Email to Test Message (SMS) Application For Windows

[FN-GM]

Good Evening,

 

I am looking for an application that will run on Physical Windows Server (this will be a PC). I would like it to convert an incoming email received from an SMTP relay, take the subject or body and send it as an test message. The SIM could be installed via a USB adapter.

 

Can someone recommend something please?

 

I know I can use various cloud services but I need this to be on premise. It's for IT outage notifications and it needs to send an SMS if the internet is down.

 

Thank You

[ThomL]

Another option (possibly), A 4g dongle with a sim to provide data services to a device. Device is also connected to the network so can receive the email via relay (or even do the monitoring itself?), uses the dongle as its gateway and makes contact via a cloud based SMS product, or sends an email/forwards the email?

 

**EDIT** A quick search returned this if you were interested in some tinkering? https://www.selectiveintellect.net/blog/2021/8/19/setting-up-sms-sending-and-receiving-using-a-usb-gsm-dongle-by-zte

Edited April 5, 2023 by ThomL

[FN-GM]

Another option (possibly), A 4g dongle with a sim to provide data services to a device. Device is also connected to the network so can receive the email via relay (or even do the monitoring itself?), uses the dongle as its gateway and makes contact via a cloud based SMS product, or sends an email/forwards the email?

 

This did cross the mind but it won’t comply with the security policies. We can’t have a device connected to a unprotected internet connection like that.

 

Thanks anyway though.

[robintech]

could it not be a backup connection after the firewall, only needs to go outbound in theory and have the server use the backup connection as a gateway for sending the SMS.

[ThomL]

This did cross the mind but it won’t comply with the security policies. We can’t have a device connected to a unprotected internet connection like that.

 

Thanks anyway though.

 

Fair enough, makes sense.

 

If you go down the tinkering route I mentioned it be great to know how it turns out and if you get it working, or are you purely looking for an off-the-shelf solution?

[FN-GM]

could it not be a backup connection after the firewall, only needs to go outbound in theory and have the server use the backup connection as a gateway for sending the SMS.

 

We have plenty of backup connections. But if the firewalls fall over or there is a routing issue the traffic won’t get there.

 

That’s why we want SMS as it will be completely independent of all this.

[FN-GM]

Fair enough, makes sense.

 

If you go down the tinkering route I mentioned it be great to know how it turns out and if you get it working, or are you purely looking for an off-the-shelf solution?

 

Ideally something off the shelf so it’s easier for other people to support as and when required.

[dmj]

Does the windows pc have WSL installed?

There's a straightforward blog post explaining how to do this

https://blog.danman.eu/e-mail-to-sms

 

I'm sure the author would be delighted to take your money if you needed support.

[FN-GM]

Does the windows pc have WSL installed?

There's a straightforward blog post explaining how to do this

https://blog.danman.eu/e-mail-to-sms

 

I'm sure the author would be delighted to take your money if you needed support.

 

Thanks - but the solution we are looking for would be Windows based.

 

The current device is Linux, but for various reasons that I won’t discuss here we are looking to switch OS.

[ThomL]

'Hardware SMS gateway' gets some results via google, e.g. https://www.smseagle.eu/ any good? Assuming you'd need to source something more geographically relevant of course...

[dmj]

Thanks - but the solution we are looking for would be Windows based.

 

The current device is Linux, but for various reasons that I won’t discuss here we are looking to switch OS.

 

You don't need to change operating system, modern windows can run this in containers, or WSL

[Steve21]

Not sure that really exists in the way you’re talking if it’s pure SIM and not data dongle etc

 

You’d either need external hardware like the eagle mentioned above, or scripting it via an external phone link (eg using windows phone link app)

 

But it sounds a bit muddled in regards to why you couldn’t use a cloud based monitoring system, as all you’re doing is basically the same with a local app that’s then using “cloud” via a SIM

 

The alternative option, but again depends on what the “security policy” mentioned is referring to, could you not have it locally monitored and when it detects downtime it’ll activate the data dongle? So it’s not unfiltered all the time and only connects once it’s required, then automatically disables again after it’s back online?

 

Steve

[andy_b]

Not the solution you were after, but a solution that is relatively "private":

 

Uptime kuma on hosted on a VPS with the Windows server using the push notification (polls a web address every 60s so no special ports to check etc) and then notification method of your choice.

