Meraka Openphone:Project Overview: Difference between revisions

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==Background - old==
==Introduction==
OpenPhone is an open source telephone based information dissemination environment that is aimed at addressing the significant African need related to the information empowerment of its people. The system aims to make it easy and inexpensive for organizations and individuals to perform information transactions on the telephone – that is, make information available to callers, and to gather information from callers. Doing this in a developing and multi cultural multi-lingual context is very challenging. Not only does South Africa’s unique diversity calls for in depth knowledge of our human factors, language and multi-cultural aspects but also for investigating how technology can be applied within this developing context. This project is a culmination of open source technologies, human language technologies, HCI research, social research and open source principles. It investigates the human and cultural factors that need to be considered when developing an information transaction platform.


OpenPhone is an open source telephone based information dissemination environment that is aimed at addressing  the significant African need related to the information empowerment of its people The system aims to make it easy and inexpensive for organizations and individuals to perform information transactions on the telephone – that is, make information available to callers, and to gather information from callers.  Doing this in a developing and multi cultural,  multi-lingual context is very challenging.  Not only does South Africa’s unique diversity calls for in depth knowledge of our human factors, language and multi-cultural aspects but also for investigating how technology can be applied within this developing context. 
This project is a culmination of open source technologies, human language technologies, HCI research, social research and open source principles. It investigates the human and cultural factors that need to be considered when developing an information transaction platform
==Background==
There are a few factors which necessitate the need for such a system. South Africa is a country with diverse cultures and languages. This diversity in some instances result in a lack of accommodation between traditional cultures and modern electronic media. Functionally literate citizens often form a significant fraction of the population. This constrains the delivery of electronic services which usually require fluent literacy and technological sophistication that builds such literacy. The relative scarcity of financial resources and general infrastructure means the delivery media for information services need to be even more cost-effective than in the developed world – and cannot assume that citizens will always have access to tools such as Internet-connected workstations.
OpenPhone aims to enable information access beyond the conventional web interfaces. This is important as only around 5% of South Africans have access to the Internet, whereas a much larger percentage has access to telephones.
The timely and economical gathering and dissemination of information is a significant problem in the developing world.  Whereas the Internet has radically democratised this task in the developed world, the extreme limitations to Internet penetration in the developing world implies that this benefit has not accrued to many citizens of the less wealthy nations.  Fortunately, telephones are much more common than Internet-connected computers, and recent technological innovations have made information gathering and dissemination using the telephone network significantly more affordable.
==The telephony approach ==
Statistics reveal that roughly 3 million people in South Africa have access to the internet resulting in a ratio of one in fifteen. Furthermore, one in ten (4.9 million) people have access to a fixed line. The above two statistics are in sharp contrast to the amount of people in South Africa who have access to mobile phones – 13.5 subscribers resulting in a ratio of 1 in 3. It is estimated that this figure will rise to 21 million by the year 2007.
The above statistics show a rapid growth in the availability of telephone connections in South Africa. Telephone-based service requires relatively low levels of infrastructure and user sophistication. We assume that useful services can be made available to citizens equipped with nothing but a normal telephone (mobile or fixed-line), and requiring no more than the ability to understand and respond to spoken commands.
There are huge costs involved in developing PABX systems which support interactive voice response (IVR).  In most cases these have to be outsourced to experts in the field and maintenance costs are incurred if changes need to be made. Hence, the need for a low-cost interactive flexible tool that will enable people to develop and maintain IVR systems in a language of choice to service a diverse multi-cultural group of people. . The OpenPhone authoring tool (DialogPalette) allows the user to develop IVR systems in a language of choice in a simplistic way and requiring basic computer skills.  DialogPalette utilises an open source TTS engine enabling the user to convert text to speech. The user also has the option of developing an application with voice prompts in the language of his choice.  The system gives the user flexibility as updates or changes are made easily.
==OpenPhone Components==
The following figure depicts the OpenPhone system.


[[Image:OpenphoneStructure.jpg]]
[[Image:OpenphoneStructure.jpg]]


