Continued from Part II…

Check Call Flow and Deploy

Now you are all set for the whole IVR application. Click the Validate button to check the call flow. Once all errors are corrected, click the Deploy to deploy the application.

Call in to test your application.

Check log file if there is error

If you have unexpected result, please check the log files under:
C:\Program Files\Voicent\Gateway\logs

The log file should give you hint as what caused the error.

Learn More

More information can be found in the IVR Tutorial

I am setting up my IVR Studio and have followed the instructions. After saving I get the following error: Error : (Talk To TTD) No touch tone key is defined. Must have child element. When I check it the “touch tone” key is set at “0″. I am not sure where else to look for a solution. What do I need to do?

The response key (touch tone key) of an element is defined on its child element. So look for (Talk To TTD) element, and if it is a choice element, the choices must be defined on its children.

Continued from Part I…

Interface between call manager and data manager

The Call flow developed above handles the incoming calls, such as play the desired prompt, collect touch tone keys entered, record the custom voicemail, and direct the call using the designed call flow. However, it does not link the call flow to the data storage. For example, the saved voicemail is not saved to the correct folder, and no email notification will be sent.

The interface are implemented using IVR Studio Actions.

1. Declare variables for email address, folder name, and voicemail audio file name. Right click on the “Incoming Call” element, select Properties, the click on the “Variable” tab. Click the New button, enter email_address as the name, and initialize the value to ” in the value expression box. Repeat the same steps to add variable named vmail_folder and vmail_file.

2. Set the variable value based on the call flow. Right click on the “John” element, select Properties, the click on the “Action” tab. Click the New button, select “Set variable value”, click OK. From the Action dialog window, select email_address, enter the correct email address enclosed by single quote. For example, ‘myemail@gmail.com’. Click the New button again, select “Set variable value”, click OK. From the Action dialog window, select vmail_folder, enter the correct folder path enclosed by single quote. For example, ‘C:\\voicemails\\1001′. Repeat the same steps to define values for variable vmail_file. Set the value to be vmail_folder + ‘/’ + __VG__CURTIME_MILLIS__ + ‘.wav’. The __VG__CURTIME_LILLIS__ is a system variable representing the current time in miliseconds.

As we can see, once the call flow determines the caller is John, it sets the correct variable values for the program to use.

3. Set the correct variable values for the other accounts, such as Mary. Using the same method described above.

4. Set the voicemail file. Select “John” element, select Properties…, set the Recording File: to be vmail_file, click OK button to finish. As you can see, the variable vmail_file holds the correct folder and file name if the caller is John.

5. Repeat step 4 for other account numbers such as Mary.

6. Send voicemail to email. Right click on the “Voicemail To Email” element under “John”, select Properties, the click on the “Action” tab. Click the New button, select “Send Email”, click OK. From the Send Email Action dialog window, To use the email_address variable in the dialog, select email_address from the drop down list, then click the Insert Vaiable button > To. The voicemail attachment can be added the same way, except you choose the variable vmail_file. The finished action looks like the following:

Click on the picture to see an enlarged picture. Also please replace the from email address to your email address.

5. Click the Email Server… button from the Send Email Action dialog window. Enter your email server information. You normally can get this information from your ISP or IT department. The following is setting for gmail:

The send email action sends the account holder an email with the newly recorded voicemail as attachement.

Continue to Part III…

In this article, we describe general steps to create an IVR application using the following example.

I would like the following steps to occur:

The first message the caller hears is “Thank you for calling TellTaleDriver.com. To report a driver press #1 on the your telephone key pad. To speak with TellTaleDriver directly, press Zero”. (So the first 2 options are 1 and Zero.)

If they press #1, the message is: “To make a driver report, please enter the 4 digit numpber that appeared on the “How’s My Driving?” decal on the car”.

When they enter 4 digits, it directs them to the account holders voice mail box to leave the message of the driving report. The message is then emailed to the email address entered in that voicemail account.

There are an initial 21 boxes I’d like to set up: with the 4 digit #’s ranging from: 0001 (my SAMPLE account) and 1001 -1020 (20 boxes) (I don’t have email addresses to enter in these 20 accounts yet. As the service is purchased I will enter them)

To developer an IVR application described above, you normally need three components:

1. Data Manager. A data manager component is usually a relational database, a software program, or just a data storage place using folders and files. In this example, this is the component to store voicemail audio files. This component also provides interfaces other than the phone interface, such as a Browser based application to access voicemails online.

2. Call Manager. A call manager component is the call flow you designed and deployed using IVR Studio. This component manages the incoming calls.

3. Interface between call manager and data manager. These are the extensions programs or scripts to link the two components. This components are the collection of IVR Studio actions.

Data Manager for Voicemails

In this example, we use Windows’ folders and files as the storage for voicemail files. Make a new folder such as C:\voicemails, and then make sub-folders for each voicemail box. To simplify management, use the account number for the folder name.

If you use a relational datbase, such as mySQL databse, for the data storage, you need to develop similar storage structures. You could also develop Browser based application to access the voicemails. But these topics are outside the scope of this artile.

Develop Call Flow

1. Open IVR Studio, click File &ft; New. Right click on the “Incoming Call” element, from the popup menu, select Add next Element > Choice…. From the General tab, enter a name like “main menu”, click Finish.

2. Add the prompt of each element/node. Right mouse select the element labeled “main menu”, select Properties…, then click the Prompt tab. Click the New button, from the Edit Prompt window, enter the text: “Thank you for calling TellTaleDriver.com. To report a driver press #1 on the your telephone key pad. To speak with TellTaleDriver directly, press Zero”. You could also use a pre-recorded audio file for the prompt.

3. Right Click the “main menu” element, from the popup menu, select Add next Element > Choice…. From the General tab, enter a name like “Select Account”, and enter 1 to the box labeled touch tone response is. Click Next, the enter the prompt as described in step 2. Use the text “To make a driver report, please enter the 4 digit numpber that appeared on the “How’s My Driving?” decal on the car”, or a pre-recorded audio file. Click Finish

4. Right Click the “main menu” element, from the popup menu, select Add next Element > Call Transfer…. From the General tab, enter a name like “Operator”, and enter 0 to the box labeled touch tone response is. Enter appropriate prompt.

5. Add new account number. Right click the element labeled “Select Account”, from the popup menu, select Add new element… > Recording…. From the General tab, enter a name like “John”, and enter 1001 to the box labeled touch tone response is. Enter appropriate prompt.

6. Set voice mail to email. Right click the element labeled “John”, from the popup menu, select Add new element… > Prompt. From the General tab, enter a name like “Voicemail to email”. Enter appropriate prompt.

7. Add another account, such as “Mary” with account “1002″, using steps shown in step 5.

8. Right click the “Mary” element, from the popup menu, select Add new element… > Go to. Select “Voicemail to Email” from the Jump to element drop down box.

9. Save the call flow by select File > Save. The finished Call flow is shown below.

10. Repeat steps 8 and 9 to add more extension.

Continue to Part II…