<p>Implement the enco.io SMS API, enabling you to send a simple reminder, confirmation delivery, or to start an SMS conversation from your own applications.</p>







<p>Still today, SMS remains a safe, secure and high reliable medium to notify customers or to engage in a conversation no matter when and where. It is the only universal messaging standard, independent of data connectivity or device type. See <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/asset/sms/overview">enco.io</a></p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="555" src="/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/image-3-1024x555.png" alt="" class="wp-image-5391" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/image-3-1024x555.png 1024w, /wp-content/uploads/2023/04/image-3-300x163.png 300w, /wp-content/uploads/2023/04/image-3-768x416.png 768w, /wp-content/uploads/2023/04/image-3-1536x832.png 1536w, /wp-content/uploads/2023/04/image-3-1200x650.png 1200w, /wp-content/uploads/2023/04/image-3.png 1563w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 1362px) 62vw, 840px" /></figure>



<p></p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">How to get started?</h3>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">Login to the Enco marketplace by Proximus</h3>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading">Existing Proximus customers</h4>



<p>Is your company an existing Proximus customer and do you have a &#8216;Digital Access Owner&#8217;? Let this DAO simply login to the enco marketplace <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/">https://proximusapi.enco.io</a></p>



<p>If your company doesn&#8217;t have a DAO yet, please contact your account manageryou can create one using the customer details from your last bill to create an account. If you don&#8217;t have any link with Proximus, just create a guest account.</p>



<p>or don&#8217;t know who it is, you can always create a new account, and manually provide your billing details (see New Customers)</p>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading">New customers</h4>



<p>If you don&#8217;t have a MyProximus account, you can create a guest account, and provide your billing details: <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/">https://proximusapi.enco.io</a> </p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="116" src="/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/image-1024x116.png" alt="" class="wp-image-5383" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/image-1024x116.png 1024w, /wp-content/uploads/2023/04/image-300x34.png 300w, /wp-content/uploads/2023/04/image-768x87.png 768w, /wp-content/uploads/2023/04/image-1200x136.png 1200w, /wp-content/uploads/2023/04/image.png 1535w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 1362px) 62vw, 840px" /></figure>



<p></p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="692" src="/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/image-2-1024x692.png" alt="" class="wp-image-5388" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/image-2-1024x692.png 1024w, /wp-content/uploads/2023/04/image-2-300x203.png 300w, /wp-content/uploads/2023/04/image-2-768x519.png 768w, /wp-content/uploads/2023/04/image-2.png 1104w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 1362px) 62vw, 840px" /></figure>



<p></p>



<p>On creation there are 2 options to configure (future) charging options; either by providing a valid Credit card or via postpaid billing (in case no credit card). </p>



<p>Once you are in, go to <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/asset/sms/price">Proximus SMS API (enco.io)</a>, and request an SMS free plan if you like to test the service or use SMS sporadic, or request one of our consumption based plans.</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="561" src="/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/smsplans-1024x561.png" alt="" class="wp-image-5594" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/smsplans-1024x561.png 1024w, /wp-content/uploads/2024/06/smsplans-300x164.png 300w, /wp-content/uploads/2024/06/smsplans-768x421.png 768w, /wp-content/uploads/2024/06/smsplans.png 1199w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 1362px) 62vw, 840px" /></figure>



<p>The ENCO team processes every request and may contact you to check legitimacy and validate your settings and your goals. On green light, the team activates the requested plan. </p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Choose your plan</h2>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">SMS Free plan</h3>



<p>The activation of a free SMS plan is typically executed instantly, on the condition you have entered a valid credit card to confirm your identity. Note that this plan is limited to maximum 5 free SMS per day, sent from a shared short code, destinations both national and international.</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">SMS Standard, Professional or Volume plan</h3>



<p>Activation of an SMS Premium plan triggers the start of a billing period where SMS traffic will be charged against agreed price settings. By default, you will share a short code with other customers, but you can also request dedicated short or long numbers, for specific use cases, e.g. for conversational SMS.</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Get started with our SMS API</h2>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">Implement OAuth2 or generate a permanent token</h3>



<p>API Solutions uses OAuth2 to protect API resources. In order to gain access to the resources exposed by your API assets, you will need to pass along a valid OAuth2 bearer access token. Here is how you can generate such a token: <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/asset/sms/documentation#apiauthentication">Proximus SMS API (enco.io)</a></p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">Send your first SMS</h3>



<p>Sending an SMS only requires a simple <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/asset/sms/documentation#outbound">API post method</a>. Watch out, a successfull API return does not mean that the SMS was successfully delivered to its destination. Therefor you can either configure a callbackurl, on which you will receive a delivery receipt for every message sent, or you can manually check the delivery status for every message sent.</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">Receiving SMSes</h3>



<p>Although preferably you are using a dedicated short code or long number, it&#8217;s even possible to receive SMSes/answers from a shared shortcode, with or without reserved keywords. <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/asset/sms/documentation#inbound">Check out the possibilities</a>.</p>

How to send or receive SMS via your applications

<p>Interactive Voice Response (IVR) systems have been around for a long time and are commonly used by businesses to handle large volumes of incoming calls. However, they can be frustrating for customers who have to navigate a complex menu system before they can speak to a live agent. This is where <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/asset/nextgen-voicemail/overview">IVR deflection </a>to messaging channels like SMS or WhatsApp comes in.</p>







<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Improved Customer Experience</h2>



<p>When a customer calls a business and is greeted by an IVR system, they may become frustrated if they can&#8217;t quickly find the information they need or get connected to a live agent. By offering the option to receive information or support via SMS or WhatsApp, businesses can improve the customer experience by giving customers a choice in how they interact with the company. This can also reduce call volume and wait times for those who still prefer to speak to a live agent.</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-full is-style-rounded"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="1024" src="/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/desperatecustomer.png" alt="" class="wp-image-5561" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/desperatecustomer.png 1024w, /wp-content/uploads/2024/07/desperatecustomer-300x300.png 300w, /wp-content/uploads/2024/07/desperatecustomer-150x150.png 150w, /wp-content/uploads/2024/07/desperatecustomer-768x768.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 1362px) 62vw, 840px" /></figure>



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">
<p>Deflecting voice calls to chat offers a personalized customer experience, while reducing call volumes and wait times, and improving overall efficiency and customer satisfaction.</p>
</blockquote>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Increased Efficiency</h2>



<p>IVR deflection to SMS or WhatsApp can also help businesses increase their efficiency by automating certain tasks. For example, a customer may call a business to request a balance inquiry or to update their account information. With IVR deflection to SMS or WhatsApp, the customer can receive a text message with the requested information or a link to a web portal where they can update their account details. This can save time and reduce the workload on live agents, allowing them to focus on more complex issues.</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Cost Savings</h2>



<p>Finally, IVR deflection to SMS or WhatsApp can also result in cost savings for businesses. By reducing call volume and automating certain tasks, businesses can lower their staffing needs and operational costs. Additionally, many customers may prefer the convenience of receiving support via SMS or WhatsApp, which can reduce the need for live agents to handle routine inquiries.</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Conclusion</h2>



<p>In conclusion, IVR deflection to SMS or WhatsApp can offer many benefits for businesses looking to improve their customer experience, increase efficiency, and reduce costs. By offering customers a choice in how they interact with the company and automating certain tasks, businesses can provide a more streamlined and convenient experience for everyone involved.</p>

Deflect voice calls to conversational messaging to improve your customer journeys

<p>Integrating conversational messaging into your CRM or ATS applications is easier said than done. While sending out SMS campaigns can seem simple at first, actually starting a conversation is another matter entirely!</p>







<p>The omnichannel reality of today with RCS, WhatsApp, and other social channels means that you&#8217;ll need something more sophisticated. Challenge no more though because there&#8217;s an easy solution: integrating your ATS or CRM application with a real conversational messaging toolkit such as <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/asset/interact/overview" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">#Interact </a></p>



<p>#Interact has all the APIs needed to <strong>start the conversation</strong>, linking it up with <strong>bot frameworks </strong>and handing over to <strong>human agents</strong>. All of this, while making sure you can <strong>access any active and archived conversations </strong>from within your CRM or ATS application.</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img decoding="async" src="https://images.ctfassets.net/hy79bo9ibw2v/7ChbTYwRaLTPWVjuJbyU9i/6491a21bc95a3aa3071f365341b27198/interact-scree.PNG" alt=""/><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">#Interact is a web based, omnichannel conversation tool</figcaption></figure>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Send custom messages from your application, then continue the conversation in #Interact</h2>



