Twilio Super Sim – Public Beta • Hacker News Board

Re: Twilio Super Sim – Public Beta

#111

Post by Nextgrid » Sat, Jun 13, 2020, 12:03 AM UTC

matjaxon wrote: post #68

throwawaysea wrote: post #29

Apologies if this is a dumb question - can I use this on a person phone for consumer use cases (voice/text/data)?

Hi there, Matt Jackson from Twilio here. I’m the Product Manager for Super SIM. This is definitely not a dumb question. In fact, all of us on the Super SIM team have really enjoyed reading this thread and learning what you have questions about! Super SIMs can be put into any device that has a SIM card slot, including almost any cell phone, but they are not designed to be a replacement for your cell phone’s SIM card.…

Last time I tried Programmable Wireless, iMessage explicitly didn't work; the activation text (sent in the background to Apple to verify your number and activate iMessage) was being swallowed by the underlying carrier and ended up verifying the internal number of the SIM (a T-Mobile number) instead of being delivered to me through HTTP (so I could route it myself through the Twilio number I wanted to use as outgoing).

I have tried raising it (as it was mostly an oversight and could've been sorted by just asking T-Mobile to make changes to their config) but my impression was that nobody even cared looking into it and just declared "iMessage is unsupported".

Re: Twilio Super Sim – Public Beta

#112

Post by rsync » Sat, Jun 13, 2020, 12:07 AM UTC

matjaxon wrote: post #65

rsync wrote: post #14

No verizon support, unfortunately ... https://www.twilio.com/docs/iot/supersim/available-networks#...

Hi there, Matt Jackson from Twilio here. I’m the Product Manager for Super SIM. You’re right, we currently don’t have support for Verizon but we hope to be able to add it in the future. We understand that different developers have different connectivity preferences, so we designed our system to be flexible to adding new partners to the platform. As we continue to add networks, the networks of the future should become…

Matt - off topic, but since I have someone from Twilio here ...

Please, please, for the love of god, please add an "email" verb to the twiml language.

You can make it super restrictive if you need to - like you can only email addresses that you can prove you own ... or something.

All I want is to be able to cc: an email with certain SMS alerts and it takes a sendgrid account and write some functions and validate email @ sendgrid with real names and addresses and on and on and on ... just to send an alert to an email address.

Re: Twilio Super Sim – Public Beta

#113

Post by mallets » Sat, Jun 13, 2020, 12:09 AM UTC

yalogin wrote: post #110

So this does not provide the wireless stack just the sim. But with software SIMs these days why is a piece hardware needed? Is it a bit late to the party? Particularly for IoT devices, given the wireless stack is anyway needed along with the RF, it makes sense to cut out other SIM in favor of software.

What do you mean by software SIM? I haven't heard or seen any such modules. eSIMs exist but still hardware. Maybe something based on SDRs can emulate them.

Re: Twilio Super Sim – Public Beta

#114

Post by goleksiak » Sat, Jun 13, 2020, 1:19 AM UTC

dominotw wrote: post #76

Nextgrid wrote: post #10

If you're interested in this space, Hologram does the same thing (and appears to have had a head start compared to Twilio): https://hologram.io

what are some of cool products built with this tech.

https://www.eatabit.io is built on it. We were one of their first beta clients. We used every M2M carrier previously and Twilio is easily superior in cost & reliability. The cellular data space has alot of problems especially with roaming: cell phones transparently switch between networks but data SIMs have a very limited set of networks they can operate on. If Twilio can get VZW access on these SIMs they will have a very strong product. As it stands, coverage is limited.

Re: Twilio Super Sim – Public Beta

#115

Post by vdqtp3 » Sat, Jun 13, 2020, 1:22 AM UTC

matjaxon wrote: post #98

pheeney wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it doesn't support traditional circuit network components used for traditional voice calling or SMS so these won't work like you expect. Does this mean that the number associated with the Super SIM would be classified as VOIP and rejected by certain systems that require a "real" number. For example using the new SIM in any phone number verification system that rejects google voice and other providers.

Good question. Super SIMs actually don’t have a phone number that is publicly addressable. You could use a Twilio phone number and our voice SDK to wire up VoIP calling to and from a device; however, Twilio phone numbers will be treated as VoIP numbers and can often not be used for verification systems.

> Twilio phone numbers will be treated as VoIP numbers and can often not be used for verification systems.

Hi Mat, obviously you aren't responsible for Programmable Wireless but I expect you probably work with the same folks. It would be really nice be able to identify a given number as wireless. I've been using Twilio as my everyday wireless provider for a couple years now (not that it's the typical use case or that I'm your typical customer) and this is one of the few issues I have with it and the only one that really impacts personal use. In general, you guys have created an incredibly powerful and flexible platform, thanks for all your hard work.

