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Two part SMS messages
In the last several days I've noticed that SMS messages from Twitter are being sent to my cell phone (using Sprint unlimited text plan in US) in two parts. I'm not sure if it is because people are generally using more than the 140 character allotment and the messages are being broken up, or if it's a technical problem on Sprint's part. It's not terribly annoying to me, but I'm sure somehow Twitter is likely paying a per message delivery fee for the system and this type of chicanery on Sprint's part is likely doubling the monthly tab to Twitter.
Thought you should be aware.
Thought you should be aware.
I’m indifferent
12
people have this problem
I have this problem, too!
Tell me when someone solves it.
The more people who report this problem, the more it gets noticed.
The more people who report this problem, the more it gets noticed.
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Inappropriate?I'm having the same problem, also on Sprint. It seems as though it won't send messages over 140 characters any more, including user name. It used to send messages up to the limit of 160 characters.
Example:
The message "macrumors: SDK support for hardware accessories via dock. Examples: FM Transmitter with radio app to tune. Also Blood Pressure cuff with app." is 141 characters. This is both under Twitter's 140 character per post limit (the post itself is 130 characters) and the SMS limit (which is 160 characters).
It arrived on my phone as "1/2 macrumors: SDK support for hardware accessories via dock. Examples: FM Transmitter with radio app to tune. Also Blood Pressure cuff wit" (139 characters) and "2/2 h app." (10 characters).
This NEVER used to happen before. Even a tweet using the full 140 characters, plus the user's name, would be under 160 characters and thus arrive at my phone as one message.
Long messages have been split up for me for about the last week, and it's really starting to grind my gears.
I’m frustrated
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Inappropriate?I'm having the same issue (with Sprint), and starting today I'm getting the second message first, which makes this even more annoying.
I’m confused
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Inappropriate?I also started getting the second message first, I think about two days ago. They generally come at about the same time, but twice today I got part two, and then a three to five minute delay before part one arrived.
I’m frustrated
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Inappropriate?I have Sprint and three phones on my plan, all with unlimited texting (my phone, my wife's phone and our roommate's phone) and we have been getting this issue over the last week or two. common culprits are @wsdot or @wsdot_traffic sending a tweet that is just under 140 characters (not including their name) and we end up with it split in two. Just happened this morning with http://twitter.com/SJGames/status/136... and last night with http://twitter.com/wsdot_traffic/stat...
Comparing where things got cut, it looks like the SMS message is getting split at 135 characters (including the twitter username, colon and leading space before the tweet)
I’m frustrated
1 person says
this solves the problem
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Inappropriate?I am a Sprint engineer and have been looking in to this problem. It appears that the messages are being divided prior to entering the Sprint network, so I can't tell if it is Twitter or one of the gateways in the middle. One thing that I believe I have seen is that all of the tweets that are split come from other Twitter clients, meaning not directly from twitter.com.
I am trying to determine if this is truly the case. Has everyone else seen this same thing? If you don't know how to tell, go to Twitter when you get a split text message, and see if it is "from web" or from another application name.
In order to determine where the problem lies, I think we need to narrow this down first. I don't know if Twitter sends directly to each carrier, or if they send to a "Bulk Messaging Gateway" that determines which carrier to send it to.
I’m investigating
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Inappropriate?Trey, it looks like all of the ones that are being split for me do indeed come from other Twitter clients.
Thanks for investigating!!! -
Inappropriate?Reb, can you tell me what client(s)? I have only seen two so far and just want to see if yours are the same two.
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Inappropriate?I know one is twitterfeed.. Other culprits are possibly twhirl, and blip.fm. (I've deleted the messages off my phone, so I'm mentally reconstructing). Once I can confirm the ones I'm sketchier on, I'll update the list.
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Inappropriate?Okay. The heavy-hitter I found was HootSuite and they confirmed that they didn't change anything, so I am working under the assumption that the Twitter API has been changed.
Now, on to the tough task of trying to find a Twitter developer that might be willing to look at it or, at least, run some tests. I am hoping that they pick up this thread, but I am going to try some other avenues as well.
I will ensure everyone right now that Sprint isn't the one splitting these messages.
