September 2005

Today I closed the “Developer Of The Month” competition for the developer that submitted the best sample for us to put in to our new samples gallery.

So that leaves a little matter of announcing the winners. Yes there are 2 of them. I was in a generous mood when I woke up this morning, well it is Friday after all.

Continue reading "And the Winner of the first Developer Of The Month Is........" »

Today we launched 1.4 of the Skype client.

We are still finalising the documentation and will make it available very soon, but in the meantime, this is the new APIs.

Continue reading "Skype 1.4 Available" »

If you haven’t taken a look at the Extras Gallery for a while, then there are some fantastic new items that have been added. Today actually!

We have added items for Hardware, Developer, Enterpise and Messaging

Take a look.

Continue reading "New Items In The Extas Gallery" »

A huge thank you to everyone that attended our Skype Night event in Palo Alto, California last week. It was a great event and absolutely fantastic to get the chance to speak to all of you. Thanks also to everyone that came up and said hello after the event.

From the front of the room all I saw was a sea of heads but I am guessing that there were well over 350 of you, which is an amazing number considering it was our first event in the US.

In case you missed the event, this was the agenda:

Opportunities to Develop New Products Using Skype’s API

Lenn Pryor, Skype Developer Relations

How to Get Started with Skype API

Lester Madden, Skype Developer Relations

Lenn spoke about the opportunities for developers to build products using the Skype API and had some great partners up on stage to demo their Skype hardware and software. I did a 30 minute talk on how to get started with the Skype API, I even wrote code (which worked first time < /DEMOKING >). Other than when I wrote my message into the wrong box and caused an unhandled exception there were no surprises which is remarkable for me.

After the event we had a cocktail party, which is posh speak for beer and food.

We had lots of photos taken, I’ll dig them out and put them up as soon as I work out who has the camera and get the pictures off them.

In case you didn’t notice I recorded the event, so if you missed the sessions or you want to watch them again, I’ll put the download links here very shortly. I am currently editing them, I’m almost finished and they should be ready in the next day or two.

Having listened to my session this morning, I have decided that there is nothing worse than hearing the sound of your own voice in a recording. I had always thought that I sounded husker and my voice was meaty rather than the squeaky. Sitting hear listing to my voice booming out the speakers is just horrible. I think I will be looking to hire a voice over in future recordings.

While I had a great time out in sunny California, it’s nice to be home again, even if it is cold and wet. I am still suffering from the jet lag and finally fell asleep this morning at around 4am, only to be woken up again by the alarm at 6:15am. :-(

On a completely random and final note, some enterprising spammer keeps sending spam to the SampleCode alias, aside from the usual rubbish I receive, one this morning offered me DNA from a millionaire. That’s the most bizarre piece of spam I have had yet!

Greetings from a sunny San Francisco! Well it was sunny yesterday but today the weather isn’t looking that good.

Tonight of course we are running our Skype Night event in Palo Alto, so if you are at the event make sure you come up and say hi to me over a beer. Expect a full report next week on the event.

The first “Developer of the month” contest is drawing to an end and the winner will be announced in early October. You still have just over a week to submit your sample code for the September contest, so get coding and submitting!

Remember every entry you submit has the chance to win the grand prize!

Your entries should be sent to: samplecode@skype.com.

(If you have no idea what I am talking about, see my previous blog post below).

Please only submit your sample code to this email address. Offers for renewals of pharmacy subscriptions, cheap Viagra, loan and credit card approvals etc should not be sent to this email address. I have all I need right now but thanks for all the kind offers.

Unfortunately, I can’t answer Technical Support questions on this alias.
If you do have a technical support question, please go to our support site where the appropriate group will be able to get you the answer you are looking for. Our technical support guys are a great bunch and eager to help, this is the best way to get your questions answered.

Also don’t forget our forums. They are another great source of information.

Developers are the smartest people on the planet. Everyday we solve problems that would cause lesser men (and women) to go insane as they try to comprehend our daily tasks.

Imagine trying to teach the average man in a bar how to spawn multiple threads or how to override a virtual class and you will see the looks of despair on his face.

While we are smart, we don’t write everything from scratch all the time. Often we keep sample code that illustrates points or how to achieve tasks. Sometimes we package these up into sample projects, and sometimes we just store away the snippet of code into a text file ready for use sometime in the future.

Chances are you have loads of fantastic samples that show how to use Skypes functionality hiding away in a folder on your hard disk right now, so why not share that code with your fellow Skype developers.

To make it worth your while, I am going to run “developer of the month” competition. Every sample project, or snippet of sample code that is sent in will be entered into the competition and the lucky winner will win a fantastic prize.

