A bit over a month ago, we heard that Chromebooks might be getting SMS notification support via something called SMS Connect, which was exciting news. The folks over at Chrome Unboxed, who initially discovered this coming functionality, just found a bit more information on the subject. Not only will we be able to see when we get an SMS, but we might even be able to read and reply to them, all from the comfort of your Chromebook.

Details are light, and to be quite clear, this not something you can do right now. But, it sounds fantastic. While it doesn't quite bring us the experience of something like iMessage — it's a lot more like how Pushbullet Pro handles SMS than anything else — at least it's a step in the right direction. Granted, with Pushbullet, or Google Voice/Hangouts, or Pulse you can replicate this functionality now, but it isn't built in.

The clearest evidence for this upcoming feature is via text attached to a single commit, which describes a future option in the Chrome OS settings menu for SMS Connect. It states:

Description of for the 'SMS Connect' setting. This feature lets the user read and reply to text messages from their Chromebook. New text messages will appear as notifications....Read and reply to text messages on your Chromebook

Chrome Unboxed claims other commits point to SMS Connect being part of a "multidevice" flag tied to a new DeviceSync API. That API, as the name suggests, is apparently meant to sync devices through your Google account. And, presumably, that might include SMS and its resulting notifications at some level

Again, there isn't a lot of information, so we aren't entirely sure about all the details of how this system might work. While the feature is obviously planned, a lot of the particulars behind it are still missing, and there's no word on when it might land.