[Web4lib] SMS (text messaging) in libraries or education?

[Robert Malesko]

I've been sending myself text message for my own library items, using my gmail account and google calendar. 
The approach might scale up, though I'm not quite sure how to do that. This is a decent start, though.

To do this you need a gmail account and a cell phone. Basically you set a calendar reminder to email you 
and have a filter set to forward these emails to your cell phone. Here's the step by step:

1. Enter the due date into google calendar. Use a unique word or string in the subject, one that 
won't appear in the subject line of any other message. (important for the filter step.) For example,
 "SFPL Library Book Due" will work, unless you get a lot of messages with that subject. Use the same string for every due date reminder.

2. In the calendar event option, select "email reminder." You can set it to email from 1 day to 4 weeks ahead of time.

At this point, you'll have an email reminder sent to remind of of the event.

3. Create a filter in your gmail account. (The link to do this is up on the top, to the right of the "search the web" button.
4. Use the unique string in your title in the subject line. Click "next step."
5. Tick the "forward it to:" box. You can email text messages to your cell phone.
The format depends on your carrier. Here's a list I found from allthingsmarked.com:

Verizon:             10digitphonenumber at vtext.com

AT&T: 10digitphonenumber at txt.att.net

Sprint:                   10digitphonenumber at messaging.sprintpcs.com

T-Mobile:               10digitphonenumber at tmomail.net

Nextel:                   10digitphonenumber at messaging.nextel.com

Cingular:               10digitphonenumber at cingularme.com

Virgin Mobile:     10digitphonenumber at vmobl.com

Alltel:                   10digitphonenumber at message.alltel.com

CellularOne:         10digitphonenumber at mobile.celloneusa.com

Omnipoint:             10digitphonenumber at omnipointpcs.com

Qwest:                     10digitphonenumber at qwestmp.com6. Select create a filter.

That's it. Next time that the google calendar emails you a reminder, your cell phone
will be forwarded a copy of the calendar reminder.

If you want to test it, try entering a test entry in the calendar, set the event to start in 
a few minutes, and set an "email reminder" to go out in that many minutes minus one.

You can do this to both test the filter when setting it up, and to test the forwarding feature
once you create the filter.

You can also just test emailing your cell phone as if you were sending any other email. Finally, note 
that text messages are limited to 160 characters in length, and this includes the subject line.

If anybody figures out how to scale this up to multiple, different recipients, please let me know!






Message: 3
Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 10:23:00 -0500
From: "Alison Cody" <alisonkc at gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [Web4lib] SMS (text messaging) in libraries or education?
To: web4lib at webjunction.org
Message-ID:
	<55b4367d0812150723n73276a54ybb7a5ad493e7ab01 at mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1

This is a little different than what you asked, but this month we started
offering reference via text message at my library. (We're using AIM's
mobile
service, so the texts arrive at the ref desk as IMs.) We've gotten a
handful
of questions so far, and from what I understand most have been "how can I
renew this item?"

More here: http://www.loyola.edu/library/REF/index.htm

Personally, I would love to get text messages when my holds are in or my
books are due.

Alison Cody
Public Relations/Instruction Librarian
Loyola/Notre Dame Library
Baltimore, MD

On Thu, Dec 11, 2008 at 8:05 PM, HUNT_STEVE <HUNT_STEVE at smc.edu> wrote:

> Hello,
>
> Does anyone use SMS (text messaging) to communicate with users? It seems
> this would be a good way to reach today's students. Overdue notices,
> books on hold, library class notices...
> Steve Hunt
> Systems Librarian
> Santa Monica College Library
> Santa Monica, Calif.