Sending an MMS from one VASP to another

Sending an MMS from one VASP to another SearchSearch
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Anonymous
Posted on Thursday, October 09, 2003 - 03:35 pm:   

I'd like to know if it is possible to send an MMS message from one VASP to another?

I'm using a sender vasp to create MMS messages and a receiver vasp to process the received messages. The MMSC used is NowSMS. Is this possible?

My understanding is as follows.
The MMS message sent from the sender VASP to the MMSC is an MM7 Submit Request. The VASP then responds to the sender vasp with an MM7 Submit response.
Now if the MMSC has to send an MMS message in MM7 format, to the receiver VASP, it needs to do so by sending a MM7 Deliver Request for which the receiver VASP would respond with a MM7 Deliver Response.
Firstly, how would I configure NowSMS MMSC to send the received mms message to another VASP.
Secondly, will NowSMS convert the received MM7 Submit Request Message to an MM7 Deliver Request when it sends it to the receiver VASP.

Please correct me if I'm wrong in my assumption.
Any other ideas to acomplish the above would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks.
Bryce Norwood - NowSMS Support
Posted on Thursday, October 09, 2003 - 07:41 pm:   

Hi,

Yes, I would expect this to work (and the submit should indeed be converted to a deliver). There are two configuration pieces that need to be setup in NowSMS.

The "MMSC VASP" page defines VASPs that are allowed to submit messages into NowSMS. So you need to define a VASP account before you are able to submit any messages into NowSMS via MM7.

The "MMSC Routing" page defines outgoing MMS message routing from the NowSMS MMSC. So if you want NowSMS to route any outbound messages to an application or VASP via MM7, you need to define that connection here.

You can either define that messages matching a certain phone number recipient mask get routed to your outbound MM7 routing definition (in which case if the MMSC has any messages to route to a recipient that matches the defined mask, they will be routed out via this MM7 connection). Or, when you define the "MMSC VASP", you can tell NowSMS to automatically forward anything received via that VASP connection out to a particular defined MM7 connection.

It's a little confusing to have to define things in two places, but we determined that it offered a considerable amount of flexibility doing it this way.

-bn
Anonymous User
Posted on Saturday, October 11, 2003 - 06:53 pm:   

Hi Bryce,
Thanks for the detailed reply.
I did create two VASP accounts (a Sender and a Receiver) as you had mentioned and was able to send MM7 Submit Request messages to the NowSMS MMSC from the Sender VASP. For my tests I let the Sender and Receiver VASPs and the MMSC run on the same machine. I let the VASP know the MMSC url(http://localhost:45000/mm7, I configured the MMSC to run on port 45000) and hence it was able to POST the MM7 message to the MMSC. The VASP also received successful MM7 Submit Responses for the messages submitted. I was also able to see the messages in one of the MMSC directories.

I then configured the receiving VASP to listen to port 50000. In the "MMSC Routing" configuration, I added a new default route and in that route, I selected the "MM7" in the "Route messages to VASP via" option. I set the "Server address" to "http://localhost:50000" (because the MMSC and the receiving VASP are running on the same machine).

I then sent MM7 messages from the Sender VASP to the MMSC. The MMSC did forward the message to the Receiver VASP. But the Receiver VASP seemed to be confused by the incoming message and threw up errors stating that the SOAP content was incomplete. On looking at the dump of the incoming message, it seemed like the message was a Submit Request rather than a Deliver Request which the Receiver VASP was expecting.

Also, in the "MMSC VASP" configuration, in the VASP account creation interface, there is a column "MMSC Routing for Received Messages" which has an option "Route via MM7". I'm unable to use this option as it is disabled.
Please let me know where I'm going wrong.

I also noticed that the MMSC was continuously trying to send the message to the VASP at regular intervals. Is this a feature of the MMSC, where it tries to send the message to the Receiver till it receives a response?

Thanks again.
Bryce Norwood - NowSMS Support
Posted on Saturday, October 11, 2003 - 08:44 pm:   

You're right ... it would be formatted as a "submit" rather than a "deliver".

We might need to have a checkbox setting to specify which format to use for a defined MM7 connection.

At present, if you are using a GSM/GRPS modem to retrieve MMS messages from an operator MMSC ... and you configure the received messages to be routed to an MM7 connection, we do post them as deliver requests.

But in the situation that you describe, you are correct, we do not convert submit to deliver.

I suspect we will need to implement a checkbox when you define the MM7 connection whether to transmit messages in submit or deliver format.


quote:

Also, in the "MMSC VASP" configuration, in the VASP account creation interface, there is a column "MMSC Routing for Received Messages" which has an option "Route via MM7". I'm unable to use this option as it is disabled.
Please let me know where I'm going wrong.




This option is not enabled until there is at least one account defined in the "MMSC Routing" list with a type of MM7.


quote:

I also noticed that the MMSC was continuously trying to send the message to the VASP at regular intervals. Is this a feature of the MMSC, where it tries to send the message to the Receiver till it receives a response?




