I’ll admit it, I’m addicted to Twitter. The only thing that I have found that I don’t like about Twitter is the inability to receive updates, either via email or SMS, for all of your @replies; I fix things I don’t like.

I’ve used a combination of Yahoo pipes and a free service, notify.me, to receive all of my @replies via SMS. A few notes about my method:

  • You can configure your updates to come as any combination of the following: SMS, email or IM. This tutorial focuses on SMS.
  • Since we're using Yahoo pipes to create the RSS feed of all the @replies there is a bit of lag between the actual Twitter @ reply and the notification.
  • The Yahoo pipe that we are using catches all @replies, not just ones that start with @reply ie: "great link from @jennykortina"

To receive all of your Twitter @replies via SMS:<ol>

  • Head over to this Yahoo Pipe
  • Enter your Twitter username in the field and click the "Run Pipe" button
  • After the pipe is done running, click the "Get as RSS" button
  • A new window will be loaded with your RSS feed. Copy the RSS link from the navigation bar
  • Head over to notify.me and register for a new account
  • Configure each notification method that you would like to use: SMS, Email, and IM
  • Click the "Sources" tab
  • Paste your Yahoo Pipe RSS feed from step 4 into feed box and click the "Add Feed" button
  • The field will appear in the blue box below the "Add Feed" section. Click on the buttons for the type of notifications you would like to receive. In my case, I only have SMS selected.

    • </ol>

    You now will get all of your Twitter @ replies as SMS messages to your phone. Like I said earlier, there is a slight delay between the time the actual @ reply message is posted and when you get the SMS, but it’s worth the wait!

    </a>