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NowSMS Support Forums ⬆ NowSMS Support - SMS Issues ⬆ Archive through October 03, 2004 ⬆ |
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| Author | Message | |||
| Dhiraj Mirchandaney New member Username: Dhirajm Post Number: 3 Registered: 05-2004 |
Hi Bryce, Plenty of queries for you with the NowSMS Gateway v5.5 that we are using:- 1. Is there any option to create Users on NowSMS gateway from web interface or through any other external application? We need to create new users on NowSMS gateway from an external application. 2. Is there any option available that we can authenticate my clients on some other website using NowSMS gateway? We are writing an external application and our clients would submit userid and password using that application. We want to check their credentials using NowSMS gateway. 3. We understand that Delivery Receipts are possible if the message is submitted to NowSMS gateway through SMPP Client. But, can we notify our clients who are using HTTP or SMTP interface for delivery ack. 4. If we submit messages to NowSMS gateway then NowSMS gateway deducts a credit for each message. Lets say, if one of the message is rejected by SMSC (for. eg. Throttling Error or some other failure at the SMSC end) then NowSMS gateway is not able to add one credit for that user. For. eg, for User A, the number of credits available is 33. User A submitted a message to gateway and after that gateway submitted that message to SMSC. SMSC rejected that message because of some error as mentioned earlier. In this case the number of credits available to user A would become 32. 5. Is there a way to top-up the credits for a particular user using a URL or some such? | |||
| Bryce Norwood - NowSMS Support Board Administrator Username: Bryce Post Number: 2904 Registered: 10-2002 |
Hi Dhiraj, Give me a week or so to discuss these issues with our engineering team. I don't think we can do anything about #4 (and a throttling error will not cause a message to be rejected, so that error code is not a good example, but there could be others like an invalid recipient address). But the other issues have been on our development list for awhile. So give me a little time to check the status on these items. I should reply in about a week. -bn | |||
| Dhiraj Mirchandaney New member Username: Dhirajm Post Number: 4 Registered: 05-2004 |
Hi Bryce, As usual, thanks for the swift response. We shall await your feedback. Meanwhile, I've been searching the forum for something that can help me with prioritising the messages in the message queue. Had no luck. Is there a way to assign some sort of priority to the messages, or to users, or both? Thanks. | |||
| Dhiraj Mirchandaney New member Username: Dhirajm Post Number: 5 Registered: 05-2004 |
Also, is there a way for the system to send some sort of an alert to the "administrator" that a particular user's limit is about to be exceeded? | |||
| Bryce Norwood - NowSMS Support Board Administrator Username: Bryce Post Number: 2925 Registered: 10-2002 |
Hi Dhiraj, We've been getting a lot of requests about message priorities lately. Basically, we have no support for priorities at present. We've started investigations to determine how to best implement priorities in the future. A static priority system would be easy to implement (associate a priority with different accounts) ... however, ideally what we'd like to see is something more dynamic that could adjust based upon current conditions. (For example, it would be ideal to be able to automatically lower priority for someone that is submitting a large batch of messages.) I also don't have any good inforomation on alerts about credit limits. But let me look at that issue along with the others. We've been working on some changes in that area (which is why I wanted to delay replying to your message), so we'll have to see if there is some way a credit alert could be generated as part of those changes. -bn | |||
| Dhiraj Mirchandaney New member Username: Dhirajm Post Number: 6 Registered: 05-2004 |
Thanks Bryce. Eagerly awaiting your reply. Here's one more issue that comes to mind which maybe you could help us with as well. Everytime we add credits to a user account, the gateway wants to restart. Is there a way where this can be avoided? | |||
| Bryce Norwood - NowSMS Support Board Administrator Username: Bryce Post Number: 2945 Registered: 10-2002 |
That message can be ignored. I'm going to investigate why the message is being triggered (because I see it on my test system too), but a restart is definitely not required for this action. | |||
| Bryce Norwood - NowSMS Support Board Administrator Username: Bryce Post Number: 2977 Registered: 10-2002 |
