| Encore provides a control interface to allow efficient
integration with a PBX, Predictive Dialer, ACD and other call control systems, as well as a direct interface to most
scripted applications in call centers or anywhere that data on an agent's screen can be matched to the caller. Our control
interface is powerful, flexible, and easy to implement. Most of our largest call center customers have taken this approach.
There is no charge for ECAPI, which comes free with every Encore and Encore Soloist system. Links to complete
documentation are listed below. For a nominal fee we also provide our customers with an internal engineering resource and all
the interface applications in our toolkit that includes support for TCP/IP, IPX, DDE, command files, etc.
This interface can interoperate with multiple message sources, so you can run inbound, outbound, home grown, and other
control sources at the same time on the same system. ECAPI supports multiple recording servers or agents in distributed call
centers, all transparently.
Generally, to achieve the greatest benefit a programmer uses ECAPI both to send commands to the recorder and also to
bring our voice recording filename back into your own host application's database. This way a user application can directly
access these recordings. We provide both an OCX control and a launchable executable to play these files. In many cases
we have customers that have implemented "instant verification" functionality this way. They simply have to write
a query for the verification agent that says "show the oldest unverified record" and have the application launch
our player when the record displays.
A sample of a typical ECAPI transaction is shown below. The "C:" lines represent the commands sent from the call
center application, the client, and the "S:" lines represent our replies.
As a practical matter, the interface is not required to check for replies, but we prefer that it does because it helps us
determine if there's a link or connectivity problem and provide immediate notification to an agent.
If all goes well the reply in each case is +OK followed by the original command. (Note that ASSIGN can also be used to query
the database, such as to extract the voice file name, but that isn't relevant in a CT environment.) If there is an error,
the reply lists thecommand and an error code.
A note on addressing: Our system looks for port addresses in the form (<node>:<port>) for total record solutions,
and (<node>:<station>) for conference/silent monitor record solutions.
Thus a total record interface needs a lookup table that maps the actual stations to the physical port on our system.
This allows us to operate properly in a station-side connection and a trunk-side connection, but does require that the table be
maintained by the interface code. Usually this is just a list in the form of "<port>, <station><CR/LF>"
with a simple maintenance utility. Our port numbers range from 1 - 288, representing our limit of 288 recording channels in a
machine, and our node numbers range from 1 - 255, representing up to 255 nodes in a customer network:
C: START (1:25) <CR/LF>
S: +OK START (1:25) <CR/LF>
C: ASSIGN (1:25 fldDNIS "1234")<CR/LF>
S: +OK ASSIGN (1:25 fldDNIS "1234")<CR/LF>
C: ASSIGN (1:25 fldAgentLoginID "Sally 123")<CR/LF>
S: +OK ASSIGN (1:25 fldAgentLoginID "Sally 123")<CR/LF>
C: ASSIGN (1:25 fldANI "5032276901")<CR/LF>
S: +OK ASSIGN (1:25 fldANI "5032276901")<CR/LF>
C: STOP (1:25)<CR/LF>
S: +OK STOP (1:25)<CR/LF>
If an error were to occure, it would look like this (in this case a command is sent to start a recording already in progress
and the error code is essentially a warning):
C: START (1:25)<CR/LF>
S: -ERROR 609 START (1:25)<CR/LF>
Document Links
|
We will be asking for some user information
before linking you to this file. |
 Encore ECAPI Developers Kit.
(access is through support pages)
Contains the following files:
- Encore Command API Application Note
- Encore Command API Specification
- Encore Database Specification
- Encore Host Simulator
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