Sporadic Text Notification

[jgcharlotte]

Has anyone seen an issue with text notifications to wireless device (I am on Verizon)?

I have a program that sends a medicine reminder text message to my phone and an email to a Gmail account I have set up just for ISY messages every 30 minutes until it is acknowledged.  The Gmail account always gets the message, the phone is about 70%.  So it is only the text message to phone that is failing.

Ideas?
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Medicine Reminder Repeat - [ID 0106][Parent 0105]

If
   - No Conditions - (To add one, press 'Schedule' or 'Condition')
 
Then
        Wait  30 minutes 
        Send Notification to 'Jim Text' content 'Medicine Reminder'
        Send Notification to 'Gmail Log' content 'Medicine Reminder'
        Run Program 'Medicine Reminder Repeat' (Then Path)
 
Else
   - No Actions - (To add one, press 'Action')
 

[rccoleman]

So you start and stop that program from somewhere else, considering that it has no "if" clause?  It sounds like a limitation or flakiness in the text message (SMS) relay for your cell service provider.  I assume that it's going through an email relay, so you could test it yourself from any email client to see if you can reproduce the failures.

Also, it's a little simpler to use "Repeat every 30 mins" as the first line and get rid of the wait/run combo.

[Bumbershoot]

You also might consider putting a two or three second wait between each notification.

[jgcharlotte]

4 hours ago, rccoleman said:

So you start and stop that program from somewhere else, considering that it has no "if" clause?  It sounds like a limitation or flakiness in the text message (SMS) relay for your cell service provider.  I assume that it's going through an email relay, so you could test it yourself from any email client to see if you can reproduce the failures.

Also, it's a little simpler to use "Repeat every 30 mins" as the first line and get rid of the wait/run combo.

Yes, I enable/disable from another program.

Ok, so I did a little research and apparently there have been intermittent issues with Verizon @vtext.com.  Mostly in bulk emails, but could be related.  Somebody suggested switching to @vzwpix.com, which I did.  They said it worked better. We'll see how that does.

 

[jgcharlotte]

3 hours ago, Bumbershoot said:

You also might consider putting a two or three second wait between each notification.

Yes, did that also.  Thanks.

 

[apostolakisl]

I agree, this sounds like a verizon email to text issue.

As a suggestion, you might consider using IFTTT for this.   The ISY portal integrates ISY with IFTTT.  For starters, IFTTT can send a text as a text.  Secondly, you can reply back to IFTTT and IFTTT can then tell ISY to end the program via a REST command.  I have a situation where IFTTT sends me a text letting me know the sprinkler is going to run in the morning.  If I reply to that text #no  it will cancel the sprinkler.  You could just as easily have it end that program repeat.  When IFTTT receives the #no, it then issues a REST command (again through portal) to ISY which sets a variable to 0.  The sprinkler runs at 6am if that variable is 1.  So the deal is that at 6pm on the day before my schedule wants to sprinkle, an ISY program sets the variable to 1 and tells IFTTT to send the text.  

[jgcharlotte]

4 minutes ago, apostolakisl said:

I agree, this sounds like a verizon email to text issue.

As a suggestion, you might consider using IFTTT for this.   The ISY portal integrates ISY with IFTTT.  For starters, IFTTT can send a text as a text.  Secondly, you can reply back to IFTTT and IFTTT can then tell ISY to end the program via a REST command.  I have a situation where IFTTT sends me a text letting me know the sprinkler is going to run in the morning.  If I reply to that text #no  it will cancel the sprinkler.  You could just as easily have it end that program repeat.  When IFTTT receives the #no, it then issues a REST command (again through portal) to ISY which sets a variable to 0.  The sprinkler runs at 6am if that variable is 1.  So the deal is that at 6pm on the day before my schedule wants to sprinkle, an ISY program sets the variable to 1 and tells IFTTT to send the text.  

Good idea.  I have an account, haven't used it much.  Right now I am disabling the program remotely most of the time via Alexa at home or on my phone:  'Turn off the medicine reminder'.  Locally is via the module that turns on a night light that is plugged into it.

I like the idea of just responding to the text from IFTTT.

[apostolakisl]

1 minute ago, jgcharlotte said:

Good idea.  I have an account, haven't used it much.  Right now I am disabling the program remotely most of the time via Alexa at home or on my phone:  'Turn off the medicine reminder'.  Locally is via the module that turns on a night light that is plugged into it.

I like the idea of just responding to the text from IFTTT.

Not positive, but you might be able to respond to an email as well.  I haven't looked into it.  Though, I use google voice and all of my texts come as emails (as well as texts) and if I respond to the email, it goes out as a text.  So, in short, I don't need to have IFTTT respond to an actual email.

[jgcharlotte]

So many options. . . .