to insert sent text messages is gone unless your app is the default SMS app.

Which app needs to be the default app? At present Handcent is set as my default sms app.

RangeR · 17-01-2014 6:34pm

jgbyr wrote: »

Which app needs to be the default app? At present Handcent is set as my default sms app.

In this case, it doesn't matter. SwiftSMS can't be the default app as it's not a conventional SMS app. It can't actually send or receive SMS's. It's specifically for webtexts only. It just talks to the various network websites.

Fluffy88 · 17-01-2014 6:50pm

Exactly :-)
And because of the way SMS messages are now handled in Android we won't be able to record sent messages unless Android decides to change it again.

jgbyr · 17-01-2014 6:51pm

Fluffy88 wrote: »

Exactly :-)
And because of the way SMS messages are now handled in Android we won't be able to record sent messages unless Android decides to change it again.

Unless you make it into a full sms app?

Fluffy88 · 17-01-2014 6:57pm

Yeah.
Which would mean having everything from inboxes to MMS sending and all kinds of things.
Might not sound like much but it's a pretty big job.

We will of course continue to improve and add new features but for now we don't have any plans to turn SwiftSMS into a fully fledged SMS app. We want to focus on providing a good experience when sending webtexts.

robtec · 18-01-2014 2:40pm

jgbyr wrote: »

Which app needs to be the default app? At present Handcent is set as my default sms app.

Hi jgbyr,

SwiftSMS is unable to support writing to the SMS database on KikKat versions, your default SMS application is the only one allowed to do this.

At the moment SwiftSMS is not designed to be a default SMS application, as it would require us to handle all SMS activities.
We are currently working on new features, we may include this in a future release if the demand is there

Thankyou for your post!

Happy Web Texting

robtec · 18-01-2014 2:46pm

robtec wrote: »

Hi jgbyr,

SwiftSMS is unable to support writing to the SMS database on KikKat versions, your default SMS application is the only one allowed to do this.

At the moment SwiftSMS is not designed to be a default SMS application, as it would require us to handle all SMS activities.
We are currently working on new features, we may include this in a future release if the demand is there

Thankyou for your post!

Happy Web Texting

Just my luck, this question already answered!
That's what I get for using my Android browser with the thread cached since yesterday

Cheers Fluffy88

robtec · 18-01-2014 4:15pm

Update, Sims acquired

Splike · 18-01-2014 9:50pm

Looks good.

Whats the tech behind this, how does it work? I tried to do something something similar to this myself but I wasn't sure how to interface with the webtext provider servers. How'd you do it?

Fluffy88 · 18-01-2014 10:00pm

Thanks :-)

The tech is just Java making HTTP connections to the server and sending GET & POST requests.
That's the easy part, the real work is figuring out the details like the URL to connect to and the parameters needed.

robtec · 20-01-2014 1:26pm

EMobile is now supported

A good weekends work!

Happy Texting

numorouno · 20-01-2014 1:52pm

robtec wrote: »

EMobile is now supported

A good weekends work!

Happy Texting

Thanks!

It's taking along time to send the messages though. I wonder is it a problem with the emobile site or the app

robtec · 20-01-2014 2:15pm

numorouno wrote: »

Thanks!

It's taking along time to send the messages though. I wonder is it a problem with the emobile site or the app

Hi

I would say its the network website, I've been using the app and no real issue with speed, are you on mobile data or WiFi?

Thanks

RangeR · 20-01-2014 3:21pm

It's the eMobile site. Trying sending a webtext from it directly, and it will be a pain.

RangeR · 20-01-2014 3:25pm

Ok, I've started using it. I like it a lot.
However, maintaining a list of sent webtexts / by network, is a must. This should be considered the first feature request.

numorouno · 20-01-2014 4:52pm

robtec wrote: »

Hi

I would say its the network website, I've been using the app and no real issue with speed, are you on mobile data or WiFi?

Thanks

it was wifi but I checked the website after and that appears to be the problem!

jgbyr · 21-01-2014 5:24pm

RangeR wrote: »

Ok, I've started using it. I like it a lot.
However, maintaining a list of sent webtexts / by network, is a must. This should be considered the first feature request.

As mentioned by Range, would it be possible to see your webtext history. I understand that an inbox folder etc is not possible but could sent messages not be listed in the app?

The number of available webtexts is still difficult to read (especially with my eyesight :-) ).

Fluffy88 · 21-01-2014 10:00pm

RangeR wrote: »

Ok, I've started using it. I like it a lot.
However, maintaining a list of sent webtexts / by network, is a must. This should be considered the first feature request.

That's what we were aiming for :-)
Thanks for the feedback/suggestion!

We've chatted about the feature you mentioned, we need to look into the Android SMS database to see does it support that type of feature.

jgbyr wrote: »

As mentioned by Range, would it be possible to see your webtext history. I understand that an inbox folder etc is not possible but could sent messages not be listed in the app?

The number of available webtexts is still difficult to read (especially with my eyesight :-) ).

There is plans to add an SMS history/inbox.
It's not highest priority at the moment as we would like to get O2 added and fix all the issues we've noticed thus far before starting on any big new features.

Thanks for the suggestions!

madmoe · 22-01-2014 6:07pm

Does Tesco Mobile work guys? I'm using them since November last year.....don't really like the look and feel of their own webtext app.....

Fluffy88 · 22-01-2014 6:14pm

Tesco is working perfectly in SwiftSMS :-)
I agree having used their app for a short bit, it's horrendous and I don't think that's over-exaggerating :-P

About the tablet version question (In PM, I'll answer here since it's relevant).

We aren't currently working on a tablet optimised version as I can't really see what we could do with the extra screen space.
I tested the app on my Nexus 7 and it works grand on the larger screen, so it's just taking some time to sit down and figure out how to make better use of the extra space.
If you have any ideas on what we could do on a tablet screen differently we'd be happy to hear them :-)

SwiftSMS - Simply sending Beautiful Webtexts

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