Twilio Cookbook

Twilio Cookbook

By : Roger Stringer

Buy this Book

Twilio Cookbook

By: Roger Stringer

Buy this Book

Overview of this book

Have you ever wanted to integrate phone features into a project you were working on? Maybe you wanted to send SMS messages to your customers about the latest sales? Maybe you want to set up a company directory with voice mail? Or maybe you want to add two factor authentication to your web sites to verify your users? Since Twilio was launched in 2007, developers have had a way to do these tasks. The power of Twilio's API is huge and lets you add any type of phone solution to your web site from 2-factor authentication for verifying your users, to setting up a company directory and a voice mail system. The possibilities are endless. "Twilio Cookbook" is your Swiss army knife for Twilio development, providing you with a number of clear step-by-step exercises. It helps you take advantage of the real power of the Twilio API, and gives you a good grounding in using it in your websites. This book looks at the Twilio API, and breaks down the mystery and confusion that surrounds adding telephone functionality to your websites. As you go through the recipes, you will learn how to take advantage of the Twilio API quickly and painlessly. You will learn how to build your own IVR system, company directory, and voicemail box, and also how to set up a 2-factor authentication system to verify users, track orders via SMS, send surveys using SMS, allow users to buy phone numbers, set up and delete sub-accounts, and check to see if a human is answering a phone call. We will also combine Twilio with other APIs to build a handy local search system such as a local business search, movie listings search, and web search. If you want to take advantage of using Twilio's API to add telephone functionality to your websites, then this book is for you. "Twilio Cookbook' will leave you with a black belt in Twilio development and enable you to integrate the API into your websites.

Twilio Cookbook

Credits

About the Author

About the Reviewer

www.PacktPub.com

Preface

Free Chapter

Into the Frying Pan

Introduction

Adding two-factor voice authentication to verify users

Using Twilio SMS to set up two-factor authentication for secure websites

Adding order verification

Adding the Click-to-Call functionality to your website

Recording a phone call

Setting up a company directory

Setting up Text-to-Speech

Now We're Cooking

Introduction

Tracking account usage

Screening calls

Buying a phone number

Setting up a voicemail system

Building an emergency calling system

Conducting Surveys via SMS

Introduction

Why use PDO instead of the standard MySQL functions?

Letting users subscribe to receive surveys

Building a survey tree

Sending a survey to your users

Adding tracking for each user

Listening to user responses and commands

Building a chart of responses

Building a Conference Calling System

Introduction

Scheduling a conference call

Sending an SMS to all participants at the time of the call

Starting and recording a conference

Joining a conference call from the web browser

Monitoring the conference call

Muting a participant

Combining Twilio with Other APIs

Introduction

Searching for local businesses via text

Getting the local weather forecast

Searching for local movie listings

Searching for classifieds

Getting local TV listings

Searching Google using SMS

Searching the stock market

Getting the latest headlines

Sending and Receiving SMS Messages

Introduction

Sending a message from a website

Replying to a message from the phone

Forwarding SMS messages to another phone number

Sending bulk SMS to a list of contacts

Tracking orders with SMS

Sending and receiving group chats

Sending SMS messages in a phone call

Monitoring a website

Building a Reminder System

Introduction

Scheduling reminders via text

Getting notified when the time comes

Retrieving a list of upcoming reminders

Canceling an upcoming reminder

Adding another person to a reminder

Building an IVR System

Introduction

Setting up IVRs

Screening and recording calls

Logging and reporting calls

Looking up HighriseHQ contacts on incoming calls

Getting directions

Leaving a message

Sending an SMS to your Salesforce.com contacts

Building Your Own PBX

Introduction

Getting started with PBX

Setting up a subaccount for each user

Letting a user purchase a custom phone number

Allowing users to make calls from their call logs

Allowing incoming phone calls

Allowing outgoing phone calls

Deleting a subaccount

Digging into OpenVBX

Introduction

Building a call log plugin

Building a searchable company directory

Collecting Stripe payments

Tracking orders

Building a caller ID routing plugin

Testing call flows

Index

Customer Reviews

5 star

4 star

3 star

2 star

1 star

Adding the Click-to-Call functionality to your website

Click-to-Call is a handy functionality where you can have your website visitors click a button to start a call. This can be useful for handling support, sales calls, or just chatting with your users.

Getting ready

The complete source code for this recipe can be found at Chapter1/Recipe4.

How to do it...

Ready? We're going to build a simple Click-to-Call system. With this, you can set up any website to allow a visitor to type in a phone number and connect a call between you and them.

Download the Twilio Helper Library ( from https://github.com/twilio/twilio-php/zipball/master) and unzip it.
Upload the Services/ folder to your website.

Upload config.php to your website and make sure the following variables are set:

<?php
  $accountsid = '';  //  YOUR TWILIO ACCOUNT SID
  $authtoken = '';  //	  YOUR TWILIO AUTH TOKEN
  $fromNumber = '';  //  PHONE NUMBER CALLS WILL COME FROM
  $toNumber = '';  //  YOUR PHONE NUMBER TO CONNECT TO
?>

Upload a file called click-to-call.php to your website:

<?php
session_start();
include 'Services/Twilio.php';
include("config.php");
if( isset($_GET['msg']) )
  echo $msg;
?>
<h3>Please enter your phone number, and you will be connected to <?=$toNumber?></h3>
<form action="makecall.php" method="post">
<span>Your Number: <input type="text" name="called"/></span>
<input type="submit" value="Connect me!" />
</form>

This file displays a form that, when submitted, triggers the rest of the calling process.

Now, upload a file named makecall.php to your website:

<?php
session_start();
include 'Services/Twilio.php';
include("config.php");

$client = new Services_Twilio($accountsid, $authtoken);
if (!isset($_REQUEST['called'])) {
  $err = urlencode("Must specify your phone number");
  header("Location: click-to-call.php?msg=$err");
  die;
}
$call = $client->account->calls->create($fromNumber,$toNumber,'callback.php?number=' . $_REQUEST['called']);
$msg = urlencode("Connecting... ".$call->sid);
header("Location: click-to-call.php?msg=$msg");
?>

Finally, upload a file named callback.php to your website:

<?php
  header("content-type: text/xml");
  echo "<?xml version=\"1.0\" encoding=\"UTF-8\"?>\n";
?>
<Response>
  <Say>A customer at the number <?php echo$_REQUEST['number']?>is calling</Say>
  <Dial><?php echo $_REQUEST['number']?></Dial>
</Response>

How it works...

In steps 1 and 2, we downloaded and installed the Twilio Helper Library for PHP.

In step 3, we uploaded config.php containing our authentication information to talk to Twilio's API.

In steps 4, 5, and 6, we created the backbone of our Click-to-Call system.

We display a form on your website, where a user enters his or her phone number and clicks the Connect me! button. The system then calls your phone number; once you answer, it will connect you to the user.

Twilio Cookbook

By : Roger Stringer

Twilio Cookbook

By: Roger Stringer

Overview of this book

Related Content you might be interested in

Current Title:

Twilio Cookbook

Adding the Click-to-Call functionality to your website

Getting ready

How to do it...

How it works...