SMS Auto-forwarding

[wallaceff]

Lol ... next think you know I'll be making product roadmap slides



There are SO many people now with 2 phones, PhoneMirror (MirrorLeash?) is a great idea! I am sold on it already.

Yes, I completely agree with myself! So.. any updates?

 

[PVS]

Hello All

My questions/issues are as follows:
1. When i tried to reply back using the phone number the message did not send. Any idea why?
2. How would I reply to an individual text if I were to receive forwarded text from 3 different senders and wanted to reply to the 2nd person first? I would think using the number method to reply would solve this problem but I could not get that to work.

HELP and thank you all very much for your feedback.

You have this feature in 1.9, uploaded an hour ago.

To initiate a new text from your remote SMS destination, say:

@2223334444 this is my message

No space between @ and number

This will send "this is my message" to 2223334444, from your PhoneLeash phone.

[@john or @alice would be great too, I know!]

And with that my documentation is out of date again

 

[PVS]

Yes, I completely agree with myself! So.. any updates?

Nearing the first of the 2 big steps (C2DM). Had to break away to offer a little featurette on popular demand

For email users, 2.0 will make all the releases so far look prehistoric! Thats all I am saying for now

 

[Mr. Lucky]

Finally got around to updating to v1.9 -- another winner, as usual. Looking forward to cloud functionality in 2.0!

 

[PVS]

Hello everyone - I think the long silence deserves an explanation. No, I am not over indulging in the early warm season this year!

PhoneLeash 2.0 -- the version with C2DM -- is essentially complete. As a reminder this release brings reply-to-SMS-from-email capability to everyone not just those fortunate in having email-to-SMS functionality from their cell operator (which is unavailable or very pricey almost everywhere but the US, and some Canada). It works but ...

Android cloud-to-device messaging is a simple way of asking Google to deliver a "ping" to a specific app on a specific device. The device would then wake up and do whatever it has to do which for PhoneLeash is to download the reply you sent via email and forward it over SMS. The problem with C2DM is that its not reliable. Sometimes the message is pushed in 5-10 seconds, sometimes its many minutes. If the device is asleep (early morning) the messages won't reach until you drag yourself out of bed and tap your phone to life. That doesn't sound like hitech magic at all!

So I am not very happy about putting it out with caveats and explanations. I think its worth a week or two of experiments to see what more can be done. Just thought I'd let everyone know. At the end of it all, 2.00 will certainly mean added functionality to large a number of email users, and at least the current level for everyone else with some usability improvements.

PVS

 

[cyberwhip]

is there a possibility that you could include a notifications disable, like a run silently? it is very annoying the constant messages in the notification bar, also if someone steal my phone I don't want them to know the application is running. Anytime the app is paused, signal loss, phone start up or forwarding of texts, there is notification in the bar, those should have option to disable.

also, would be very nice to include a change sim notification with the new sim phone number. If someone steals the phone and changes the sim, we can still locate the phone.

im having slight problem getting the "locate" function to operate. maybe I'm doing it wrong. i send "locate 1234567890 password" I got it to work fine for awhile now it seems to have stopped. I tried it on two different phones, I think it has something to do with the GPS not locking but i thought it would use the 3g tower info.

one last complaint, sorry so much complaining, the website really needs work. It doesn't explain hardly any of the features or where to go for help. It is really a pretty good app so far. Would be cool if it was totally configurable remotely. nice work

 

[Mr. Lucky]

is there a possibility that you could include a notifications disable, like a run silently?

You can do that now. The functions are nested beneath the Calls and Status buttons... just uncheck the notifications you don't want (or all of them).

 

[cyberwhip]

yes, ok, but the startup and pause notifications still popup and the very annoying "no signal" will retry in 5 seconds. Unfortunately those are the real giveaway notifications. The no signal message is really ticking me off.

 

[cyberwhip]

You can do that now. The functions are nested beneath the Calls and Status buttons... just uncheck the notifications you don't want (or all of them).

you misunderstand, the setting you are talking about are only the "forwarded" messages disabled, they still appear in the "notification bar" of the app running phone. We need to disable all "notification bar" status on the phone that is running phoneleash.

