- Posted by jfarrar on August 22, 2009
Broadsoft posted up the second developer contest, which has now entered the judging stage. Here is the first application that I submitted. One note regarding the video, Click To Call works with any phone, mobile, land line, VoIP, etc. Additionally, the Xtended Account app, can include more services other than the two in the video, this is just a teaser for those interested.
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- Posted by jfarrar on October 11, 2008
Well this was my first trip to Broadsoft Connections and hopefully not my last. I had a really good time going down to AZ. We (my family, a friend and my two business partners) drove down last Sunday. It wasn't a bad trek from Las Vegas. Going about 80mph the whole way got us there in about 4 1/2 hours. We stayed at the Extended Stay Deluxe hotel. Funny pun about that, is that the Broadsoft show had a theme this year called "Xtend".
Once we got there we had to head over to the Westin to do a dry run through of our slot on "Show Me The Apps". Almost immediately we met up with Thomas Howe (who won first place in the Broadsoft Mashup Competition). This guy really gets it when it comes to voice mashups. Yeah, so his apps may not look all graphical and stuff, who cares, his stuff makes sense. Anyhow, it was refreshing to hear some of his stories over the three days of the conference. If you have a chance to meet up with him, do so, in fact you can in November if you are up near VoiceCon in San Francisco. On top of being a nice guy he has a wealth of information regarding the ip communications industry.
After doing the prep work on Sunday there was a welcome event. It was a good networking event. Saw some old faces and new during the event. Got to meet up with some people that we had talked to on the phone as well. It was overall a fun night, well that is until this one guy got pretty drunk and was leaning on everyone and stumbling around. He was trying to talk to us about why he sells PRI's and he wasn't making any sense. LOL It was pretty hilarious.
Monday started out good, didn't get much sleep because of preparing for Tuesday morning's session. I've spoke in front of people before, but I always get somewhat nervous. I guess it's a good thing. Unless I get distracted I'm able to tune out the nerves. Anyhow, spend most of Monday networking again, getting cards and meeting people. Dr. James Canton spoke regarding the future. He started out really strong, but ultimately got less interesting as time went on. He touched on so many things that are "trends" that it made it confusing to follow. Some of the points he made I know are true and I see being the future, but I think today we need something tangible as well.
I got this great idea on Monday that I should create an IVR app that would allow you to integrate Broadsoft's XSI Platform with VXML and CCXML. That night I spent about 2 - 4 hours putting together the app and testing and modifying code and testing etc. In the end at about 2:30am I finished the necessary coding to make it stable to run. With only 5 hours left till the session "Show Me The Apps" - I got a little rest.
Come 7:30am it was time to run through the demo's. We (Len and I) were in the slot to go right after Thomas Howe's demo. Thomas appears to have done this alot, he was straightforward and very informative. After running through the demo's it was about 8:15am (15 minutes till the start). Nerves started kicking in at this point. It was good though, because it kept my adrenaline going and my excitement up.
IMO the highlights of the demos (to start with) were Omar and Wendell from Broadsoft. They demoed some really cool apps. Two of them were Google Gadgets which allow you to view your call history as well as your voicemail history. Then they showed off an iPhone app that allows you to access into the Broadworks Anywhere service. After that they showed off a pretty cool provisioning tool that would streamline the process for creating enterprises, groups and users. On a side note, I've had my fair share of coding this of app before and it takes some time but is well worth it. Anyhow, that was there demo (really cool!).
Alex Danyluk from Microsoft and Alex Doyle from Broadsoft showed off the cool integration features of the Office Communication Server and Client to the audience. I've been doing work with OCS since it was LCS. Which I guess isn't that long (2003), but its come a long way. Mobile Max also showed off their integration into Broadsoft Anywhere with their Mobile Client Application. Some great integration on their platform, I was impressed. Best feature IMO, has to be the extension dialing from your cell phone!
Thomas Howe (no I don't get paid to say his name lol) delivered a great talk on voice mashups and demonstrated the app that won him first place "Disaster Dispatcher". Interesting concept and he completely explained his intention behind it. You can read more about that here. Overall I think his message was well received.
Made my nerves even worse haha. On top of that we were trying to log into our mobile portal on the blackberry we were borrowing. We were having some technical difficulties almost right up until we went on. Despite that everything went well and without a hitch once I started talking and Len started driving. Len is the CEO of BlueVisor btw, and I'm obviously JoeDeveloper, but one thing that we released while we were there is that I've joined on to be well Chief Of Apps if you will. JoeDeveloper will still continue on as it has, you will just start seeing more and more of BlueVisor.
It appears that people liked the apps overall and not just ours. My personal favorite was by the guys at WorldxChange in New Zealand. They had a very real solution to a very common business problem; debt collection. They took an app that existed and added voice into it. Adding voice by setting up a way to allow account reps to initiate automated calls to the customer letting them know that there balance is past due. They also had it in a bulk format where you could send multiple calls at once. While they are a service provider in New Zealand and don't plan on becoming a development shop, I still think they could make money training people. Have a 2 day course on how to conceptually improve your business as a service provider. Keep it general enough so that trade secrets aren't exposed, but at least make some money off of that great internal app.
Overall it was a great experience to be down there and meet alot of people. I can't wait to meet up with everyone again. I could talk about more, but it's 3am so I guess it's time for me to say goodnight. Hope you enjoyed this random post of information!
JoeDeveloper
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- Posted by jfarrar on July 8, 2008
Let me just start out by saying that today is a great day because of this contest. The reason for this cannot be better illustrated then by going to one of my first blogs on the site here. If you don't have time to read that I'll give you a quick rundown:
Broadsoft didn't used to have an easy way for any third-party developer to work with their platform.
