AT&T Announces New Call Management API and Alpha API Program | Hacker News Reader

AT&T Announces New Call Management API and Alpha API Program

att.com

44 pointssciurus36 comments

Brian from Voxeo Labs here: I'm really excited that this has publicly launched. I worked on the call management api from the operations side of things, and I'll be happy to answer any questions I can.

Can you give a brief overview of how the API works. I can't really understand the press release on what solution does the API provide.

I agree. They start out by talking about video and phone integration in apps. But then they are like, you have 1 million api calls, and it will translate text for you. Please pay us money for our babel fish. Also we will populate forms for you sometimes.

So they're talking about all of the AT&T APIs with respect to the 1 Million API calls which includes things like Watson translation and other such niceties.

Does that help explain?

The short version is that anything you could do with Tropo (e.g. inbound and outbound calls and sms, text-to-speech, speech recognition) you can now do at AT&T in conjunction with AT&T's other APIs (e.g. Payment, MMS, and Location).

We have a presentation up about what you can do with the API at http://www.crunched.com/access/dc387b73d0aa876e67a173e7b1fdf...

You can find tutorials, sample applications, and documentation at http://developer.att.com/developer/forward.jsp?passedItemId=...

Would this be an example of implementing the new API?

Have calls to your mobile number ring to a phone or computer in your house (wifi or wired).

No, this API is not for reusing your existing number. It's about building applications with new phone numbers.

Thanks for the quick response. Would be neat to do with existing numbers, but I know that would involve a great deal more trickery or porting of numbers.

We think it would be neat to do this sort of thing with existing numbers, too. That's why we released Ameche a couple of months ago. http://voxeolabs.com/ameche/overview/

Built by the same folks as Tropo was, so the couple hundred thousand Tropo developers will find the Ameche API familiar.

As it gains carrier support, you'll be able to do all this with your existing mobile number.

Are the apps subject to individual review and approval by AT&T (as opposed to direct through Tropo or Twilio where you can launch on your own)?

We developed a location service that met all of AT&T's and CTIA's consent guidelines yet they were the one carrier to reject the app - and without good reason.

Applications developed on the Call Management APIs do not require approval by AT&T. The APIs offered by AT&T that require approval tend to be those that interact with subscriber devices. If you can take over a mobile handset with it or grab someone's private info, AT&T wants to approve your code.

"...customer's existing mobile numbers are no longer tied to a single device..."

Does this mean if the customer has an AT&T iPhone (for example) you can receive copies of SMS sent to their handset via the API, or is it still the case that you need a new virtual/tropo number or port your number away from the device?

Had to reread this a couple of times:

AT&T products and services are provided or offered by subsidiaries and affiliates of AT&T Inc. under the AT&T brand and not by AT&T Inc.

Gotta love corporate America.

I agree that the fancy legal/business structures are offputting.

On the other hand, AT&T is making a strong endorsement of the product by offering it under their name. Since the customer trusts AT&T when it comes to telephony technology, this saves a lot of money for the 'subsidiaries and affiliates' on marketing etc. AT&T saves money by not having to develop their own in-house product.

Who doesn't win here?

Company the size of AT&T working in highly regulated areas, everything's a subsidiary for various accounting and legal reasons.

AT&T Mobile and AT&T UVerse are two different companies. They probably have different operating entities for different states, even. But they roll everything up into a single brand for ease of sales and marketing.

True, though it's interesting that you can purchase UVerse at an AT&T Mobility store. (I have a friend who's an AT&T store manager) While it has the appearance of being one company, I guess it's the rough equivalent of an "affiliate" sale.

Man.

I immediately dropped what I was doing to see if I could send or receive an MMS from my laptop. The documentation and sample apps do not make it easy for someone to figure out how to actually do that.

AT&T does have some APIs for interacting with MMS. Those have actually been around for several months. The MMS API they offer at https://developer.att.com/developer/basicTemplate.jsp?passed... is restricted to working with AT&T mobile numbers only, though.

Hey Jeff,

Did you check out the sample applications, they have a pretty well documented example ( https://gist.github.com/3125729 )

-John

Thanks for the reply, John. I did check out the gists of the apps, so I guess it's only fair to explain why I'm not a fan yet.

In the "download sample apps" gists, you don't actually include all the files: where are the views? Where is the public directory? Clearly, someone could create these themselves, but when I click a link to download the sample app, I want to download the entire sample app and not just selected files. I don't want to spend time debugging what's missing.

In the MMS sample app2, there are files for phone number lists and a "tokens" file. But you'd have to go directly to the github repository to find out what they're used for and how to use them. (I'm still not sure how/what "tokens" does.)

I appreciate the amount of work it takes to release a public API (and one as robust as this), but it's just kinda .... AT&T-y at this point.

Tremendously excited for the folks at Voxeo for this huge win.

In the past year they've inked with AT&T and T-Mobile.

My BIG question here is: Where does this leave Twilio? Did they not just ink a deal with AT&T to provide apps for call control?

Reading between the lines: Twilio got locked out of AT&T because they don't do IMS, whereas Voxeo does. Very interesting, very very interesting.

Looks like AT&T screwed them (Twilio).

I agree: http://thepbxblog.com/2013/01/07/att-and-apis-where-does-twi...

IMS?

Integrated Multimedia Subsystem.

It's a wrapper system to let Telcos perform IP operations on non-IP infrastructure. Lets you treat the PSTN like an IP network.

It's pretty jenky but it's required by the big guys for interop.

Thanks Josh!

We've been using Tropo (by Voxeo) for phone and SMS integration for Flocknote (www.flocknote.com) for almost two years, and I have to say they've done a great job scaling up their services and support in that time. This new service looks like a good step forward from AT&T!

My main question here would be could I use this API in an app that is installed on phones on AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, etc.

I'm sure this is just my ignorance of understanding the press release.

Yes, Call Management is cross-carrier. Don't worry about not understanding the press release. Those aren't ever written to be understood by humans.

So they're white labelling Tropo?

Not exactly. Instead of white labeling our APIs in our cloud, AT&T is running their own APIs in their own network, just like our previous announcement with Deutsche Telekom in Germany. We (Voxeo Labs) provided the technology to them, and licensed the APIs.

I wouldn't call it white labeling Tropo exactly, especially since AT&T is clearly stating that it's Call Control API is powered by Tropo.

Hey Adam! Congrats buddy!

Go Voxeo go!

Thanks. As you can imagine, we're all amped up.

Woot, Way to go Tropo !

Great job guys! :)

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