I pick the prize, and I work on the premise that whatever you win I should also have. So you can bet that it is going to be worth your while.

The more code you submit, the better the chance of winning you have, and the more other developers can learn from you expertise

To send in your code/projects drop an email to samplecode@skype.com

It would also help if you could use the following format with your entries so I can identify them.

Platform (Windows/Linux/Mac/Embedded)

DevLanguage (C++/VB/C# etc) don’t feel limited to these selections

Description This sample shows how to……

I’ll be putting up a webpage shortly so others can get their hands on the samples.

Until then – get uploading and good luck.

I just wanted to take a moment to share a little with you about why we at Skype are so excited about the announcement and why we think it will bring new opportunities to build an ecosystem of developers, service providers, and content providers. If you have not seen the details of the announcement, have a look here.

So what does this mean to the existing partners who have been building businesses on Skype does anything change?

Nothing changes for developers and for Skype’s developer relations team other than we now have access to a new group of friends with great technology at eBay and PayPal. We will continue to build the team, invest in building a world class developer community, and grow the opportunity for others to make money using Skype. We will continue working hard to build the APIs, tools, and resources to make it possible for you to make money building things we never dreamed of.

Skype will remain an independent company as part of eBay much like PayPal and will continue to be 100% focused on our goal of building the worlds largest internet communications company. Our current strategy remains in tact and is supported by our new family at eBay.

Overtime we will work towards ways to become better together, but given eBay’s commitment to enabling and empowering communities, developers should be as excited as we are here at Skype about the good things coming for all of us.

Questions, comments? Let us know below

The rumors are over. This just got announced. To celebrate the event, go ahead and download the latest stable public version of Skype.

Below is a letter from Niklas and Janus about the occasion.

Hello,

When Janus and I originally created Skype, we had a vision of creating the world’s largest communications company to revolutionise the way everyone communicates through the internet.

We believed that voice is the most natural way for people to communicate and that making it widely and easily available would be a major step forward in Internet communications. We also thought that as the Internet grew, there was no reason why everyone in world shouldn’t be able to talk for free.

We set out to build software which was not just powerful but also incredibly easy to install and use. Janus and I wanted to make something which would make talking on the Internet the simplest and most natural thing in the world.

We are now working with an amazing dedicated and talented team of people across the world to deliver on this vision. Skype people are now in 15 countries, from 27 nationalities and everyday we wake up and think about one thing — how can we make voice the most natural form of Internet communication.

It seems to have caught on.

In only two years, we have been fortunate to have experienced spectacular growth. There are now over 54 million people using Skype to talk for free to families, friends and colleagues in 225 countries and territories around the world — everyday another 150,000 new people sign up to join in. We also have a fantastic and fast-growing network of thousands of partners and developers building exciting hardware and software products, as well services around the Skype experience.

Now today we are thrilled to be joining forces with Meg Whitman and the fantastic team at eBay to help us deliver on our vision and help make Skype the voice of the Internet. Working with eBay and Paypal — two of the greatest brands on the Internet — we can’t think of any more powerful platforms to accelerate our growth.

We want to take this opportunity to thank every one of you who has contributed so far to the growth of Skype. But let’s remember, we’ve only just begun to write the story of becoming the voice of the Internet.

We are totally motivated for now and the next several years to continue all this great work and to try to exceed all of your expectations and more. We have some great ideas about what happens in the next chapter and think we have some powerful friends to help us realize our dreams. We can’t wait to work with you all in writing the next chapter and together make it possible for the whole world to talk for free.

Thanks again, all our best

Niklas and Janus

Well I arrived in Tallinn around 2am on Thursday morning. The flight was delayed by 2 hours to begin with, then as we were taxing for take off one of the passengers panicked and wasn’t able to fly. So we had to return to the stand, let the passenger off and unload the passenger’s bags adding another hour to the journey.

Apparently on the passengers inbound flight there had been some extreme turbulence and the passenger was still shaken up from the experience and wasn’t ready to fly again just yet.

I have been lucky and never experienced really bad turbulence on a flight, I can only imagine that it is terrifying so I feel for the guy.

I finally fell into bed around 3am and up again at 7am ready for a series of meetings. As you can imagine I have been pretty tired since.

You will have seen that we announced the Voice Services Program to expose IVR applications to the Skype’s global user base.

IVR applications (Interactive Voice Response) applications are typically written with Voice XML (VXML) or Speech Application Language Tags (SALT). VXML and SALT allow you to expose functionality by voice interaction by speaking your request, or by pressing buttons on your phone to respond to questions (press 1 for accounts, press 2 for sales).