The core of OpenPhone is the Asterisk PABX open source system (www.asterisk.org). Asterisk does voice over IP in many protocols, and can interoperate with almost all standards-based telephony equipment using relatively inexpensive hardware. DialogPalette is a graphical user interface to Asterisk and allows a user to easily create telephony applications. It can be conceptualised as an authoring tool for telephony applications. The Asterisk system has been expanded to use FLITE, a text to speech (TTS) engine designed by Carnegie Mellon University (http://www.speech.cs.cmu.edu/flite/index.html) . FLITE enables the OpenPhone system to convert text to speech using a computer generated voice.
The primary role of DialogPalette is to act as an authoring tool which allows an information provider to design an information dissemination application.  The information provider can record the prompts for the various phases in multiple languages. The application designer also has the choice of using the text to speech (TTS) to record prompts in a language of choice. The application design will be guided by the use of templates.
The information users will access the designed solution by phoning a number. This number will ideally be toll-free or sponsored. The user will listen to the voice prompts and interact with the system by entering the requested key presses.
The OpenPhone system can be used for either informational or transactional services. Below we depict some possible applications.
===The cattle pricing system===
A cattle farmer from Mozambique has to travel a long distance in order to determine the market selling price for cattle. Sometimes, this travel is in vain as prices are too low and will result in a loss for farmer Brown. The OpenPhone system allows someone at the market to develop an IVR information system that could indicate the prices offered to livestock on a daily basis.  The cattle farmer can then just phone in to a toll free number and determine what the market selling price for the day will be. This saves the farmer time and money of travelling to the city if the market price is not right.


The core of OpenPhone is the Asterisk PBX open source system (http://www.asterisk.org) . Asterisk does voice over IP in many protocols, and can interoperate with almost all standards-based telephony equipment using relatively inexpensive hardware. DialogPalette is a graphical user interface to Asterisk and allows a user to easily create telephony applications. It can be conceptualised as an authoring tool for telephony applications. The Asterisk system has been expanded to use FLITE , a text to speech (TTS) engine designed by [http://www.speech.cs.cmu.edu/flite/index.html Carnegie Mellon University]. Flite enables the OpenPhone system to convert text to speech using a computer generated voice.
===Reuniting family members===


===DialogPalette===
The war in Angola has resulted in Mpho being displaced from his family members. Using the OpenPhone system, Mpho leaves his details as well as the details of the family members he is seeking. Mpho periodically phones into the system for information whether his family members have been found. The system checks a database for information and informs Mpho whether the family members have been found and if so, gives him their details.


DialogPalette is a powerful and easy to use integrated development environment for visually creating telephonic IVR applications running on the Asterisk open-source software PBX. It utilizes an intuitive mouse-driven interface in conjunction with dynamic support dialogs and flexible application "building blocks", called Event Nodes, to graphically create speech-based applications. Traditionally, developing telephonic speech applications requires hours of programming and studying cryptic grammar and transition scripting languages. Furthermore, debugging such applications can be problematic and time consuming, as often the application must first be deployed on a remote server in order to be tested.
===UIF system===


Unemployed people travel long distances to UIF offices only to discover that their payment is not available. An application on OpenPhone can result in people checking the status of their UIF application and availability of their payment.


To solve this problem, DialogPalette integrates Asterisk into its design environment, using the computer's sound card and microphone to accurately simulate a caller's experience when interacting with your application, while allowing you to graphically follow the call flow via an on-screen canvas.
==Conclusion==


The OpenPhone system will play a great part in bridging the digital divide by allowing a wider audience access to information previously limited to people with internet connections. Telephone based systems require low levels of user interaction and user sophistication. Telephones do not require high levels of learning as they are a common feature in many homes. The system aims to make it easy and inexpensive for organizations and individuals to perform information transactions on the telephone – that is, make information available to callers, and to gather information from callers.


The latest version of Dialogue Palatte can be downloaded [http://dialogpalette.sourceforge.net/ '''here'''].
'''The latest version of Dialogue Palatte can be downloaded [http://dialogpalette.sourceforge.net/ '''here'''].'''

Revision as of 13:28, 4 September 2007

Introduction

OpenPhone is an open source telephone based information dissemination environment that is aimed at addressing the significant African need related to the information empowerment of its people The system aims to make it easy and inexpensive for organizations and individuals to perform information transactions on the telephone – that is, make information available to callers, and to gather information from callers. Doing this in a developing and multi cultural, multi-lingual context is very challenging. Not only does South Africa’s unique diversity calls for in depth knowledge of our human factors, language and multi-cultural aspects but also for investigating how technology can be applied within this developing context.

This project is a culmination of open source technologies, human language technologies, HCI research, social research and open source principles. It investigates the human and cultural factors that need to be considered when developing an information transaction platform

Background

There are a few factors which necessitate the need for such a system. South Africa is a country with diverse cultures and languages. This diversity in some instances result in a lack of accommodation between traditional cultures and modern electronic media. Functionally literate citizens often form a significant fraction of the population. This constrains the delivery of electronic services which usually require fluent literacy and technological sophistication that builds such literacy. The relative scarcity of financial resources and general infrastructure means the delivery media for information services need to be even more cost-effective than in the developed world – and cannot assume that citizens will always have access to tools such as Internet-connected workstations.

