As an IT guy, I like to get notified when something goes sideways on the servers that I am responsible for. Further, because of the various mobile networks out there, I don’t always get email in a timely manner. Something that I am always able to get, even though the worst network connection, are SMS (text) messages.
Fortunately, almost all the cell phone carriers provide a minimally documented feature called an SMS gateway. By using the SMS Gateway, any email message (SMTP) can be sent to the SMS gateway, to be delivered as a Text message. This service is typically available by default for almost all smart phones and carriers worldwide.
The technique is very simple once you know the cellphone number (you typically know your own) and the carrier that you are using for your phone. For a phone number of +1 (303) 555-1234 with a carrier named “SMSGateway” the format would look like this: 3035551234@smsgateway.com. For a European phone number, I recommend checking with your carrier for the correct formatting of the phone number for that carrier. Also be aware that each provider and contact is different, thus there may be a per message cost involved for the recipient.
The SMS gateway addresses are published here: http://mfitzp.io/list-of-email-to-sms-gateways/
Look up your carrier on the list (mine would be Verizon), and find the carrier’s SMS gateway. In my case this would be @vtext.com, thus with the phone number above I would use 3035551234@vtext.com as an email address to receive the text message on my phone.
Set-up this email address as your notification address, and you have alerts being sent to you as a text message.