Hi Dhiraj, Apologies for the delay in responding to your initial questions. Your questions address some areas that we are actively working on. Some enhancements are planned for a patch release to be made available shortly ... while some other enhancements are planned for a major new release later this year. So I wanted to get a better idea of what issues we were going to be addressing in the short term, and what issues were a bit longer term. A web interface for defining the "SMS Users" accounts is very high on our priority list. There is an existing web admin interface for the "MMSC Users" list, which allows those accounts to be provisioned via a web interface, either menu or URL based. We are working on extending that interface to also support the "SMS Users" accounts, for provisioning via a web interface, both menu and URL based. We are hopeful that we will see a patch release that adds this functionality in the next 2 weeks. This interface will allow you to add credits, either through a menu interface, or via a URL interface. So, I believe this would address your #1 and #5 issues from the original posting. Regarding the other issues ... #2 - This is a very interesting idea. The only downside that I see is that for HTTP requests, there isn't really a session context, and without major reworking, we would have to authenticate for each request. I see that as a potential performance hit, but probably not a major hit. I suppose we could implement an HTTP callback, where we pass the user account details in the HTTP callback. And the callback has to respond whether or not the connection should be allowed. (And if a user account doesn't exist in NowSMS, it could be provisioned automatically upon success.) I do like that idea. I'm just not sure how quickly it could be implemented. #3 - Unfortunately, I don't know of a good way to handle this. We've got some work-in-progress regarding this area, but we're not yet sure how we're going to handle this for HTTP and SMTP accounts. #4 - A "throttling" error won't cause a message to be rejected. We'll keep trying in that instance. But I understand your point. The error could be an invalid phone number, for instance. We do not have a way of handling this type of situation and reapplying credits. Regarding other follow-up queries ... The problem where the gateways says that it needs to restart the service to apply changes after you add credits to an account is in the process of being fixed. It will be fixed in the next patch release, but in the meantime, this error can be safely ignored. And regarding an alert when credits are low for an account, that is on our planned enhancement list. It is likely to appear in the next major release scheduled for late this year. (It could appear sooner, but at this point, it looks more likely for the major release.) | |||
| Dhiraj Mirchandaney New member Username: Dhirajm Post Number: 7 Registered: 05-2004 |
Hi Bryce, Thank you so much. We are eagerly awaiting the patch release, as it will really help us a lot. Here's another one for you  We are trying to implement SSL for the web interface. What is the process to do it? Is there a document / help file that can help us? Thanks. | |||
| Bryce Norwood - NowSMS Support Board Administrator Username: Bryce Post Number: 2979 Registered: 10-2002 |
Hi Dhiraj, The patch is finally available. http://www.nowsms.com/download/nowsms550c.zip I'm anxious to see some other features get added to the web admin and provisioning interface, but those are going to have to wait for the next major release. SSL/TLS support is planned for our next major release. But now that you mention it, I wonder if maybe we could make it available a little early. I'm going to see what can be done. | |||
| Dhiraj Mirchandaney New member Username: Dhirajm Post Number: 8 Registered: 05-2004 |
Hi Bryce! As ususal, thank you for your efficient and prompt support! Would really appreciate if we could implement the SSL capabilities soon. | |||
| Bryce Norwood - NowSMS Support Board Administrator Username: Bryce Post Number: 3014 Registered: 10-2002 |
Hi Dhiraj, We've got an internal update that is accepting SSL/TLS connections on the web interface, so I think we're getting closer. We've got a lot more testing to do, and we need to add support for https:// URLs for external connections in a few places (HTTP SMSC, 2-way command, MM7). But it looks optimistic that we might see this feature before the next major release. We're also hopeful to see an SSL option for SMPP connections. -bn | |||
| Dhiraj Mirchandaney New member Username: Dhirajm Post Number: 9 Registered: 05-2004 |
Hi Bryce, Thank you for the release. We are pretty excited about the web admin features as it opens up a lot of possiblities! Kudos to you guys for being so prompt!! Good to know that SSL implementation is going to happen sometime soon. We are eagerly awaiting the release. Any ideas by when this will happen? | |||
| Bryce Norwood - NowSMS Support Board Administrator Username: Bryce Post Number: 3027 Registered: 10-2002 |