OpenPhone aims to enable information access beyond the conventional web interfaces. This is important as only around 5% of South Africans have access to the Internet, whereas a much larger percentage has access to telephones.

The timely and economical gathering and dissemination of information is a significant problem in the developing world. Whereas the Internet has radically democratised this task in the developed world, the extreme limitations to Internet penetration in the developing world implies that this benefit has not accrued to many citizens of the less wealthy nations. Fortunately, telephones are much more common than Internet-connected computers, and recent technological innovations have made information gathering and dissemination using the telephone network significantly more affordable.

The telephony approach

Statistics reveal that roughly 3 million people in South Africa have access to the internet resulting in a ratio of one in fifteen. Furthermore, one in ten (4.9 million) people have access to a fixed line. The above two statistics are in sharp contrast to the amount of people in South Africa who have access to mobile phones – 13.5 subscribers resulting in a ratio of 1 in 3. It is estimated that this figure will rise to 21 million by the year 2007.

The above statistics show a rapid growth in the availability of telephone connections in South Africa. Telephone-based service requires relatively low levels of infrastructure and user sophistication. We assume that useful services can be made available to citizens equipped with nothing but a normal telephone (mobile or fixed-line), and requiring no more than the ability to understand and respond to spoken commands.

There are huge costs involved in developing PABX systems which support interactive voice response (IVR). In most cases these have to be outsourced to experts in the field and maintenance costs are incurred if changes need to be made. Hence, the need for a low-cost interactive flexible tool that will enable people to develop and maintain IVR systems in a language of choice to service a diverse multi-cultural group of people. . The OpenPhone authoring tool (DialogPalette) allows the user to develop IVR systems in a language of choice in a simplistic way and requiring basic computer skills. DialogPalette utilises an open source TTS engine enabling the user to convert text to speech. The user also has the option of developing an application with voice prompts in the language of his choice. The system gives the user flexibility as updates or changes are made easily.


OpenPhone Components

The following figure depicts the OpenPhone system.

OpenphoneStructure.jpg

The core of OpenPhone is the Asterisk PABX open source system (www.asterisk.org). Asterisk does voice over IP in many protocols, and can interoperate with almost all standards-based telephony equipment using relatively inexpensive hardware.	DialogPalette is a graphical user interface to Asterisk and allows a user to easily create telephony applications. It can be conceptualised as an authoring tool for telephony applications. The Asterisk system has been expanded to use FLITE, a text to speech (TTS) engine designed by Carnegie Mellon University (http://www.speech.cs.cmu.edu/flite/index.html) . FLITE enables the OpenPhone system to convert text to speech using a computer generated voice.

The primary role of DialogPalette is to act as an authoring tool which allows an information provider to design an information dissemination application. The information provider can record the prompts for the various phases in multiple languages. The application designer also has the choice of using the text to speech (TTS) to record prompts in a language of choice. The application design will be guided by the use of templates.

The information users will access the designed solution by phoning a number. This number will ideally be toll-free or sponsored. The user will listen to the voice prompts and interact with the system by entering the requested key presses.

The OpenPhone system can be used for either informational or transactional services. Below we depict some possible applications.

The cattle pricing system

A cattle farmer from Mozambique has to travel a long distance in order to determine the market selling price for cattle. Sometimes, this travel is in vain as prices are too low and will result in a loss for farmer Brown. The OpenPhone system allows someone at the market to develop an IVR information system that could indicate the prices offered to livestock on a daily basis. The cattle farmer can then just phone in to a toll free number and determine what the market selling price for the day will be. This saves the farmer time and money of travelling to the city if the market price is not right.

Reuniting family members

The war in Angola has resulted in Mpho being displaced from his family members. Using the OpenPhone system, Mpho leaves his details as well as the details of the family members he is seeking. Mpho periodically phones into the system for information whether his family members have been found. The system checks a database for information and informs Mpho whether the family members have been found and if so, gives him their details.

UIF system

Unemployed people travel long distances to UIF offices only to discover that their payment is not available. An application on OpenPhone can result in people checking the status of their UIF application and availability of their payment.

Conclusion

The OpenPhone system will play a great part in bridging the digital divide by allowing a wider audience access to information previously limited to people with internet connections. Telephone based systems require low levels of user interaction and user sophistication. Telephones do not require high levels of learning as they are a common feature in many homes. The system aims to make it easy and inexpensive for organizations and individuals to perform information transactions on the telephone – that is, make information available to callers, and to gather information from callers.

The latest version of Dialogue Palatte can be downloaded here.