Can't send MMS, error code 5

[Hwmpunk]

Checklist

• I can reproduce the bug with the latest version given here.
• I made sure that there are no existing issues - open or closed - to which I could contribute my information.
• I made sure that there are no existing discussions - open or closed - to which I could contribute my information.
• I have read the FAQs inside the app (Menu -> About -> FAQs) and my problem isn't listed.
• I have taken the time to fill in all the required details. I understand that the bug report will be dismissed otherwise.
• This issue contains only one bug.
• I have read and understood the contribution guidelines.

Affected app version

1.0.0

Affected Android/Custom ROM version

Graphene OS

Affected device model

Pixel 8 pro

How did you install the app?

None

Steps to reproduce the bug

Sending gif text results in cannot send, touch to retry. Then error code 5 pops up.

Expected behavior

Can't send Gifs

Actual behavior

Error code 5

Screenshots/Screen recordings

No response

Additional information

No response

[Aga-C]

Are you able to send normal photos? Also, how large (in kilobytes) is this GIF file?

[Hwmpunk]

Are you able to send normal photos?

Yes but FYI I must type a text along with it or send button is greyed out.

Videos also do not send*

[naveensingh]

Error code 5 is usually thrown when you are sending something that exceeds carrier limits. It may be that you have sent too many MMS messages or you are sending a file that is too big. The error messages need to be more user-friendly.

@Hwmpunk Can you please try sending a very small file no more than 20-100kbs?

[Hwmpunk]

Error code 5 is usually thrown when you are sending something that exceeds carrier limits. It may be that you have sent too many MMS messages or you are sending a file that is too big. The error messages need to be more user-friendly.

@Hwmpunk Can you please try sending a very small file no more than 20-100kbs?

I sent a 191kb gif and it worked. The one that didn't was exactly 1mb. The stock Graphene messaging app can send larger Gifs and videos under 2mb. For some reason your app has a smaller limit of less than 1mb. But yes, there's a limit on standard mms.

Out of curiosity, stock Android or Apple can reduce the quality of the media in order to send, not sure how difficult it would be to incorporate that into the app. Would at least make mms more usable. Most pictures these days are above 2mb

[naveensingh]

The app always tries to resize normal images to the MMS limit set in app settings. It doesn't do that for GIFs (yet) so that explains why your stock messages app can send it by compressing it. Can you try sending a ~2MB JPEG or PNG image? It shouldn't fail.

[Aga-C]

I think, while we don't have such feature, we could temporarily add a warning, that file is too large instead of showing cryptic "error code 5".

[naveensingh]

Yes, some of the error codes have some useful descriptions available but I didn't update error code 5 for some reason that I can't remember. Currently, 3 errors have user-friendly messages out of all the error codes available at SmsManager.java:2399

I guess we can close this as the original issue is not an 'issue'. We'll later add support for compressing different formats like GIFs.

[Hwmpunk]

The app always tries to resize normal images to the MMS limit set in app settings. It doesn't do that for GIFs (yet) so that explains why your stock messages app can send it by compressing it. Can you try sending a ~2MB JPEG or PNG image? It shouldn't fail.

I tried sending a 2.41mb photo and still received the error code 5 so it appears this app does not automatically reduce the size on any type of media.

[naveensingh]

What is the value of the "Resize sent MMS images" setting? Is it 300KB? Can you try lowering it down to 200KB and then sending the message?

[naveensingh]

In fact, you can send images of up to 100MBs and they will be compressed under the set MMS limit: SimpleMobileTools/Simple-SMS-Messenger#589

[DarkSirrush]

Just to add to this, I can't send images with carrier limit disabled with this app, however I can send images with limit disabled with Textra. This is on a stock Samsung flip 4, v1.0.0 of app installed via FDroid Izzy repo.

It looks my carrier does compress the image themselves however, as the received image goes from 2.96mb to 294kb. Maybe that is related?

Also note, when setting carrier limit to 300kb, it allows me to send, however the file is compressed to 158kb and looks significantly worse than the one sent via Textra with "no limit". See screenshot below:

Update: after seeing Hwmpunk's comment tried setting limit to 2mb, image sent just fine, but was compressed down to 255kb.

Edit by naveensingh: Minimized image.

[Hwmpunk]

What is the value of the "Resize sent MMS images" setting? Is it 300KB? Can you try lowering it down to 200KB and then sending the message?

Confirmed that setting the limit to 2mb allowed a 6mb image to be sent. However, the image received is now 766kb

What is the value of the "Resize sent MMS images" setting? Is it 300KB? Can you try lowering it down to 200KB and then sending the message?

Confirmed that setting image limit to 2mb allowed a 6mb image to be sent. However, the image was reduced to 766kb. Would be nice if it could retain as much quality as possible.

As you confirmed, this ability is only via photos and not any other type of media such as Gifs or video.

As you mentioned, perhaps a message instead of code 5, a more user friendly message saying try reducing size to 2mb in settings due to carrier limits, as well as currently only photos are supported.

Everything else is working great, thanks!

One other request would be the search function, it seems to only work for finding contacts. If it could include text messages within threads it'd be amazing for finding addresses or old bits of info buried in old messages.

[naveensingh]

I can't send images with carrier limit disabled with this app, however I can send images with limit disabled with Textra.
It looks my carrier does compress the image themselves however, as the received image goes from 2.96mb to 294kb.

An alternative explanation is that Textra is always compressing images to under 300KB or by some factor and is ignoring the set MMS limit.

Confirmed that setting the limit to 2mb allowed a 6mb image to be sent. However, the image received is now 766kb

Great! This means there is no MMS bug and it's the image compressor that needs to be more precise.

[DarkSirrush]

An alternative explanation is that Textra is always compressing images to under 300KB or by some factor and is ignoring the set MMS limit.

I sure hope not, and when I sent the same image with a 2mb limit in textra I got a 293.8kb file. I might test receiving images with a few sms apps later to confirm it's my carrier later.

[naveensingh]

Addressing this properly requires:

• Support for GIF compression
• Support for video compression
• Improved (more accurate) image compression.