VoiceXML 2.1 Development Guide

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Which Platform Should I Use?

Choosing a Platform

Voxeo provides IVR products and services that dramatically reduce the cost of common phone calls to and from your company.

Voxeo's proven, flexible, standards-based IVR software platform is available as follows:

Prophecy IVR Hosting - hosted IVR services from our facilities

Prophecy IVR Platform - IVR software infrastructure for your facilities

Hosted Options

Voxeo offers three main application platforms: CallXML, CCXML, and VoiceXML. Use the following reference information to determine which platform options best suit your application requirements.

Prophecy -- CallXML 3.0

The CallXML platform is available exclusively from Voxeo. CallXML 3.0 adds powerful enhancements to this widely used, simple-to-learn IVR markup. Retaining its low cost and short learning curve, 3.0 adds the ability to use simple voice recognition menus within your applications, and employs built-in conditional logic operations to further extend its capabilities. Additionally, CallXML 3.0 has new container element aliases and also features built-in XPath support, allowing developers to build robust IVR applications using only static content. CallXML suits the needs of most telephony applications that use touch-tone input (DTMF). If your application won't need complex voice recognition, CallXML may be the right choice for you. You can review our CallXML 3.0 Developer Guide and use our samples and how-to tutorials to start developing your applications. Prophecy CallXML 3.0 is available for use on either the Voxeo hosted network, or as a free trial installation on your local machine, another first in the industry.

Prophecy -- CCXML W3C 1.0

Voxeo offers the world's first CCXML 1.0-compliant platform. Having routed over 1 billion calls since its commercial introduction in 2002, it's without a doubt the best platform to deploy your next-generation conferencing and call routing applications to ensure that they will remain at the forefront of technology. Prophecy CCXML 1.0 is available for use on either the Voxeo hosted network, or as a free trial installation on your local machine. For details, tutorials, and code samples specific to the most recent version of CCXML 1.0, see our CCXML 1.0 Developer Guide.

Prophecy -- VoiceXML 2.1

Prophecy is available as a hosted solution or an on-premise platform. It includes the Voxeo ASR engine (available only in US English) and is the world's first and only 100 percent certified-compliant VoiceXML 2.0 browser. Concerned about IVR application portability? Worry no longer, as Prophecy allows you to develop applications that won't need refactoring if you migrate to another compliant platform. The Prophecy platform supports all of the VoiceXML 2.1 additions and enhancements, as well as the SISR/SRGS grammar formatting standards. It also includes legacy support for the older GSL and JSGF grammar formats. The entire Prophecy package offers you and your callers an enormous range of flexibility and options in your voice-activated IVR deployments.

Premise Solutions

The on-premise version of the Prophecy platform (see preceding paragraph Prophecy - Voice XML 2.1) is available as both a software license and a preloaded turnkey server called Prophecy IVR Server. Prophecy premise deployments include CallXML, VoiceXML and CCXML browsers, as well as Voxeo Designer.

Prophecy 9.0

Voxeo's previous release of the Prophecy IVR platform delivers many new features to the prior Prophecy 8 platform that have been requested by our users, including the ability to host the software on Linux, and Mac-based operating systems. In addition, users can take advantage of many, many more opportunities to administer on-site IVR deployments, including a completely redesigned SIP core (allowing for a much wider range of interoperability with telephony gateway solutions), extended language support, a brand new Log Analyst utility for enhanced debugging, and the Prophecy Commander dashboard for real-time monitoring and administration of your own IVR network. Prophecy 9 is available as a 100% free 2-port download at Voxeo Prophecy Download.

