I’m attempting to setup my email to text. Mainly due to the limitations of using SMS within Sharptool.io.
I was trying to activate my email in the Verizon format of **********@vtext.com.
Received a text from noreply@sharptools.io indicating to click on the link in the text to accept or decline the notifications.
However, the link was incomplete. Showed as https://sharptools. Error when clicked was sharptools DNS address could not be found. Diagnosing the problem.
Any suggestions?
Did it potentially come across as two messages?
Keep in mind that the email-to-sms translation happens by Verizon. We intentionally keep the email verification message as short as possible to keep it under a standard 140-160 character limit, but it’s still up to the email-to-sms gateway provider to actually format and deliver the message.
Can you share a screenshot of the message? Feel free to redact any sensitive info.
Are you referring to the undocumented 1000 message limit discussed here? Are you actually sending that many messages monthly? I’m trying to understand why 1000 SMS messages would feel like a restriction or how the messages are being used as perhaps there’s a better approach?
I can’t remember if I shared it already, but the following post might also be helpful:
I don’t ever reach the 1000 limit, to my knowledge.
Right now, I can’t get a count on how many messages I actually used to receive. Right now, it’s 0.
That’s why I’m looking at alternatives. No super actively.
After our last info exchange, I received a sum total of 1 message from SharpTools.io. Then, nothing more . So the 1k messages, wouldn’t appear to be an issue.
At this point, I’d be glad to get the notice on 1 phone, much less 2.
Last couple of months, I start out receiving my text messages. But by about the 20th of the month, that just stops.
I’m starting to believe that this may be more Verizon related, but it would be hard for me to claim that. About a month ago I spent at least an hour on the phone with Verizon, without a resolution. They were going to pass me off to a higher level tech, but I didn’t have the time, or the patience, to dedicate to the issue.
p.s. I started looking into the Textbelt approach. Maybe by the end of this week, I’ll have some update.
I was trying the email to text approach, that’s when the verification couldn’t be completed.
I wonder if it’s because they inject the subject into the message as that seems to add an additional 33 characters to the message.
The length of the message up to where it’s cutoff in your screenshot is 137 characters including the injected subject which is right up against the 140 character count we try to stay under, so it’s probably the injection of that subject by Verizon’s Email-to-SMS gateway that’s causing the trouble.
That being said, most carriers usually automatically split messages into multi-part SMS and reassemble them when delivered if they’re longer than their character, but again I guess Verizon’s Email-to-SMS gateway doesn’t do that. 
I’ve made a note to try to shorten the message and subject even further, but I’m not sure it’s something I’ll be able to get to right away.
I took a quick look at how we could potentially shorten the mobile version of our validation message and realized it should already be under the 140 character limit even if the carrier embedded the subject into the message.
If you want to try Verizon’s email-to-SMS gateway again, you can try removing the pending @vtext.com address and try it again using the SMS tab when adding an extra email to your account.
I understand you’re already looking into the TextBelt approach, but I wanted to share my findings here anyway since they might be helpful to you or a future internet traveller!
Click or copy the link below to accept/decline receiving SharpTools notifications:
https://sharptools.io/emv/xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Click the link below to accept/decline receiving notifications:
https://sharptools.io/emv/xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
We knew that things could be tight with SMS so we trimmed some things out to tighten it up as best as we could when we knew it was an email-to-sms gateway being used.
The mobile version even accounts for the subject being included in the message body and stays under 140 characters even in that scenario. For example, it’s 133 characters with the T-mobile Email-to-SMS gateway:
/ SharpTools Opt-in / Click the link below to accept/decline receiving notifications:
https://sharptools.io/emv/xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Per the image at the top of this post, the ‘mobile’ flag only gets set if you explicitly use the SMS tab when adding an additional email. If you manually enter an email using the EMAIL tab, it’s treated like a normal email.