Is there some kind of work around or fix for the jumbling that happens when I text my friends with Android phones using Messages on my Mac? The messages get broken up into sentence fragments and often do not even arrive in order. I've done some research for a fix, but have yet to find one. Do we have a solution? Has Apple found a work around of some kind?
I'm assuming you're sending them via SMS through your iPhone. If not, then I have no idea how you're sending them to your android using friends, since iMessage is proprietary to Apple...
Assuming that's the case, send shorter messages. SMS supports a maximum message length of 140 characters (assuming ASCII characters). Longer messages will be broken down into pieces and send by the cellular carrier. They may not arrive in the order they were originally sent due to the nature of cellular networks.
The only way to completely avoid the problem is to send shorter messages.
Yes, I have SMS enabled and the iPhone on network, as well as nearby. I hear what you're saying, but the 140 character limit is not there on my iPhone when I want to send a longer message. Why does it manage to avoid the scrambling, but Messages (or "iMessage," as it used to be called) does not?
Thanks again for the response.
Mick
Hi,
Despite the name they are in fact different apps.
The app has always been called Messages on the iPhone and did SMS before iMessages was added.
The Mac version was iChat back before OS X 10.7.x and then had iMessages shoe-horned in. (i.e it was doing AIM and Jabber chats long before anything else).
Therefore the iPhone/iPad version has always been geared towards the 140 Character limit for SMS.
The Link created by Text Forwarding to the Mac allowing for SMS from the Mac does not take account of this limit.
8:31 pm Friday; June 10, 2016
Thanks for the reply. All the various schizophrenic naming and renaming of Apps by Apple doesn't really apply to my issue, but they're both called Messages now. Apple seems to loathe the "i" that heralded its comeback along with Steve Jobs, but I don't really care much anymore about their marketing schemes. I've been with Apple for decades now and have pretty much seen it all. I find the current incarnation of Apple disappointing and driven too much by it's market value (stock price). I'm sad to see designed obsolescence become it's latest modus operandi. But all of that is irrelevant to this issue. Just ruminating. ;-)
I just tested this with a friend and his long texts arrive just fine on both my Mac and my iPhone. Is there a setting HE can enable that would make his receipt of mine more coherent?
I'm attaching a very simple text I sent him that was broken into 4 pieces in no particular order.
HI,
At this point you are at the mercy of his Carrier service.
As KiltedTim said whilst there is a Nominal 140 character limit which if sent as one text splurt then it is much more likely to arrive in one piece and therefore in order.
Obviously there are many SMS apps for computers of all different types that are accessing the SMS system overall.
It's down to the individual carriers about how precise they are about the limit and how they split any large text item.
On the iPhone > Settings > Messages > Character count is a setting that can be On or Off.
Mine has always been Off and I have no idea if it influences the SMS sending on the iPhone (or just counts) and whether it effects the Mac sends if it does limit the SMS Messages.
10:01 pm Saturday; June 11, 2016
Yes, everything under 140 characters arrives just fine, but I'm pretty sure he's using one of the big 4 carriers here in the U.S. I'm on ATT and am waiting to hear back from him (out of curiosity) as to what his carrier is.
I turned the character count on for kicks.
I thought I read somewhere that there was a workaround for this issue. I vaguely remember that someone said that selecting your email address in Messages, as opposed to your email address AND phone number was better? Or maybe it was the other way around?
Still seems like there must be some workaround that would allow me to text more than 140 characters to the other half of the texting world.... If he can send long texts to me, why can't I to him? :-\
Thanks again for your thoughts.
Hi,
Whilst I know a lot about iChat and as a consequence Messages (first and foremost on the Mac) I have come to dabble a bit in the iPhone version.
That's does not mean I know it as well as I do the Mac version and SMS is really something quite new to me as I was never a great phone user before I got my iPhone.
I might suggest that his carrier's gateway for outgoing stuff is not a precise as the incoming one.
However both would be data across their servers and splitting the texts would cause more work.
After that I have no other suggestions.
10:25 pm Saturday; June 11, 2016
Using Messages to text Android Phone Problem?