Prophecy 10.0

Voxeo's latest GA release of the Prophecy IVR platform includes all of the features of Prophecy 9.0, plus many new features like significant 10x performance improvements. Prophecy 10 is the result of more than 3,000 product performance, reliability, and usability improvements and investments made by Voxeo over the last eighteen months. While IVR platforms built with VoiceXML and CCXML standards typically support no more than 500 concurrent calls per server, Voxeo's intense focus on product quality improvements have given Prophecy the ability to support over 6,000 concurrent calls per server - more than 10-times the performance of other standards-based IVR platforms. At the same time, Prophecy works perfectly well on low-end netbook, notebook, or embedded computers requiring anywhere from 1 to 100 concurrent calls. Prophecy 10 continues to include intelligent call reporting and analytics, call conferencing and recording, Designer - an easy-to-use Visio-like visual application development tool, comprehensive SIP VoIP support, bundled US English speech recognition (ASR) and synthesis (TTS) engines, and support for more than 30 additional language engines from vendors including Cepstral, IBM, Loquendo, LumenVox, Microsoft, Nuance and Telisma. Prophecy 10 is also available in a "Pro" edition that bundles Voxeo's industry-leading VoiceObjects Application Lifecycle Suite. Prophecy 10 is available as a 100% free 2-port download at Voxeo Prophecy Download.

Development Tools

After you have decided on platform, be it hosted or on-premise, you need to decide what kind of development tool you will use to build your application. The following are Voxeo development tools that can help you build your application.

Voxeo Designer

Voxeo Designer is a Graphical User Interface that makes it easy for developers and non-developers alike to create and deploy simple commercial-grade IVR applications in a Visio-like environment. The Designer utility generates 100% compliant VoiceXML from an easy-to-use interface in less than half the time it would take to hand-code application content, and also comes bundled with call transcription queuing, call detail reporting, inherent version control capabilities, and robust web service integration modules. Voxeo Designer is available both in our hosted and on-premise Prophecy platform solutions.

VoiceObjects

The VoiceObjects technology enables the development, management and analysis of sophisticated self-service phone portals. Its Design Once - Deploy Anywhere architecture makes it easy to design an application once and deploy it on every available phone channel, such as voice, video, text (IM, SMS, USSD) and mobile Web. The VoiceObjects solutions include the phone application server VoiceObjects Server, the reporting and analysis portal VoiceObjects Analyzer, and the graphical development environment VoiceObjects Desktop. A free download of the VoiceObjects Developer Edition is available at the VoiceObjects Developer Portal.

VoiceObjects Server is the core product of VoiceObjects, enables highly scalable, carrier-grade deployments of personalized and adaptive over-the-phone self-service applications and is designed with efficient application execution and management in mind.

VoiceObjects Analyzer is a real-time service analysis environment that enables instant analysis of key business, operational, and application design questions. Leveraging Infostore, the integrated statistics logging component of VoiceObjects Server, users can access live information through popular business intelligence software such as IBM Cognos, MicroStrategy, and SAP Business Objects.

VoiceObjects Desktop is the graphical development environment for creating, testing, deploying and monitoring self-service applications for multiple channels delivered over phone and mobile devices. It is available in two editions: the rich client Desktop for Eclipse based on the leading open-source IDE, and a thin-client, web-based version, Desktop for Web.

VoiceObjects On-Demand

The latest release of the VoiceObjects software, VoiceObjects 10 Early Access, includes the new offering VoiceObjects On-Demand, the new Software-as-a-service (SaaS) version of ther popular VoiceObjects Application Lifecycle Suite. VoiceObjects On-Demand enables the rapid deployment and expansion of both new and existing VoiceObjects applications on Voxeo's carrier-class SaaS hosting infrastructure. VoiceObjects On-Demand eliminates the need for on-premise application servers, VoiceXML IVR platforms, phone lines, load balancers, and associated overhead. Customers can significantly decrease costs and increase reliability by leveraging the new on-demand offering.

