It is time again!

We scheduled our next monthly jam session  for June 09, 2011 and we would like to invite you to join us for this session.

How Do You Hear Me Now? The Power of Wideband (HD) Audio

What is “wideband” or “HD” audio? What are the benefits of wideband audio? What are the advantages and disadvantages of  using wideband? With all the buzz out there, what does wideband or “HD” audio really do for you in a business setting?

In this Developer Jam Session, Dan York, Director of Conversations at Voxeo will explain the basics of wideband audio, discuss the various versions of wideband audio deployed in the industry, explain why it is important in terms of business value.

Additionally, he will talk about how wideband audio is implemented in Voxeo’s Prophecy and PRISM products.

You’ll learn how wideband audio coupled with IP communications can give you a competitive advantage in terms of richer conferencing, more accurate speech recognition and voice biometrics – and an all around better user experience.   Even better, you’ll learn how you can get started immediately working with wideband audio in your applications.

Please join us for this session to understand the power of moving beyond the audio limitations of traditional telephony.

Register today for this developer jam session.

Title: Developer Jam Session: How Do You Hear Me Now? The Power of Wideband (HD) Audio
Date: Thursday, June 9, 2011
Time: 8:00 AM US Pacific, 11:00 AM US Eastern, 5:00 PM Central European,

After just having brought VoiceObjects 10.0 up-to-date, we’d like to give you a brief preview of things to come in the next few months, namely VoiceObjects 10.1. This is the release we’re currently working on, and it will focus on enhancements in Infostore and in Desktop for Eclipse.

Infostore
Every useful application needs to have some amount of backend access – be it reading a customer profile, setting status in a database, or triggering a transaction in an ERP system.

When analyzing an application’s performance it is therefore desirable to have detailed information on the performance of these backend calls. Infostore currently provides minimum, maximum, and total times (from which the average can readily be obtained).
With 10.1, a new table is introduced that tracks each backend call individually, for Connector and Database objects as well as, optionally, for Script objects. So for each individual call there is precise timing, as well as tracking of the amount of data sent to and received from the backend. Aggregate values are provided on the level of Business Tasks and for the entire dialog.

An ID can be assigned to each backend (e.g. “CRM”, “TrackingDB”, etc.) so that different calls to the same system can be grouped in reporting. This also enables you to analyze backend calls “in both directions”, i.e. access to different systems from within the same application as well as access to the same system from within different applications. Both are very relevant sets of questions when making sure that your production architecture is up to its task.

Desktop for Eclipse
More and more of you use Desktop for Eclipse to work in multiple different environments; not only standalone and VoiceObjects On-Demand mode but also multiple different network mode connections. So we have been asked whether we could make switching between multiple connections easier – and we’ve listened.

With 10.1 we’re switching from the current static division (standalone, network, VoiceObjects On-Demand) to a flexible model in which you can define any number of connections (of type network or VoiceObjects On-Demand) and switch between them at will. On top of that, we also make it easier to combine metadata and Control Center connections. This should be real boon to power users!

Beyond these major blocks, there are a number of smaller extensions such as improved support for REST-style interfaces. We will provide more information on these, and on the ones listed above, as we get closer to the release itself.

For the time being: Make sure you have VoiceObjects 10.0 R2, lean back, relax, and enjoy the ride toward 10.1

Revision 2 of VoiceObjects 10.0 has been posted to the Developer Portal as well as the Service Portal.

Revision 2 addresses view refresh problems in Desktop for Eclipse, deployment issues when using VoiceObjects On-Demand,  and problems with cache standby in VoiceObjects Server. The update is recommended for all current users of VoiceObjects 10.

What is all the IPv6 buzz about? And how will it impact your communications applications?  In February 2011, the last IPv4 addresses were allocated to the global registries. While IPv4 addresses will be available for some time, the reality is that IPv6 addresses will be required in the future.  

Service providers, enterprises and integrators need to understand how IPv6 works and what impacts it may or may not have on applications.

To learn more, join Voxeo’s Dan York for this exploration of IPv6 and what it means for you.  In this free webinar, he will cover:

• a quick overview of the basics of IPv6, including addressing, DNS, and some subtle differences between IPv4 and IPv6
• how SIP and VoIP work in an IPv6 world
• what you need to consider when looking to migrate an application to IPv6

In the session, Dan will demonstrate VoIP communications over IPv6 using SIP and Voxeo Prophecy and will provide resources to learn more.

Not sure whether IPv6 really matters?  Come with your questions and be ready for a lively and dynamic session.

Join us for this session on May 05, 2011
8:00 AM US Pacific, 11:00 AM US Eastern, 5:00 PM Central European.

Do customers want to tweet or text you?  Or call you on the phone?

In 2011, what communication channels do customers most want to use with businesses?  Voice?  Text messaging?  Web? Social networks?   With the wide range of options and changing consumer preferences, what are the industry best practices in how to communicate with customers across multiple channels?

To answer these questions, please join us for this free webinar featuring Art Schoeller, Principal Analyst at Forrester Research, Inc. and Dan York, Director of Conversations at Voxeo.  

You will learn:
- what communication channels customers are choosing for interacting with businesses
- best practices you can implement for each channel
- where customer interaction is heading, with particular focus on social and mobile channels
- how you can create applications that interact with customers across multiple channels
- best practices in cross-channel analytics and integration into business intelligence systems

Come with your questions and be ready to learn about how you can get started today with applications that interact with customers in the communication channel of their choice.

Join us for this session on April 19, 2011

8:00 AM US Pacific, 11:00 AM US Eastern, 5:00 PM Central European time.

