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ActiveXperts SMS and MMS Toolkit Add SMS and MMS capabilities to any Windows or .NET application

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Using The SMS and MMS Toolkit with Visual Basic 5.x/6.x

The SMS and MMS Toolkit is a software development kit (SDK) to enhance an application or script with SMS, MMS and Pager functionality. SMS messages can be sent using a GSM/GPRS modem, an SMPP provider, an HTTP compliant SMS provider or using a standard dialup or fixed-line SMS modem. MMS messages can be sent via a GSM/GPRS modem (MM1), an SMTP server (MM4) or an XML/SOAP compliant provider (MM7).

SMS features:

  • Send and receive numeric- and alphanumeric text SMS messages
  • Verify delivery of outgoing SMS messages
  • Support for multimedia SMS messages, including ringtones, pictures and logo's
  • Support for WAP Push, WAP Bookmarks, vCards, voicemail/e-mail/fax/MMS indications
  • Support for Unicode, to support foreign languages like Arabic, Chinese, Hebrew, etc.
  • Support for multi-part messages, to allow messages longer than 160 characters
  • Support for GSM modems, GSM phones, SMS/HTTP providers, SMPP (Short Message Peer to Peer) providers, TAP/XIO and UCP dial-in SMSC providers
  • Support Multi-threading environments. The component is thread-safe, which means it can be used in a multi-threaded environment
  • Samples included for various development platforms: MS Visual Basic, MS Visual Basic .NET, MS Visual C++, MS Visual Studio C# .NET, ASP, ASP .NET, Borland Delphi, Borland C++ Builder, Windows Powershell ColdFusion and more

MMS features:

  • Support for many multimedia formats incl.: JPG, GIF, PNG, BMP, WBMP, TIF, WAV, MP3, MIDI, AC3, GP3, AVI, MPG, MP4, VCARD, VCALENDAR, JAR and more
  • Support for MM1 (MMS over WAP), MM4 (MMS over SMTP) and MM7 (MMS over HTML/SOAP)

Pager features:

  • Send alpha-numeric Pager messages through SNPP

This document describes how the SMS and MMS Toolkit can be integrated into Visual Basic 5.x/6.x projects.

Step 1: Download and install The SMS and MMS Toolkit

Download the SMS and MMS Toolkit from the ActiveXperts Download Site and start the installation. The installation guides you through the installation process.

Step 2: Create a new Visual Basic project

Launch 'Microsoft Visual Basic' from the Start menu, and choose 'New' from the 'File Menu'. The 'New Project' dialog appears. Select 'Standard Exe' and click 'OK':

Visual Basic

(Click on the picture to enlarge)

Step 3: Refer to the SMS and MMS Toolkit Library

A new Project is created, with a blank form.

First, you must add a reference to the SMS and MMS Toolkit in the project to be able to use the SMS objects. To do so, choose 'References...' from the 'Project' menu. In the 'References' dialog that pops up, enable the ActiveXperts SMS and MMS Toolkit Type Library' reference as shown in the following picture:

Visual Basic

(Click on the picture to enlarge)

Click 'OK' to close the 'References...' dialog.

Then, select the Project form and choose 'View Code' from the context menu:

Visual Basic

(Click on the picture to enlarge)

On top of your code, declare the following objects:

Dim objGsmProtocol As AXmsCtrl.SmsProtocolGsm
Dim objSmsMessage As AXmsCtrl.SmsMessage
Dim objSmsConstants As AXmsCtrl.SmsConstants

Step 4: Declare and create the objects

From the Code window, select 'Form'. The Private Sub 'Form_Load()' will be displayed now. In the 'Form Load' function, create the GSM objects in the following way: 

Set objGsmProtocol  = CreateObject("ActiveXperts.SmsProtocolGsm")
Set objSmsMessage   = CreateObject("ActiveXperts.SmsMessage")
Set objSmsConstants = CreateObject("ActiveXperts.SmsConstants")

Step 5: Send SMS messages

The following code snippet shows how to send an SMS message using a connected GSM phone or modem:

Private Sub buttonSend_Click()
    Dim Format As Long
    
    buttonSend.Enabled = False
    
    textResult.Caption = "Sending message, Please wait..."
    textResult.Refresh

   ' Set Device
    objGsmProtocol.Device = comboDevice.Text
    
    ' Set LogFile
    objGsmProtocol.LogFile = textLogfile.Text
    
    ' Set Speed
    If comboSpeed.ListIndex = 0 Then
        objGsmProtocol.DeviceSpeed = 0               ' use default speed
    Else
        objGsmProtocol.DeviceSpeed = comboSpeed.List(comboSpeed.ListIndex)
    End If
    
    ' Set Format    
    objSmsMessage.Format = objConstants.asMESSAGEFORMAT_TEXT     
    If SendConfig.checkMultipart.Value = 1 Then
        objSmsMessage.Format = objConstants.asMESSAGEFORMAT_TEXT_MULTIPART
    End If  
    If SendConfig.checkFlash.Value = 1 Then
        objSmsMessage.Format = objConstants.asMESSAGEFORMAT_TEXT_FLASH
    End If
   
    ' Set Delivery Report 
    objSmsMessage.RequestDeliveryStatus = SendConfig.checkReport.Value
    
    ' Set recipient
    objSmsMessage.Recipient = textRecipient.Text
    
    ' Set Message parameters
    objSmsMessage.Data = textMessage.Text
        
    ' Send the message
    objGsmProtocol.Send( objSmsMessage )
        
    ' Display result
    ShowReference = True
    GetResult (True)
    ShowReference = False
             
    buttonSend.Enabled = True
End Sub

There are many working samples included with the product. You can also find them on the ActiveXperts FTP site: ftp.activexperts-labs.com/samples/mobile-messaging-component.