Increasingly we have seen more and more systems that allow you to interact with them via voice, so rather than pressing 1, 2, or 3 to indicate your choice you can just say, “I want to speak to the sales department” and the system will act on your request. These voice systems can be very complex and allow the user to do powerful things. Book travel, sell shares etc without having to speak to an agent in a call centre.

The Voice Services Program opens up these services to Skype, meaning you can “callto:” a Skype name that is voice enabled and speak to the system to get the information you are after.

Try tellmeonskype here to get a flavour of what you can do.

If you have an IVR system, or are thinking about developing one to expose though Skype, there are 2 models available for making money from your service:

• Free services: these are free for the Skype caller. As a content provider, you will pay a small per minute fee for receiving these calls.

• Chargeable services: callers will pay per minute from their Skype Credit. As a content provider you will receive a share of call revenue

Charging for your services is entirely up to you define the per-minute charge to callers. You receive a percentage of the call revenue, so the more users that call your service, and the longer they call, the more money you make. It’s that easy!

For more information on the Voice Services Program go here: Skype voice program.

Okay, you have a hardware solution, which works! You would like to get it Skype certified!
BUT…

What requirements Skype has for certain device categories? Which categories there are? How are tests done? What approach Skype has for testing solutions? Scientific, subjective or measuring mean score opinion?

Answers for these questions you can be find in Specifications section of Skype web pages. There we have listed test specifications, which are used for certification tests and also requirements, which we have for devices. Use these documents to self-check, before you submit your solution for official certification at Partner inquiry form. Specifications will be renewed every 2 weeks or so. Make sure you have always the latest version downloaded for your device category.

BUT…
You have software solution!
- No worries, software requirements and specifications will be available soon. We are working on them! Give us few more weeks, please!

Have you ever wanted to learn another language? I tried French at school but in England we don’t learn until we are 11 years old and by then it’s too late.

My wife is Brazilian and her parents don’t speak a word of English so you can imagine what it’s like when the mother-in-law rings, for some reason she is convinced that I speak fluent Portuguese and talks to me for ages. In reality I can order one beer, two beers or even three beers, say I am hungry or thirsty but beyond that I start getting out my depth.

When I try to explain that the wife is shopping and won’t be home for another 3 hours it usually results in phone calls every 20 minutes to see if she is home yet.

Why am I telling you this? because my life could soon get easier thanks to the Voice Services Program announced by Skype today.

Now imagine, the next time my mother-in-law calls and my wife is out, I could use voice services to locate a translation service and conference in a translator that speaks both English and Portuguese to translates enabling us to communicate more effectively.

The use of voice is only limited by your imagination, it’s a great way to open up IVR systems to provide Skype’s global user base with access to your existing voice solutions.

You can build voice services that provide train arrival information, sports scores, weather forecasts, daily horoscopes, or just about anything you can think of.

There are 2 service models available for making money:

• Free services: these are free for the Skype caller. As a content provider, you will pay a small per minute fee for receiving these calls.

• Chargeable services: callers will pay per minute from their Skype Credit. As a content provider you will receive a share of call revenue

Charging for your services is entirely up to you define the per-minute charge to callers. You receive a percentage of the call revenue, so the more users that call your service, and the longer they call, the more money you make. It’s that easy!

For more information on the Voice Services Program go here: Skype voice program

If you have a website, have you though about becoming a Skype Affiliate to make money and spread the word about Skype?

How does it work?

Just set up an account with one of our Affiliate Network Partners, and use the graphics or texts they provide to link to skype.com. Whenever someone from your site buys or subscribes to one of Skype’s premium services (SkypeOut, SkypeIn, and Skype Voicemail), you will earn a commission. You will earn a commission on the purchases they make up to 90 days after they originally clicked on a link at your site! How much will you earn? The more customers you convert, the more money you can earn. Simple really. You will earn a 5-10% commission on purchases of Skype premium services.

Why join?

• A huge (and ever-growing) user-base - more than 120 million downloads, over 40m registered users, 1.5m+ SkypeOut users, and 150,000 new users joining daily (…and these figures will be hopelessly out of date by the time you read this).
• It’s free and there’s nothing to lose - It won’t cost you a cent to become a Skype affiliate.
• Easy to set up – the Skype Affiliate Program is straightforward and simple to get going – and our Affiliate Network Partners provide you with all the cool creative you need to start earning money.
• 90 days to buy – even if your users don’t sign up straight away, we will pay you commission for everyone who buys or subscribes directly on skype.com for 90 days after they click through from your site.
• Up to date reporting - check how much you have earned with real-time online reporting.

