Wednesday, February 25, 2009

SMS-enabled devices attaching to the RMS

On many occasions customers ask me about notifications in general and SMS-notifications particularly and how to make a SMS-enabled device work in conjunction with the RMS.

Actually it is very straightforward. Windows Server has to detect the SMS-enabled device (a mobile telephone) - for instance - as a modem. That is all there is to it. When this happens, SCOM will be able to send SMS messages. Nothing more, nothing less.

However there is some advice

Drivers:
Where do you find a good driver (x86 / x64, W2K03 and W2K08)? I myself do have good experiences with a universal cable driver of Nokia. No, I do not want to start advertising Nokia but this cable driver really works very good with many types of Nokia's. A networkengineer of a customer of mine pointed me to this driversoftware and from that moment on, it has become a regular tool in my personal SCOM toolbox. It can be found here. Also drivers for other brands can be found there.

Type of Mobile
Just a plain one. No fancy stuff on it like a dual screen or clamshell (breaks easily when attaching it to the RMS with Velcro). But just a simple straightforward type of Mobile telephone will do the work. Hey, we do want to send SMS not to play all kind of fancy games or to impress our colleagues with a bling bling mobile do we? And the simpler the telephone is, the better it will work. Not all too many bugs in it.

Prepaid or Not?
This really happened. I got it out of the field. Attaching a prepaid mobile to the RMS, forgetting to check its balance so it run out of its credits and not a single SMS message got out. Before this was found out, it took the people involved many frustrating hours. So do not use a prepaid mobile it is bound to go wrong.

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