I'd agree with you on all counts. Store-and-forward technology like SMS is wedged firmly in the jaws of the incumbents, as they control the signaling path, device parameters, and application gateways. Dead end. IP is a far better method for real-time, though SMS does have a higher reliability for more "sketchy" geography or coverage areas, by nature of its store-and-forward abilities. One must consider the usefulness of a large belch of store-and-forward messages upon coverage restoration, so even this becomes less useful as your edge cases get more grey. JT On Aug 9, 2009, at 8:44 PM, Alex Balashov wrote:
Hi John,
Thanks for your reply.
I think I've pretty much ruled out using SMS to accomplish what I was looking to accomplish simply because there's no way the costs would scale appropriately to the task.
I was wanting to get a high-volume stream of updates from a mobile device (non-phone) that moves and does not always operate in areas of the US where anything but basic digital coverage is available - and certainly not 3G.
But if - even granted a large up-front investment in a shortcode - there is an operating cost of at least several hundred dollars a day, there's just no way that's going to work.
Personally, I think SMS is just a pointless waste of money and time. It's far too much of a profit center to try to do anything serious with it. It's designed to maximise billing to parents of teenagers, not to be used as a transport layer for any sort of serious application. If one wants to backhaul real-time and/or high- frequency data from devices in the field, unlimited data is more or less the way to do it. The stakeholders I was talking to were just interested in a "hack" because they faced the unique problem of not being able to count on any sort of EDGE or 3G coverage.
Thanks,
-- Alex Balashov Evariste Systems Web : http://www.evaristesys.com/ Tel : (+1) (678) 954-0670 Direct : (+1) (678) 954-0671 Mobile : (+1) (678) 237-1775