Glossary of Terms
A
A2P SMS
A2P is an acronym which stands for Application-to-Person SMS. It is a term used to describe an SMS message sent from a software application (run by an enterprise or business) to a person’s phone.
Account
The term Account refers to your business account with SMSPortal. To access your account, log in to the Customer Portal, where you can review current charges and credit availability, access Web Tools, review online reports and more.
API
An Application Programming Interface (API) is provided by a service or program so that others may use the features and functions of the system. APIs are like a contract that describes how a consumer will make requests of the system, and what they will receive in return.
APN
An Access Point Name (APN) is used for mobile devices to establish a data connection from the mobile network to a different network, and describes specific characteristics of the connection.
B
Bind
A bind in the specific case of connecting to SMSPortal via SMPP is a single connection using the SMPP protocol.
Bulk SMS
Bulk SMS is a term used to describe a company sending a large amount of messages to their customers via an API or the SMSPortal website, usually as part of a marketing campaign.
C
Concatenated SMS
A concatenated short message service is used to overcome the limit on the number of characters that can be sent in a single SMS text message transmission (usually 160 chars). With this method, the sending device divides the long message into smaller ones that get recombined at the receiving end, with each smaller message billed separately.
Country Code
A country code is part of a comprehensive numbering plan which is prefixed to each country's national numbering plan’s telephone number to support a standard for international destination routing.
D
Delivery Receipt Status
The status of your sent message indicates the status of your message to any given recipient number. For more information on statuses, please refer to Delivery Statuses.
DLR
Delivery Receipt, which is provided (upon request) to notify intermediate and final statuses of an outbound SMS. Final DLRs are widely provided but intermediates are dependent on the receiving network.
E
F
FTP (File Transfer Protocol)
The File Transfer Protocol (FTP) is a standard network protocol used to transfer computer files from one host to another host over a TCP-based network, such as the Internet.
G
GSM-7
GSM-7 is a character encoding standard which packs the most commonly used letters and symbols in many languages into 7 bits each, for usage on GSM networks. As SMS messages are transmitted 140 8-bit octets at a time, GSM-7 encoded SMS messages can carry up to 160 characters.
H
HLR (Home Location Register)
The Home Location Register (HLR) is the main database of permanent subscriber information for a mobile network. The HLR is an integral component of CDMA (code division multiple access), TDMA (time division multiple access), and GSM (Global System for Mobile communications) networks.
HTTP Post/Get
In computing, POST is one of many request methods supported by the HTTP protocol used by the World Wide Web. The POST request method is designed to request that a web server accepts the data enclosed in the request message's body for storage. It is often used when uploading a file or submitting a completed web form.
I
J
K
L
Latency
SMS Latency is defined as the amount of time between a message being submitted to an aggregator and the message being delivered to the handset.
Long Codes
A long code is a standard phone number used for sending and receiving SMS messages. Phone numbers are typically called “long codes” when comparing them with SMS shortcodes (5-6 digit numbers).
M
MCC
Mobile Country Code, as defined by the ITU-T E.212 standard.
MNC
Mobile Network Code, as defined by the ITU-T E.212 standard.
MSISDN
Mobile Station International Subscriber Directory Number is the number that uniquely identifies a subscription in a GSM or a UMTS mobile network. An MSISDN is the phone number associated with a single SIM card; in other words, the number you call or send an SMS message to.
MO
Mobile Originated message. It may also be referred to as an inbound message. This is a message originated from a mobile device towards an SMSPortal source address.
MT
Mobile Terminated message. It might also be referred to as an outbound message. This is a message sent from a client application to a mobile device.
N
O
P
P2P SMS
P2P SMS stands for Person-to-Person SMS, or sometimes Peer-to-Peer SMS. It is a type of SMS that flows between two end users via their individual home networks.
Q
R
REST
Representational State Transfer (REST) is an architectural style for designing distributed systems. It is not a standard but more a set of constraints, such as being stateless, having a client / server relationship and a uniform interface.
Roaming
When a subscriber travels outside of his or her home operator service area, we say a subscriber is roaming onto another network.
S
Sender ID
The originator of an SMS is the label describing who or where an SMS is sent from. The most common originator is a mobile number (MSISDN), as this is what is displayed when an SMS is sent from a mobile handset.
Short Code
A short code is a special 5 digit telephone number that's shorter than a full phone number. Short codes are used to send and receive SMS messages to and from mobile phones.
SIM
Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) is a removable smart card for mobile phones. SIM cards securely store the service-subscriber key (IMSI) used to identify a GSM subscriber. The SIM card allows users to change phones by simply removing the SIM card from one mobile phone and inserting it into another mobile phone.
SMPP
Short Message Peer-to-Peer (SMPP) in the telecommunications industry is an open, industry standard protocol designed to provide a flexible data communication interface for the transfer of short message data between External Short Messaging Entities (ESME), Routing Entities (RE) and Message Centres.
SMTP
Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) is an Internet standard for electronic mail (e-mail) transmission. SMTP by default uses TCP port 25.
SMS
Short Message Service that allows the exchange of short text messages (maximum 160 characters for one message) between phone, web or mobile communication systems.
SMSC (Short Message Service Center)
A Short Message Service Centre (SMSC) is the portion of a wireless network that handles SMS operations, such as routing, forwarding and storing incoming text messages on their way to desired endpoints.
T
TCP (Transmission Control Protocol)
The Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) is a core protocol of the Internet Protocol Suite. It originated in the initial network implementation in which it complemented the Internet Protocol (IP). Therefore, the entire suite is commonly referred to as TCP/IP. TCP provides reliable, ordered, and error-checked delivery of a stream of octets between applications running on hosts, communicating over an IP network.
U
UCS-2
Universal Coded Character Set is a character encoding standard in which characters are represented by a fixed length 16 bits (2 bytes). It is used as a fallback on many GSM networks when a message cannot be encoded using GSM-7 or when a language requires more than 128 characters to be rendered.
UI
A User Interface (UI) is what is used by people to interact with computers / software.
UX
User Experience (UX) describes all elements of a customer's interaction with a company, its services and its products.
V
W
Webhook
Webhooks are user-defined HTTP callbacks. They are triggered by some event in a web application and can facilitate integrating different applications or third-party APIs.
X
Y
Z
Updated about 1 year ago