Difference between revisions of "Fax/Pager Gateway"

Revision as of 12:57, 9 June 2009

How does the email-to-fax/pager service work?

We use a publicly available software package, known as HylaFAX, along with our own scripts. When you send a fax, HylaFAX simply takes the place of a fax machine. It dials up the specified number and transfers the data you provided. The pager gateway works much the same way, but it dials a general number to the pager company, gives the phone number to deliver the message to, and then the data/message to be delivered.

Can I send messages to pagers without using this service?

Most pager/cellular companies, now, associate an email address with all their numbers. The syntax is usually 10digitnumber@pagercompany.net, but you'd need to check with the individual companies to be sure. This method sends the message directly to the pager company to, then, be delivered to the recipient. This surpasses the need for our system to dial the pager company directly.

Are there any coverage limitations?

These services are currently available only for calls made locally in the greater Salt Lake City metro area. (All pager companies listed have local data numbers.) Expansion of these services to our remote dial-up locations are in the planning stages. Please email fax@xmission.com for more information.

How do I send a fax using the fax gateway?

Using mail.xmission.com as your SMTP/POP mail server, an email addressed to: Addressee_Name@5551234.fax

would send an XMission cover page addressed to Addressee_Name followed by your email to the fax machine answering at 555-1234. By default, the service will attempt to deliver the message up to three times in a 20 minute period.

How do I send a pager message using the pager gateway?

Using mail.xmission.com as your SMTP/POP mail server, an email addressed to: verify@airtouch5551234.pager

would send the Subject: line of your email to the pager answering the Airtouch pager at 555-1234 and a verification of your page to your email address. If you don't want the verification message sent to you, replace verify@ with silent@.

The pager message will contain your account name/email name followed by the subject of the email. Anything in the body will be stripped from the message.

If the Subject: was "Aliens are invading Tooele! Head for the hills!", the recipient would see something like:

acctname:Aliens are invading Tooele! Head for the hills!

What pager/cellular services are supported?

The following pager companies have been verified to work with our email-to-pager gateway:

1. airtouch (Verizon)
2. westlink
3. american
4. att-national
5. att-slc
6. att-ogden
7. att-logan
8. att-pcs
9. pagenet
10. pagemart (for pin numbers starting with "13")
11. pagemart16 (for pin numbers starting with "16")
12. skytel-ut
13. westlink (Qwest)
14. voicestream
15. voicestream PCS

The following companies have not been verified. Please let us know if they do or do not work.

1. skytel
2. skypage
3. mobilecomm
4. gte
5. worldcom
6. mci
7. sprint-spectrum
8. sprint

Can someone send me a fax using this service?

Unfortunately, no. Incoming faxes are sent as images instead of ASCII (plain text), so there's no way to extract individual information from a fax and then send it to the appropriate mailbox. There are image-to-text converters, but they're less than reliable. Since the original fax is sent as a scanned image, much like a copy machine, any number of factors can cause it to be mis-aligned, incomplete, or otherwise not perfectly readable.

Can someone send me a pager message using this service?

Not directly, because the SMTP server needs to be set to XMission's mail server. However, you can set up one of your four free aliases* as your pager address, and this will allow the message to be sent to XMission's gateway via our mail server.

Can this service be used to notify me of new email?

Yes. Using your shell account, create a .forward file in your home directory. On the first line, enter \acctname, silent@pagercompanyPAGERNUMBER.pager (filling in your information where indicated). Please note that most pager/cellular companies will charge for pager messages exceeding the contract limit. Make note of your contract limit and try to stay below it, as XMission will not be responsible for resulting charges from your pager/cellular company.

Are there a limit to how many pages or faxes I can send?

There is currently no limitation on the number, frequency or size of fax/pages sent. However, these services were NOT intended for unsolicited fax/paging. Use of these services to send unsolicited fax/pages will result in IMMEDIATE termination of your account, probable legal action and collection of fees at $50 per incident and $100 per hour involved. FEDERAL LAW REFERENCE.