Voxeo Developers Corner

Would you like to build applications that only use inbound or outbound SMS? i.e. no voice, IM, web or social channels… just text messaging?

If so, check out our new service -> SMSified.com

SMSified has a super simple REST API that lets you easily send and receive SMS messages using whatever programming language you already use… assuming that language can make HTTP connections. All for just 1 cent per message within the U.S.

The cool part for developers using other Voxeo platforms – you can use your same login credentials. So if you use Evolution or Tropo, you can just go over to SMSified.com and login there with the same username and password.

We’ve spent some good time putting together a solid set of documentation and sample apps with an overview and sections on sending, receiving and reporting. We’re also posting more into to the SMSified blog, complete with videos and screencasts showing you what to do. We’ll be publishing more info to that blog, too, as SMSified moves through its beta stage. One way to stay up on what’s happening with SMSified is to follow the @smsified Twitter account. Don’t forget to check out the FAQ, too!

We’ve seen a great amount of interest in an SMS-only option for building apps and so we’re pleased to launch SMSified to meet that demand. Now we’re looking forward to seeing what you all build with it!

P.S. And obviously if you want to work with more than just SMS, we have Evolution and Tropo to fit your needs!

Yes it really is as easy as one-click… check it out in the video below – and then head on over to our Evolution developer portal to give it a try:

If you want more information about our text messaging capabilities – or to find out about availability of SMS numbers in regions where you want to send or receive text messages, please contact us.

Have you wanted to develop and test applications that were globally accessible by your customers? Have you wanted your potential customers to be able to call into a number in Europe rather than having to call a US number or use Skype or SIP? Have you been excited about the idea of multi-channel applications that used voice and SMS… but wanted a SMS number from outside the US?

Now you can… with the free international developer program we just announced today. While our production customers have always been able to get phone numbers (DIDs) around the world and to make outbound calls to any country, developers using free accounts on our Evolution developer portal have been limited to free US numbers and to outbound calls in the US only. We have had a developer program for people outside the US for some time, but there were fees involved and it was too limited for what we really wanted to offer.

That has all changed – if you login to your Evolution account today (or create a new free account), you will find that you now have these new capabilities:

• SMS-enabled International Numbers - Moving beyond simply using voice, developers can add SMS-enabled numbers and enable their application to communicate with customers via both voice and text/SMS.  

• Support for New Languages  - Applications using Speech Recognition (ASR) or Speech Synthesis (TTS) can now choose from over 20 languages and voices, including French, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Greek, Polish, Swedish, UK English and many more. See the full list online.

• Self-provisioning of International DID Numbers - Developers can easily add international inbound DID numbers from over 40 countries to their applications through a simple web interface. With a click in a web form, your application can be accessible from numbers around the world! (And naturally you can add multiple numbers to your app!)
  

• International Outbound Dialing - In the development environment, applications can make outbound calls for free to 18 countries, including: Belgium, Canada, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, Hungary, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, UK, USA. Note that the free calls are to landlines only, except for the USA where you can also call mobile numbers for free.

• Country-specific Developer Dial-In Numbers – Developers can now dial local numbers in countries across EMEA to test their applications. Previously developers could test using U.S. numbers, as well as using Skype or SIP. Now we’ve made it so that you and the people testing your app can dial numbers in local countries, enter your app ID as the PIN, and be talking to your app.
  

More information about this new program can be found in the developer program FAQ.

We’re excited to expand our free developer program globally and we’re looking forward to adding even more capabilities in the weeks and months ahead! Our goal is to make it easy for you all to build communication applications… and we’re looking forward to seeing what you all do with these new features.

Did you miss our free webinar last week about how you can build a “multi-channel” application that interacts with customers across voice, SMS, IM, mobile web and Twitter?

If you missed it, don’t worry… the archive of both the recorded webinar and the slides are available now on the Monthly Jam Sessions page of our VoiceObjects Developer Portal. In the session, Tobias Göbel and Dave Hoff gave a great overview of how you can easily create a single application that interacts across multiple channels using our IMified service and VoiceObjects products. They also provided links to documentation, code samples and more. Please do check it out and get started building your own multi-channel applications today.

With our announcement of Prophecy 10 today, you can now add SMS and instant messaging (IM) to any existing VoiceXML, CallXML or CCXML application. When you login to our Evolution developer portal (and you can sign up for a free account if you don’t have one) and go into the settings for one of your applications through the Application Manager, you will now see that you can choose to make an application a voice application, a text-messaging application, or both:

Once you have added text messaging capability to your application, you can switch to the Contact Methods tab where you can add an SMS-enabled phone number and/or attach IM IDs to the application:

Now you have one application accessible via multiple channels. We’ll write more in the next bit about how to tweak your apps to work with multiple channels… but for those who want to login right now and get started, go right ahead!

P.S. Note you can also do this with Tropo.com applications as well