External Application Connection

External Application connection allows you to connect SMS Studio with other applications in order to exchange messages.

This type of connection executes external application for sending messages and uses named pipe for receiving messages, sending status and delivery reports.

The contents of this topic:

Sending messages
Receiving messages, statuses and delivery reports
External Application Connection Dialog

Sending messages

When a message is placed in the Outbox, SMS Studio will execute the external application with supplied application parameters.

To compose the application parameters you can use the following text parameters:

%MsgID% - the unique ID of the message.
%MsgHexID% - the unique ID of the message converted to a hex string.
%MsgFrom% - the sender of the message.
%MsgTo% - the recipient of the message.
%MsgText% - the text of the message.
%MsgType% - the type of the message - 0 for text, 1 for binary.

When the application exits, the status of the message in the Outbox will be Sent. In case that the Wait for send status option is checked, the status will be Submitted, and then you can use the named pipe to return back the final status of the message.

Receiving messages, statuses and delivery reports

This connection creates a named pipe server which can be used by the external application to send messages, message statuses and delivery reports to SMS Studio. For more details and examples for using named pipes with SMS Studio, read the Named Pipe topic.

Use the following commands for receiving a message:

From: - Specifies the sender of the message.
To: - Specifies the recipient of the message.
Text: or Body: - Specifies the text of the message.
NewLine: - Adds a new line to the existing text of the message.
Encoded: - Specifies the URL encoded text of the message.
Type - the type of the message - 0 for text (default), 1 for binary.
<Receive> or <R> - Receives the message by placing it in the Inbox.
<Clear> or <C> - Clears all previous commands.

Use the following commands for receiving a message status:

MsgID: and MsgHexID: - Specifies the ID of the message assigned by SMS Studio when the message was sent (with %MsgID% or %MsgHexID%).
ExternalD: - Specifies the ID of the message assigned by your application. This value is used for receiving a delivery report for this message. Note that you can return the %MsgID% value in case that your application is not able to provide its own ID.
Sent: - Tells SMS Studio whether the message has been successfully sent. If the value is 1, SMS Studio will set its status to Sent. Otherwise, its status will be Failed.
TemporaryError: - In case that the sending of the message has failed, tells SMS Studio whether it was a temporary or a permanent error. If this value is 1, then, depending on the retry settings of the connection, SMS Studio might try to send the same message again.
<Status> or <S> - Receives the status of the message and updates it in the Outbox.
<Clear> or <C> - Clears all previous commands.

Use the following commands for receiving a delivery report:

ExternalD: - Specifies the ID of the message assigned by your application, previously received through the message status command.
Delivered: - Tells SMS Studio whether the message has been successfully delivered to the final recipient. If the value is 1, SMS Studio will set its status to Delivered. Otherwise, its status will be set to Not delivered.
<Delivery> or <D> - Receives the delivery report for the message and updates it in the Outbox.
<Clear> or <C> - Clears all previous commands.

External Application Connection Dialog

See Connection Dialog for description of the Connection, Account and Options tabs.

Settings tab

Pipe name specifies the name of the pipe used by this connection.
Remote user lets you specify the name of a user or a group of users that should be granted access to the named pipe. This may be necessary if you need to access the pipe through a web server or from another computer.
External application specifies the application to execute when sending a message.
Application parameters lets you specify parameters the application will receive.
Timeout lets you specify the period of time in seconds after which the execution of the application will be considered as failed.
Wait for send status lets you specify whether a message status will be Submitted or Sent after external application completes.
Maximum sending rate specifies the maximum rate (in messages per second) at which SMS Studio will send messages. SMS Studio will never send messages faster than this rate. Note that you may enter a decimal value in this field.