VAS ASP is Value Added Services Application Service Provider
Dimitris Evmorfopoulos ________________________________ From: Aaron Simmons [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, September 13, 2007 9:46 AM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: Beginner questions about SMS in general 2. You get an account with some SMS provider, VAS ASP, or some mobile operator. You setup kannel to connect to them using the protocol of their choice (SMPP, UCP, CIMD, HTTP, etc etc) and send you messages thought them. You still need to pay for the traffic to those providers, ASP's or operators. Another newbie question... What is "VAS ASP"? Is that "Value Added Service" for "Active Server Pages"? e.g., an sms interface for asp? On 9/12/07, Philip Reed <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: Dimitris, Thanks for the thorough reply. This is more or less what I had intuited from reading that tutorial and Kannel's docs. However, here's the part I don't understand. I passed along more or less what you said to my manager, and he pointed out that Verizon (his carrier) allows free texting by sending emails to the vtext.com domain, e.g. HYPERLINK "mailto: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> "[EMAIL PROTECTED] will text that number if it's a Verizon user. I find that not only do most major carriers offer this free service, but apparently teleflip.com acts as a free gateway to all of them. See HYPERLINK "http://www.tech-recipes.com/instant_messaging_tips362.html "http://www.tech- recipes.com/instant_messaging_tips362.html . So now my question is, what's the benefit to setting up your own account with a provider / ASP? I would imagine there's still some reason why people do it, e.g. greater throughput. Thanks, Philip From: Δημήτρης Ευμορφόπουλος [mailto: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> ] Sent: Wednesday, September 12, 2007 2:00 AM To: Philip Reed Subject: RE: Beginner questions about SMS in general Hello Philip, You have got the whole issue right up to a point, and that is sending free SMSs .. Nothing is free in this world J . Now here is the deal. 1. You setup one or more phones use something like kannel to use them as SMSCs and you send all your messages through them. You still need to pay for the phones, sims and the sms traffic you make over those sims. 2. You get an account with some SMS provider, VAS ASP, or some mobile operator. You setup kannel to connect to them using the protocol of their choice (SMPP, UCP, CIMD, HTTP, etc etc) and send you messages thought them. You still need to pay for the traffic to those providers, ASP's or operators. 3. You go to an ASP and they give you an HTTP url that you 'get/post' to send your messages. You still need to pay for the traffic. In all cases (and these are all cases available) you need to pay. There is no such thing as a free service unless you offer it free and get your income from some other source like some free SMS sites do. (I know I have helped setup 2 of those, one gone down a while ago) Your final choice is reverse charge premium SMS, which is not offered by all mobile operators, and is usually localized. This is a premium sms service where your customers are charged for receiving and SMS, not sending one. If you have access to an operator or ASP that carries such a premium number/service and your customers are localized to this ASP/operator than you can still use kannel to connect to the operator to send your messages there, and get some income for sending messages. If you customers are all over the world, then forget I ever mentioned it. Reverse charge premium sms is not widely offered since it is easy to overcharge people for messages they do not want, either on purpose or by software error. So finally if you are looking for a way to send SMSs for free you are out of luck. If you need to send SMSs without charging your customers then you need to find an alternative source of income to compensate for the SMS charges as well as a cheap SMS provider/ASP/operator. Dimitris Evmorfopoulos _____ From: Philip Reed [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, September 11, 2007 11:31 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Beginner questions about SMS in general These questions are going to be terribly rudimentary because I don't yet understand some fundamental questions about how Kannel fits in the big picture. I've perused the FAQ but not really found answers to these, but feel free to redirect me to somewhere I can find answers. I'm tasked with finding a way to provide text messages to our Web site users with certain information on request. I've read the first 11 chapters of this SMS tutorial: HYPERLINK "http://www.developershome.com/sms/"; http://www.developershome.com/sms/ <http://www.developershome.com/sms/> . It seems to imply that we need to either send (1)our messages via a mobile phone or modem, (2) directly by setting up an account with an SMSC, or (3) by paying a service provider on a per-message basis. I infer that Kannel fits into those last two options, and that, although Kannel itself is free, it doesn't eliminate the need to pay someone for access to an SMSC (either directly to the SMSC or via a service provider). Is this accurate so far? Given that we'd like to find a completely free solution, and that most wireless providers appear to offer free email- or Web-based text messaging to their own customers, it's hard to see the benefits for us to setting up our own gateway. What are the practical advantages to going with this setup? Is there some volume of outgoing messages at which using each provider's free interface ceases to be practical? Or is it just the cost in time associated with using all these different email interfaces instead of one common one? Thanks in advance, Philip Internal Virus Database is out-of-date. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.5.484 / Virus Database: 269.13.5/988 - Release Date: 9/4/2007 9:14 AM Internal Virus Database is out-of-date. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.5.484 / Virus Database: 269.13.5 /988 - Release Date: 9/4/2007 9:14 AM Internal Virus Database is out-of-date. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.5.484 / Virus Database: 269.13.5/988 - Release Date: 9/4/2007 9:14 AM