ANNOTATIONS: EXISTING POSTS

zazo

1/28/2006 8:25 AM (EST)

yet i don't get the diffrence btw the ccxml and motorola voicexml , to me they seams as each other , my question is when should i use this and when should i use the other

also , i belive that the vxml guide here is deticated to the voxeo network , and not for cisco networks for example , am i write

Michael.Book

1/28/2006 10:30 AM (EST)

Howdy zazo,

CCXML is a Call Control mark-up developed by the W3C specifically to address the lack of call control in the VoiceXML specification. Specifically, VoiceXML is only capable of a straight two party bridge, whereas both call-legs (i.e. inbound and outbound) are bridged immediately and handled as one. In other words, you cannot do things like play an audio message to one or both legs independently, un-join the bridge an maintain control of both call-legs, etc...

In short, CCXML is not VoiceXML at all, but a "wrapper" designed to complement your VoiceXML applications. Adding robust a robust state machine and powerful call control, CCXML is certainly a welcome addition to the W3C telephony mark-up specification suite.

So, to answer you specific question, you should use both at the same time...

Now, you also mentioned our VoiceXML documentation/platform being "dedicated to the Voxeo network." This couldn't further from the truth... Voxeo is one of the very few companies in this space that do not lock their customers and developers in with proprietary, non-W3C-compliant VoiceXML. As a matter of fact, our VoiceXML platform is one of only five platforms certified by the VoiceXML Forum to be 100% VoiceXML2.0 compliant.

Now, how a W3C VoiceXML2.0 compliant application built on the Voxeo VoiceCenter platform would fare in a Cisco VoiceXML environment, I couldn't say for sure. But I guess the real question here would be, does your Cisco VoiceXML environment comply with the W3C VoiceXML2.0 specification? :-)

I hope this helps to better explain...

Have Fun,

~ Michael

shred

5/11/2006 4:03 PM (EDT)

Hello

Prophecy VoiceXML2.0 looks fantastic!! However, its not hosted. How can I get access to a hosted version?

You guys are a developers best friend :)

Shred

mikethompson

5/11/2006 6:41 PM (EDT)

Hey Shred,

Actually, you do have access to Prophecy hosted. Simply create a new application in your application manager, and you should see all the Prophecy Platform options.

Hope this helps,
Mike Thompson
Voxeo Extreme Support

shred

5/12/2006 2:51 AM (EDT)

Thanks for the quick response, Mike!

Prophecy platform claims "newest ASR engine"... How does one utilize it in the current context (hosted trial). I presume this is not command & control, but dictation mode ASR.

mikethompson

5/12/2006 12:36 PM (EDT)

Hey Shred,

To answer your question, it's not dictation mode. It is simply our great, low cost, Voxeo recognizer. If you provision a Prophecy VoiceXML application, it is enabled by default.

Hope this helps,
Mike Thompson
Voxeo Extreme Support

sureshdharmadurai

5/12/2008 5:46 AM (EDT)

Hi My Prophecy 8.0 does not starts all the services....prophecy server does not start even if i start manually...is there any configuration should i do before running all the services

voxeojeremyr

5/12/2008 6:56 AM (EDT)

Hi Suresh,

We would be glad to help you out. If you would, open an account ticket by clicking on the link for Support tickets in the account overview. Also, if you would start a DOS prompt and type:

netstat -abc > netstat.txt

And then send us that netstat.txt file, we should be able to get you up and running.

Thanks,
Jeremy Richmond
Voxeo Support

zkco

6/5/2008 5:14 AM (EDT)

I have a question,as to build a voicexml-based platform,I install Prophecy and build my webserver,but how can a phone call be delivered to my voicexml Gateway(Prophecy),do I need any other hard device such as pstn/sip/voip card?(I am not say just a sip soft call,I mean really phone call)

voxeojeremyr

6/5/2008 7:04 AM (EDT)

Hi,

Yes, to receive phone calls via regular phone lines, the cheapest solution, usually, is that you will need a Dialogic board and also software called Paraxip, that translates analog POTS lines to SIP. For information on pricing for the hardware and software, you can contact our sales department at sales@voxeo.com.

