We have multiple Messages addresses enabled. So our correspondents. We often wish to know from which exact address was a message sent. Inversely we want to know which of our addresses was used by the sender.
How do I do this on Mac/Yosemite and iOS 9?
MacBook Pro (Retina, 15-inch, Mid 2014), OS X Yosemite (10.10.4)
Hi,
In the Main window of Messages the Name of the person listed in the 'To" spot can become a drop down and will list the options they have to connect to you (or you to them).
SO if the person is in your Contacts App and the iMessages came from their iPhone which in turn was set up to send from the iPhone number then you will see their iPhone Number and the current choice in the "To" drop down.
In chats for other services such as AIM then you are told which ID you are calling from.
The Chat I used here is with a Buddy using an account I have listed as "Main AIM".
I two potential iMessages ID I could connect to them with and one that is a previously used one plus several other options about my other AIM Accounts and my Google one.
Your iMessages Account on the Mac can be set up to "Start Conversations From" any of the ID or iPhone Numbers you list in the set up.
However this only applies to Starting a new conversation.
If you have selected to Receive At several IDs then it will respond with the one which the iMessages was Addressed to.
That is to say it is a little more difficult to find out which is in use.
However the Contact should be able to tell you with the info that appears at the head of the chat and at any point it was changed in between.
In this example the conversation changed between iMessages and SMS.
(It was because the place I was in doesn't have complete WiFi coverage nor does it have full Carrier service either.)
8:33 pm Sunday; November 15, 2015
That's a big help Ralph. This is a key bit of info - all our devices have multiple addresses enabled. As do many of our correspondents.
If you have selected to Receive At several IDs then it will respond with the one which the iMessages was Addressed to.
We are currently in New Caledonia, which still has the old monopoly telco situation. It's impossible for non-residents to get both voice and data service. So we normally can only communicate via SMS. If we had iMessage enabled on our iPhones we discovered that iOS Messages would preferentially send an iMessage if the sender was connected to internet. Since the receiver is rarely also on the internet - the message seems to go into the Great Bit Bucket. I'm not 100% sure that my description is correct -- but we found that disabling iMessage at least made messaging reliable. I first tried to eliminate the iMessage path by creating unique Contacts entries that are mobile# only. That didn't seem to work.
Another mystery - in New Caledonia we always see two conversations on our iPhones when we are using SMS. When my wife replies a new conversation pops up.
Lastly, by experiment we concluded we need to delete all our conversations - else sometimes our device would fail to sound the LOUD ringtones we have chosen (because we may not be close to the iPhone). But when I send a new message the deleted conversation reappears. Not a big problem, but why?
Hi,
On the Mac the App does "store" the "history" to the iMessages so that they reappear when you reconnect to that person (providing it is the same ID/iPhone Numbers involved).
It is supposed to be similar on the iPhone but I don't rely on mine so much as the Mac so I can't really say as I only delete conversation on the iPhone much later.
The Mac version can also use the Save option (which comes from iChat really) and stores a different copy deep within the Home Folder/Library/Containers set up.
I really struggle to see the sense in this, particularly as the iMessages "history" storage is not so deep.
I have seem other people post that deleting older posts to make the app start an new conversation with the correct ID/iPhone info as well.
I have not had to do this myself but I do note my Mac is set to "Start Conversation From" using the Apple ID and the iPhone from the iPhone Number.
This does mean that if I iMessages th iPhone (it's number) then I get sync copies of the iMessages and the iPhone lists two conversations (which appear to be the one to the iPhone Number and the Apple ID sync version despite both "side" of the conversation being in each chat).
When you start using multiple IDs and iPhone numbers linked to the same Account it can be difficult to maintain an understanding of which iMessages are going where.
I had two iPhones (i.e. two Numbers). I have my Original Apple ID which I have linked to iCloud and got an @me.com ID (and a later @iCloud one).
I used the Original one on one iPhone and the @me.com on the other (iMessages sees them as separate IDs).
However it did not give me the separation that I expected and I removed the Second Apple ID from the second iPhone.
That iPhone still lists it's Number but the @me.com ID keep also appearing in Pop ups to be accepted on the Mac and on the iPhone it was on and my iPad.
Even when you say No to the pop ups the ID is still added to the Receive At list on the Mac and the Send and Receive on the iPhone and iPad but it remains Inactive.
On the iOS devices you can remove it but it is a little more difficult on the Mac.
As to "losing" iMessages both the Mac version and iOS version will turn the Contact Red if the server can't currently "see" them as being On-Line.
There is limited Off Line saving of iMessages and tends to only happen when devices are set up to Sync.
I can't speak for the Teleco's SMS abilities on Off Line storage but most mainland ones seems to support it.
8:40 pm Monday; November 16, 2015
How to access details of a message: sender address and receiver address