<p>With the Proximus&#8217; <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/asset/sms/overview" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">conversational SMS </a>offering, you can send custom messages from your application, and offload the conversation to <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/asset/interact/overview" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">#Interact</a>. When a customer or candidate answers, he/she is immediately transferred to the right user to continue the conversation.</p>



<p>With the <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/asset/interact/overview" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">#Interact </a>Campaign API, you can provide the <strong>history and context </strong>of your user and message, eg. provide a link to your CRM application or other relevant information linked to that conversation, so your agent knows exactly what to talk about.</p>



<p>From your ATS/CRM application, you can always <strong>access active or archived conversations</strong> in a secure way.</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Send omnichannel campaign messages from your CRM or ATS application</h2>



<p>Instead of sending messages directly from your ATS or CRM application, you can create <strong>omnichannel campaigns </strong>within <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/asset/interact/overview" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">#Interact</a>, <strong>managing your templates </strong>on different channels, and provide <strong>fallback mechanisms</strong> (eg. from RCS or WhatsApp to <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/asset/sms/overview" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">conversational SMS</a>)</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-full"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="747" height="606" src="/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/rcscampaign.png" alt="" class="wp-image-5332" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/rcscampaign.png 747w, /wp-content/uploads/2023/02/rcscampaign-300x243.png 300w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 984px) 61vw, (max-width: 1362px) 45vw, 600px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Omnichannel campaign fallback to conversational SMS</figcaption></figure>



<p>So, looking for a way to integrate conversational messaging into your CRM or ATS application, don&#8217;t hesitate to <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/contact-us" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">contact us</a>!</p>

Integrate conversational messaging into your CRM or ATS application

<p>In the <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/blogs/tutorials/build-a-voice-bot-ivr-the-easy-and-fast-way" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">previous tutorial</a>, we have discovered how FlexIO&#8217;s Visual Designer can be used to create simple yet convincing voice bots using the built-in speech to text capability and some formatting tricks to accept wider voice inputs from callers. In this tutorial, we will discover how to increase the quality of speech recognition in your IVR and voice bot project, whether we use it thru the visual designer or in your own applications.</p>






<div id="toc_container" class="no_bullets"><p class="toc_title">Contents</p><ul class="toc_list"><li></li><li></li><li></li></ul></div>




<h2 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Language_selection">Language selection</span></h2>



<p>The very first check to do, how obvious is may sound, is to make sure that you are correctly specifying the language in which the speech recognition has to be executed. It&#8217;s easy to overlook that the platform will default to English when nothing is specified, and trying to recognize French or Dutch with a speech recognition engine expecting English is a guarantee for failure.</p>



<p>When working with the Visual Designer, make sure to select the required speech recognition language from the drop down menu, just below the Speech input configuration:</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="649" height="544" src="/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/image.png" alt="Selecting the right language for speech recognition in the Visual Designer" class="wp-image-5148" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/image.png 649w, /wp-content/uploads/2021/06/image-300x251.png 300w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 984px) 61vw, (max-width: 1362px) 45vw, 600px" /></figure>



<p></p>



<p>When using RCML in your own code development, specify the input language as following: <em>&lt;Gather action=yourendpointUrl method=&#8221;GET&#8221; timeout=&#8221;3&#8243; input=&#8221;speech&#8221; <strong>language=&#8221;fr-FR&#8221;</strong> hints=&#8221;&#8221;&gt;</em></p>



<p>For the list of supported BCP-47 language tag (ie &#8220;fr-FR&#8221;, &#8220;en-US&#8221;, &#8230;) see the list of supported language on <a href="https://cloud.google.com/speech-to-text/docs/languages" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Google&#8217;s supported STT language list</a>.</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Speech_adaptation">Speech adaptation</span></h2>



<p>As we know, Google trains its speech to text engine on very large sets of data, however the performance might drop when we request the engine to recognize very specialized words such as used a specific domains (such as in medicine) or family names and surnames.</p>



<p>FlexIO can leverage Google Speech to Text&#8217;s <em>speech adaptation</em>. As Google explains it on this <a href="https://cloud.google.com/speech-to-text/docs/speech-adaptation" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">documention page</a>:</p>



<p><em>You can use the&nbsp;<strong>speech adaptation</strong>&nbsp;feature to help Speech-to-Text recognize specific words or phrases more frequently than other options that might otherwise be suggested. For example, suppose that your audio data often includes the word &#8220;weather&#8221;. When Speech-to-Text encounters the word &#8220;weather,&#8221; you want it to transcribe the word as &#8220;weather&#8221; more often than &#8220;whether.&#8221; In this case, you might use speech adaptation to bias Speech-to-Text toward recognizing &#8220;weather&#8221;. Speech adaptation is particularly helpful to the following use cases:</em></p>



<ul class="wp-block-list"><li><em>Improving the accuracy of words and phrases that occur frequently in your audio data. For example, you can alert the recognition model to voice commands that are typically spoken by your users.</em></li><li><em>Expanding the vocabulary of words recognized by Speech-to-Text. Speech-to-Text includes a very large vocabulary. However, if your audio data often contains words that are rare in general language use (such as proper names or domain-specific words), you can add them using speech adaptation.</em></li><li><em>Improving the accuracy of speech transcription when the supplied audio contains noise or is not very clear.</em></li></ul>



<p>In FlexIO, speech adaptation is designated as &#8220;hints&#8221; or &#8220;hot words&#8221;. When working with the Visual Designer, you define your hint phrases or hot words in the configuration of the speech recognition as a comma-separated list, as illustrated here:</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="649" height="666" src="/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/image-1.png" alt="Defining hot words or sentences to enforce speech adaptation" class="wp-image-5166" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/image-1.png 649w, /wp-content/uploads/2021/06/image-1-292x300.png 292w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 984px) 61vw, (max-width: 1362px) 45vw, 600px" /></figure>



<p></p>



<p>When working with RCML in your own code development, make sure to include the <em>hint</em> keyword in the Gather verb: <em>&lt;Gather action=yourendpointUrl method=&#8221;GET&#8221; timeout=&#8221;3&#8243; input=&#8221;speech&#8221; language=&#8221;en-US&#8221; <strong>hints=&#8221;hydrotherapy, osteopathy, re-education,paraplegic&#8221;</strong>&gt;</em></p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Class_tokens">Class tokens</span></h2>



<p>Next to helping the speech recognition engine with hint phrases or words, it can also be that you are expecting a very specific type of input from your caller. Let&#8217;s imagine you need the caller to provide an identification number. Without any guidance, it could very well be the result of speech recognition will be &#8220;two seven five zero three one&#8221;, whereas you would have expected to receive &#8220;275031&#8221;. </p>



<p>By using <em>class tokens</em>, you can tell the speech recognition engine that you are expecting a digit sequence instead of the literal transcription. In our example, the class token for a digit sequence is <em>$OOV_CLASS_DIGIT_SEQUENCE</em>.  </p>



<p>When using the Visual Designer, you would specify the class token at the same place you define hot words or hint sentences:</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="649" height="625" src="/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/image-2.png" alt="Defining class tokens to optimize speech recognition in teh Visual Designer" class="wp-image-5169" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/image-2.png 649w, /wp-content/uploads/2021/06/image-2-300x289.png 300w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 984px) 61vw, (max-width: 1362px) 45vw, 600px" /></figure>



<p></p>



<p>When using RCML in your own code development, you will specify the required class token with the same &#8220;hint&#8221; definition as above: <em>&lt;Gather action=yourendpointUrl method=&#8221;GET&#8221; timeout=&#8221;3&#8243; input=&#8221;speech&#8221; language=&#8221;en-US&#8221; <strong>hints=&#8221;$OOV_CLASS_DIGIT_SEQUENCE&#8221;</strong>&gt;</em>.</p>



<p>You will find the complete list of available class token on <a href="https://cloud.google.com/speech-to-text/docs/class-tokens" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Google&#8217;s documentation page</a>.</p>



<p>Note that class tokens can be combined with hot words or hint sentences. A few examples:</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list"><li>&#8220;my address is $ADDRESSNUM&#8221;</li><li>&#8220;my reference code is $OOV_CLASS_ALPHANUMERIC_SEQUENCE</li></ul>

Increasing the quality of speech recognition in your IVR and voice bot project

<p>In this tutorial we will see how to develop a simple approach to number masking, allowing people to be called without having to disclose their real phone numbers.</p>






<div id="toc_container" class="no_bullets"><p class="toc_title">Contents</p><ul class="toc_list"><li></li><li></li><li><ul><li></li><li></li><li></li><li></li><li></li><li></li><li></li></ul></li><li></li></ul></div>