REGISTER NOW!

Leveraging exciting synergies with the new generation of smartphones such as LG’s Optimus 3D or HTC’s EVO 3D that provide glasses-free 3D screens, VoiceObjects is going to introduce a new channel in its unique multi-channel architecture. The 3D channel will allow developers to build applications that really pop out!

Integrating seamlessly with VoiceObjects’ Unified Self-Service™ architecture, additional layers can also be added to existing applications to take them to the next level. Imagine your menu options sorted in space, the most relevant one closest to you and the least relevant one furthest away. Imagine your account balance floating in front of you, moving up as it grows and sinking to the bottom as it falls. The possibilities are endless.

The VoiceObjects 3D channel will be compatible with the popular Android platform (Gingerbread or higher), as well as with WebOS and iOS once they add support for 3D.
So if you want to stay a cut above the rest, stay tuned for the first beta version of the new VoiceObjects release, which we’ll make available here during the next few weeks!

IVR developers often put in a lot of work in order to match reportings requirements from their business stakeholders. In particular, providing solid KPIs (key performance indicators) on self-service task completion rates routinely turns out to be a somewhat tedious and error-prone task. Getting information on call transfer rates vs. IVR containment rates is easy, but knowing how many customers were really successful in getting the info they were seeking, in being transferred to the right agent group, in using self-services to top up their account or transfer money … that’s often a little more involved.

The VoiceObjects application life cycle platform makes providing sound, business-level reporting as easy as it gets. The VoiceObjects solution is based on rich, fully automated functionality around the unique “Business Task” object that developers use to define success and failure criteria for business tasks. VoiceObjects Analyzer provides a set of standard reports on Business Task execution results, including the Business Task Completion Rates report (a screenshot is shown below, full documentation can be found here).

Based on real-world experience from a large number of customer implementations, we have assembled a Business Tasks Best Practices technical article that is available in the Tech Topics – Articles section of the VoiceObjects Developer Portal. It addresses VoiceObjects developers who want to get a full understanding of the Business Task framework and who want to provide great business-level reporting with least effort. It gives valuable insight on the proper design, implementation, testing and reporting of business tasks.

This new technical article is a highly recommended read for VoiceObjects developers right after the first product training as well as for seasoned VoiceObjects veterans who are interested in the consolidated best practices from numerous customer projects.

Business Task Completion Rates Standard Report - Based on data from the multi-channel Prime Telecom sample application

We would like to invite you to our next developer jam session scheduled for Thursday, April 07, 2011.

Two thirds of today’s Internet users actively engage with social networks such as Twitter or Facebook.
They use it mainly for personal communication, but often share feedback and thoughts about product or
service experiences. Companies need to contribute to this conversation to protect their brands, enhance
customer service or provide proactive customer care. They are or will soon be faced both with a staffing
problem and the technical challenge of having to integrate with their more traditional customer interaction channels.

Learn how Voxeo can help you automate communication over social channels and bridge the gap between social
networks and traditional channels such as IVR or direct agent interaction.

Register today for this session

Time: 8:00 AM US Pacific, 11:00 AM US Eastern, 5:00 PM Central European time

Title: Social CRM And Building Apps to Monitor Social Channels

In the few short months since releasing VoiceObjects 10, we’ve been busy working on enhancements, and we’re happy to announce that VoiceObjects 10.0 R1 is now available for download from both the Service Portal (for existing customers) and the Developer Portal.

It packs quite a list of improvements for a humble revision, and in a range of different areas:

• Password policy enhancements
  User accounts can now be automatically locked after a certain period of inactivity. When locked e.g. by repeated wrong login attempts they can also be automatically unlocked after a given period. The number of simultaneous logins by the same user account can now be limited, and it is even possible to integrate with external authentication mechanisms.
• IP stickiness
  Specifically relevant for the mobile web channel, sessions can be made “sticky” so they can only be continued from the same client IP address.
• New Expression functions
  The new functions encodebase64, decodebase64, urlencode and urldecode provide additional flexibility in dealing with embedded data.
  The break, continue and return functions allow you to influence dialog processing behavior.
  The addxmlrow function offers an alternate way of augmenting collections.
  And finally the transferdestination function lets you set data for Infostore.
• New Web Service Interface method
  The new method writeAuditTrail gives third-party applications a chance to include their messages in the VoiceObjects audit trail stream, simplifying the monitoring of access and changes.
• Storing recordings
  Recordings of caller input can now also be stored using FTP or HTTP uploads.
• Application defaults
  The XML file that provides application default information can now also be loaded using HTTPS and/or basic authentication.
• New drivers
  Support has been added for Avaya MPS and Commetrex BladeWareVXi
• Bug fixes
  Dragging a new Connector object from the Object Palette into the dialog flow now gives you the correct editor.
  Proxy authentication in Desktop for Eclipse now works properly.

As always, we hope you enjoy the new capabilities and look forward to your feedback!

Many legacy IVR platforms are at or nearing end-of-life.  While PeriProducer was once a powerful and effective IVR platform, customers are now looking to replace it with a next generation service creation, management and reporting environment that will protect their investment with 100% standards compliance and support for multiple customer contact channels – not just voice.

In this webinar, we will show you the process in action by: taking an existing PeriPro application, running it through the converter, importing it into VoiceObjects and making the first call to your new VoiceXML-based IVR application.

Register today for this Developer Jam Session.

Date: March 10, 2011
Time: 8:00 AM US Pacific, 11:00 AM US Eastern, 5:00 PM Central European