#44 Either "Check now" feature or two timers for SMS please

[Rick Sewill]

I started using the SMS feature. I like it very much.

But when I am using SMS messages to converse with someone I'd like a way to have it check for new SMS messages faster.

Perhaps have a check now feature for SMS messages.

Alternatively, perhaps have two timers for when to check for SMS messages.
Have a long timer that checks for messages when one does not expect SMS messages.
Have a short timer that checks more frequently for messages when one just received or responded to a SMS message.

I hope you get the idea what I'm asking for.

Thanks again. It is a nice applet.

[Jim Duchek]

You can turn the check frequency down to 20 seconds... Are we talking perhaps faster than that??

[Rick Sewill]

I am aware of the check frequency. One can set it to 0.3 of a minute (18 seconds) if I've done my math.

I am suggesting two timers, the "fast" timer could check every 0.3 of a minute (18 seconds) if set to that,
when there is SMS activity. When there hasn't been any SMS activity for a length of time (not sure what length is reasonable, perhaps another parameter?), revert to the "slow" timer that can be set to something more network and server friendly. I think the default, before I changed this check frequency was ever 1.3 minutes (every 78 seconds).

At this moment, I have set the check frequency to 0.3 of a minute (18 seconds).

[Rick Sewill]

I see I did not answer your question directly...I apologize.

I believe checking for SMS messages every 0.3 of a minute (think that's 18 seconds) is fast enough.

I would be surprised if someone wanted to check for SMS messages faster than that.

[Jim Duchek]

That's an interesting idea. I've been meaning to sniff a bit with trying to get push working (supposedly, that's how the GV app on Android works now). Currently though, I actually use the mobile site to check whether a new message has arrived, so it doesn't use a whole lot of bandwidth (8k, if I recall, per check) to turn it up fast.

[Rick Sewill]

Being able to do a push would be even more network friendly, but might be more complicated to implement.

If I remember, one has multiple choices for receiving SMS messages.
One can have messages delivered to a cell phone.
I assume the cell phone provider will do a store-and-forward if the cell phone is off.

One can have email sent for every SMS message.
Again, the email provider will do a store-and-forward.

To push SMS messages to googsystray might become complicated.
1) The Google Voice SMS server would need the IP address for googsystray.
This would imply googsystray would need to register itself periodically.

2) Something would need to be done with firewalls and NAT boxes to allow
the incoming pushed SMS messages.

3) Some sort of encryption might be desired to insure the SMS message wasn't
pushed to the wrong PC if, for example, the PC running googsystray were on a dynamic IP address
and got turned off/disconnected from the Internet.

[Jim Duchek]

Agreed... it would be pretty dicey, especially if reverse-engineered. (Google likes to change unpublished APIs :) Still, I'm gonna eventually sniff what the android GV app is doing, because it gets texts _quick_ as of the last couple versions -- there's no way it's polling.