Upingme\’s Progress - Blog

We have some new API features online that were rolled out today. You can now retrieve the location of any number with a RESTful call to our API interface; you point your client to it like this:

http://www.upingme.com/api/location/00121234567891

where ‘00121234567891′ is a user’s number. The system returns your client an XML package that reads like this:

<upingme_package mode=”location”>
<location>727 5th ave new York by 10022</location>
<timestamp>1196876518</timestamp>
<icon>http://www.upingme.com/thumbnails/1.jpg</icon>
</upingme_package>

or, you are returned a ‘nowhere’ package if the user is set to ‘private’ or an error ‘404′ package if the user was not found.

You can also retrieve the five most recent messages by calling:

http://www.upingme.com/api/simple.xml

which will return your client a neat XML package of the five most recent messages.

Check out the API documentation for the details and let us know how you are using the API and what you would like to see in it.

There’s more to come!

Our new service ‘Uät’ is now online; take it for a spin and let us know what you think. Uät lets you see the exact location of your friends both online and with a mobile phone, wherever they are in the world.

When you set your location with a text, we tell all your friends where you are so that you can swarm around all the places you like to have fun. You can also see where your friends are on a Google Map via the Uät home page.

Let us know how you are using Uät so that we can tweak the service to make it better!

We have just rolled out QR-Codes on the reply boxes. QR-Codes are a useful way of initiating an SMS message, saving the user some thumb strokes.

The obvious next step is to allow access to our Upingme QR-Code engine via the API; the images would be available for print and the web, and all sorts of cool things could be done with them.

Check out this YouTube video on QR-Codes, by Marcello Di Pietro if your phone cannot do QR-Codes.

And thanks to GiaGia for the reminder and inspiration…

Upingme Grüps is now online and testing. Technically it is a ‘private message reflector’ which takes an incoming message and then distributes it to a members list.

In its current incarnation, you can send a single message and reflect it to an unlimited number of recipients. This could be used for an unlimited number of purposes, some of which we touch on in the ‘about’ page for Grüps. Do let us know if you have any suggestions or find and unexpected features.

You can now get a reminder of your password; simply send:

U password

to the upingme number and the system will send you your password.

We have had some excellent suggestions over the last few days, and are folding them them into the system over the next two weeks. These improvements will streamline the commands and do some other stuff; watch this space!