mailFone & SimpleSignal Phone - Ribbit KillerApp Challenge

To start off with I must say that Ribbit has come a long way. I joined the beta program back in Nov 2007 and started messing around with the framework. After doing little with the framework for about a year or so I started re-learning the API and then updating some code examples I had built to be compatible with their 2.5 release. There were alot of great enhancements to the API with the 2.5 release. At the same time they released the version update they also announced a contest for developers.

I decided I was going to enter into the contest and see how it went. I made it into the 3rd checkpoint, but fell short of placing in the top 5. Further motivated, I created another application (SimpleSignal Phone) along with the my first application (mailFone) -- video after the jump. I enhanced my mailFone to include incoming screens as well as outgoing, and integrated Plaxo photos for a visual identification of incoming calls or outgoing calls.

So here are my two entries:

mailFone:
http://www.joedeveloper.net/ribbit/emailfone.html

SimpleSignal Phone:
http://www.joedeveloper.net/ribbit/simplesignal/JoeDeveloperSimpleSignal.html

It was really fun working with the Ribbit API and I know that I will use it more frequently and hopefully sell some apps.

Ribbit Ribbit!

Joe


0 comments

Official Click2Message Beta Launch

It's official, we have launched the Click2Message application into beta. We have made some stability changes to the application and are continuing to make sure everything is running smoothly. If anyone needs help or has problems please don't hesitate to add a comment or send an email to click2message@joedeveloper.net.

Keep checking in for updates to the Click2Message application. Shortly we will be unveiling the website. This will allow you to manage your account as well as distribute the application to different social networking sites or even your own website. Additionally we have quite a few new features that we will be rolling out soon. Once again if you have any feedback or want to know more feel free to email us.

There has been some really great press regarding the application lately so please check it out:

http://www.broadsoft.com/Newsroom/Press2008/voip-application-on-facebook.htm

http://biz.yahoo.com/iw/080422/0389268.html

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24255832/

http://www.fiercevoip.com/story/broadsoft-and-joedeveloper-net-mashup-facebook/2008-04-22


Also don't forget that Broadsoft is at Web 2.0 in San Francisco.
Visit the BroadSoft Xtended booth (#220) at Web 2.0 Expo from April 23 to 25 for a live demo of the Click2Message Facebook application.

Thanks!
JoeDeveloper.NET

P.S.
Congratulations to Joseph and his Wife who just had their second child Micah.

kick it on DotNetKicks.com


3 comments

Click2Message In Beta

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:

  • Visual Voicemail (meaning you can read your voicemails instead of listening to them. All thanks to simulscribe. this feature will cost... sorry)
  • Outbound calling (low cost outbound calling, meaning you can call out from the application)
  • Remind me (get pre-scheduled calls to your phone to alert you of an appointment or anything you choose it to be)
  • 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

Ribbit is cool

I'm not the greatest when it comes to blogging. I guess it's just difficult to blog when you have so many things going on. I'm going to get better at it, but for the time being it appears there will be months between blogs <g>. Anyhow, I've recently starting reading up again about this new voip component for Flex called ribbit. I had registered way back in October when it was first being released as a beta to only developers. I never really got a chance to integrate it into anything. However, now that I've started reading up on it again and have some ideas to play around with it.

I kind of have a philosophy about developing with new stuff. I first of all like to read all of the documentation (twice) so that I get a good grasp of the classes, methods and properties so I am not constantly having to go back to the reference documentation. Then I like to build some really simple applications that illustrate most of the features of the component/api/platform. After I've developed and integrated most of the simple features and made a few working examples (widgets, simple webforms) it's time to start wireframing and diagraming a much larger scale application.

So enough with the way in which I like to go about development and back to the ribbit platform. This product is absolutely the most innovative technology solution that ties together both the UI and backend to present a pretty and powerful application framework. The best of both worlds. I started out developing in flash then moved to PHP then moved to ASP.NET, C#, VB.NET. I figure it makes sense to return to my favorite framework (flash/flex/actionscript) and develop some cool little applications.

Ribbit just makes a ton of sense when it comes to user friendly applications. Obviously because it allows the developer to focus on the development and the designer to focus on the design and not really have to worrying about cross platform issues. It speeds up development and design time in my opinion by 40%, depending on the complexity of the UI and functionality.

In the end I'm looking at developing some pretty cool applications around the Ribbit platform, but at first I'll just do some simple integrations into familiar platforms that I have developed in before. Looking forward to messing around with the API.


19 comments

Blockades and Thoughts

Well you would think that if you created a cool application that you would get some notice from the company. After numerous attempts to become part of the Broadsoft developer solutions network, I still can't seem to get much response from them. I've talked to quite a few different people there but each time it seems that they are too busy to be able to follow through.

No complaints to them though, they have been helpful, it just seems that the state of their third-party developer application program isn't going so well. I mean Broadsoft is a busy company but harnessing the power of the third-party developer community could cause a great adoption for new client applications and SaaS development.

I've been reading the latest reports and forecasts for the VoIP industry and it's pretty amazing. Currently the latest buzz is about Unified Communications (UC) and everyone is trying to get in on the ability to provide a UC offering. As time goes on though I think that companies like GrandCentral and TalkPlus (who offer SaaS applications with UC features) will become way more popular. In addition there needs to be more web based applications that focus on this kind of functionality.

As a developer Pure-play VoIP interests me to no end, because it provides the ability to harness the power of VoIP in a tangible retail way. Obviously there are thousands of VoIP providers that offer all sorts of different solutions, but Pure-play VoIP just stands out. There will always be carriers, and in reality that is where most of the money is made, but it's the cool applications that can be built off of the carriers that gets me going.

Anyhow, this is mostly just a jumble of my thoughts because I've been kind of absent for awhile working on all sorts of stuff. I'm still trying to see how I can contribute best to this end of the VoIP industry.


12 comments