Mobile Dialog-SIFT issue

[Jean]

Newbie question - I started my Mobile Dialog component, connected it
to a SIFT channel, and tested a few messages. Test msgs worked from
Rogers phone. Made admin changes to SIFT (from open to closed
membership), then msgs FAIL to reach SIFT (and show up in my MD stats
2X). Changed SIFT back to open membership, but msgs still fail and are
still in MD stats 2X.

I presume then that it's not a SIFT problem. Why does this happen in
Mobile Dialog? (see screencap):

http://muse3-platform.googlegroups.com/web/16.58.Jan.26.2009.MDialog..duplicates.issue.tiff?hl=en&gsc=-4yDtxYAAACHvPbgk8BNiA1LGrQqhsmv-vghgYgES8zAzJdW7J9-8w

[Jim Udall]

The issue of mobile dialog stats showing up 2x has been reported before. I
guess this is a bug - since I don't have a good explanation for you.

However that's not the primary issue of course. Your real issue is 'Why am
I not getting my inputs to SIFT?"

From looking at your configuration, I concluded you've done the following:

You've set up 2 sift channels. The first of these will take all incoming
SMS/MMS from 778-320-6873 that begin with illuminate-yaletown and sned that
to sift channel named 'muse3'. The 2nd of these will take all incoming
SMS/MMS from778-320-6873 that begin with misc09 and send that to the sift
channel named 'Miscellaneous Theatre'. My editorial comment is that this
configuration is confusing for both you as an administrator and as mobile
users. Remember you mobile users will have to preface their SMS message
with the keyword you configure. Texting in 'illuminate-yaletown' will be a
BITCH for users. I personally would bail by the time I got to the second L.
'misc09' is better but still awkward to enter as text.

I also see that SIFT has correctly configured a callback URL within Mobile
Dialog to handle those messages; or at least the callback is pointing to
some SIFT code.

So when I test it, I can tell you the following happens:

1. The platform receives your message and it delivers it successfully to
Mobile Dialog.
2. Mobile Dialog does the appropriate routing based on the keyword and
dispatches it to the Sift tool. In particular it does a POST to the
following URL:
http://sifttool.com/channel/95084/smsreceive?kw=4-1497e4f41a8d1c&Type=sms&Fr
om=16047161523&Text=Misc09+jim+udall&SP=MMS+and+SMS
3. Sift appears to barf on this. I say this because firstly, nothing
appears in the SIFT channel. But more worrisome: This is a REST call and
SIFT does not return a valid XML response. In fact it returns an HTML page.
I therefore suspect this is the wrong callback URL within Mobile Dialog

4. SO then I reconfigured your 'Miscellaneous Theatre' SIFT channel.
Specically, I changed the MD keyword from 'misc09' to 'misc19'. I then sent
in a text message.... and this WORKED! (including no invalid XML response)
5. I then looked at the callback URL that appeared in the MD configuration
for 'misc19'. This was DISTINCTLY different than before - and also
DISTINCLY different the still existing configuration for keyword
'illuminate-yaletown'. Specifically the new callback URL looked like:
http://sifttool.com/channel/misc09/smsreceive?kw=4-1497e4f41a8d1c Notice the
difference from the previous callback URL which looked like
http://sifttool.com/channel/95084/smsreceive?kw=4-1497e4f41a8d1c
6. I therefore conclude that you - Jean - had gone into Mobile Dialog and
manually adjusted the callback URL for the SIFT channel. This is of course
BAD BAD BAD.


This is a FREQUENT slip that configurators make. I had a similar issue with
Glenn Isle last week - where in an effort to make things work, he had begun
banging around at Mobile Dialog directly and only succeeded in making things
worse. In fact Mobile Dialog should be modified such that routing entries
that have been setup by other components should NOT be editable directly
thru Mobile Dialog itself. If you were at the point of using Mobile Polling
you would discover that polling keywords A,B,C,D,E are not only not
editable, but in fact not even visible. However, this solution is not
easily transferrable to the general case - and as a result, other components
- except Mobile Polling - can create keywords and users are free to bugger
up the routing tables.