<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="What_is_number_masking">What is number masking?</span></h3>



<p>Number masking is a technique that allows an individual to use a temporary phone number to communicate with another party without disclosing his real phone number. Number masking answers many different real business use cases across industry sectors where communicating a real personal or even business phone number could become problematic to safeguard this person&#8217;s privacy or work effectiveness. </p>



<p>Think about drivers for ride services, food delivery, truck transports in the logistics sector, employees working in the back office on customer cases, or caregivers and nurses in the home care sector: each of them may have valid reasons not to disclose their personal phone number. They need to guarantee a clear cut between their private and professional lives. Organizations and online platforms working with these people may as well find in number masking a way to avoid off-platform transactions (such as a customer calling a driver directly to avoid paying fees to the driver&#8217;s platform).</p>



<p>There are multiple approaches to number masking, such as one way masking (1 party is contacted thru a masked number) or two way masking (2 parties can call each other over temporary numbers assigned to each of them). And there are several ways to implement number masking with <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/asset/flexio/overview">Proximus FlexIO</a>, using the Visual Designer or using APIs.</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="A_number_masking_scenario_for_field_technicians">A number masking scenario for field technicians</span></h3>



<p>Let&#8217;s suppose a utility company has technicians visiting customers for installation and repair operations. Technicians use a work force management solution (WFM) on their smartphone or tablet, showing the list of all planned interventions for the day. In the WFM solution, a technician can press a button next to each intervention record to trigger a phone call to that customer (1). Our number masking solution steps in and first calls the technician (2). Once the technician has picked up the phone, our number masking solution makes a call to the customer (3).  When the customer picks up the phone, both technician and customer are put together in call (4). </p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="850" height="359" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/image-1.png" alt="Number Masking call flow" class="wp-image-4897" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/image-1.png 850w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/10/image-1-300x127.png 300w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/10/image-1-768x324.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 1362px) 62vw, 840px" /><figcaption>Number Masking scenario</figcaption></figure>



<p>To both technician and customer, the call will appear as coming from the temporary number used by the number masking solution. </p>



<p>In this tutorial, we will see how we can develop such system using the Visual Designer of Proximus FlexIO.</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Scenario_implementation">Scenario implementation</span></h3>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Number_pool">Number pool</span></h4>



<p>To get started with number masking, you should have at least one phone number reserved and available on the FlexIO platform. You could also provision several numbers to have the freedom to rotate usage, like using a different number for each masked call. </p>



<p>Once logged on <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://proximusapi.enco.io?utm_source=blog&amp;utm_medium=web&amp;utm_campaign=encoblog" target="_blank">API Solutions</a>, open a new browser tab to the <a href="https://flexionumbers.enco.io?utm_source=blog&amp;utm_medium=web&amp;utm_campaign=encoblog">Proximus FlexIO Number Management microsite</a> and register a new phone number to your account.</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="750" height="334" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/flexio-register-number.gif" alt="Reserve your phone number" class="wp-image-4639"/><figcaption>Booking a new number for Proximus FlexIO</figcaption></figure>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Using_the_visual_designer">Using the visual designer</span></h4>



<p>If you have never used FlexIO and the Visual Designer before, it&#8217;s maybe best to start first with <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/blogs/tutorials/your-first-visual-designer-application-for-inbound-calls" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">this tutorial</a>. Come back here once you&#8217;re done.</p>



<p>Go to the <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://proximusflexio.enco.io/" target="_blank">Proximus FlexIO console</a> and create a new blank Visual Designer Application. We&#8217;ll call this application &#8220;<strong>numberMasking</strong>&#8220;. We&#8217;ll have 2 actions in this application:</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list"><li>a <em>Say</em> action, just to let the technician know the application is now going to call his customer</li><li>a <em>Dial </em>action to a <em>Number</em> where this number is defined as <em>$customernumber</em> &#8211; this dollar sign means <em>customernumber</em> is a variable, as the customer number will be different for each call</li></ul>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="900" height="486" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/image.png" alt="Number Masking application in the FlexIO Visual Designer" class="wp-image-4887" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/image.png 900w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/10/image-300x162.png 300w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/10/image-768x415.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 1362px) 62vw, 840px" /></figure>



<p>Please note the various setting cogwheels in the interface that we clicked to choose the language of our <em>Say</em> action and well as to define that we will only try to call the customer for 20 seconds before giving up. Don&#8217;t forget to save your work once this is all done.</p>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Creating_a_web_trigger">Creating a web trigger</span></h4>



<p>Now that the application is created, we need to know how to trigger it easily. The objective is to have a simple trigger that takes in the number from which we will call (ie the masked number), the phone number of the technician and the phone number of the customer.  By using this trigger, we launch the whole call sequence.</p>



<p>While still being in the Visual Designer, click on the top right menu and select first&nbsp;<em>Account Settings</em>&nbsp;to verify that your Proximus FlexIO credentials are correctly set.</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="150" height="310" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/image-2.png" alt="Account settings and web trigger" class="wp-image-4901" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/image-2.png 150w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/10/image-2-145x300.png 145w" sizes="(max-width: 150px) 85vw, 150px" /></figure>



<p>Select again the top right menu and click on&nbsp;<em>Web trigger</em>. Enable the trigger, set an application specific token (a password), copy the URL then save and close the Web trigger setting. The password token allows to securely share our web trigger URL without having to disclose our complete credentials on Proximus FlexIO.</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="900" height="518" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/numbermasking1.gif" alt="Configuring the number masking web trigger" class="wp-image-4902"/></figure>



<p>Paste the copied URL in an empty text file (such as using Notepad), and replace “mysecret” at the end of the URL by your application specific token or password.</p>



<p>Save your application. You may now close that Visual Designer window.</p>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Editing_the_web_trigger">Editing the web trigger</span></h4>



<p>You will need to change a bit the URL you copied in the previous step to make it usable to trigger the masked call scenario. Go back to the text editor where you pasted your URL and:</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list"><li>change&nbsp;“to=+1231231231”&nbsp;to&nbsp;“to=%2B32xxxxxxxxx”&nbsp;where&nbsp;32xxxxxxxxx&nbsp;is&nbsp;the phone&nbsp;number&nbsp;of the technician</li><li>change&nbsp;“from=12345”&nbsp;to&nbsp;“from=%2B32aaaaaaaaa”&nbsp;where&nbsp;32aaaaaaaaa&nbsp;is&nbsp;the phone&nbsp;number&nbsp;that&nbsp;you&nbsp;have&nbsp;reserved on the FlexIO platform for this application. This is the callerID that will be shown to both the technician and the customer</li><li>add &#8220;&amp;customernumber=%2B32bbbbbbbbb&#8221; at the end of the URL, where 32bbbbbbbbb is the phone number of the customer</li></ul>



<p>Your URL should look like this (we used “x” to mask sensitive information so your own content should be real):</p>



<pre class="wp-block-preformatted">https://proximusflexio.enco.io:443/visual-designer/services/apps/APxxxxxxxxxxxxxx/start?from=%2B32xxxxxxxx&amp;to=%2B32xxxxxxxxx&amp;token=somepassword&amp;customernumber=%2B32xxxxxxxxx</pre>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Testing_the_scenario">Testing the scenario</span></h4>



<p>To launch the scenario, just copy your customized URL in a new browser tab and hit enter. Congratulations, your first masked number scenario is now fully working!</p>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Integrating_the_number_masking_application_in_a_WFM_system">Integrating the number masking application in a WFM system</span></h4>



<p>This is obviously a task for developers or application engineers, but all it takes is to use the URL you just built and have your calling button trigger a HTTP GET request to this URL. Obviously the values after &#8220;to=&#8221; and &#8220;customernumber=&#8221; will not be fixed values anymore but variables that are resolved at each execution request.</p>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Call_usage_and_reports">Call usage and reports</span></h4>



<p>You may now want to understand if and how this system is used by your technicians and get a bit of statistics on their calls. It is important that field technicians communicate regularly with their customers to let them know about their expected arrival time and warn them about delays. Good communication always increases the level of customer satisfaction! </p>



<p>Go to the <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://proximusflexio.enco.io/" target="_blank">Proximus FlexIO console</a> and click on the <em>Logs </em>link on the top menu. From here, you have access to all your call records and can filter by originating number (our &#8220;from&#8221; number), destination numbers, dates etc. All of these informations are also available via API so developers can retrieve usage data on a daily basis and integrate that data in your own reporting systems.</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Advanced_number_masking">Advanced number masking</span></h3>



