A communiqué from Kieran Dolan reports on the release of an initial public review draft for Mobile Message Access Protocol Specification (MMAP), produced by the SMS Forum XML Protocol Group. Mobile Messaging Access Protocol (MMAP) is a "SOAP protocol that provides a framework for web application access to mobile messaging services. It provides a mechanism whereby applications can initiate 'one-shot' requests or more complex peer sessions over SOAP and HTTP. MMAP provides support for service identification and billing and defines a standard way of supporting session-oriented communication. MMAP is a generic access protocol which now subsumes and extends the SMS Forum's original XML protocol specification, called SMAP. SMAP is now an application part of MMAP, providing a transport-independent set of XML primitives for handling Short Messages. SMAP provides XML operations for: (1) Submission of short messages to a short message centre; (2) delivery of short messages and delivery receipts to an application; (3) managment of messages after submission." XML Schemas for the MMAP Modules and SMAP modules are provided in section 9 of the specification. A pre-release draft of this new MMAP XML-based Message Protocol is available for download; the SMS working group requests feedback from application developers on this draft.

Bibliographic information: Mobile Message Access Protocol Specification (MMAP). From the SMS Forum. Version 1.0, Draft 12. 107 pages. 17-Dec-2002. Section 9 (pages 82-105) provides the XML Schemas for the MMAP Modules and SMAP modules.

Overview.

The Hypertext Transport Protocol (HTTP) is an increasingly popular transport mechanism for sending short messages from web applications to mobile phones. Many service providers implement HTTP interfaces. These interfaces are, however, implementation-specific, may offer only a limited set of functions and frequently do not have a full and formal specification. A number of existing protocols support the transfer of messages between a Short Message Center and External Short Message Entities (ESMEs). These are normally specified as binary protocols accessed over TCP/IP or X.25. It is proposed to define a new text protocol to support application access to message centers and/or messaging gateway nodes over HTTP and other Web protocols. It is further proposed to specify this new protocol in XML. This will allow messages to be specified in a structured format and will also facilitate automatic translation to other messaging formats.

This new Mobile Message Access Protocol (MMAP) provides a standard framework for mobile messaging over SOAP and HTTP. It provides support for service identification and billing and provides a standard way of supporting session-oriented communication. MMAP supports generic XML operations as SOAP body elements. The Short Message Application Part (SMAP) is a set of abstract XML operations for short messaging. These operations are functionally equivalent to the SMS forum's binary access protocol; SMPP version 3.4. SMAP is defined in XML as a set of abstract operations and requires MMAP or an equivalent framework for implementation.

MMAP provides a set of SOAP elements that allow applications to perform requests and receive responses within a structured framework. MMAP provides a mechanism for validating applications and managing a session over SOAP. It also allows applications to establish an asynchronous session, whereby requests can be initiated by either party. This is particularly useful for delivery of messages to an application where message delivery is only attempted when the application is connected to the server.

MMAP provides a set of primitives for session management. These allow an application to bind to a server, invoke a series of operations on a server and end the session by unbinding from the server. A session can be a pure client session, where one party invokes operations on the other. A peer-to-peer session can also be established when a client provides bindback details to the server. This allows the server to bind back to the client using a URL and connection details provided by the client in the original bind request. Once the bindback operstion has succeeded the two client-server sessions operate together as a single peer-topeer messaging session. Each SOAP request is accepted for processing and the immediate response indicates this acceptance. When the request completes, the response is sent back on the peer session.

As part of the bind process, the requesting agent can specify the operations required and can request optional features. In the bind response, the responding agent indicates the operations and features that are actually supported on the session. There is no explicit negotiation process; the exchange of information simply indicates to each agent the operations that are possible on that session..."

Discussion Group. "Reviewers are invited to submit comments or queries to the SMS forum's online discussion group. Click on the "online discussion" sidebar from the SMS Forum homepage." The MMAP-Related forum is one of several discussion groups.

About the SMS Forum. "The SMS Forum (formerly SMPP Forum) is an independent body incorporated in 1999 (Memorandum and Articles of Association) with six founding members, organized into a single working group. Since then, the Forum has grown in numbers and organizational complexity. The SMS Forum was established to foster and promote SMS to the benefit of the Wireless Industry, and to manage/enhance SMPP with the intent of providing a robust worldwide standard. The SMS Forum meets quarterly at locations worldwide as the technical authority for the evolution of SMPP. These quarterly meetings are supplemented by monthly teleconference calls held on the first Tuesday of each month. The Short Message Peer to Peer (SMPP) protocol is an open, industry standard messaging protocol designed to simplify integration of data applications with wireless mobile networks such as GSM, TDMA, CDMA and PDC. The protocol is widely deployed in the mobile telecommunications industry..."