SMS terminology and glossary

Size limits

An SMS Text message can be a maximum of 140 bytes. With the most common character encoding, GSM-7, this translates to 160 characters. If your message is longer than 140 bytes, it must be split into multiple messages, and preceded by a header signifying that it is a multipart message. Common can handle this splitting, concatenation, and the overhead unless you want to do it yourself.

MT

Mobile Terminated. Refers to any SMS message which is sent to a mobile phone. (The message is terminated, or “ends”, at the phone.)

MO

Mobile Originated. Refers to any SMS message which is sent from a mobile phone. (The message’s origin, or beginning, is at the phone.)

Charged, Premium

An MT message can cost money for the end-user to receive. This is usually referred to as a charged message or premium message. If you are going to send charged messages to end-users, please review the rules and regulations for your country. Charged messages are only available in some countries and shortcodes. In certain markets, you can charge the end-users without actually sending them a message, so-called "Silent billing". Support will be happy to advise you if you are in doubt.

Bulk

A message which does not cost money for the end-user to receive. Bulk messages can set their Source (the “From”-field) of the message to any text, 2-11 characters a-Z. Using this feature to impersonate other parties will lead to a termination of your account.

Delivery Report

For each MT message we send, we can send you an acknowledgement when the message is confirmed received by the end-user’s handset. If the message fails for any reason, we will inform you about this. Delivery reports are mandatory for charged messages, optional for bulk.

TON

Type of Number. This identifies how systems shall interpret your Source (your “From”-field). It can be a Shortcode, an alphanumeric string, or a phone number (MSISDN). Same applies for the Destination, or recipient, of the message, though destination will almost always be an MSISDN.

KeyValue

Map with string key and string value where you may specify unique parameters.

Character Encoding

All communication to and from Common will be using UTF-8 encoding.

IP Addresses

When Common is delivering a Delivery Report to you, the requests can be coming from several different IP addresses.

SMS Delivery report page contains the hostnames and IP addresses that are currently active.

Please configure your firewalls so that these hosts/networks can connect to your systems to deliver messages.