SMS text messaging simulation on android

As part of an application I’m currently developing, I need to be able to interogate incoming SMS messages. Since I’ll be developing against the emulator initially I need a way of sending in SMS messages to the emulator. Fortunately, we can use adb to poke in SMS messages at will, as detailed below.

Ultimately, you’ll need to telnet into your emulator, and you’ll need two things:- The port the emulator runs on. To find this out, open up a command window and type :

adb devices

You should see something like this :

C:\development\projects\AndroidSam\trunk_androidsam> adb devices  
List of devices attached  
emulator-5554 device

So my emulator is running on the default port of 5554.

• Secondly, if you’re a Windows 7 / Vista user, you probably won’t have telnet enabled by default, so switch that on by going into Control Panel > Programs > Programs and Features > Turn Windows features on or off.

Now, lets actually send in an SMS. From the command window, type :

telnet localhost 5554

sms send 07841123123 Hello this is a sample message
OK

Then have a look at your emulator, you should see the SMS come through.

Stick around, I’ll post up some more SMS related tips in the coming weeks!