[FN-GM]

Not sure that really exists in the way you’re talking if it’s pure SIM and not data dongle etc

 

The SIM itself has no ability for data, it’s data only. We currently have this running on a Linux box and looking to lifecycle it.

 

But it sounds a bit muddled in regards to why you couldn’t use a cloud based monitoring system, as all you’re doing is basically the same with a local app that’s then using “cloud” via a SIM

 

The monitoring system is on premise. I don’t want to use a cloud SMS service as the message is sent over the internet. If the internet, firewalls etc is down the notification won’t get there. We don’t want to touch the monitoring systems as it has over 5,000 devices. It would be a huge task to migrate to something news.

 

The alternative option, but again depends on what the “security policy” mentioned is referring to, could you not have it locally monitored and when it detects downtime it’ll activate the data dongle? So it’s not unfiltered all the time and only connects once it’s required, then automatically disables again after it’s back online?

 

 

That wouldn’t be permitted. Plus it won’t work as the SIM has no data at all. We don’t have any servers in the main LAN internet access. Anything that does need internet is in a DMZ and it whitelisted. Where I work is quite security sensitive and the type of place you need to be vetted for to work there.

Edited April 6, 2023 by FN-GM

[robintech]

Wonder is this would work

 

https://www.diafaan.com/applications/e-mail-to-sms-gateway/

[Steve21]

I assume that Linux way is via lots of scripts etc though; which you said you didn’t want compared to off the shelf for support?

 

Maybe I misunderstood, but wasn’t this just to monitor the firewall etc? Or did you mean that it’s full infrastructure monitoring but it’s just that you need it to bypass the firewall in case that’s down too?

 

Or how does the relay receiving an email come into the process? Is it just monitoring the out queue and if it stays sitting in it’ll text?

 

Just trying to get a picture of the whole route currently

 

Steve

[FN-GM]

I assume that Linux way is via lots of scripts etc though; which you said you didn’t want compared to off the shelf for support?

Steve

 

We already have it working on Linux but the OS will be out of support in in the next 18 months or so. In general I am trying to simplify where I can as we already have a vast and complex system as a whole.

 

Maybe I misunderstood, but wasn’t this just to monitor the firewall etc? Or did you mean that it’s full infrastructure monitoring but it’s just that you need it to bypass the firewall in case that’s down too?

 

Or how does the relay receiving an email come into the process? Is it just monitoring the out queue and if it stays sitting in it’ll text?

 

We have a monitoring system that monitors absolutely everything. Servers, switches IOT devices etc. Critical functions are monitored and we receive alerts via various methods. But if there are issues getting out the the internet we need to know and the comms need to be via another method as the internet is broken. The email part is basically the method of producing the alert by the monitoring system, it sends the email message and this goes via SMTP to the current Linux box and that device converts it to SMS and alerts relevant parties.

[dmj]

Can I just recap as I'm getting confused:

 

You've got a system that currently works but the operating system it runs on is EOL shortly.

You don't want to port the current application to a new OS, but you do want to change OS and change the application.

You want to pay for support.

[ITGURU]

Do you have any NAT rules? I use Uptime robot that monitors IIS on an external IP, if it down, the physical WAN link is down.

Our internal monitoring emails me if our proxy goes down and there's no internet, but the WAN line can still be up, sends email to 365, then can send me a text via textmagic if required.

[FN-GM]

Can I just recap as I'm getting confused:

 

You've got a system that currently works but the operating system it runs on is EOL shortly.

You don't want to port the current application to a new OS, but you do want to change OS and change the application.

You want to pay for support.

 

Yes. That’s basically it.

[dmj]

ok. seems a bit like throwing the baby out with the bathwater, but radical changes are sometime necessary.

 

It's quite difficult to do this sort of thing on windows because the application would have to be written from the ground up, whereas *nix systems can rely on a range of subcommands and processes that simply don't exist on windows - packages to handle email, sms are baked in to *nix systems so tying them together is fairly trivial (see Unix philosophy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unix_philosophy ).

 

You are asking for quite a niche application and I'm not really surprised that there are not many windows only options. The market for this would be tiny, and most people would take the easy (and free) route.