No longer is this the case which is why I'm very happy.
I had already said that I think it makes complete sense to allow third-party developers to build against your platform. Granted we haven't seen the greatest success with sites like Facebook or MySpace and their third party developer network. However, before I get attacked for the blasphemy that I just spoke, things ARE getting better. Don't get me wrong there are plenty of good applications on Facebook and MySpace. However, by opening up your platform you do have to watch for the bad applications.
There surely are obstacles to launching an open platform, from the logistics to the legal to the implementation. However, regardless of all of these things Broadsoft has done it and done it well. Their platform is open to any developer who registers and requests a sandbox account. Additionally, there is now added incentive for the developer.
Here's the thing making applications is fun once you finish them, even fun while you are developing them. I'm definitely going to enter a few applications into the contest. I mean who doesn't want cash for what they do. Not only, do you get cash though, you get to be at Broadsoft's annual event called Connections. I've never been to it, but from what I have heard it's a blast. Additionally, it's a great way to network and show you product to potential buyers (carriers, customers etc).
In the short period that I've used Broadsoft Xtended I have been approached by several large service providers. Don't forget that Broadsoft's platform is in places like Cox, Verizon, Sprint; or as they put it:
"BroadSoft provides VoIP applications to 7 of the top 10 and 13 of the top 25 largest carriers worldwide, as measured by recent annual revenue, including Korea Telecom, KPN, SingTel, Sprint, Telefonica de Espana, Telstra, T-Systems, and Verizon"
Additionally, you (developers) don't have to know VoIP or telephony to benefit from this opportunity. Now granted, knowing some terms and how things work is important, but don't worry all of that information is accessible here.
You have until September 2nd, so get to it. Additionally, if you need any help post a question to forums on developer.broadsoft.com. The forums are very active and there are alot of knowledgeable Broadsoft engineers and developers on them answering questions real quick. I'm always interested in a cool web app, so I am looking forward to see what comes of this.
9 comments
- Posted by jfarrar on March 25, 2008
Exciting news! Click2Message is now in beta. It's really actually is Alpha but who cares. When you have a team of a few developers it really all works out to be the same thing. So what is this all about and what the heck is Click2Message?
Click2Message is focused on enabling voice communication in the social networking space. It allows you to put a little "widget" on your social profile. This widget allows someone to put in their cell phone or any other phone number and click call. What happens is some cool magic with the Broadsoft platform. Immediately you will get connected to the person who put the widget on their page. This allows you to talk to them without needing to know their number.
Perfect examples are long lost friends, colleagues and more. Currently Click2Message is in Beta so that means there are a lot of things that aren't quite there yet. However, I feel it's better for this application to be shaped by the users and not by the company. Yes, while it ultimately has to be adopted into the application, I believe in user interaction and feedback to make it what you want and have what you want.
So what is there to look forward to in the next couple of months?
Shhh... don't tell anyone just yet:
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Visual Voicemail (meaning you can read your voicemails instead of listening to them. All thanks to
simulscribe. this feature will cost... sorry)
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Outbound calling (low cost outbound calling, meaning you can call out from the application)
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Remind me (get pre-scheduled calls to your phone to alert you of an appointment or anything you choose it to be)
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Blast a message (post out a audio file that your friends can listen to)
At least that's the general idea. There's actually a ton more ideas and cool features on the way.
So if this doesn't do the application justice then check it out on facebook.com!
It's currently in a private beta so once you install it you will need to go to http://www.click2message.com and put in a invitation code. The beta is open only to a limited amount of users doing this current phase, so don't wait to sign up. Invitation code is: BETAC2M
In case you are interested in any of the PR that's out there:
http://www.broadsoft.com/xtendedpr/
http://blogs.wsj.com/biztech/2008/03/18/business-software-gets-a-voice-makeover/
http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/03/17/broadsoft-going-up-against-ribbit-with-voip-platform-for-web-apps/
I'm excited to see this appliciation move forward. Its been awhile coming.
Until next time,
Joseph
75 comments
- Posted by jfarrar on September 1, 2007
Well I've been working hard lately on quite a few things. Mostly I've been focusing my attention on CallControl.NET. I've just finished the initial version of the actual component and I'm pretty happy with it. Heres a little run down on what it does:
Name: JoeDeveloper.CallControl.dll
Description: Integration into the call control API exposed by the broadsoft™ softswitch.
Features:
► Receive incoming call notifications
► Monitor incoming and outgoing calls
► Handle multiple calls at once.
► Dial out
► Answer incoming calls
► Transfer to phone number
► Transfer with consultation
► Transfer to voicemail
► Place call on hold
► Call hang-up
There is so much more that I will be working on to implement more features exposed by the broadsoft™ api. Just some background information regarding the component, it's developed to work on the .NET 1.1 or 2.0 Framework but only for Windows Forms applications. I'm going to be trying to develop a web version of the product, but this will prove to be more challenging for a couple of reasons. #1 There is the neccesity to keep an open TCP connection in a typical client - server model. #2 HTTP doesn't currently support this nor will it ever. I have a few ideas how to get around this so we will see. Until then I'm going to be starting to release more information about the component so that people can purchase it.
If you want more information about it leave a comment and I will get back to you.
In other news I've also developed a .NET Assembly to integrate into the LinksysOne service node API. It provides all of the features available as well as a few custom ones that I developed onto it. I'll post more about that later. Until then stay tuned for more information.
6 comments