PHP Voicemail with Tropo

Copyright (c) 2015 Adam Kalsey. Released under MIT license. See LICENSE file for details.

Introduction

PHP Voicemail is a simple voicemail script designed for people who would like a second phone number that functions as a voicemail box. Use cases envisioned are a small business that has no fixed line but uses mobile phones, throwaway numbers for Craigslist ads, or community organizations that want a voice number backed by nothing but a mailbox.

Messages transcribed and emailed as a WAV file with transcription to you using your mail server. Tropo is used to provide the phone and transcription services.

Setting up

Dependancies are installed using Composer. From the command line, change to the php-voicemail directory and run composer install to install dependancies.

PHP Voicemail uses Slim Framework to expose it's urls. Your web server should be set up to allow for rewriting of URLs in order for Slim to properly expose routes. See Slim's rewrite documentation for details on what this means and how to do it.

Audio and transcription files will be stored in the audio directory. This directory must be writable by the web server.

Rename sample.config.json to config.json. Edit this file to add your mail server configuration. A full list of config keys and their meanings can be found later in this document.

On your server, visit http://example.com/path/test where example.com is your host, and path is the directory path in which you installed PHP Voicemail. You will see output like the following.

Your Tropo Script URL is `http://example.com/path/tropo.php`
Your files will be stored in `/var/www/example/public_html/path/audio`

Copy that Tropo Script URL. You'll need it in the next step.

Create a Tropo account at http://tropo.com and create a new Tropo Application. Choose Scripting API for the type. In the form field, instead of creating a "New Script" or "Select My Files", enter the Tropo Script URL you copied earlier.

Choose a phone number and click "Create App".

Wait a moment or two for your number to be provisioned and give it a call. Leave a message and you'll get a voicemail delivered to your email box.

Config Glossary

• mailserver: (required) The email server's hostname. Probably something like smtp.example.com

• mailport: (required) SMTP Port number for the outgoing mail server

• mailuser: If your mail server requires authentication, the username

• mailpassword: If your mail server requires authentication, the password

• mailtls: Use TLS connections?

• mailfrom: (required) The address voicemail messages should be emailed from.

• mailto: (required) The address voicemail messages should be emailed to.

• greeting: The voicemail greeting. If text, will be read out. If a WAV or MP3 URL, will be played.

• transfer: If set, calls to your number will be forwarded to this number. Will ring for 15 seconds before voicemail picks up. Format with the country code as +12125551212

If transfer is set, Tropo requires that your account be enabled for outbound calling access. Email support@tropo.com to request account verification. The numbers you can dial are also restricted. See https://www.tropo.com/docs/scripting/international-features/international-dialing-sms