Dialogic D/300 JCT-E1 is the entry level board for anyone who needs digital network interface with PSTN network as well as voice resources in the single board. I feel, D/300 board is most used entry

Dialogic D/300 JCT-E1 board

Features of Dialogic D/300 JCT-E1 board

1. Digital Network Interface

It has both E1(2.048MBPS) and T1(1.544 Mbps) support. It supports digital interface network protocols like ISDN PRI, R2MF. ISDN PRI is widely used protocol for connecting CTI board with PBX systems. With D/300 board, it is quite easy to configure it to work with many ISDN variants as per PBX from one country to another or manufacturer.

2. FAX support

Dialogic D/300 board supports both FAX and host based speech recognition. In certain cases, FAX and speech recognition may not work together. It also supports CSP ( Continuous Speech Processing) which offers IVR developers a powerful feature to develop many interesting IVR applications and features depending on the call progress. Speech recognition feature provides IVR developers to develop Speech-Enabled menu for any IVR application.

3. Scalability

Dialogic D/300 supports H.100 connector and it allows it to connect to other Dialogic boards. Inexpensive normal PC can be used to install this board and one PC may install upto 16 boards per machine if PCI slots are available.
With its support for GSM and G.726 bit exact voice coders ( standard for Voice Profile for Internet Messaging (VPIM) , one may develop unified messaging solutions based on D/300 board.

4. Programming

Dialogic D/300 board is supported by many RAD Tools for IVR development. It also supports widely popular GC ( Global Call Protocol) for making many high end, mission critical IVR applications.

Applications

D/300 board can be used to develop any kind of IVR applications. It offers many call related information available with digital network interface protocols. Call bridging available in ISDN PRI is one of the feature which is used to make Click To Call application can be developed.

D/300 board is also ideal choice for starting a voice portal service to start with 30 lines and then increase the lines.

DIalogic has some other models with higher capacity with same features. D/600 and DMV1200 have 60 voice and 120 resources respectively. One may move from D/300 to DMV/1200 without having to make any changes in the application.

Other CTI vendors like Donjin, Synway, Digium too have D/300 equivalent boards. For example, Digium TE122P/TE122B, Synway TEJ Series and Donjin DN300 are Dialogic D/300 equivalent boards with similar features.

Without doubt, interactive voice response (IVR) has become the ubiquitous technology in telecommunications applications. IVR solutions have a myriad of uses that are mostly taken for granted, however, the essence of an IVR system is its ability to offer ‘self-service’ for the user, thus it can help to reduce cost and improve the customer experience.

Since introducing the world’s first ‘all-in-one’ voice board in 1998, Aculab has been setting the standard of enabling technology components – e.g., CTI cards – for IVR applications. Whatever your needs for advanced IVR functionality, Aculab has the media processing technology and APIs – voice, fax, call progress, etc. – to drive your success.

Beneficially, Aculab is able to offer a choice; from its range of IP-centric, DSP-based Prosody X boards to its host-based (SoftDSP or HMP) option, Prosody S. And you can use Prosody X for converged or mixed IP/TDM environments, where you still need E1 or T1 PSTN connectivity.

Additionally, Aculab\’s VoiceXML/CCXML interpreter set offers a powerful and scalable design option for platform vendors and service providers alike. It is the fastest, most cost-effective, high performance solution available today, which is an effective combination in any language.

IVR system features and capacities vary depending on the market segments they target. Small to medium enterprises (SMEs) may look to enhance their IP-PBX with an IVR-based auto-attendant using Prosody S, while larger companies will require a Prosody X board-based solution for a hybrid contact centre or voice portal, perhaps also using automatic speech recognition (ASR) and text-to-speech (TTS). Carriers and service providers need IVR to provide a wide range of subscriber messaging and large scale, hosted or VAS and mobile VAS service offerings. And, undoubtedly, TEMs (of all descriptions; Tier 1, Tier 2, etc.) and platform vendors supplying these user communities will also benefit from Aculab’s board and software options.

Check out Aculab at http://www.aculab.com/solutions/IVR-solutions.asp

What is UMS ( Unified Messaging System) ?
In one sentence, UMS can be defined as a system that provides phone subscribers with the ability to access, read and reply all their messages in whatever form from any terminal (whether telephony-based, Internet-based or both) that may be available. Message types are normally, Email, Voice Mail, Fax and SMS. UMS provides a single mailbox to store all all these messages and then access these messages from mobile phone, telephone, website or as SMS on mobile phone! For more, please visit Niche Tech Services NTS1BOX product page.

With the above description, it is obvious that IVR Software will play the main part in a UMS Solution. In fact, one can view UMS as enhancement of IVR Software.

1. Accessing ‘Message’, either Email, SMS, Voice Mail or FAX one has to use an IVR Software. This IVR software will be programmed to give options to read Email, SMS, Voice Mail or FAX to a caller.

2. Depending on the choice, IVR Software will retrieve Email, read it out to caller using TTS(Text To Speech). It will also give option to reply by the caller as a voice message, which will be stored as Audio File ( WAV File) and replied to sender as email attachement. For Option to download as SMS, IVR Software will trigger SMS Module to send out the email as SMS.

3. For Voice Mail, its a straight forward retrieval and playback of stored messages.

4. IVR Software can also send and receive FAX! The CTI Card has to have FAX support.

5. For SMS again, SMS texts would be read out to the caller and a voice message would be sent as reply to the SMS sender.

Best part of an UMS is, for every incoming message, be it SMS, Email, FAX or Voice Mail, a subscriber can be alerted by a outbound IVR Software.

UMS can be an extension of Voice Portal Software. Voice Portal operators can easily upgrade their IVR Software to give functionality of UMS. This can be new revenue earner for voice portal.

So, IVR Software can be extended to serve as UMS.

There are few basic difference between outbound and inbound IVR Application. Normal IVR Application deals with inbound calls and call transferring. But an outbound IVR performs the few more tasks than an Inbound IVRS! And this is purely call handling point of View.

Though inbound application may have to do more computation as it has wider applications. But outbound calls have greater challenges in development. Here are few points to ponder about developing an outbound IVR Software:

1. Outbound calls may encounter various called parties! For example, the number dialed may turn out to be FAX number, so as soon as your call gets connected, IVR will get a FAX tone! So IVR has to detect FAX tone and and take appropriate action! It is specially important where outbound calls are payable as well as the usage time needs proper recording! It may face not only FAX, but also voice mail, answering machine, call forwarding etc.

2. Starting the message ( playback audio file ) after connection is very crucial! For example, if you detect FAX tone, you need to disconnect, not play the message! Same for Voice Mail, Answering Machine.

3. Deciding the type of card is also important. According to me, digital cards are better suited that analog cards. Here by digital cards, I am meaning digital interface like ISDN, R2MF, SS7! CTI cards are of course digital! Digital CTI boards can perform better in detecting FAX tone, Voice Mail, Answering Machine! Also, they give quick disconnection which important for call accounting.

4. Call synchronization is important. As outbound IVR Application will dial out multiple number simultaneously and some calls will be unsuccessful, which need to be retried! These kind of mechanism should be important and properly taken care of.

Few Features which are useful in an outbound IVR Application:

1. Outbound IVR application should have call transfer facility as an option just like inbound IVR application.

2. It should also have called party interaction through DTMF or Speech recognition.

3. The messages should be short and quick.