<p>Proximus FlexIO also comes with <strong>advanced number masking APIs</strong>. These specific APIs makes it easier for you to manage masked number sessions between 2 participants in such a way that you don&#8217;t need to take care of most of underlying technical details. These advanced APIs are more suitable for bi-directional number masking use cases, such as the ability for a taxi driver and a customer to contact each other once a ride is reserved, or a back office employee and a customer to contact each other without compromising the direct phone number of that employee.</p>



<p>Among other, the APIs let you:</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list"><li>manage your own masked number pool</li><li>create on the spot bi-directional number masking sessions and control their status and duration (such as the duration of a taxi ride)</li><li>define what happens when someone tries to contact a masked number once the session as expired (such as a customer having forgotten valuable goods in the taxi and trying to contact the driver)</li><li>automatically ban callers from number masking sessions</li><li>access integrated reporting (API and user interface) to understand how and when interactions are being used  </li></ul>



<p>If you are interested to know more and get access to our advanced number masking APIs, <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/contact-us" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">don&#8217;t hesitate to reach out to us</a>.</p>

Number masking for field technicians

<p>In this tutorial we will see how to create SIP client credentials on Proximus FlexIO that can be used to receive phone calls on softphones. We will use the Visual Designer to create a simple call cascading scenario.</p>






<div id="toc_container" class="no_bullets"><p class="toc_title">Contents</p><ul class="toc_list"><li></li><li></li><li><ul><li></li><li></li></ul></li><li><ul><li></li><li></li></ul></li><li></li><li></li></ul></div>




<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="About_soft_phones">About soft phones</span></h3>



<p>Many companies are adopting VOIP phones, and in particular soft phones, looking for efficiency and cost effective solutions for telecommunications. Softphones’ ability to make or receive phone calls using computer programs installed on a variety of internet-enabled devices is definitely a game changer.  </p>



<p>Softphones makes it easier to support a variety of requirements and usage scenarios that would be more difficult or expensive to implement using standard phone systems. To take just a couple of examples:</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list"><li>support to service mobility : when on the go business or technical users need to stay connected to their professional phone numbers, wherever they are</li><li>better customer interactions : you can choose where your calls ring and how. For instance, you might select the first few rings to be forwarded to your office. If you don’t answer the call, it will then be transmitted to a second or third device</li><li>faster call pickup : have a call ring on multiple phones or devices at the same time</li></ul>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Creating_the_SIP_clients">Creating the SIP clients</span></h3>



<p>Go the <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://proximusflexio.enco.io" target="_blank">Proximus FlexIO console</a> and select the <em>Clients</em> section in the main menu. For our scenario we will create 2 clients. Let&#8217;s call them <em>bob</em> and <em>alice</em>. Take note of the password you assign to them.</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Install_and_configure_a_soft_phone">Install and configure a soft phone</span></h3>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Linphone_Jitsi">Linphone &amp; Jitsi</span></h4>



<p>As we will need 2 soft phones up and running to support this call cascading scenario, you will install 2 different soft phones on your computer:</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list"><li><a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://www.linphone.org/" target="_blank">Linphone</a>, a freeware under &nbsp;<a href="https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Licence_publique_g%C3%A9n%C3%A9rale_GNU">GNU GPL 2</a> licence that is available for multiple operating systems, including mobiles and standard desktops</li><li><a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://desktop.jitsi.org/Main/Download" target="_blank">Jitsi Desktop</a>, also available for a variety of desktop operating systems</li></ul>



<p>If you are searching for a mobile soft phone, you could try out <em>Zoiper</em> on both iOS and Android. </p>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Configure_your_softphone">Configure your softphone</span></h4>



<p>Whether you use Jitsi, Linphone or Zoiper, all of these will let you add your own SIP account. Simply use the credentials you created earlier on Proximus FlexIO, <em>bob</em> and <em>alice</em> respectively for each soft phone you configure. The SIP domain is <em>proximusflexio.enco.io</em> and the transport must be set to <em>TCP</em> (TLS will be implemented in a later phase).</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Use_the_Visual_Designer_to_create_a_cascading_application">Use the Visual Designer to create a cascading application</span></h3>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="The_cascading_scenario">The cascading scenario</span></h4>



<p>The scenario will be the following: when someone calls your FlexIO phone number, Bob is going to be called first. If he doesn&#8217;t pick up the phone within 10 seconds, Alice&#8217;s softphone will ring. And if Alice doesn&#8217;t pick up too, then a SMS will be sent to your mobile phone to let you know you missed a call.</p>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Using_the_Visual_Designer">Using the Visual Designer</span></h4>



<p>Go to the <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://proximusflexio.enco.io" type="URL" id="https://proximusflexio.enco.io" target="_blank">Proximus FlexIO console</a> and create a new blank Visual Designer Application, like you have learned from our <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/asset/flexio/documentation#buildvisualdesigner?utm_source=blog&amp;utm_medium=web&amp;utm_campaign=encoblog" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">online documentation</a> or through the various tutorials of this blog. You can keep the first default <em>Say</em> action and use it to give an announcement such as &#8220;Thank you for contacting us, please wait while we connect you to one of our collaborators&#8221;. Don&#8217;t forget to specify your preferred TTS engine and voice, like you have already done so in previous tutorials. </p>



<p>Drag a <em>Dial </em>action, and configure it to call a <em>Client</em> called <em>Bob</em> with a timeout of <em>10 seconds</em>, as shown below :</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="800" height="486" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/sipfwd1.gif" alt="Calling a SIP FlexIO Client from the Visual Designer" class="wp-image-4751"/></figure>



<p>If the call is not picked up by Bob, we want to do the same, but calling <em>Alice</em> this time. Add another <em>Dial</em> action and configure it just as we did above, this time calling the Client <em>Alice</em>. </p>



<p>Next, create a new <em>Module</em> called &#8220;send SMS&#8221;, and add the actions <em>Say</em>, <em>SMS</em> and <em>Hang Up</em>, configured as shown on the picture. </p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="849" height="582" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-9.png" alt="Configuring the send SMS module for our FlexIO call cascading scenario" class="wp-image-4753" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-9.png 849w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-9-300x206.png 300w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-9-768x526.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 1362px) 62vw, 840px" /></figure>



<p>For the <em>SMS</em> action, please mind:</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list"><li>we use the system variable <em>$core_From</em> to include the phone number of the caller in the message</li><li>obviously, set your own mobile phone number in the <em>To</em> field without omitting the country code</li><li>For the <em>From</em> field, you have to specify a FlexIO number that you own, even if this is not a mobile number. That number will be substituted by our systems and the SMS will be shown to the recipient as coming from a short code number (4 digits number). Failure to set a valid FlexIO number will result in the SMS not to be sent.</li></ul>



<p>Finally, go back to the &#8220;Welcome&#8221; module, and configure that last <em>Dial </em>action (the one calling Alice) to <em>Continue to</em> &#8220;send SMS&#8221;:</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="800" height="168" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-10.png" alt="Configure SMS sending if second dial attempt fails in the call cascading scenario" class="wp-image-4754" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-10.png 800w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-10-300x63.png 300w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-10-768x161.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 984px) 61vw, (max-width: 1362px) 45vw, 600px" /></figure>



<p>Save your application.</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Link_your_FlexIO_number_to_your_application">Link your FlexIO number to your application</span></h3>



<p>Back to the Proximus FlexIO console, go to the &#8220;Numbers&#8221; section, pick up one of your available number and associate it to your call cascading application, like you learned to do it multiple times in previous tutorials.</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Testing_the_call_cascading_scenario">Testing the call cascading scenario</span></h3>



<p>Give a call to your FlexIO number and don&#8217;t answer any of the incoming calls on your SIP phones. In this case, the scenario goes to the end meaning the caller is warned vocally that no one could be contacted and a SMS is sent to your mobile phone.</p>



<p>Now give it some other tries, letting or Bob, or Alice answer the incoming call. When any of the two picks up the call, the scenario is stopped when any of the party hangs up the line, and the remaining of the scenario (&#8220;we&#8217;re sorry&#8230;&#8221; message and the SMS sending) is not executed.</p>



<p>Now consider that several people could be connecting their soft phone application <span style="text-decoration: underline;">using the same credentials</span> at the same time. So instead of Bob and Alice, as individuals, you could have a <em>sales</em> and a <em>support</em> Client accounts. When a call is forward to the FlexIO Client <em>sales</em>, all soft phones connected with that credential will ring, but of course the call will go on only with the one person from the <em>sales</em> team who picks up the call.</p>