Thanks,
Jeremy Richmond
Voxeo Support

visionik

6/5/2008 7:30 AM (EDT)

Actually the cheapest solutions for getting calls into or out of Prophecy are:

1. Find an Open-SIP VOIP provider. Prophecy works with most VOIP providers.

2. Get a small one or two port VOIP gatweay, such as a Sipura SPA-3102

Best,

-Jonathan

zkco

6/6/2008 2:11 AM (EDT)

thks for all your answer

dhawansalil

9/18/2008 1:15 AM (EDT)

Hello

How can i get call-id in VXML for my application so that it uniquely identifies each call.I need something like unique call-id which i can see in Log Viewer.

voxeoJeffK

9/18/2008 2:05 AM (EDT)

Hi,

We have a great explanation here:

http://docs.voxeo.com/voicexml/2.0/ani_dnis.htm

Please keep in mind that callerid is not 100% dependable due to inconsistencies across the telecom infrastructure.

Jeff K.

jonesy

4/6/2009 7:58 AM (EDT)

Hi,

Beacuse I'm on the other side of the pond, would it be possible for you to transfer me over to the UK data centres? Also, do you have any other TTS synthesizers my applications can use? Preferably UK TTS engine, if not, how would I go about purchasing a licence for eg. Loquendo and using it on your servers?

voxeoblehn

4/6/2009 9:15 AM (EDT)

Hello,

I have gone ahead and given you access to out London staging platform. If you click on "Add Application" in your application manager you will see the new available platform.

Also, UK English is the default language in this environment. You will need to reference the following language mapping in your code like so in order to invoke UK TTS:[code] xml:lang="en-gb"[/code]

Please let us know if you have any further questions.

Regards,

Brian Lehnen
Voxeo Support

jonesy

4/6/2009 1:08 PM (EDT)

thats great, but for me to able use it I need a skype number, or will I only be able to use the sip number?

thanks

MattHenry

4/6/2009 1:17 PM (EDT)

Hello Jonesy,

Unfortunately, the Skype indial option isnt available for the UK datacenters at this time: As such, it is restricted to SIP dialing for the staging centers. Note that the UK production network also allows DDI and NGN access, I should point out.

Regards,

~Matthew Henry

bazik

10/29/2009 2:23 PM (EDT)

hello team,
sorry for not replying i had a few troubles,
thanks for the answers and the document, for now its little early for technical questions so i think you should close the topic, but soon when i'll begin the developpment in one or two months i'll open another one.
thanks again for your support, it means really much for me now that i know i have all the support i need, you really are the best ;-)

sdaram

1/4/2010 12:06 PM (EST)

Hello,

I am starter of creating the IVR applications. Can some one suggest me with which software do i need to start with? Which software would be easier? Voice XML or the Prophecy Voice XML?

Regards,
Shilpa

voxeoJason

1/4/2010 12:42 PM (EST)

Hi,

I believe there may be some confusion. The 'Prophecy' portion of [code]Prophecy - VoiceXML 2.1[/code] indicates what platform your VXML application is 'hosted' on. (for example [code]Prophecy 8.0 - VoiceXML 2.1[/code] would simple mean that your VoiceXML application is on the Prophecy 8 platform.)

Regards,

Jason Sewell
Voxeo Support

ottawahome

1/27/2012 9:46 PM (EST)

Hi,

I'm kind of new to this and I would like to understand this this is what I need.
I want to create an application where a customer can ask for information about a specific product and a dialog system can find the and retrieve appropriate answers. Can that be done and where shall I look first if that is possible.

Cheers,
Adrian

xshao

1/28/2012 7:44 AM (EST)

Hi, Adrian,

Thanks for the post. I believe I have answered your question in another ticket, [link=https://evolution.voxeo.com/ticket/720070]Link Here[/link]. Is this a duplicate? If it is, can we close this one to avoid confusion and to honor your the other one?

Please let me know. Thanks.

Best Regards.
Xudong Shao
Voxeo Support

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