Sunday, September 19, 2010

For iPhone users

There are many reasons to use GVMax these include:
- Being able to get SMS/VM notification on your computer's desktop via GTalk (and being able to reply from the IM program)
- Sending group SMS messages
- HttpPost and general API access to GV.
- Auto responding to SMS

But I suspect most people use GVMax for the original reason it was built for, namely to be able to be notified of SMS/VM on the iPhone. Of those people I would say around 2/3rd of them use it via an IM client on the iPhone such as Beejive or Meebo. This is because until recently this was the most seemless way to integrate GV with a non-jailbroken iPhone.

Recently Apple has allowed a couple of Google Voice native applications into its AppStore. This is great news ofcourse. Unfortunately currently both of these applications do not provide push notifications. This can be fixed by using GVMax together with Prowl. GVMax monitors your GV account for SMS/VM and tells Prowl to notify the user. The cool thing about Prowl is that it is them able to redirect the notification straight into GVMobile+ or GV Connect.

So to these people I suggest that they switch to using the GVMax/Prowl configuration (see my previous posts on how to set that up).

Saturday, September 18, 2010

GVMobile+ also released on Apple's store.

Well done to Sean for getting GVMobile+ into the Apple Store. It is a pity that it appeared a day after GV Connect, since I think it is better than GV Connect.

If you need push notifications of SMS and Voicemail, you can follow the same instructions from my previous post but select GVMobile instead of GV Connect (note: I have not tried that yet, so let me know if it works, ie prowl can redirect properly).

Friday, September 17, 2010

Native IPhone Google Voice App at last!

So Apple finally allowed a native Google Voice app into their store. Read about it here:
http://lifehacker.com/5641283/apple-finally-approves-a-native-google-voice-iphone-app-again

It is called GV Connect

It looks pretty nice (the interface is functional although it could use a little polish).

It does not have push notification though, which is a pain. But using GVMax together with Prowl solves this problem. Here is how to do it:

  1. Purchase Prowl on your iPhone.
  2. Register at GVMax. Note you do NOT need to provide your GV password to GVMax. (If you don't provide your GV password you will need to create a gmail filter manually, instructions available here. If you do provide the password than all the config is done automatically)
  3. Once registered, change your default notifiers, select Prowl and enter your Prowl API key.
  4. Start prowl on your phone, 'Settings'/'Redirections'/'Add a New Redirection'
  5. Under 'Application Name' type 'GV SMS' and select 'GV Connect (SMS)
  6. Repeat step 4
  7. Under 'Application Name' type 'GV VM' and select 'GV Connect (Voicemail)
Now when you receive a google voice SMS, GVMax will send you a prowl notification, which in turn causes prowl to display the SMS as a notification and opens up GV Connect so you can reply etc...

If I get sometime (unlikely) I will post a more detailed tutorial.

Regards,
Hani