A simple call cascading scenario to soft phones

<p>Check out how the turnkey <a href="https://blog.enco.io/updates/flexio-voicemail-takes-care-of-your-callers-when-you-cant/">FlexIO Voicemail solution </a>improves the user &amp; caller experience, and brings value to a &#8216;legacy telco feature&#8217;, or build your own voicemail application, with the Visual Designer of <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/asset/flexio/documentation?utm_source=blog&amp;utm_medium=web&amp;utm_campaign=encoblog" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Proximus FlexIO</a> there is no need to be an engineer or a developer to create your own new voicemail. A system that will mail you the messages and allow to retrieve the recordings with a simple mail or SMS link.</p>



<p>All you need to get started is subscription to <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/asset/flexio/overview?utm_source=blog&amp;utm_medium=web&amp;utm_campaign=encoblog" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Proximus FlexIO</a>. Here is how it works.</p>






<div id="toc_container" class="no_bullets"><p class="toc_title">Content of the article</p><ul class="toc_list"><li></li><li><ul><li></li><li></li><li></li></ul></li><li><ul><li></li></ul></li></ul></div>




<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Book_a_new_number">Book a new number</span></h3>



<p>Once logged on <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://proximusapi.enco.io?utm_source=blog&amp;utm_medium=web&amp;utm_campaign=encoblog" target="_blank">API Solutions</a>, open a new browser tab to the <a href="https://flexionumbers.enco.io?utm_source=blog&amp;utm_medium=web&amp;utm_campaign=encoblog">Proximus FlexIO Number Management microsite</a> and register a new phone number to your account.</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="750" height="334" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/flexio-register-number.gif" alt="Reserve your phone number" class="wp-image-4639"/><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Booking a new number for Proximus FlexIO</figcaption></figure>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Create_a_new_FlexIO_Visual_Designer_application">Create a new FlexIO Visual Designer application</span></h3>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Creating_the_blank_application">Creating the blank application</span></h4>



<p>Go to the &#8220;Applications&#8221; section of the Proximus FlexIO console, and click on the &#8220;+ Add New App&#8221; button, then &#8220;Create a Visual Designer Application&#8221;. Select the &#8220;Blank&#8221; template in the Template Gallery. </p>



<p>Give your application a new name and make sure the type &#8220;voice&#8221; is selected before clicking on &#8220;Create&#8221;.</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-resized is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/flexio-new-vmapp-1024x538.png" alt="Create your own new voicemail application" class="wp-image-4642" width="512" height="269" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/flexio-new-vmapp-1024x538.png 1024w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/08/flexio-new-vmapp-300x158.png 300w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/08/flexio-new-vmapp-768x403.png 768w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/08/flexio-new-vmapp-1200x630.png 1200w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/08/flexio-new-vmapp.png 1342w" sizes="(max-width: 512px) 85vw, 512px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Give a name to your new voicemail application</figcaption></figure>



<p>The Visual Designer window opens in a new tab. We can see several components in this window:</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="650" height="354" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/flexio-vda-editor.png" alt="The Proximus FlexIO Visual Designer" class="wp-image-4643" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/flexio-vda-editor.png 650w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/08/flexio-vda-editor-300x163.png 300w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 984px) 61vw, (max-width: 1362px) 45vw, 600px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">The Proximus FlexIO Visual Designer</figcaption></figure>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><strong>Building blocks</strong> on the left: these are all action types that you can execute in your scenario, like “Play” for playing an audio file, “Say” to use text to speech, “Collect” to gather input from the caller, etc</li>



<li>These action blocks can be dragged in the main screen, one below the other. They can be reordered on the screen and will be executed in sequence.</li>



<li><strong>Modules </strong>can be created and are ways to regroup action blocks together. There is always a startup module that will execute first. When creating a new application, the default module is called &#8220;Welcome&#8221;. Modules can be linked together using specific actions in some building blocks.</li>
</ul>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Configuring_the_welcome_module">Configuring the welcome module</span></h4>



<p>When people will call your new voicemail you will want to greet them with a welcome message. You can use the &#8220;Say&#8221; action, which is already added by default to your Welcome module, to use speech to text. Alternatively you could delete that &#8220;Say&#8221;action and drag instead a &#8220;Play&#8221; action, to play a prerecorded wav file. We&#8217;ll go on with the speech to text option, but you prefer to use a wav file you need to make sure your file is <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://proximusflexio.enco.io/docs/rcml/play-rcml.html" target="_blank">correctly encoded</a>, then add to the application by dragging the file in the &#8220;Media resources&#8221; box.</p>



<p>Configure the Say action with your own welcome message, and select your preferred text to speech engine and voice type (male/female) from the action&#8217;s settings:</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="750" height="455" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/vm-vda-say1.gif" alt="Greeting the caller in our new voicemail to mail application" class="wp-image-4648"/><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Because we can, let&#8217;s add another Say action with a message in a different language, such as French, by dragging a new Say action into our module:</figcaption></figure>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="750" height="455" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/vm-vda-say2.gif" alt="Greeting in multiple languages" class="wp-image-4649"/></figure>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Recording_then_branching">Recording then branching</span></h4>



<p>Now that have greeted our callers, we want to record their message then receive this message by email. Triggering the recording will be done in our &#8220;Welcome&#8221; module, and once this is done we&#8217;ll need another module to take up from there and do the sending. Let&#8217;s create a new module we will call &#8220;email&#8221;:</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="750" height="455" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/vm-vda-createmodule.gif" alt="voicemail to mail configuration" class="wp-image-4652"/><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">We can now go back to our &#8220;Welcome&#8221; module, and add the action to trigger the recording and tell the application to branch to our &#8220;email&#8221; module once the recording is completed:</figcaption></figure>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-resized is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/vm-vda-record.gif" alt="Recording the caller's message in your new voicemail application" class="wp-image-4655" width="630" height="382"/></figure>



<p>Finally, we go back to the email module, drag an &#8220;Email&#8221; action to it and fill in its fields. Our email content text will be:</p>



<pre class="wp-block-preformatted">You have new message from <strong>$core_From</strong>.
Here is the URL to access your message: <strong>$core_PublicRecordingUrl</strong></pre>



<p> Since you are sending a mail to yourself, mind that the <em>from</em> address should be the same as the <em>to</em> address. The domain of the <em>From</em> address must exist on the network.</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-resized is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/vda-vm-email-1024x486.png" alt="Sending the mail with the recorded voicemail message" class="wp-image-4656" width="768" height="365" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/vda-vm-email-1024x486.png 1024w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/08/vda-vm-email-300x142.png 300w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/08/vda-vm-email-768x365.png 768w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/08/vda-vm-email-1200x570.png 1200w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/08/vda-vm-email.png 1354w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 984px) 61vw, (max-width: 1362px) 45vw, 600px" /></figure>



<p>Note the use of 2 internal variables in the email content:</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>$core_From: this will insert the phone number of the caller (if not a private or masked number)</li>



<li>$core_PublicRecordingUrl: the URL to the audio recording. Public URL means you can access the recording without providing any authentication in your browser</li>
</ul>



<p>You could use many other internal variables in the Visual Designer to support your scenarios. Refer to our <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/asset/flexio/documentation#vdavariables?utm_source=blog&amp;utm_medium=blog|utm_campaign=encoblog">online documentation</a> for more examples.</p>



<p>Finally, let&#8217;s confirm to the caller that the message has been sent, then hangup the call. Simply add and configure a new Say action that you add under the Email action, and finally drag a Hangup action at the end. Make sure you save your application:</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-full is-resized is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/vda-vm-save.png" alt="Finishing the voicemail application" class="wp-image-4661" width="659" height="296" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/vda-vm-save.png 879w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/08/vda-vm-save-300x134.png 300w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/08/vda-vm-save-768x344.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 984px) 61vw, (max-width: 1362px) 45vw, 600px" /></figure>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Link_your_FlexIO_phone_number_to_the_application">Link your FlexIO phone number to the application</span></h3>



<p>The final step is to tell Proximus FlexIO that it needs to trigger this new application once the platform receives a call for your number. To do so, go back to the <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://proximusflexio.enco.io" target="_blank">FlexIO Console</a> and select the &#8220;Numbers&#8221; section. Find your newly reserved number and click on it. From the drop down list next to &#8220;Voice request&#8221;, select your application then click on &#8220;save changes&#8221;:</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="650" height="366" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/vda-vm-assnumber.png" alt="Linking your FlexIO phone number to your voicemail application" class="wp-image-4667" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/vda-vm-assnumber.png 650w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/08/vda-vm-assnumber-300x169.png 300w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 984px) 61vw, (max-width: 1362px) 45vw, 600px" /></figure>



