This is the second post in our “tips and tricks” series, and this time we’re taking a look at dialog flow options and new capabilities added with VoiceObjects 7.4.

If you have already worked with the Voxeo VoiceObjects tools you know that application dialog flows are presented in a self-organizing tree format, like this:

You read the flow from top to bottom, and at any point you can “drill down” to explore more details. In the  example shown above, you could expand the sub-sequence “Check applicable rebates” to examine its dialog interaction. Or, if you do not really care about that part of the application for the time being, you can leave it collapsed and have it out of the way while you work elsewhere.

By default, the dialog flow shows the “main path” through the application. In addition there are a variety of options that show more information and enable other ways of interacting with the dialog flow. To activate these options, right-click anywhere within the whitespace of a dialog flow editor:

Alternatively, you can access the options by clicking on the Dialog Options button in the menu bar:

Either way will get you to the Display Options window:

By default, only Show comment icons is selected. It alerts you to comments defined on objects by showing a text bubble icon to the right of the object name. The comment itself can be seen in the object’s tool tip. It is often used by designers to explain certain assumptions made in the object, or certain restrictions it exhibits.

Show Output items enables the separate display of each item within an Output object, as well as embedded outputs within other objects such as Modules, Menus, Inputs, etc.

Show pre-/postprocessing enables the display of pre- and postprocessing for all objects that have it. For Module objects, it additionally shows Dialog End Processing.

Enable validation automatically validates the dialog flow to indicate broken or insufficiently configured objects such as Inputs without grammars. Broken objects are marked in the dialog flow by a red name display.

Normally, the modified display option settings are only applied to the current dialog flow editor. By selecting Use as default for new worksheets you can set them as the new default for the current as well as all newly opened dialog flow editors.

But display options do more than just change the look of the dialog flow. They also offer additional ways of manipulating the dialog flow, always specifically adjusted to what you’re looking at. When displaying pre- and postprocessing, the respective embedded sequences can be manipulated in the dialog flow by simply dragging objects into them. Additionally, pre- or postprocessing can be set directly by dragging a Sequence object onto e.g. a Module object and selecting the respective command from the pop-up menu:

Likewise when displaying output items, embedded outputs e.g. in a Menu can be set by just dragging an Output object onto the Menu and selecting the desired target:

The dialog flow display options are one of the ways in which users can customize the Voxeo VoiceObjects tools to suit their own preferences and working styles. Stay tuned, there’s more to come in future posts of our “tips and tricks” series. And as always, let us know what you think and how we can make you even more productive in building outstanding phone applications.

Tags: Eclipse, VoiceObjects Developer Edition 7.4

This entry was posted on Monday, March 30th, 2009 at 2:19 pm and is filed under Tips and tricks. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.