 

[PVS]

Folks - I just uploaded 2.0 to Google Play. It took waaaay longer than I expected, but hopefully it proves to be as easy-to-use and rock-solid as I tried to make it.

The BIG feature is that now everyone with an email account can reply remotely to SMS since PhoneLeash has a C2DM server! No more email-to-SMS address which most of the world doesn't have anyway.

[C2DM has its issues, since so many things can affect the data connection on a phone, plus Google's idiosyncracies. The PhoneLeash server will be tracking how long it takes for messages to reach phones, so I can anticipate problems.]

The other BIG feature is getting SMS-sent confirmations back from the phone. Sometimes, the phone is not nearby and you have a nagging feeling maybe the reply didn't make it. Now, just suffix //// to your message and you'll get a confirm back.

For email users, the server has smarts to detect quoted (original) text, so if you reply normally you should see only your reply getting sent.

Some embedded help, plus email-help upon app first launch. Docs and website work in progress.

Enjoy!

PVS

 

[PVS]

is there a possibility that you could include a notifications disable, like a run silently? it is very annoying the constant messages in the notification bar, also if someone steal my phone I don't want them to know the application is running. Anytime the app is paused, signal loss, phone start up or forwarding of texts, there is notification in the bar, those should have option to disable.

also, would be very nice to include a change sim notification with the new sim phone number. If someone steals the phone and changes the sim, we can still locate the phone.

I think there is a group of PhoneLeash users who would like to know as much as possible about the app, especially problems in forwarding. Right now, the app is obviously biased towards their needs. The other group wants the app to be silent (some for not the best of reasons). One thing I can tell you is that PhoneLeash is not a "stop thief" app at all. A thief can simply uninstall the whole app in seconds. But I can understand your point about annoyance -- hopefully its minor and they clear on their own anyway.

im having slight problem getting the "locate" function to operate. maybe I'm doing it wrong. i send "locate 1234567890 password" I got it to work fine for awhile now it seems to have stopped. I tried it on two different phones, I think it has something to do with the GPS not locking but i thought it would use the 3g tower info.

With the latest version, the format for most commands is
@<destination number or email> <command>

So @2223334444 locate OR @someone@example.com locate should work fine

Simply sending "locate" from your forwarding destination will also work.

Yes, in the absence of GPS it will try to use the "network" locationing option, provided its not turned off.

one last complaint, sorry so much complaining, the website really needs work. It doesn't explain hardly any of the features or where to go for help. It is really a pretty good app so far. Would be cool if it was totally configurable remotely. nice work

[/QUOTE]

Yes, the website needs a complete redo! Now that I know what to document, I am starting to do just that! And your "complaints" are welcome, thanks for caring, sorry about the long silence.

PVS

 

[Mr. Lucky]

Sorry, but I had to uninstall and revert to the previous version (v1.9, as I had skipped 1.95). The forwarding icon in the status bar is now gone. It flashes briefly at boot, but then disappears. This may be okay for people surreptitiously installing on someone else's phone, but it's an absolute deal breaker for me. I use it to forward to a second number on my own phone, and depend upon that icon to remind me of the current status (I don't forward 100% of the time). I suggest that you make this a configurable option, then everyone will be happy.

Another oddity I noticed is the message that appears when pressing the phone's Options button within the app. The message appears to be hardcoded to "Your PhoneLeash trial is linked to abc@lmnop.com." If you have a paid version installed, it shouldn't say "trial" - this would make it consistent with the main screen, where the "App licenses" button is absent on a paid install (just a full screen width "Click to pause" button).

 

[wallaceff]

I still want a client server model for android too!

 

[colmmcgrath]

Good info. I would like add one more app that is good at sms auto-forwarding. It is the Auto SMS. It is free from the google play store.

 

[PVS]

Mr Lucky - Just fixed the notification issue in the recently uploaded 2.1.

PVS

 

[Mr. Lucky]

I would like add one more app that is good at sms auto-forwarding. It is the Auto SMS. It is free from the google play store.

