-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 This went only to Mads, was intended for the list :)
/Tryggvi Mads Kristiansen wrote: > Mobile phones have had support for concatenated SMS messages for ages, so I > don't really see the point of having this limit. If you wan't to send an 8 > bit SMS message in a single package it can contain 140 bytes (you are right > about that), but 6 of those bytes can be used for UDH headers if the message > is larger, so if you send an SMS message with total 141 bytes it will > wrapped up in one message containing 134 bytes in one message and 7 bytes in > the second message - 6 bytes in each SMS will then be used for overhead > describing the order and number of messages in the batch. When was the last > time you had problems sending 140+ bytes messages from your mobile phone? I'm not trying to defend any decision or something like that, just sharing my thougts :) This was just _an_ explanation to myself for the 140 characters limit. I'm gonna share my thoughts as well on concatenated SMS:s. The theoretical upper limit of concatenated SMS:S is 255 messages (given octets that would be 34170 characters). Nobody (I hope) uses this theoretical upper limit since SMS sending is based on "best effort" which does not guarantee that the SMS will reach it's destination (although the network will try as hard as it can). IIRC, I have always only been able to send 3 concatenated SMS:s (a total of 402 characters). Now I don't know if that is the default for most networks or phones or whomever implements the limit. I do however know that it has happened to me a few times that I get an SMS which apparently was split into 3 parts and I only get 2 of those parts (and I have to manually put them together in my SMS inbox with at least one saying "text missing"). It is also not that uncommon that SMS:s don't reach their destinations. It has also happened to me that my SMS:s don't reach their destinations. Once I was travelling and my girlfriend was sending me SMS:s which I replied to. Then she started sending me SMS:s asking why I wasn't answering her SMS:s and asked me to please answer so she would know if I was OK. So if we look at those two cases where _an_ SMS doesn't reach the destination (even though the network tried as hard as it could) from the perspective of sending SMS to a microblogging service: a) Sending a single SMS. The SMS network provider will probably be blamed. b) Sending concatenated SMS and one goes missing. The microblogging service will probably be blamed for screwing up the SMS post. Laconica is free software and you can change the upper limit if you want, but for a default site (or a popular one like identi.ca) it is probably not a good idea if one considers the users' (who don't understand the basics of the SMS standard) opinion and criticism, to allow for more than a single SMS. Plus think about the microbloggers who are addicted to microblogging. It's bad enough that their bills will get higher because they're sending more SMS:s, think how they would skyrocket if the could send 2-3 SMS:s per microblog (since some providers charge for each SMS). I might be completely wrong with these speculations (I reiterate: speculations!) and the people who decided 140 characters would be great for microblogging didn't really give it that much thought, but you can always change the source code since laconica is free software ;) /Tryggvi -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.6 (GNU/Linux) iD8DBQFJOcfwTfUwC3N5Fj0RAm7yAJ9eyHOhNXXoPRRby8Y6XCfi+bGT5gCgg8xX 1dA8cZDVMU9/ReykL9Inhy0= =C3Mr -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- _______________________________________________ Laconica-dev mailing list [email protected] http://mail.laconi.ca/mailman/listinfo/laconica-dev