How do you start?

Joining the Affiliate Program is quick and easy. You can start by visiting the affiliates page here

Some of the applications I have seen are fantastic examples of how people are taking Skype and extending it. This one just made me laugh so I though I would share it.

To cut a long story short, this guy was tired of random guys adding his girlfriend to their contact list looking for a date, so he decided to get revenge.

To do this is put a picture of an attractive girl in his profile and put Skype in Skype-me mode. Within a few minutes he would have a few guys take the bait and attempt to chat him up assuming that he was a she. The clever part was he had written an application that that would forward the messages, calls, files etc to one of the another unsuspecting guys who had also taken the bait.

The result would be two guys chatting each other up both assuming they were chatting to a girl. Take a look at: pranked.hopto.org

You have to admire some peoples cunningness and ingenuity.

If you have any cool applications or cool Skype related stories let me know @ lester.madden@skype.net I’d love to hear from you.

Greetings and welcome back from the weekend, I hope you had a good break.

I have my first piece of Skype related travel this week and will be flying out to meet the guys out in Tallinn on Wednesday. I’ve travelled around most of Europe but I haven’t been to Estonia before so I am looking forward to the trip. It’s always nice to get a new stamp in the passport, especially as the passport will shortly have to go for renewal so its one of the final stamps it will receive.

One of the programs we are about to implement is video interviews with the developers and program managers here at Skype, so they can tell you about the things they are working on and give you the inside scoop. Think of it as Developer TV. So I need to go and buy myself a video camera, line up some recordings and practice my skills as a video editor. If all goes according to plan we should have some to launch next week.

Once we get up and running we’ll extend it to partners so you can get involved too!

I am still working my way though all your emails, I am down to the last few so almost there. I still aim to get back to everyone, so my apologies if you are still waiting to hear back from me.

I have to say that you guys are doing some really fantastic things with Skype, having read your emails I am really amazed with the applications you are writing. Skype is just a fantastic tool (but you know that already). On Wednesday I had a chat with the MD from an eLearning company that I work with, I persuaded the MD to install Skype and add me to his contact list. I have to admit it was tough sell but nether the less he installed and brought himself a pair of headphones. By 11am he had spoken to a friend in Australia and made several SkypeOut calls. By the time I received my call after lunch he was buzzing about wanting to set up Skype at home so his wife can chat to friends and family around the world, and also about using Skype for all their out going calls in the office.

I would now say that he is a Skype convert and a pretty typical one at that. Once you have started to Skype it’s hard to go back to normal telephone conversations, which is good for Skype and good for you guys as more and more people will be hungry for the hardware and service that you are developing.

My job of course is to make it easier to write Skype enabled applications, so for the last few days I have been playing around with the API to get a feel for the problems you face.

If like me you have been wondering where to start with the Skype API, then take look at the excellent Learning Skype’s Plug-In Architecture from Skype Journal, you’ll find it in the developer section in the extras gallery on Skype.com. It’s a fantastic document that will have you writing applications in no time.

They have even taken the time to localise the document into Chinese, Dutch, English, German, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian and Spanish. With lots of sample code get you started. I have found it very useful so a big thank you to the Skype Journal team that put this resource together.

Having spent just a few days playing around with the API I am beginning to understand the enormity of the problem you face. Coming from Microsoft I only use to worry about producing samples/documentation in C# and VB. For Skype we have around 6 different programming languages spanning 4 operating systems for which we need to provide documentation so it’s a big challenge.

I figure that you guys know more than me, most of you are Skype developer veterans, so shortly I will be offering you a deal, you write some content and submit it to me so we can get the documentation up and running and I’ll make it worth your while by offering you Skype goodies in return

I’ll work out the finer points on how you can submit your sample code, hints tips, etc, and of course tell you how you get your hands on the goodies shortly, until then, keep any interesting sample code you have written, useful tips etc to one side.

Today Windows Skype version 1.4 was published as secondary download.

http://www.skype.com/products/skype/windows/

Here is brief overview of new API features

• application-to-application communications
• my profile enchancements
• more control over UI
• other improvements

Application-to-Application Communications

A2A communications allows two API clients to exchange information without visual appearance.

• Connections are only allowed to online parties who are in contactlist or have active ongoing communication.
• Connections are only attempted to connectable users at CONNECT.
• Connections are established only when there is a same named application on the other side.
• Application name is limited by 32 bytes.
• Idle connections will be dropped in some time (usually 8 minutes)
• When connection is relayed throttling is engaged.