<p>Give it a try ! Now is a good time to call your number to test that everything is working well.</p>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Configure_Your_Phone">Configure Your Phone</span></h4>



<p>For the final step, you will want your mobile phone to redirect unanswered calls to your new voicemail number. This operation may be different depending on your phone OS. On an Android smartphone, you would search in your dialer&#8217;s settings for the call &#8220;Transfer&#8221; settings:</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>if busy : put your FlexIO phone number instead of &#8220;+32475151525&#8221; (for a Proximus customer)</li>



<li>if no answer: put your FlexIO phone number instead of &#8220;+32475151516&#8221; (for a Proximus customer)</li>



<li>if not reachable: put your FlexIO phone number instead of &#8220;+32475151525&#8221; (for a Proximus customer)</li>
</ul>



<p>Depending on your mobile operator such options can also be configured used <a href="https://www.proximus.be/support/en/id_sfaqr_call_divert/personal/support/telephony/voicemail-and-call-management/call-management/divert-calls-on-your-mobile-or-landline.html" data-type="URL" data-id="https://www.proximus.be/support/en/id_sfaqr_call_divert/personal/support/telephony/voicemail-and-call-management/call-management/divert-calls-on-your-mobile-or-landline.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">special dial codes</a>.</p>

Build your own voicemail to mail with Proximus FlexIO

<p>In this tutorial we will learn the very basic steps required to build an application using the Visual Designer that will answer inbound phone calls. If you are getting started with Proximus FlexIO, this is the right place to start.</p>






<div id="toc_container" class="no_bullets"><p class="toc_title">Content of this article</p><ul class="toc_list"><li></li><li><ul><li></li><li></li><li></li></ul></li><li></li><li></li><li></li></ul></div>




<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Getting_a_phone_number">Getting a phone number</span></h3>



<p>To implement this first application you will to have a <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/asset/flexio/documentation#flexiosubscribe?utm_source=blog&amp;utm_medium=web&amp;utm_campaign=encoblog" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">valid subscription</a> to the Proximus FlexIO service. Once this is done, you will need to have a least one available reserved phone number on the platform. To do so, log on Proximus <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/?utm_source=blog&amp;utm_medium=web&amp;utm_campaign=encoblog" target="_blank">API Solutions</a>, then open a new browser tab to the <a href="https://flexionumbers.enco.io/?utm_source=blog&amp;utm_medium=web&amp;utm_campaign=encoblog" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Proximus FlexIO Number Management microsite</a> and register a new phone number to your account:</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="750" height="334" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/flexio-register-number.gif" alt="" class="wp-image-4639"/></figure>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Creating_the_Visual_Designer_application">Creating the Visual Designer application</span></h3>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Starting_with_a_blank_template">Starting with a blank template</span></h4>



<p>Now that we have a phone number, we need to create an application using the Visual Designer. This application will define the scenario that will be executed when someone calls your number.</p>



<p>Log into with <a href="https://proximusflexio.enco.io" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Proximus FlexIO console</a> with the user credentials you received after subscribing to the service. Go to the &#8220;Applications&#8221; section of the console, and click on the &#8220;+ Add New App&#8221; button, then &#8220;Create a Visual Designer Application&#8221;. Finally, select the &#8220;Blank&#8221; template in the Template Gallery. </p>



<p>Give your application a new name (like &#8220;hello world&#8221; or anything meaningful to you) and make sure the type &#8220;voice&#8221; is selected before clicking on &#8220;Create&#8221;.</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="800" height="485" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-12.png" alt="Creating our first inbound call application" class="wp-image-4779" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-12.png 800w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-12-300x182.png 300w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-12-768x466.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 984px) 61vw, (max-width: 1362px) 45vw, 600px" /></figure>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Discovering_the_Visual_Designer">Discovering the Visual Designer</span></h4>



<p>The Visual Designer window opens in a new tab. We can see several components in this window:</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="850" height="473" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/flexio-vda-explain.png" alt="Proximus FlexIO Visual Designer" class="wp-image-4860" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/flexio-vda-explain.png 850w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/09/flexio-vda-explain-300x167.png 300w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/09/flexio-vda-explain-768x427.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 1362px) 62vw, 840px" /><figcaption>Proximus FlexIO Visual Designer</figcaption></figure>



<ul class="wp-block-list"><li>Action b<strong>uilding blocks</strong> on the left: these are all action types that you can execute in your scenario, like “Play” for playing an audio file, “Say” to use text to speech, “Collect” to gather input from the caller, etc</li><li><strong>Modules </strong>can be created and are ways to regroup action blocks together. More complex scenarios or applications typically use several modules where each module is composed of several actions. There is always a <em>startup module</em> that will execute first when the application is triggered. When creating a new application, the default startup module is called &#8220;Welcome&#8221;. Modules are linked together using specific actions in some building blocks.</li><li>The action blocks can be <strong>dragged</strong> in the active module screen, one below the other. They can be reordered on the screen and will be executed in sequence.</li></ul>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Configuring_our_welcome_module">Configuring our welcome module</span></h4>



<p>When people will call your new <em>hello world</em> application, you will want to greet them with a welcome message. You can use the &#8220;Say&#8221; action &#8211; which is already added by default to your Welcome module &#8211; to use speech to text.</p>



<p>Let&#8217;s enter &#8220;Welcome to my first inbound application on Proximus FlexIO&#8221; as text to be spoken out. Notice the little cogwheel icon at the bottom left of this &#8220;Say&#8221; action ? Clicking on it will allow to define additional parameters, specific to each action. In our case, we&#8217;ll select the &#8220;Google English British Wavenet B&#8221; voice and click on the man icon (man voice). </p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="750" height="455" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/helloworld-vda-1-1.gif" alt="Configuring the first speech to text action" class="wp-image-4784"/></figure>



<p>Notice all the possible voices and text to speech engines that can be used in your scenarios. With Proximus FlexIO, you are free to use any of the listed TTS engines and voices. Please note that TTS providers may not always provide both man and woman voices for all the different voices they propose.</p>



<p>Let&#8217;s assume that after our English spoken greeting, we want to greet the caller also in French. Simply add another &#8220;Say&#8221; action by dragging the action from the left menu under the first Say action. Notice the thick velvet bar that appears to show you where the dragged action will be inserted. Add the French greeting (&#8220;Bienvenue sur ma première application réalisée sur Proximus FlexIO&#8221;) and select the french voice of your liking after clicking on the cogwheel:</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="750" height="455" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/helloworld-vda-2.gif" alt="Adding a new text to speech action to the application module" class="wp-image-4782"/></figure>



<p>Save the application by clicking on the <em>save</em> link on the top of the screen. Once this is done, you can close the Visual Designer window.</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Associating_the_phone_number_to_the_application">Associating the phone number to the application</span></h3>



<p>Now that you have both a phone number and an application, you need to associate these two together. This will let Proximus FlexIO know which application must be triggered when it receives a phone call to that number. </p>



<p>To do this association, go back to the <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://proximusflexio.enco.io/" target="_blank">FlexIO Console</a> and select the &#8220;Numbers&#8221; section. Find your newly reserved number and click on it. From the drop down list next to &#8220;Voice request&#8221;, select your &#8220;hello world&#8221; application then click on &#8220;save changes&#8221;:</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="750" height="455" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/helloworld-vda-3.gif" alt="" class="wp-image-4783"/></figure>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Testing_it_out">Testing it out</span></h3>



<p>That&#8217;s it, your application is now ready to use! Pick up your phone and call your number.</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Do_you_want_to_change_anything">Do you want to change anything ?</span></h3>



<p>Should there be anything in your application you are not satisfied with, from the FlexIO Console just go back to the Applications section, click on the application you want to update then simply click on the <em>Design </em>button. The Visual Designer will open again, and any change you apply will become directly active after you press on <em>save</em>.</p>

Your first Visual Designer application for inbound calls

<p>Learning something new is usually most effective with a hands on approach rather than only reading documentation. But hands on may be tricky in a developer&#8217;s context as you don&#8217;t always have all resources at hand. In this tutorial, we&#8217;ll learn a quick trick to understand the basics of RCML testing without the need for having application servers up and running.</p>






<div id="toc_container" class="no_bullets"><p class="toc_title">Content of this article</p><ul class="toc_list"><li></li><li></li><li><ul><li></li><li></li><li></li><li></li></ul></li></ul></div>




<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Access_to_development_resources">Access to development resources</span></h3>



