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DEVELOPING COLDFUSION 9 APPLICATIONS
Using External Resources
• Notifying users of events such as package shipments or restaurant table availability, or providing stock or weather
alerts
• Sending person-to-person text messages
• Presenting interactive text-based menus on a mobile phone
• Providing cellular phone updates, such as direct download of logos
• Providing telematics and mobile or remote wireless device applications, such as soda machines, vehicle tracking,
smart gas pumps, and so on
SMS protocol features include, but are not limited to, the following:
• Authentication verification is built in.
• Communications can be secure.
• Store and forward communication is performed in near real time.
• Communications can be two-way and session-aware.
• Mobile devices such as mobile phones already include support; you do not install software on the client.
About SMS
The following discussion simplifies SMS technology and describes only a typical use with a ColdFusion application. For
a more complete discussion of SMS, see the publicly available literature, including the several books that discuss SMS.
In a ColdFusion SMS application, a mobile device such as a mobile phone communicates (via intermediate steps) with
a message center, such as a short message service center (SMSC). For example, a mobile phone user calls a telephone
number that the SMS provider has associated with your account; the SMSC gets the messages that are sent to this
number. The SMSC can store and forward messages. A ColdFusion application can initiate messages to wireless
devices, or it can respond to incoming messages from the devices.
The SMSC communicates with a ColdFusion SMS event gateway using short message peer-to-peer protocol (SMPP)
over TCP/IP. Information is transferred by exchanging Protocol Data Units (PDUs) with structures that depend on
the type of transaction, such as a normal message submission, a binary data submission, or a message intended for
multiple recipients.
Because the SMSC is a store-and-forward server, it can hold messages that cannot be immediately delivered and try to
deliver them when the receiving device is available. The SMSC provider configures the time that a message is held on
the server for delivery. For example, AT&T Wireless saves messages for 72 hours; after that time, any undelivered
messages are deleted. Your messages can request a different time-out (by specifying a
message can also use a
registeredDelivery
message is delivered.
SMS communication can be secure. Voice and data communications, including SMS message traffic between the
SMSC and the mobile device is encrypted as part of the GSM standard. The SMSC authenticates the mobile user's
identity before the encrypted communication session begins. Secure the communications between ColdFusion and the
SMSC. Typically, you use a secure hardware or software VPN connection around the SMPP connection.
field to tell the SMSC to inform you about whether and when the
Last updated 8/5/2010
field). The
ValidityPeriod
1293
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