PocketMSN, Hotmail and SMS 'push' notifications?

[Guest Islanti]

I have been playing with the mobile email features of my new T-Mobile US SDA. I have been able to setup SMS-based pseudo-push email for my corporate Exchange mailbox, SMS-based pseudo-push email for my personal mailbox on Mac.com using T-Mobile's "My Mail" feature. I'd like to be able to do the same thing with my Hotmail account (I'm considering moving from Mac.com to Hotmail.com as my primary personal mailbox).

Except that it doesn't seem to work. I get SMS notifications when I get an email in my Hotmail inbox. The message just sits in my SMS inbox. I feel like something must not be working right. Otherwise, why did MS put PocketMSN in ROM, provide SMS notifications for Hotmail accounts, and provide a setting to "Download new e-mail automatically." in PocketMSN?

Anyone using this feature that could shed some light on how this is supposed to work for me?

[Guest chucky.egg]

What do the notifications for the new Hotmail emails, and the others for that matter, say?

The AUTD ("Always Up To Date") feature in Exchange sends specially formulated SMS messages, which get intercepted by Windows Mobile and trigger ActiveSync.

AFAIK you can't have "push" email on non-Exchange mailboxes because there just isn't a mechanism to do the sync'ing

I suspect your SMS notifications just include the message sender, subject and perhaps part of the email body. Or are you saying that the SMS messages from Mac.com trigger a Send and Receive on your phone?

[Guest chucky.egg]

Just found this as an example of an Exchange AUTD sync command message:

//SCKL04EA AwFqAAADxgADBQHDEAASvfzrYb0SgK1vGm0oxQEB

[Guest Islanti]

What do the notifications for the new Hotmail emails, and the others for that matter, say?

They're generic "MSN alert" SMS messages.

AFAIK you can't have "push" email on non-Exchange mailboxes because there just isn't a mechanism to do the sync'ing

All PocketMSN has to do is grab that SMS message and initiate a Hotmail "Send/Receive" cycle. There's nothing complicated about it.

Or are you saying that the SMS messages from Mac.com trigger a Send and Receive on your phone?

T-Mobile US has a feature called "My E-Mail". You enter accounts that you want to access from your phone. T-Mobile's server checks your inbox for new messages and sends an SMS to your phone. When that happens, their software on the phone silently syncs to their mail server and notifies me of an email (but never the SMS). They even sync deleted items back to the original mailbox. Folders aren't supported, though. The big issue is you've got T-Mobile's server poking around in your mailbox.

I can't understand how Microsoft is asking $20 for PocketMSN without this feature when I get it from T-Mobile for free. It seems like a trivial bit of code. Probably they just don't want Hotmail competing with Exchange.

Edited February 24, 2006 by Islanti

[Guest chucky.egg]

OK, I'm no expert on Hotmail, so this may all be redundant but...

AFAIK there is no free POP3 access to Hotmail, so you cant create a mailbox for it on your device and (probably) nor can you tell T-Mobile about it for them to check it for you.

The "MSN alerts" are just to tell you (not your device) to check for new emails, and because there is no mailbox for Hotmail it couldn't trigger a Send and Receive (because there's no mailbox to S&R on) even if there was a code sequence like my example to do it.

I suspect that you can't even get a hosted Exchange server for your personal mail and have the AUTD sync'ing on that (it'll probably only write to the "Outlook" mailbox, which is already in use for your Corporate email).

What about a service like Smartner? (http://www.smartner.com)

Last I looked it was still periodic sync'ing, but I think somebody said they were doing proper "push" now.

Even then you'll have the same issue - some other "person" going through your emails.

Maybe wait until AKU2 is out and see what that offers, but it may not do anything more than "push" to one mailbox (ie: you may not be able to tell it "push emails from this account to here, and push emails from that account to there")

[Guest Islanti]

AFAIK there is no free POP3 access to Hotmail, so you cant create a mailbox for it on your device and (probably) nor can you tell T-Mobile about it for them to check it for you.

Right. I can pay $20/year for Pop access I believe, which may make sense in the end. I wouldn't be using PocketMSN at all then, though.

The "MSN alerts" are just to tell you (not your device) to check for new emails, and because there is no mailbox for Hotmail it couldn't trigger a Send and Receive (because there's no mailbox to S&R on) even if there was a code sequence like my example to do it.

With PocketMSN there is a Hotmail account in the "Messaging" (email) Smartphone application. You can do a manual send/receive. So this is as easy as "see SMS, do S/R".

I suspect that you can't even get a hosted Exchange server for your personal mail and have the AUTD sync'ing on that (it'll probably only write to the "Outlook" mailbox, which is already in use for your Corporate email).

You're right about that. You can only have 1 Exchange sync.

I can live with T-Mobile's solution on my mac.com account. It seems to me PocketMSN falls short of its potential here is the bottom line.

Thanks for your help and feedback, Chucky!

Edited February 24, 2006 by Islanti