 

As you are asking for a radical change, I would approach the problem form a different perspective: Reduce the risk of internet failure - get a backup line to send sms, email, alerts whatever. It's ultimately a better solution because all you really need is a method of informing you of failure. A backup internet connection with automated failover is a better solution than fabricating a backup solution that can *only* communicate using sms.

[FN-GM]

Reduce the risk of internet failure - get a backup line to send sms, email, alerts whatever. It's ultimately a better solution because all you really need is a method of informing you of failure. A backup internet connection with automated failover is a better solution than fabricating a backup solution that can *only* communicate using sms.

 

We have multiple 1 & 10gig backup connections. It's not just the internet that can fail. There can but routing issues with OSPF, BGP, firewall faults etc. Having so much fault tolerance greats a whole new set of issues.

 

If it can't be done on Windows I will look at a hardware option or we may end up migrate to a new Linux box.

[Arthur]

I am looking for an application that will run on Physical Windows Server (this will be a PC). I would like it to convert an incoming email received from an SMTP relay, take the subject or body and send it as an test message. The SIM could be installed via a USB adapter.

I think I may have found a solution...

 

Auron SMS Server

 

The Auron SMS Server is an easy to use Windows server application to integrate and build instant messaging and e-mail based applications.

 

Use it to connect to SMS, WhatsApp and E-mail providers and automatically send, receive and process messages.

 

With many integration options the Auron SMS Server is a perfect fit for any business.

 

Use its many advanced scripting and routing options to build your custom instant messaging application or integrate into your existing IT landscape.

 

Typical use cases

• Send out mass WhatsApp, SMS, or E-mail campaigns from any data-source
  
• Automatically reply or forward messages based on the message subject or content
  
• Forward any type of message as any other type of message
  
• Use WhatsApp, SMS or E-mail to remotely control IT-infrastructure
  
• SMS based Two-factor authentication (2FA)
  
• Setup your own SMSC by having users connect to the SMS Server and routing and forwarding their messages
  

 

or

 

Auron SMS Component - A Windows library for SMS

 

The Auron SMS Component is an easy to use MS Windows library for sending and receiving SMS and pager messages.

 

You can use it in most programming and scripting languages available on MS Windows. Use it from your website or desktop application.

 

It’s able to accept incoming connections as well so you can use it to setup gateway or forwarding applications too.

 

In addition the Auron SMS Component contains a HTTP Server to receive incoming message from HTTP. This can be used to build any kind of custom API as well.

 

If you need more than a library please also have a look at the Auron SMS Server.

 

Typical use cases

• Send and receive SMS from scripts. For example: Add alerting to your monitor scripts
  
• Add SMS functionality to an existing application. For example send reminders from your agenda application
  
• Build your own bulk SMS center. The Auron SMS Component is able to accept incoming connections as well
  
• Script HTTP API’s. The Auron SMS Server includes a tiny, portable and secure HTTP server
  
• Act as a gateway from any SMS protocol to any other SMS protocol
  
• Build A2A applications. The SMS component supports binary SMS messages, custom user headers and application ports
  

 

Auron also supports sending/receiving SMS messages via an Android phone (with their client app) or a GSM modem since cloud providers are not an option in your use case.

 

Another alternative I came across is Traccar SMS Gateway. This turns any Android phone into an SMS gateway with an HTTP API that you could script using cURL or PowerShell (for example). If you can automate the email side, this solution wouldn't cost any money since Traccar is free.

 

Traccar SMS Gateway is an Android messaging app. The key difference from other messaging apps is an option to expose HTTP API for sending SMS messages through the phone.

[FN-GM]

I think I may have found a solution...

 

Auron SMS Server

 

 

 

or

 

Auron SMS Component - A Windows library for SMS

 

 

 

Auron also supports sending/receiving SMS messages via an Android phone (with their client app) or a GSM modem since cloud providers are not an option in your use case.

 

Another alternative I came across is Traccar SMS Gateway. This turns any Android phone into an SMS gateway with an HTTP API that you could script using cURL or PowerShell (for example). If you can automate the email side, this solution wouldn't cost any money since Traccar is free.

 

Thanks Arthur. I haven’t looked at it properly but it’s looks promising! Thanks again.