<p>In the &#8220;<a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/asset/flexio/documentation#gettingstartedwithapplications?utm_source=blog&amp;utm_medium=web&amp;utm_campaign=encoblog" target="_blank">Getting Started with Applications</a>&#8221; section of the Proximus FlexIO documentation, we have learned that developers may need to leverage 3 elements in order to integrate flexible communications in their applications:</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list"><li>FlexIO APIs: to reserve and release numbers, trigger outbound calls, send SMSes or manipulate ongoing calls</li><li>RCML: a XML data structure that gives instructions to Proximus FlexIO about what to do with calls</li><li>Web endpoints: exposed by your application and answering to Proximus FlexIO queries by returning RCML instructions</li></ul>



<p>That documentation includes typical example flows for inbound and outbound calls. Sometimes however it&#8217;s better to try for yourself, but what if you don&#8217;t want to spin up an app server and have rapid development environment such as Node Red at hand ?</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Introducing_Beeceptor">Introducing Beeceptor</span></h3>



<p><a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://beeceptor.com/" target="_blank">Beeceptor</a> allows to build a mock Rest API mocking in seconds, without coding required. The web site allows to create a named endpoint, then to define rules for how the endpoint will answer based on POST/GET/OPTIONS/&#8230; conditions.</p>



<p><em>Mind that Beeceptor, in its free usage, creates public endpoints. You should NOT send sensitive data in your requests.</em></p>



<p>Other similar endpoint mocking services are available such as <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://kara.rest" target="_blank">kara.rest</a>, <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="http://get.mocklab.io/" data-type="URL" data-id="http://get.mocklab.io/" target="_blank">MockLab</a>, <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://www.mockable.io/" data-type="URL" data-id="https://www.mockable.io/" target="_blank">Mockable</a>, etc. This tutorial will focus on Beeceptor but all of the above would work in a similar way.</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Testing_your_RCML_response">Testing your RCML response</span></h3>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Book_a_new_number">Book a new number</span></h4>



<p>The first thing is to have a phone number available on the FlexIO platform. You can use our number management APIs, or just use the microsite. For the latter, once logged on <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://proximusapi.enco.io?utm_source=blog&amp;utm_medium=web&amp;utm_campaign=encoblog" target="_blank">API Solutions</a>, open a new browser tab to the <a href="https://flexionumbers.enco.io?utm_source=blog&amp;utm_medium=web&amp;utm_campaign=encoblog">Proximus FlexIO Number Management microsite</a> and register a new phone number to your account.</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="750" height="334" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/flexio-register-number.gif" alt="Reserve your phone number" class="wp-image-4639"/><figcaption>Booking a new number for Proximus FlexIO</figcaption></figure>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Prepare_your_Beeceptor_endpoint">Prepare your Beeceptor endpoint</span></h4>



<p>Go to <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://beeceptor.com" data-type="URL" data-id="https://beeceptor.com" target="_blank">beeceptor.com</a>, sign in with your Google account or create a new account. Create a new endpoint giving it whatever name you want &#8211; for instance &#8220;flexiorcml&#8221;. Your endpoint is now live:</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="750" height="382" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-4.png" alt="Creating a web endpoint in Beeceptor" class="wp-image-4726" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-4.png 750w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-4-300x153.png 300w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 984px) 61vw, (max-width: 1362px) 45vw, 600px" /></figure>



<p></p>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Prepare_your_RCML_response">Prepare your RCML response</span></h4>



<p>The REST Communications Markup Language represents a set of instructions you can use to tell Proximus FlexIO what to do when you receive an incoming call. Calls from a Proximus FlexIO number to an outside number are also controlled using RCML, in the same manner as incoming calls.</p>



<p>For example, the following will say a short message, and then record the caller’s voice:</p>



<pre class="wp-block-preformatted">&lt;?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?&gt;
&lt;Response&gt;
    &lt;Say voice="woman"&gt;Please leave a message after the tone.&lt;/Say&gt;
    &lt;Record maxLength="20" /&gt;
&lt;/Response&gt;</pre>



<p>You can read more about RCML and all the available <em>verbs</em> or actions you can use on the <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://proximusflexio.enco.io/docs/rcml/overview.html" target="_blank">Proximus FlexIO documentation site</a>.</p>



<p>Let&#8217;s assume we want to test the following simple RCML instruction set:</p>



<pre id="block-29346038-f350-45f9-84a6-d9e801f46862" class="wp-block-preformatted">&lt;?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
&lt;Response>
    &lt;Say language="google.en-US-Wavenet-B" voice="woman">Hey there, this is a test on Proximus FlexIO. What a wonderful day&lt;/Say>
    &lt;Hangup/>
&lt;/Response></pre>



<p>On the Beeceptor endpoint page above, click on &#8220;Mocking Rules&#8221;, then &#8220;Create a new rule&#8221; : when a POST (A) request is done on our endpoint flexiorcml.free.beeceptor.com/helloworld (B), Beeceptor will answer with a status 200 OK, specify the answer is of time text/xml (C) and paste the RCML from above in D:</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="799" height="483" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-3.png" alt="" class="wp-image-4724" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-3.png 799w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-3-300x181.png 300w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-3-768x464.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 984px) 61vw, (max-width: 1362px) 45vw, 600px" /></figure>



<p>Let&#8217;s save and proceed.</p>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><span id="Link_your_phone_number_to_our_endpoint">Link your phone number to our endpoint</span></h4>



<p>Go to the <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://proximusflexio.enco.io" target="_blank">Proximus FlexIO Console</a>, in the &#8220;Numbers&#8221; section. Click any of your available phone numbers, not already associated to any other application. Select &#8220;RCML URL&#8221; for the voice request, then type in the URL of your Beeceptor endpoint together with the &#8220;/helloworld&#8221; you just created:</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="750" height="378" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-5.png" alt="" class="wp-image-4728" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-5.png 750w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-5-300x151.png 300w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 984px) 61vw, (max-width: 1362px) 45vw, 600px" /></figure>



<p>Save the settings, then call your number. That&#8217;s it !</p>



<p>Back on your Beeceptor endpoint page, you will find a log for all incoming requests. Click on any of them to see additional information, including information that was transmitted from FlexIO to &#8220;your application&#8221; as well as the RCML response that was sent back to FlexIO. Interesting to see which type of data is received by an application for any new call! (obviously sensitive data has been masked in this example).</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="850" height="499" src="/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-6.png" alt="" class="wp-image-4729" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-6.png 850w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-6-300x176.png 300w, /wp-content/uploads/2020/09/image-6-768x451.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 1362px) 62vw, 840px" /></figure>



<p></p>

Simulating web endpoints to understand RCML

<p>In most cases, an IoT Telco operator allows you access the data from your sensors by pushing this data to your application over HTTP. We have seen in previous articles that Proximus CloudEngine makes it possible to benefit from other integration capabilities, ranging from Microsoft Azure and SAP IoT Cloud down to various protocols such as sFTP and mail. To the already existing CloudEngine&#8217;s ability to use its own MQTT client to connect to your MQTT broker, we add now the ability for your MQTT client to connect to the CloudEngine&#8217;s broker.</p>
<p></p>
<p>Using the CloudEngine&#8217;s MQTT Broker simple and straightforward.</p>
<h4>Step 1 &#8211; Define your client&#8217;s credentials</h4>
<p>The first step is to create the <strong>credentials</strong> for your MQTT client. In the CloudEngine&#8217;s microsite, click on Settings then select &#8220;MQTT&#8221; in the Inbound Endpoint type list. Add a new configuration item and give it a name and password. Be careful and take a note of that password as it won&#8217;t be displayed once the item uis saved.</p>
<p><figure id="attachment_4500" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-4500" style="width: 598px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="wp-image-4500 size-full" src="/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/cloemqttsettings.png" alt="" width="598" height="296" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/cloemqttsettings.png 598w, /wp-content/uploads/2019/12/cloemqttsettings-300x148.png 300w" sizes="(max-width: 598px) 85vw, 598px" /><figcaption id="caption-attachment-4500" class="wp-caption-text">CloudEngine MQTT settings</figcaption></figure></p>
<h4>Step 2 &#8211; Integrate our MQTT Broker module in your script</h4>
<p>The second step is to <strong>integrate the MQTT Broker outbound module in your CloudEngine visual flow or script</strong>. In the creator of the MQTT Broker object, you include the reference to the credentials that we just created in the step above (&#8220;<em>mqttbrotest</em>&#8221; in the example below) and the MQTT topic to which the data will be published (&#8220;<em>lorasensors/pxsmythings</em>&#8221; in the example below). Topics can have several levels if needed, such as &#8220;<em>mytopic/level2/level3&#8243;</em>. You must also specify the <a href="https://stackoverflow.com/questions/33480730/understanding-mqtt-subscriber-qos" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">MQTT QoS</a> (0 for best effort delivery, 1 for at least one or 2 for exactly once).</p>
<p><figure id="attachment_4503" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-4503" style="width: 799px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="wp-image-4503 size-full" src="/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/cloescriptmqttbroker.png" alt="" width="799" height="535" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/cloescriptmqttbroker.png 799w, /wp-content/uploads/2019/12/cloescriptmqttbroker-300x201.png 300w, /wp-content/uploads/2019/12/cloescriptmqttbroker-768x514.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 984px) 61vw, (max-width: 1362px) 45vw, 600px" /><figcaption id="caption-attachment-4503" class="wp-caption-text">CLOE script including the MQTT Broker module</figcaption></figure></p>
<h4>Step 3 &#8211; Connect your MQTT client to our broker</h4>
<p>The final step is obviously to <strong>connect your MQTT client to our broker</strong> and start receiving your messages. The URL of our broker is simply &#8220;mqtt.enco.io&#8221;, using a secured connection on port 8883, or unsecured on port 1883. Credentials for your client have been defined as first step and the topic to which it should register <strong>must include the username</strong>, so in our example <em>lorasensors/pxsmythings </em>becomes <em>mqttbrotest/lorasensors/pxsmythings</em>.</p>
<p><strong>Enjoy more secure &amp; reliable data transfer </strong></p>
<p>Now it&#8217;s your turn to leverage our new MQTT Broker and leverage the reliability, security and flexibility of the MQTT protocol !</p>