Well, we were going to wait on SSL/TLS... However, we've started to see more requirements for SSL/TLS, especially with MM7 connections in a couple parts of the world. So, we decided to go ahead and implement SSL/TLS both as a client and a server. There is now a v5.50d update available at http://www.nowsms.com/download/nowsms550d.zip. It adds SSL/TLS support as follows:
Note: Some functions (specifically the SMS Gateway Web Interface and the MMSC HTTP Interface) require an SSL Server Certificate before they can function properly. In SSL environments, server certificates are used to identify the server and to validate that the individual or organisation operating the server is who they claim to be. The "Generate Server Certificate" option on the "SSL/TLS" page of the NowSMS configuration dialog allows you to build a self-signed certificate. This will allow you to accept HTTPS connections, however web browsers will display a warning message when a user first connects to your site. To remove this warning, you must have your certificate signed by a recognised Certificate Authority (CA). A CA verifies that the identity claimed on your certificate is valid, which in theory helps prevent another party from masquerading with your server's identity. For more information on Certificate Authorities, please visit http://www.sslreview.com. The following file names are used by NowSMS for SSL related keys and certificates: SSL.KEY - Server Private Key; SSL.CRT - Self-signed server certificate; SSL.CSR - Certificate Signing Request (CSR) that can be submitted to a CA; SSL.CA - The file name that should be used to store a certificate returned by a CA. | |||
| Dhiraj Mirchandaney New member Username: Dhirajm Post Number: 12 Registered: 05-2004 |
Bryce, I must say, your support is simply fantastic! We are reviewing this release, and shall soon be implementing it. Quick question. Is it possible to integrate a certificate purchased from a CA (like Versign) with NowSMS? If so, how? Thanks a ton! | |||
| Bryce Norwood - NowSMS Support Board Administrator Username: Bryce Post Number: 3047 Registered: 10-2002 |
I'm not an expert in the area of certificates, but I'll attempt to offer some guidance. First off, most certificates are issued to a particular host name. If you have a certificate issued for a particular host, and you install it on a different host or connect to that same host using a different host name, the web browser will complain that the name in the certificate does not match that of the host to which you are connecting. (Some companies will offer more expensive wildcard certificates for an entire domain. But I don't think Verisign offers that.) So that's one issue to be aware of. The next issue is that when you submit a certificate request to be signed by a CA, the certificate that you get back is only understandable if you have access to the private key that originally signed the request ... and you need the password associated with that request. So, in order to move a certificate from one server to another, you need to be able to take across not just the certificate, but also the server's private key and the password associated with the certificate request. If the formats are compatible, you can bring across the other server's private key and put it in the SSL.KEY file on the NowSMS server. And put the signed cert in as SSL.CA. But then the next trick is to bring across the password associated with the original request. We store a scrambled version of the password in the SSL.INI file. So, what you need to do is generate a new certificate request via NowSMS. That will update SSL.INI with information about the password. Then copy over SSL.KEY and SSL.CA. (And while you're at it, copy the certificate over also as SSL.CRT, as the self-signed cert that NowSMS generated will be useless when the private key is replaced.) If you can do all of this, then it might work, depending upon whether or not the formats are all compatible. -bn | |||
| Dhiraj Mirchandaney New member Username: Dhirajm Post Number: 14 Registered: 05-2004 |
The webadmin feature is a great thing! As I mentioned earlier, it really makes life simple for us. However it grants "All Options Enabled" level of rights to all users that are created using the web admin interface. Is there a way to provide the same Web Menu Options drop down list on the web admin interface? | |||
| Bryce Norwood - NowSMS Support Board Administrator Username: Bryce Post Number: 3140 Registered: 10-2002 |
Dhiraj, Yes, this feature was long overdue. I'll be anxious to see more of this type of capability in the next major release. We're going to add the selection for what options should be available in the web menu interface in the next update. We're currently trying to get a few additional changes tested before we post it. -bn | |||
