Ever tried the SMS client simulator in CF7 and above? If it fails to launch, here's why

Note: This blog post is from 2007. Some content may be outdated--though not necessarily. Same with links and subsequent comments from myself or others. Corrections are welcome, in the comments. And I may revise the content as necessary.

But I want to pass on a tip about something that tripped me up when I first tried to "play with" the new phone simulator. I would launch the SMSClient.bat file (in the cfusionmx7/bin directory), and a DOS window would open (and stay open) but I'd never see the simulator.

I finally figured it out: you need to have started the SMS Test Server (done in the "Event Gateways">"Settings" page in the CF Admin).

I also just noticed that there are also a couple of log files created in the same directory as the bat file, which probably would have clued me in. (Even though I've now stopped the test server, I can't get the client to recreate the problem--it now always shows up. I'm sure a restart would solve it and the log may then have told me what to do, but I missed the log before, so I still think this info worth passing along.)

To learn more about the SMS client and server simulators in CF7 (and 8), see:

Kevin Schmidt's Dev Center article

The CF docs

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