Create Tasks from Phone Calls using TwiML: Receive an Incoming Call

We've seen how to create Tasks using the TaskRouter REST API and how to accept a Task Reservation using both the REST API and Assignment Callback instructions. TaskRouter also introduces new TwiML instructions that you can use to create a Task from a Twilio phone call.

Receive an Incoming Call

To receive an incoming phone call, we first need a Twilio phone number. In this example we'll use a US toll-free number, but you can use a Voice capable number from any country.

Before purchasing or setting up the phone number, we need to add on to our server.rb to handle incoming calls:

server.rb

1require 'rubygems'
2require 'twilio-ruby'
3require 'sinatra'
4require 'json'
5
6set :port, 8080
7
8# Get your Account Sid and Auth Token from twilio.com/user/account
9account_sid = 'AC99ba7b61fbdb6c039698505dea5f044c'
10auth_token = '{{ auth_token }}'
11workspace_sid = '{{ workspace_sid }}'
12workflow_sid = '{{ workflow_sid }}'
13
14client = Twilio::REST::Client.new(account_sid, auth_token)
15
16post '/assignment_callback' do
17  # Respond to assignment callbacks with accept instruction
18  content_type :json
19  {"instruction": "accept"}.to_json
20end
21
22get '/create-task' do
23  # Create a task
24  task = client.taskrouter.workspaces(workspace_sid)
25                            .tasks
26                            .create(
27                                attributes: {
28                                      'selected_language' => 'es'
29                            }.to_json,
30                                workflow_sid: workflow_sid
31                            )
32  task.attributes
33end
34
35get '/accept_reservation' do
36  # Accept a Reservation
37  task_sid = params[:task_sid]
38  reservation_sid = params[:reservation_sid]
39
40  reservation = client.taskrouter.workspaces(workspace_sid)
41                        .tasks(task_sid)
42                        .reservations(reservation_sid)
43                        .update(reservation_status: 'accepted')
44  reservation.worker_name
45end
46
47get '/incoming_call' do
48  Twilio::TwiML::VoiceResponse.new do |r|
49    r.gather(action: '/enqueue_call', method: 'POST', timeout: 5, num_digits: 1) do |gather|
50      gather.say(message: 'Para Español oprime el uno.', language: 'es')
51      gather.say(message: 'For English, please hold or press two.', language: 'en')
52    end
53  end.to_s
54end

You can use the Buy Numbers section of the Twilio Voice and Messaging web portal to purchase a new phone number, or use an existing Twilio phone number. Open the phone number details page and point the Voice Request URL at your new endpoint:

Using any phone, call the Twilio number. You will be prompted to press one for Spanish or two for English. However, when you press a digit, you'll hear an error message. That's because our <Gather> verb is pointing to another endpoint, /enqueue_call, which we haven't implemented yet. In the next step, we'll add the required endpoint and use it to create a new Task based on the language selected by the caller.

Next: Create a Task using Enqueue »