29/06/2015Dr James Kadirire1 The Short Message Service (SMS) for Schools/Conferences

29/06/2015Dr James Kadirire2 What is SMS? How does it work? What is it used for? How can it be used in schools or conferences ? Overview

29/06/2015Dr James Kadirire3 The Short Message Service SMS was developed as part of the GSM It allows mobile systems to exchange short text messages with upto 160 characters long It is piggybacked on the control channels used for call setup SMS was commercially introduced in 1992

29/06/2015Dr James Kadirire4 How does SMS work? It is a store-and-forward service Messages are 160 bytes long because they ride on top of signalling channels for call setup SMS features confirmation of message delivery

29/06/2015Dr James Kadirire5 How does SMS work? A user needs a subscription to a mobile telephone network that supports SMS Use of SMS must be enabled for that user Knowledge of how to send or read a short message using their specific model of mobile phone A mobile phone that supports SMS

29/06/2015Dr James Kadirire6 What is SMS used for? SMS was commercially introduced in 1992 In 2001, an estimated billion SMS messages were exchanged worldwide In September 2004, there were 1.25 billion global GSM users In learning environments or the business place Voting in the UK local elections in Spring 2002 Accessing local information services like traffic announcements, weather forecasts, banking details, etc

29/06/2015Dr James Kadirire7 SMS in schools or the business environment

29/06/2015Dr James Kadirire8 How does this work? Pupils text messages to an SMS server during a lesson intended for their teacher The application retrieves each message as it arrives and stores it in a database The messages are time stamped and formatted by the application so that they can be displayed as stickies on a computer monitor The monitor is connected to a data projector The stickies are colour coded and fade with time to a dull grey They can be tiled, cascaded, resized and saved with state information until they are next retrieved At the end of the lesson, the teacher can then project all the messages onto a large screen/white board & discuss each message

29/06/2015Dr James Kadirire9 What are the benefits of SMS in schools or the business environment It can be used in group discussions where everyone has an equal chance of articulating their views It allows anonymity & eliminates fear of being criticised or bullied into silence It is easy to use Messages are saved with state information until the next discussion or meeting

29/06/2015Dr James Kadirire10 Summary There has been an explosive growth in the use of mobile devices with billions of text messages being sent each day SMS is a stable and well established technology SMS can be used in –Schools –Conferences like this one Dr James Kadirire Ultralab Anglia Polytechnic University