If we don't get a valid response back, yes.

I don't recall the exact schedule, but I think it waits at least one minute between attempts, and for each failure increases the wait time until it maxes out at something like 10 or 15 minutes.

Basically, we expect to see an MM7 format response (either ok or with an error), and if we don't get one, then we assume that something is wrong with the destination server, and the message will be retried.

-bn
ribhu_bhaskar
Posted on Wednesday, October 15, 2003 - 12:25 pm:   

Hi Bryce

This is regarding "Route via MM7" option.

I have created an account in MMSC routing tab to route the message as MM7. Still the "Route via MM7" option is not getting enabled in the Vas Account tab.

I am using the latest version of Now SMS/MMS Gateway Version 5.0 (b20031006).

Please help

Rgds
Ribhu Bhaskar
Bryce Norwood - NowSMS Support
Posted on Wednesday, October 15, 2003 - 06:23 pm:   

Hi Ribhu,

There is definitely a bug in the configuration dialog there.

I'll be posting a link to a patch for fixing a few minor problems in the v5.0 release within the next 24 hours. Details will be posted in the What's New area of the web site: http://www.nowsms.com/whatsnew.htm

-bn
Mikael
Unregistered guest
Posted on Tuesday, October 21, 2003 - 09:14 am:   

I installed the patch, and the option to route
over mm7 was no longer grayed out. Good :-) However...it seems the setting is not persistent! Changing the setting, closing the dialogue and opening again shows that it is automatically changed back to "Standard MMS delivery".

/Mikael
Bryce Norwood - NowSMS Support
Board Administrator
Username: Bryce

Post Number: 1002
Registered: 10-2002
Posted on Tuesday, October 28, 2003 - 06:37 pm:   

Mikael,

Well, that didn't help much.

A refreshed version of that URL has an updated MMSCDLL.DLL that fixes that problem.

http://www.nowsms.com/download/NowSMS5-Patch1.zip
Anonymous
Unregistered guest
Posted on Wednesday, October 29, 2003 - 02:56 pm:   

Hi Bryce,
Thanks for your prompt response.The new patch works fine.
Back to my problem, my scenario is essentially to have a phone send an MMS message to a VASP. The scenario I specified earlier(VASP to VASP communication) was basically because I didn't have the facility to send MMS messages from a phone to the NowSMS MMSC. Hence I tried using another VASP to act as the sender phone. As per your reply, I don't think this would be possible.

I have configured a vasp with the name 'testvasp'.
If I need to send an MMS message from a phone to the VASP 'testvasp', how would I go about doing so.
1. I understand that the recepient address of an MMS message can be either an email address or an MSISDN number. Can I specify the vasp id as the recepient address instead?
2. If I have to use the routing option, I'm assuming I'll need to have a VASP process that receives MM7 messages. Looking at some of the SDK available for receiving MMS in a VASP, I found that they expect MM7 Deliver Request messages. Will NowSMS convert the MMS message coming from the phone to an MM7 Deliver Request while routing it to my vasp.
3. What is the commonly used way to send MMS messages from a mobile phone to a VASP?
I greatly appreciate any help in this regard.
Thank you.
Bryce Norwood - NowSMS Support
Board Administrator
Username: Bryce

Post Number: 1038
Registered: 10-2002
Posted on Saturday, November 01, 2003 - 08:41 am:   

1.) No. The "MMSC VASP" definition only defines the interface for the VASP to submit a message to the MMSC.

To route a message to a VASP, the MMSC must initiate an outbound connection to the VASP.

Rather than force the two settings to be tied together, we decided to offer more flexibility and allow them to be defined independently. (Especially as there are so many different configurations that the system can be installed into.) To define a connection for routing a message to a VASP, you define it on the "MMSC Routing" dialog.

This thread might help explain things somewhat:

http://support.nowsms.com/discus/messages/485/521.html

The above thread is asking how to receive delivery reports back to a VASP.

2.) It depends on how the message is received back into NowSMS. It stays in the format in which we received it. If it is delivered into NowSMS, then it is delivered to the VASP. If it is submitted to NowSMS, then it is submitted to the VASP. (This does cause some confusion in many scenarios. We need to add a configuration setting to force the format.)

3.) As a phone number or an e-mail address. We will also start to see short codes used more in the future.

Keep in mind that the mobile phone needs to have some addressability to the VASP. That is why it is typically a phone number or an e-mail address. The recipient of the message might be on a different MMSC from the one to which the VASP originally submitted the message.
Anonymous
 
Posted on Thursday, February 12, 2004 - 10:55 pm:   

I'm wondering if it's possible to do the followings in NowSMS:

1) The mobile posts a MMS message to NowSMS via MM1 (I know it works)
2) On receiving the message, NowSMS saves it in its MMSCDATA directory and converts the message from m-send-req to m-retrieve-conf
3) NowSMS then generates a MMS Notification and uses the To field in the MMS message to determine where the route the SMS Notification

Any info is appreciated.