Brian sent me an email today about a simple HTTP API for making calls with vonage (our voice over IP phone service).

Third party call control allows third party developers to write their own software applications to initiate a call from their Vonage phone to any other phone in the world.

For example, an Outlook plug-in could be created that would initiate a call by clicking on a phone number in the Outlook contact list. Another example would be a browser plug-in that would place a call to a phone number on any web page.

- Vonage Third Party Call Control

I thought it'd be nice to be able to select a phone number in Apple's Addressbook.app (where I keep my contacts) and have it call that number. After a bit of looking around I found just such a script for skype. I did a couple of small modifications, and now it works for vonage.

Just save the following code as a script in "~/Library/Address Book Plug-Ins/", and modify the variable 'thispage' url to match your vonage username, password and phone number:

'username=vonage_username&password =***&fromnumber=15551212'

applescript:

using terms from application "Address Book" on action property return "phone" end action property on action title for p with e return "Dial with Vonage" end action title on should enable action for p with e return true end should enable action on perform action for p with e set phone_num to the value of e set prefix to "" set cutoff to 0 set taster to character 1 of phone_num set taster to taster & character 2 of phone_num if taster is "00" then set prefix to "+" set cutoff to 2 end if if taster is in {"01", "02", "03", "04", "05", "06", "07", "08", "09"} then set prefix to "+44 " set cutoff to 1 end if set new_num to prefix repeat with i from cutoff + 1 to the number of characters in phone_num set new_num to new_num & character i of phone_num end repeat set phone_num to new_num vonage_out(phone_num) end perform action end using terms from on vonage_out(phone_num) tell application "Safari" set call_string to phone_num set thispage to "https://secure.click2callu.com/tpcc/makecall?username=vonage_username&password=****&fromnumber=7125551212&tonumber=" & call_string make new document at end of documents set URL of document 1 to thispage end tell end vonage_out

Once installed just right click on any number displayed for a contact and select 'Dial with Vonage'.

All that picking up the phone and dialing crap, it was making me tired. Yet another great example of how the modern age has turned me into a lazy bastard.

I went to to my Mom's today and helped her hook up her new fangled high speed cable internet access. She has been using a cheapo dialup serviced provided by non other than Walmart. They have a $10.00 a month dialup plan that she has been using forever.

I've mentioned a few times that she might want to try broadband internet access, but she has just retired, and was unwilling to pay the extra cost.

She moved into a new Apartment a few months ago, and since then her dialup access has been spotty at best. Her phone lines at the new apartment are noisy as hell, and she would get dropped off of the internet fairly often. I wanted to help my her upgrade to a better internet connection, but the question was how.

Rewind maybe a year ago or more to my boss Nick trying to convince my to switch to Vonage, a Voice over IP phone service. Basically, Voice over IP is a phone service that works over your broadband internet connection instead of the normal copper lines that your local provider uses to give you phone service. Now this all sounded great, getting rid of our local service which stunk and was very expensive, but we had been using Vonage at the space where I worked and it just plain sucked. We'd try to have phone conferences over the Vonage line, but it would be filled with static and echo, and people would drop in and out, and the net connection for every one else would be dog ( tam says, "Dawgs aint slow" ) slow while we were on the phone. Mind you, we were on a very crappy Verizon DSL connection that was spotty at best even when we weren't on the phone.

Fast forward a year to my friend Brian trying to convince me to try Vonage. I complained how it sucked at work, but he had been using it at home over his cable broadband connection, and he had no complaints. I decided to give it a try. I must say that I have been pleasantly surprised. The Vonage line is much cheaper then our old Verizon phone service, almost two thirds in fact, and we get unlimited long distance and local calls, as well as access to our voice messaging via the web. And we have had none of the problems we had where I worked. It has been great.

So how does this relate to my mother's crappy dialup issues you may wonder? Well, its basically a question of broadband cost vs. Voice Over IP savings. My mom's local phone provider was charging her about $40.00 a month with at least a $10.00 month long distance bill, and I imagine for some months it could be upwards of $20.00 for long distance. Her dial up was costing her about $10.00 a month for a grand total of $60.00 a month cost for phone and internet.

• Local phone: $40.00
• Long Distance: $10.00 (on a good month)
• Dial up service: $10.00
• total: $60.00

I did a little research and found that her local cable broadband provider was offering a special rate of $29.95 a month for the first year of service if you singed up before October 1st. An unlimited long distance and local calling plan from Vonage is $24.95 a month, totaling at $54.90.

• Optima Online year special rate: $29.95
• Vonage unlimited continental and Canada calling plan: $24.95
• total: $54.90

Mind you, this does not include tax and such, so throw in an extra 5-10 dollars for both totals.

In the end, my mom could save about $5.00 a month and get broadband to boot, a win/win if you ask me. So I helped her order the cable and Vonage, and today I went out to her new apartment and got her all set up. I threw in a wireless router and network card as a present from her favorite son, and she is now surfing the net like a pro while simultaneously talking to her loving son on her new voice over IP phone service.

So I say to all you dialup users out there who despise the local phone provider, The future is now. Throw off the shackles of local phone service and awash yourself in the freedom of high speed internet, where the porn flows like cheap wine, and pirated movies and mp3s fall like rain from the heavens.