How to retrieve your IoT data with a MQTT client ?

<p>In this article, you will discover how Proximus makes it easier to automate the integration of LoRaWAN sensors connected to our national public LoRa network with the Microsoft Azure IoT Hub. We will indicate that this integration can go far beyond just forwarding messages to an event hub.</p>
<p></p>
<h4><span style="color: #0059b3;">The Azure IoT Hub</span></h4>
<p>The Azure IoT Hub has become a very popular service to ingest IoT data over the last years. At least, for companies or developers who want to leverage Microsoft’s cloud capabilities in building their IoT solution. The IoT Hub is basically the standard cloud entry point in Microsoft’s own IoT Reference Architecture. It comes with several key additional features over the Azure Event Hub, such as:</p>
<ul>
<li>Concept of device and device twins, with associated device capabilities, reported and desired properties</li>
<li>Support of both device-to-cloud and cloud-to-device messaging</li>
<li>Access right management at device level</li>
</ul>
<p>As Microsoft states in this <a href="https://energizedanalytics.com/en/azure-iot-hub-vs-event-hub/">comparison article of IoT Hub and Event Hubs</a> :</p>
<p><span style="color: #800080;">“<em>the IoT Hub includes features that enrich the relationship between your devices and your backend systems. Bi-directional communication capabilities mean that while you receive data from devices you can also send commands and policies back to devices</em>”</span></p>
<h4><span style="color: #0059b3;">LoRaWAN devices and Azure IoT Hub</span></h4>
<p>Some questions will arise when including LoRaWAN devices and sensors in an IoT project leveraging Microsoft’s IoT Reference Architecture:</p>
<ul>
<li>How do I prevent to double my device management activities?</li>
<li>How do I get my LoRaWAN device data into the right IoT Hub device?</li>
<li>Is there any way to make use of the IoT Hub’s device twin feature?</li>
</ul>
<p>This means, when considering a tighter integration of Proximus LoRaWAN and the Azure IoT Hub, we want to solve these challenges:</p>
<ul>
<li><span style="color: #800080;"><strong>Integrate device management end-to-end</strong>:</span> when a device is created or deleted on the LoRa network, the same action should be taken on the IoT Hub. Depending on the device’s provisioning status on the network, we will want the corresponding IoT Hub device’s status set as active or inactive.</li>
<li><span style="color: #800080;"><strong>Sensor data must flow to the right IoT Hub device</strong>:</span> when new sensor data is generated and sent over the LoRaWAN network, it should be forwarded to the corresponding IoT Hub device. This instead of being just sent to “the hub”, like it would be with the Azure Event Hub.</li>
<li><span style="color: #800080;"><strong>Leverage “desired” and “reported” properties</strong>:</span> it is perfectly possible to leverage an IoT Hub device twin’s &#8220;<em>desired</em> and <em>reported&#8221;.</em> For instance, setting a <em>desired </em>property like “report interval” to 60 (minutes) may trigger a LoRa downlink message to configure the device accordingly.</li>
</ul>
<h4><span style="color: #0059b3;">Proximus MyThings and CloudEngine to the rescue</span></h4>
<p><em>MyThings</em> is the device management platform from Proximus to connect, configure Things. But, also to connect the data from LoRaWAN devices to our national network. This web-driven management platform also exposes all its device management functionalities via REST API and can forward device data to an HTTP endpoint (your application). These are not the features we will leverage to implement the scenarios above. We will leverage the <a href="https://proximusapi.enco.io/asset/cloe/overview">Proximus CloudEngine</a> which comes with 2 dedicated modules to deal with Azure IoT Hub integrations:</p>
<ol>
<li><span style="color: #800080;">The<strong> <em>Azure IoT Manage Device</em> <em>module:</em> </strong><span style="color: #000000;">to manage the lifecycle of IoT Hub devices</span> by </span>creating, updating and deleting devices, reading or setting device keys and setting a device status.</li>
<li><span style="color: #800080;">The <strong><em>Azure IoT Device module:</em></strong> for device to cloud messaging and dealing with device twin properties.</span></li>
</ol>
<p>These modules support various transport protocols to address the IoT Hub: HTTPS, MQTT and AMQPS.</p>
<h5>Integration CloudEngine and the MyThings platform</h5>
<p>The CloudEngine comes with a standard integration with the MyThings platform, implemented as 2 input endpoints:</p>
<ol>
<li><span style="color: #800080;"><em>MyThings – Things</em>:</span> MyThings sends events to CloudEngine for every add, delete, update, provision or deprovision on a device. These events can either come from the MyThings UI or the MyThings REST API.</li>
<li><span style="color: #800080;"><em>MyThings – Data</em>:</span> all incoming data from the connected LoRaWAN devices. This inflow can be further filtered based on tags, device address or other such attributes.</li>
</ol>
<p>Putting all these components together, our implementation will look as the schema below.</p>
<p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-4472" src="/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/Untitled-1.png" alt="" width="700" height="250" srcset="/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/Untitled-1.png 700w, /wp-content/uploads/2019/09/Untitled-1-300x107.png 300w" sizes="(max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 984px) 61vw, (max-width: 1362px) 45vw, 600px" /></p>
<p>In this implementation, using the standard components listed above and the scripting capability of the Proximus CloudEngine:</p>
<ul>
<li>Every time CloudEngine receives an event from MyThings about a new device being created, deleted, provisioned or deprovisioned on the network, a CloudEngine script is triggered to reflect the very same operation on the IoT Hub</li>
<li>Every time sensor data is forwarded by MyThings to CloudEngine, a script identifies which IoT Hub device should be matched with that physical LoRaWAN device, and sends the sensor data to it as a device-to-cloud message (D2C)</li>
<li>Changes to the device conditions (like its battery level or radio signal quality) are reported as &#8220;<em>reported properties&#8221;</em> on the matching device twin.</li>
</ul>
<h4><span style="color: #0059b3;">Now it’s your turn!</span></h4>
<p>In our <a href="https://github.com/Enabling">Github</a>, you will find <a href="https://github.com/Enabling/CloudengineScripts/tree/master/MyThings%20Scripts/Azure%20IoT%20Hub">two sample scripts</a> reflecting this implementation scenario. One script is dealing IoT Hub device CRUD (create, update, delete) operations. The second script handles device-to-cloud messaging. Once you are all set up with your scripts and IoT Hub, you’re ready for the next steps. You can start to leverage storage, analytics and machine learning capabilities of Azure.</p>
<p>With the CloudEngine, Proximus makes it easier than ever to address more complex IoT integration scenarios. This goes far beyond capabilities offered by other network operators. Next to the Azure IoT Hub, we also provide integration modules for Azure Event Hub, SAP IoT Leonardo, HTTP(S), sFTP, MQTT client and MQTT broker.</p>

Integrating LoRaWAN devices in the Azure IoT Reference Architecture

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