SMSGupshup launches its own AppStore

Bangalore: India's equivalent of Twitter for SMS messages, SMSGupshup launched its own AppStore - AppShup. SMSGushup plans to make it simpler for developers to create applications which provide SMS facility, something which till now has been rather complicated, reports Kshitij Sobti from thinkdigit.

"Text-messaging is by far the most popular communication platform in the world. AppShup unleashes the creativity of global developers and enables them to quickly and inexpensively put their applications in front of billions of mobile subscribers worldwide," said Beerud Sheth, SMS GupShup CEO. Currently a lot of time and investement is required for a developer wanting to build an SMS enabled application, as they need to deal with multiple carriers and approval processes.

With this service, a developer needn't worry about all that, they only need to use the API which uses JSON / XML which most developers are already familiar with. They can use any programming language of their choice but must host the app themselves. The API is simple, you merely host your application anywhere you wish, and any time as SMS message is received in your account, the message will be forwarded to your app's URL with the relevant phone number and message content. Your app can communicate with the Smsgupshup service using a simple JSON or XML syntax.

The service throttles outgoing messages to protect against spam. To encourage creation of interactive applications, the service will increase your outgoing capacity if you receive incoming messages, giving you five outgoing messages for each incoming message.

Smsgupshup as of now is only available in India, however they are working on expanding and taking the service worldwide.