I’m getting there
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Inappropriate?I don't think this is a Sprint problem. I'm using Virgin mobile via Helio. I checked and the split tweets I've received have come from TwitterFox, TwitterBerry and TweetDeck, that is, non-web based updates.
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Inappropriate?Dan, Virgin Mobile actually uses the Sprint equipment so technically your messages are still "Sprint" messages. Anything that is broken on Sprint will also be broken on VMU/Helio. Learn something new every day, huh?
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Inappropriate?at least one of the messages I have gotten that was split was via the Web client, not any third party app (http://twitter.com/wsdot_traffic/stat...)
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Inappropriate?Trey:
Okay, I blame Sprint, then. ;)
I figured that what you said was probably true, but I figured I'd give all the credentials of what was going on. I remember there was a rash of resellers, Helio included, that don't really exist anymore. Ah well. Thanks for the help. I get a LOT of updates so it's pretty hard to go through all of them and cross-reference their SMS versions, but all the ones I've seen have been from 3rd party clients so far. -
Inappropriate?Thanks Ben. Good info. I am doing some testing now, and that's good to know. I am worried that we may be stuck until I can find someone who can tell me the path these messages take to get into the Sprint network so I can start working backwards towards Twitter.1 Comment Add a comment
This solves the problem
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I would suggest trying to get a message to @delbius or @al3x or someone else at twitter to get some inside assistance. btw, I think it is awesome that you are jumping on this. -
Inappropriate?I don't have my phone in front of me, but I did check a few tweets that I know for sure were split, and all of them so far were from the web. Some of the tweets in question, in case any Twitter people need to look into this further:
http://twitter.com/infinities/status/...
http://twitter.com/RockBandDLC/status...
http://twitter.com/macrumors/status/1...
All three of those were updated from the web and came to my Sprint phone as two SMS messages. Hope this helps out.1 Comment Add a comment
This solves the problem
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I went back through the past couple days of Twitter SMS messages, and so far all of them (I've checked about ten messages so far) have been from the web.
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Inappropriate?Sent messages to some Twitter devs and heading to the office to find someone who knows how Twitter SMS messages get to Sprint. I think we can now safely say that it isn't just third-party clients. Thanks for the quick responses everyone.
I'll update if/when I know more... -
Inappropriate?Not that anyone probably cares, but I am now just keeping notes here in case any Twitter developers ever read this.
I found out that Twitter sends messages in an SMPP (the common protocol for this type of application) message directly to Sprint's network. The Messaging Centers in our network don't even have the ability to "split" messages like this, so it appears that they have to be split by Twitter prior to sending the SMPP. Anything that comes in that is longer than 160 characters would just get truncated by our system, so you would get a single incomplete message instead of two.
Also, to address the concern about getting the second half before the fist: Our messaging centers are made up of a lot of computers, so if the messages come from Twitter in rapid succession, the system may not be able to keep them in order. That part, obviously, will be alleviated once the messages are no longer split.
I’m just waiting...
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Inappropriate?Interesting quote from Twitter's blog. Looks like it may correlate to the beginning of the issue.
Wed March 11
"Our upstream SMS provider will perform planned maintenance from 10:00 to 10:30 PDT tonight. This maintenance will not affect AT&T and T-Mobile customers; customers of other carriers will not be able to use SMS with Twitter during this period." -
Inappropriate?Still having issue and not sure why... parts 1 and 2 its not twitter itself nor sprint but Its so annoying :(
I’m frustrated
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Inappropriate?I also have this problem. Here is a message where it happened: http://twitter.com/qoolquest/status/1... -
Inappropriate?I believe that Twitter has to be aware of this problem now. I bombarded them with e-mails and support requests, but I haven't heard anything back yet. I got another one this morning, so it looks like it is still a problem.
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Inappropriate?I've been having this problem as well. For the past week or so. Hope they figure it out soon.
I’m kind of annoyed
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Inappropriate?Has anyone heard from Twitter employees regarding this? I'm sure they know about it, since several people have tried to contact them, but have they responded at all? Are they working on it? Do they even care? I read something (sorry, I forgot to bookmark it and I can't find it again) about how in some countries, this is just the way Twitter works due to how the cellular networks work there or something. I just hope they aren't doing that worldwide now, since it was working so well here before.
