The popular web API service "Twilio" in the United States has also begun in Japan (related article).
Twilio, which started in Japan
Twilio is simply a "API that can easily operate the phone from the web".You may have thought, "Is it a phone call now?"However, from the perspective of engineers and from the service planning perspective, Twilio is an API with a lot of possibilities (one of the author is also paying attention to that possibility).
What can you do with Twilio?What is the possibility?Let's introduce the charm through the series.
First, let's experience twilio
What is Twilio?First, call the following number from your mobile phone (call charges will be charged).
050-3159-6680
When I was connected to the phone, I think the message was flowing in a little awkward woman's voice.In fact, this automatic response system, Twilio, is realized only with four lines of code.
はじめまして。電話をかけてくれてありがとう！As you can see, it's really easy, isn't it?Twilio was called a web API, but with such a simple system, you can control the phone just by writing a very simple code.In addition, if you add a small code, you can also accept numbers inputs like the redelivery reception service for courier services, and record the voice of the calling partner.
The method will be followed in order later, and let's briefly introduce what you can do with "Twilio" and what is attractive.
お詫びと訂正：掲載当初、記事タイトルが「たった5行で」となっていましたが、正しくは「たった4行で」の誤りです。お詫びして訂正いたします。（2013年5月30日）The charm of Twilio, which is friendly to developers
The biggest attraction of Twilio is that, as you can see in the previous sample, you can easily control the phone function.Until now, it was necessary to build a PBX and connect to the telephone network to build a system in collaboration with the telephone, which takes a huge initial development cost and hassle.
Twilio is provided as a cloud -type API, so you can do business small starts without initial costs.In addition, since it is a cloud type, it can be used on demand as much as necessary when necessary, and there is no need to be aware of scale -up / scale out.Since it is already deployed in 40 countries abroad, it is also attractive that systems built in Japan can be used overseas.
The functions are also substantial.In addition to receiving a phone call as in the previous example, you can also make a phone call or send and receive SMS (although it has not been realized in Japan yet) (for details, see the Twilio function.please).
In addition, the founder Jeff Lawson is from an engineer, and has an environment where developers, such as APIs, SDKs, and documents, can concentrate on application development.Specifically, the following three APIs are provided for each application (for details, see the API document).
REST APIs and XML twimls are easy to link to system, providing library of various languages (Ruby, PHP, Java) and frameworks (Ruby On Rails, Fuelphp).Because the samples are substantial, it seems that it is often used in new employees programming exercises in the United States.
Such a case of TWILIO
Twilio has various functions, but one of the major reasons that is attracting attention is the fact that it is actually widely used.In the United States, "Hulu" and "Salesfoce.Twilio APIs are used for more than 200,000 developers, including "Com" and "Airbnb".
Hulu said that by building a call center on Twilio, it was able to build a system at low cost, and take advantage of the cloud -type benefits to smoothly deploy it when expanding overseas.In addition, examples of elections and voting systems that require large amounts of call processing can be said to be a case that benefit from cloud -type (to Twilio customer (English) for examples).
Not only the construction of a telephone system in cooperation with smartphones and tablets, but also the telephone can be easily linked from all devices, so it may be a matter of course to call from television or refrigerators.
With the expansion of various possibilities from "devices" + "telephone" that have been difficult to realize until now, new innovation ideas will be born one after another.