Until and unless that is corrected, users should be cautioned NOT to
directly modify routing entries in Mobile Dialog if the associated keywords
you know are instead being managed by another component. Nothing but going
from bad to worse will occur if you do otherwise.

I have corrected your 'Miscellaneous Theatre' SIFT channel so that it now
works with keyword 'misc09'. I leave it as an exercise for the reader (i.e.
Jean) to correct the other SIFT channel - 'muse3'.

Jim

No virus found in this incoming message.
Checked by AVG - http://www.avg.com
Version: 8.0.176 / Virus Database: 270.10.13/1916 - Release Date: 1/26/2009
7:08 AM

[Roland Tanglao]

hmmm, thanks Jim!
Something I need to document it looks like: i.e. don't manually change
callbacks in Mobile Dialog

On Jan 27, 9:00 am, "Jim Udall" <jim.ud...@quickmobile.com> wrote:
> The issue of mobile dialog stats showing up 2x has been reported before.  I
> guess this is a bug - since I don't have a good explanation for you.
>
> However that's not the primary issue of course.  Your real issue is 'Why am
> I not getting my inputs to SIFT?"
>
> From looking at your configuration, I concluded you've done the following:
>
> You've set up 2 sift channels.  The first of these will take all incoming
> SMS/MMS from 778-320-6873 that begin with illuminate-yaletown and sned that
> to sift channel named 'muse3'.  The 2nd of these will take all incoming
> SMS/MMS from778-320-6873 that begin with misc09 and send that to the sift
> channel named 'Miscellaneous Theatre'.  My editorial comment is that this
> configuration is confusing for both you as an administrator and as mobile
> users.  Remember you mobile users will have to preface their SMS message
> with the keyword you configure.  Texting in 'illuminate-yaletown' will be a
> BITCH for users.  I personally would bail by the time I got to the second L.
> 'misc09' is better but still awkward to enter as text.
>
> I also see that SIFT has correctly configured a callback URL within Mobile
> Dialog to handle those messages; or at least the callback is pointing to
> some SIFT code.
>
> So when I test it, I can tell you the following happens:
>
> 1.  The platform receives your message and it delivers it successfully to
> Mobile Dialog.
> 2.  Mobile Dialog does the appropriate routing based on the keyword and
> dispatches it to the Sift tool.  In particular it does a POST to the

> following URL:http://sifttool.com/channel/95084/smsreceive?kw=4-1497e4f41a8d1c&Type...

> om=16047161523&Text=Misc09+jim+udall&SP=MMS+and+SMS
> 3.  Sift appears to barf on this.  I say this because firstly, nothing
> appears in the SIFT channel.  But more worrisome: This is a REST call and
> SIFT does not return a valid XML response.  In fact it returns an HTML page.
> I therefore suspect this is the wrong callback URL within Mobile Dialog
>
> 4.  SO then I reconfigured your 'Miscellaneous Theatre' SIFT channel.
> Specically, I changed the MD keyword from 'misc09' to 'misc19'.  I then sent
> in a text message.... and this WORKED! (including no invalid XML response)
> 5.  I then looked at the callback URL that appeared in the MD configuration
> for 'misc19'.  This was DISTINCTLY different than before - and also
> DISTINCLY different the still existing configuration for keyword

> 'illuminate-yaletown'.  Specifically the new callback URL looked like:http://sifttool.com/channel/misc09/smsreceive?kw=4-1497e4f41a8d1cNotice the
> difference from the previous callback URL which looked likehttp://sifttool.com/channel/95084/smsreceive?kw=4-1497e4f41a8d1c

> http://muse3-platform.googlegroups.com/web/16.58.Jan.26.2009.MDialog....

> ates.issue.tiff?hl=en&gsc=-4yDtxYAAACHvPbgk8BNiA1LGrQqhsmv-vghgYgES8zAzJdW7J
> 9-8w
>
> No virus found in this incoming message.

> Checked by AVG -http://www.avg.com

[Jean Hébert]

Thanks, Jim! Definitely a great lesson for new users.