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Inappropriate?I hope they do something about it. It didn't used to be like this, and I'm getting about 50% of my incoming SMS tweets split into 2 parts.
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Inappropriate?I have Helio which along with Virgin Mobile uses the Sprint network and this is pissing me off. This has been happening for a while. If the tweet has a url and is split you cant click on it. I also have been having the problem with the second part showing up first. Very frustrating. This is a deal breaker for me. I was going to get a Palm Pre this summer but it is on Sprint. If this is not fixed then I will choose another carrier.
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Inappropriate?I don't have any updates. I turned this over to Twitter and have never heard anything back. I will see if there is some method to escalate with them. I have to believe that they haven't even looked into it yet, because I assume it would be fairly easy for their SMS provider to fix.
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Inappropriate?Okay, I decided to go a different direction. Sprint has a team that may be able to contact Twitter directly, so I have sent an e-mail trying to get them to start working on this as well. I will update if I hear anything back.
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Inappropriate?Trey, I just wanted to thank you for being the point person on this. You're awesome!
I’m grateful
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Inappropriate?Good news. I finally heard back from a couple people at Twitter, and they claim that they are looking into the issue. I made sure they had the link to this thread, so thanks to everyone who helped contribute.
I don't know if they will post here or not, but if not, I'll post any follow-up I receive from them.
1 person says
this solves the problem
1 Comment Add a comment
This solves the problem
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Trey, thanks so much for looking in to this!
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Inappropriate?EVERYONE PLEASE DIGG.! Maybe this will get some attention.
http://is.gd/pChZ -
Inappropriate?T-Liv: From what I understood, this is not a problem of Sprints doing...it is a problem of Twitters SMS provider and when there messages are sent to the Sprint network.
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Inappropriate?I sent an e-mail, with a link to this post, to this guy: http://twitter.com/jbtaylor
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Inappropriate?just to let everyone know I have Verizon and it happens to me as well, its just a slight bug, it will be fixed i am sure they are aware.
I’m unconcerned
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Inappropriate?Starting last night my incoming alerts from Yahoo are now broken into 2 or 3 parts. I also have my email setup with a tool that sends 160 char (or less) alerts to my phone. These now sometimes show up in multiple parts. Looks like it's not just a twitter thing.
Also, it's not consistent. I just got another Yahoo alert and it's one piece even though it's long. Or maybe someone just fixed everything. :-)
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Inappropriate?its specifically with sprint and not twitter, i send myself a automated message every day telling myself a backup is done.. and it split, so its something with the @messaging.sprintpcs.com deal i belive
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Inappropriate?Anyone else notice that the problem appears to be fixed?
I noticed yesterday that messages were not being split. I received a split message right now, but it was a direct message that was over 140 characters...so that was normal. -
Inappropriate?Yeah, i got my last split txt on 4/9 @ 1:29pm. Very cool - i didn't even notice!
I’m happy
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Inappropriate?I am new to Verizon with an LG Versa phone and am getting split messages for DM's from twitter. Anyone have suggestions?
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Inappropriate?issue seems to be resolved.. what was the cause ? sprint? twitter? something else?
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Inappropriate?It had to be a problem where the message was coming into the Sprint network from Twitter, since we (Sprint) received it already split. I haven't yet heard an official answer from Twitter, but it was them that asked me to test it and see if it was still happening after it had been resolved, so I assume, at least, that they are aware of what was done to fix it.
I’m finally happy
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Inappropriate?trey, it was not a issue from "outside" of sprint since i had a message i send myself when a backup program finishes via the e-mail option. and it split.
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Inappropriate?mementh: Is the problem with the backup program still happening or is it solved as well?
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Inappropriate?azindependent: Are the DM's over 160 characters? DM's can be longer and it is not unusual for them to be split.
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Inappropriate?it only happened once. and the message was under 140 characters.
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Inappropriate?memeth, it was a problem from outside of Sprint. The e-mail service that powers messaging.sprintpcs.com is complex, but was affected by a different issue entirely. It wasn't related to the Twitter problem and affected quite a few e-mail SMS messages during a short window.
