05/08/2008 by nicola.

I’ve tried uploading a version (not very much different to yesterday’s) to Voxeo and testing through Skype but I keep getting “an internal error has occurred”. The voicexml appears to be valid. The xhtml is valid, I’m still not 100% sure about the JavaScript. You can’t check the whole thing on the regular w3 validators. I am too tired to process any more code tonight.

In terms of saving something as a favourite, via a cookie downloaded to the device, it appears to depend on different devices and manufacturers, session cookies appear to work across all, but persistent cookies may disappear once phone is switched off.

In theory, it should be possible to create a series of voicexml forms referenced in an xhtml+voice page which allow someone to choose what type of web coding template they would like to receive and then when the final form is submitted, a mouseclick or spoken event should send a message to the server to deliver back the output of those choices.

Its similar in principle to any type of online shopping. Once you have completed payment an invoice is generated - either on the final ‘thank you’ page or a ‘confirmation that it has been emailed to you’ page. As with a milkshake order, it should be possible to return a receipt of your order as a text file after you have completed the order, so sending a text file back to the user with an xhtml, RSS, php or whatever type of coding template inside it, which can be then saved to the phone or device should be no different.

A guess of how to do it would be to put templates in a mysql database then add php to the original xhtml+voice page to tell the server to fetch the template and include it in an email/SMS back to the customer. I know php has code for email options and for attaching files, I just don’t know exactly how to do it myself…yet - anyone else out there using or developing an ecommerce site tried ?

If this is all possible, it also means that someone who wanted a template might not have to actually go online at all, they could just make a phone call, make their choice and receive the template back - i.e. they would be calling (just like telebanking). Hopefully….

Will return to this later - am SO not on track to complete everything by September (maybe end of) but its still been very useful exercise, uncovering increasingly complex layers of coding, media and to some extent - architecture, now starting to make some connections between some of these too.

There is definitely potential to create pages of code against the 5 original strands (sms,multimodal,standalone vs mobile web/widget, pc vs web, mobile opensource vs mobile proprietary) it is possible to create both stand alone and web applications to do this, will compare and review their efficiency against the other strands in terms of device independence in the final stages of this project. Will also compare and review as to what this could mean for any mobile learning development and if it is worthwhile being deployed.

Anyway, my online persona is going to have a break for a few days, not sure what the offline one is going to be doing yet

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05/08/2008 by nicola.

First unfinished attempt which have not either validated or checked via Voxeo. Please feel free to copy / download (will need to select page and source to view code….once I have finished version will upload as a text file)
Would also recommend waiting until have a finished attempt that is assuming anyone out there would actually want a copy of either finished or unfinished It will hopefully provide at least half an idea. The milkshake one is more complicated in that you need branching immediately upon answering the first question. I guess it is unlikely that if you had such a wide choice of flavours that you would just tell an online form that you wanted one flavour only.

Is based around this text from post yesterday.

It is quite similar to a familiar Xhtml page except that it has slightly different DOCTYPE and namespaces to be declared. Another difference is use of time - which you can declare in seconds or milliseconds, you also should provide script so that the browser reading it, knows that you’re finished / stops listening. You also use scripting (JavaScript) to manage events such as prompts, speech input and branching etc I’m not entirely sure I’ve got my “elements by ID” in the right sequence to fit with the branching at the moment, but will inspect in more detail tomorrow

You can put the voicexml directly into the Xhtml coding or reference it as an external voicexml file (based on everything I’ve understood so far, external is better because you can reuse it, even within the same document). You set up grammar files to help with understanding i.e. a file will include typical words that you might expect to hear in response to a prompt/question.

Tomorrow’s task is to reference this unfinished version against the W3 guidelines Then put together an aural stylesheet. Another option is to record the prompts and save as audio files which you can then reference within the forms, so might do this too.

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