That app was documented back in post #1 as not working when forwarding to HeyWire, which probably means that it will not work with Google Voice either.

Mr Lucky - Just fixed the notification issue in the recently uploaded 2.1.

Thanks PVS!

 

[PVS]

Ah what I wouldn't do for some publicity like this: http://www.engadget.com/2012/06/20/mightytext-browser-texting-android-app-now-available/

 

[Mr. Lucky]

Issue a Press Release on PRWeb (very inexpensive) and get a following on every relevent forum and social network you can find (free). After a while, there's a good chance that Engadget will find you.

 

[PVS]

PhoneLeash Version 2.3 is out:
- Log outbound texts
- SIM change alert
- A quiet mode (no, its not a secret mode)
- Even simpler to reply, send commands over email (no need for device IDs etc)

Enjoy! (FB likes would be very nice - www.facebook.com/phoneleash)

PVS

PS. $ 0.99 only, only for July.

 

[Mr. Lucky]

I'm glad you mentioned the $.99 thing. I noticed it yesterday and was going to post here about it. I'll try v2.3 this weekend.

 

[Mr. Lucky]

The new version works fine and is intuitive to use, as expected. Two observations though:

1. For clarity, you may want to change the menu verbiage of the new option under the SMS button from "Outgoing SMS" to "Log outgoing SMS" (especially since the feature is not documented at gearandroid.com yet).
2. I don't know if it's a Google problem or yours, but I was unable to +1 you within the Play store (yes, I was logged in). It kept returning a "Try again later" error.

 

[PVS]

Hello everyone - A bit of exciting news! Last night PhoneLeash v 2.6 with MMS forwarding was released.

MMS forwarding to email looks quite good (pics, media, multiple attachments etc.). Sending an MMS programmatically on Android is quite the witch's brew, so for those forwarding to a second phone you get an SMS notification of the MMS, along with the text content, and attachment file names.

The most important thing -- there is no setup involved additional to what was needed earlier (which was pretty simple).

Happy Thanksgiving!

PVS

 

[Mr. Lucky]

> for those forwarding to a second phone you get an SMS notification of the MMS,
> along with the text content, and attachment file names
Maybe I don't understand how this works. As you know, I'm forwarding to another phone number (HeyWire). I receive the notification, text content, and filename... but how do I access the file? When the file has "dots" in the name (e.g., "2012-10-31 15.16.29.jpg" <-- that's an actual name from my phone's camera), the filename appears as a link in the forwarded message. However, the link only extends to ".29" with the ".jpg" appearing as plain text. Pressing the link doesn't do anything useful, as the only choices are "GrooVe IP" and "Phone" (i.e., it thinks it's a tel#). I tried renaming the file to something simple (freddy.jpg) and resent the MMS. This time the notification and body text arrived as before, but with "[Attachments: freddy.jpg]" appended (with no hyperlink). Is this a bug, or I just don't know how to access the picture?

 

[PVS]

Hello Mr Lucky! How are you!

Well, the no-BS way of saying it is that MMS' get forwarded with attachments only to email destinations, and you are out of luck if you are forwarding to a second phone (or Heywire). I simply haven't been able to hack my way to a reliable way of sending MMS programmatically (no problem doing this with email).

So the MMS is converted into SMS, and only the attachment names are included (in case they offer a clue). The appearance of a clickable link must be an accident.

Of course, I could upload the files to the cloud, and send proper links in the SMS, but I am in two-minds about that due to privacy concerns.

Happy T'giving!

PVS

 

[Mr. Lucky]

OK, that's understandable... and still an improvement, since MMS was previously ignored (+ I don't receive many, and HeyWire-to-HeyWire MMS works perfectly). Two thoughts come to mind, if you think either is worth further consideration:
1. Offer the ability to configure an email address for MMS in addition to the forwarding number used for everything else. If it could send SMS notification of the email (or as it currently does), it would be icing on the cake!
2. Your idea of upload to cloud... offer a user config option to integrate with Box, Dropbox, etc. I use several apps that work this way now (e.g., JS Backup, OfficeSuite Pro).

Thanks for your continued interest and support. Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours!