Using Gnokii to Send and Receive SMS Messages from a Linux PC

Introduction

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Gnokii is an open source mobile phone tool that can be downloaded free of charge from the web (go here). It was originally developed for Linux but also worked on Linux-like systems such as FreeBSD and Solaris. Today it has been ported to other platforms such as Microsoft Windows and Mac OS. However, some functions are not available in these versions.

Gnokii supports many different features. For example, sending and receiving SMS messages, reading and writing entries of the phone book and calendar, retrieving WAP bookmarks, handling logos, loading ringtones, reading battery charge level and radio signal strength, etc. The actual features supported depend on the model of your mobile phone. Regarding SMS sending and receiving, Gnokii works well with many mobile phones from Nokia, and also those from other manufacturers that support the AT-command mode.

As Gnokii is a command line program, some people find it less intuitive to use. If you are one of them, you may want to try XGnokii or Gnocky, two easy-to-use graphical user interfaces for Gnokii. XGnokii is already included in the Gnokii package, while Gnocky can be downloaded separately from the Gnokii web site. Some screenshots of XGnokii and Gnocky can be found at here.

Mobile Phone Models Supported by Gnokii

The following table lists the Nokia mobile phone models supported by Gnokii 0.6.14. The drivers used by Gnokii to communicate with the mobile phones are also provided here, since this information can be useful to you when you set the model parameter in Gnokii's configuration file. Further details will be covered in the "The model Parameter -- Specifying the Model of the Mobile Phone" section.

In addition to the Nokia mobile phone models in the above table, Gnokii supports Nokia 5120, Nokia 6160 and Nokia 6185 through its nk6160 driver and Nokia 2110, Nokia 2140 and Nokia 6080 through its nk2110 driver. However, these two drivers were not updated for a long time while Gnokii went through a lot of changes internally. As a result, the nk6160 and nk2110 driver may not work as expected today. If necessary, you may try older versions of Gnokii to see if these two drivers work.

Gnokii supports mobile phones that use Symbian as the OS through its gnapplet driver, including Nokia 3650, Nokia 3660, Nokia 6600, Nokia 6630, Nokia 7650 and Siemens SX1.

Gnokii also supports mobile phones that can operate in AT command mode. Many modern mobile phones support AT commands. However, usually not all AT commands, command parameters and parameter values are implemented. Also, the behavior of the implemented AT commands might be different from what was defined in the standard. As a result, you may not be able to use some of Gnokii's features. For example, SMS sending might be supported but not SMS receiving. Here are some mobile phone models that should work in varying degrees with Gnokii using AT mode: (If you find any mistakes, please report to us using the feedback form at the end of this web page.)

• Motorola C350

• Motorola E398

• Motorola L7

• Motorola RAZR V3

• Nokia 3310

• Nokia 3315

• Nokia 5140

• Nokia 6020

• Nokia 6021

• Nokia 6103

• Nokia 6170

• Nokia 6210

• Nokia 6230

• Nokia 6230i

• Nokia 6310

• Nokia 6310i

• Nokia 6510

• Nokia 6610

• Nokia 6800

• Nokia 6810

• Nokia 7110

• Nokia 7210

• Nokia 7250i

• Nokia 7610

• Nokia 7650

• Nokia 8210

• Nokia 8250

• Nokia 8290

• Nokia 8310

• Nokia 9210

• Samsung SGH-C100

• Sharp GX30

• Sharp GX32

• Sony Ericsson D750i

• Sony Ericsson K300i

• Sony Ericsson K600i

• Sony Ericsson K700i

• Sony Ericsson K750i

• Sony Ericsson S700i

• Sony Ericsson T300

• Sony Ericsson T610

• Sony Ericsson T630

• Sony Ericsson T68i

• Sony Ericsson W550i

• Sony Ericsson W800i

• Sony Ericsson Z600

Further details such as the features available for a certain driver and the bugs known can be found in the gnokii-version/Docs directory of the extracted source tarball, where version is the version of Gnokii you are using. For example, notes specific to the nk6510 driver of Gnokii 0.6.14 can be found in the README-6510 file under the gnokii-0.6.14/Docs directory.

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