Re: Twilio Super Sim – Public Beta

#116

Post by matjaxon » Sat, Jun 13, 2020, 1:24 AM UTC

VectorLock wrote: post #102

matjaxon wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hi there, Matt Jackson from Twilio here. I’m the Product Manager for Super SIM. Our other cellular connectivity solution, Programmable Wireless, which we developed in partnership with T-Mobile, has a NB-IoT SIM that you can purchase from us if you’re interested in checking out T-Mobile’s narrowband network. If you don’t have any hardware, you can purchase a Developer Kit for the T-Mobile USA NB-IoT network from our C…

Do you support accounts with 1 sim?

We don't have any minimums on accounts but there are normally a minimum number of SIM's come in an order depending on which item you're looking to get.

The 2 flavors of Programmable Wireless SIMs, the normal one and the NB-IoT one, can be bought in "Starter Packs" that come with 3 SIMs that can be registered to any Twilio accounts. They don't have to be used with the same account so you can share them if you know anyone else interested in checking it out. As you scale up your solution you can get SIMs in orders as few as 10 that come preregistered to your account so you don't have to type in the registration codes for each one.

If you need hardware to get started with you can buy the Developer Kit for the T-Mobile USA NB-IoT network from Console that comes with some hardware and 1 NB-IoT SIM that you can register to your Twilio account.

For Super SIM, because we're in Beta, you can buy as few as 1 from our Console. That will come pre-registered to your account. Super SIM doesn't support Narrowband IoT but it does support an array of networks that do have LTE-M such as AT&T if you're interested in a similar but more widely adopted low power technology.

Re: Twilio Super Sim – Public Beta

#117

Post by matjaxon » Sat, Jun 13, 2020, 1:28 AM UTC

ilaksh wrote: post #93

What type of IoT device would I install this SIM in? Are there SBCs that come with a place to plug in a SIM and everything else needed to run it? I thought all of those types of things were made for phones. Edit: After some googling, found out about cellular IoT and GSM/GPRS modules for things like Arduino. Will that work with these Super SIMs?

Yep Arduino's or RaspberryPis are solid platforms to get started with. We have a couple quickstarts that you can checkout.

https://www.twilio.com/blog/super-sim-quickstart-adafruit-fo...

https://www.twilio.com/blog/super-sim-quickstart-arduino-mkr...

Re: Twilio Super Sim – Public Beta

#118

Post by matjaxon » Sat, Jun 13, 2020, 1:39 AM UTC

rsync wrote: post #112

matjaxon wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hi there, Matt Jackson from Twilio here. I’m the Product Manager for Super SIM. You’re right, we currently don’t have support for Verizon but we hope to be able to add it in the future. We understand that different developers have different connectivity preferences, so we designed our system to be flexible to adding new partners to the platform. As we continue to add networks, the networks of the future should become…

Matt - off topic, but since I have someone from Twilio here ... Please, please, for the love of god , please add an "email" verb to the twiml language. You can make it super restrictive if you need to - like you can only email addresses that you can prove you own ... or something. All I want is to be able to cc: an email with certain SMS alerts and it takes a sendgrid account and write some functions and validate ema…

Hi there! That's a bit out of my wheelhouse but I shared your message with some Twilio Sendgrid email folks to take a look.

Re: Twilio Super Sim – Public Beta

#119

Post by matjaxon » Sat, Jun 13, 2020, 1:43 AM UTC

lyime wrote: post #66

What hardware would you recommend?

Arduino's or RaspberryPis are solid platforms to get started with. We have a couple quickstarts that you can checkout too.

https://www.twilio.com/blog/super-sim-quickstart-adafruit-fo...

https://www.twilio.com/blog/super-sim-quickstart-arduino-mkr...

Re: Twilio Super Sim – Public Beta

#120

Post by dane-pgp » Sat, Jun 13, 2020, 1:57 AM UTC

Apofis wrote: post #84

adriand wrote: post #31

I've always thought it would be fun to make experimental hardware devices with this type of technology. An example: Build a solar-powered device that you stick up in a tree in a forested patch near an urban center where kids go and have bush parties/bonfires/etc. The device would include a text-to-speech synthesizer. It's dormant most of the time, but designed to activate when people are around it at night. As the "a…

Brilliant! Get this man investments!

Who is going to fund a company whose business model involves making people hear mysterious voices from on high? Well, I suppose angel investors might.