I'm not sure this is the right forum to be posting this in, but here goes:

I have been working on a system that allows Transloc's wonderful bus-tracking system, TVS (http://ncsu.transloc.com), to be accessed using text messages on any cell phone. It can be accessed by sending a text message containing the number/name of a bus route (i.e. "3", "7", or "werewolf") to "tvstext@michaelmarley.com". You will then receive a reply containing the location of each bus on that route. You can also send it "list" to get a list of the currently-operating routes. It is completely free to use, except for possible text messaging charges from your cell provider. There is a complete list of all the supported routes and other commands at http://michaelmarley.com/tvstextroutes. TVStext also has its own forum at http://michaelmarley.com/forum/2.

I am hoping that this will prove to be useful for someone out there. Feel free to give my comments or suggestions about how to make this better. Also, if anyone wants to know the technical details of how I implemented it, just ask!

[Edited on October 18, 2010 at 9:24 PM. Reason : Add info about forum]

10/18/2010 9:19:20 PM

what sms gateway are you using?

is it free?

10/18/2010 9:38:10 PM

we use celltrust at work - i'm not aware of a free one though

10/18/2010 9:44:13 PM

I don't use a gateway; I just fire off email messages back at the address the original message came from. For Verizon, that is tendigitno@vtext.com. It works for messages sent using regular email addresses too, but it can't parse HTML messages so be sure to use plain text.

[Edited on October 18, 2010 at 10:04 PM. Reason : ]

10/18/2010 9:52:18 PM

I think its neat, and a great hobby project, but is there any specific reason people just couldn't use the mobile site that they provide?

10/19/2010 7:55:19 AM

^really? people still have dumb phones, crappy phones, and/or no data plan..

10/19/2010 8:32:36 AM

^
http://ncsu.transloc.com/m/

it actually degrades very gracefully to dumb browsers

also, to the OP, i'm assuming you found their little PHP interface that spits back XML with all the route/location information?

10/19/2010 9:41:49 AM

@Wolfmarsh: Using dumbphones is exactly the reason I created it. I don't have a smartphone or a dataplan, and I know many other people who are in the same position as me.

@evan: No, I didn't know about that I used an open-source project called simplehtmldom (http://simplehtmldom.sourceforge.net/) to web-scrape http://ncsu.transloc.com/t/.

[Edited on October 19, 2010 at 10:36 AM. Reason : Got the URL wrong.]

10/19/2010 10:31:59 AM

BTW, my project is opensource, too. You can get the sourcecode here: http://michaelmarley.com/node/27

10/19/2010 10:34:56 AM

http://e00.us/tww/transloc/xmlparser.php

a demo i wrote a while ago. it's a bit broken right now - looks like they changed a bunch of stuff with their response format... but still.

10/19/2010 10:47:41 AM

Very nice! If I only knew the URL for the php-generated xml files...

10/19/2010 10:52:57 AM

^^are you agreeing with me or saying the mobile version is good for dumb phones? cause it's not good for all dumbphones or those without data plans!

10/19/2010 10:55:21 AM

I am saying that my system is designed for phones with no/crappy web browsers and/or no data plan. I agree with you

10/19/2010 10:59:04 AM

^yeh, we're on the same page... but this evan character... well I don't know about him... I wouldn't trust that guy... I'm sure he owes me $5 anyways...

10/19/2010 11:32:10 AM

stfu bill

10/19/2010 12:25:51 PM

ohai

10/19/2010 1:47:37 PM