• If other party is logged in multiple Skype instances then stream for each instance is created

• Stream write provides reliable transmission to deliver large amount of data

• Maximum amount of write to stream can be 0xFFFF bytes long.

• Any character except 0x00 is allowed in message

• Datagrams are unreliable packets sent over network (usually translates to UDP).

• Datagrams maximum size is 1400 bytes.
• There is no guarantee that datagrams will be delivered.

Commands

// Register new application object
-> CREATE APPLICATION appname 
<- CREATE APPLICATION appname

// Establish connection to another user
-> ALTER APPLICATION appname CONNECT username
<- ALTER APPLICATION appname CONNECT username

// Write stream to connection "username:id"
-> ALTER APPLICATION appname WRITE username:id text
<- ALTER APPLICATION appname WRITE username:id

// Read stream to connection "username:id"
-> ALTER APPLICATION appname READ username:id
<- ALTER APPLICATION appname READ username:id text

// Write datagram "username:id"
-> ALTER APPLICATION appname DATAGRAM username:id text
<- ALTER APPLICATION appname DATAGRAM username:id

// Drop an connection to user
-> ALTER APPLICATION appname DISCONNECT username:id
<- ALTER APPLICATION appname DISCONNECT username:id

// Unregister an application
-> DELETE APPLICATION appname
<- DELETE APPLICATION appname

APPLICATION object properties

You can query properties with GET as usual and property changes are notified by Skype. Syntax examples here are based on GET but CONNECTING, STREAMS, SENDING and RECEIVED make more sense as notifications.

// query connectable users
-> GET APPLICATION appname CONNECTABLE
<- APPLICATION appname CONNECTABLE [username[ username]*]

// query on-going connection process
// after the connection is established username is removed from CONNECTING list
-> GET APPLICATION appname CONNECTING
<- APPLICATION appname CONNECTING [username[ username]*]

// query open streams (connections)
-> GET APPLICATION appname STREAMS
<- APPLICATION appname STREAMS [username:id[ username:id]*]

// query if currently sending any data
// after the data is sent stream name is removed from SENDING list
-> GET APPLICATION appname SENDING
<- APPLICATION appname SENDING [username:id=bytes [username:id=bytes]*]

// query if there is data waiting in received buffer
// after the data is read from stream the stream name is removed from RECEIVED list
-> GET APPLICATION appname RECEIVED
<- APPLICATION appname RECEIVED [username:id=bytes [username:id=bytes]*]

// incoming datagram notification
<- APPLICATION appname DATAGRAM user:id text

Example of communiction

Jim and Joe are two users who installed "toru" application.

// register application on both sides
[JIM] -> CREATE APPLICATION toru
[JIM] <- CREATE APPLICATION toru

[JOE] -> CREATE APPLICATION toru
[JOE] <- CREATE APPLICATION toru

// JIM initiates communication to JOE
[JIM] -> ALTER APPLICATION toru CONNECT joe
[JIM] <- ALTER APPLICATION toru CONNECT joe

// connection establishing in its way…
[JIM] <- APPLICATION toru CONNECTING joe
// .. and is succeeded
[JIM] <- APPLICATION toru CONNECTING
// .. and has created one stream
[JIM] <- APPLICATION toru STREAMS joe:1

// and JOE is notified by new stream
[JOE] <- APPLICATION toru STREAMS jim:1

// JIM sends data over stream to JOE
[JIM] -> ALTER APPLICATION toru WRITE joe:1 Hello world!
[JIM] <- ALTER APPLICATION toru WRITE joe:1
// stay tuned while data is transmitted…
[JIM] <- APPLICATION toru SENDING joe:1=14
// .. and you are notified on delivery success
[JIM] <- APPLICATION toru SENDING 

// JOE receives notification about incoming message
[JOE] <- APPLICATION toru RECEIVED jim:1=12
// .. and reads data from stream
[JOE] -> ALTER APPLICATION toru READ jim:1
[JOE] <- ALTER APPLICATION toru READ jim:1 Hello world!
// … and is notified that stream is empty
[JOE] <- APPLICATION toru RECEIVED 

// JOE sends back acknowledgement of message
// Datagram is used because it is not so important to acknowledge
[JOE] -> ALTER APPLICATION toru DATAGRAM jim:1 Hello back!
[JOE] <- ALTER APPLICATION toru DATAGRAM jim:1
// Now data is transmitted…
[JOE] <- APPLICATION toru SENDING jim:1=11
// .. and notificed when it was sent (but delivery not assured)
[JOE] <- APPLICATION toru SENDING 

// JIM receives datagram notifcatoin
[JIM] <- APPLICATION toru DATAGRAM joe:1 Hello back!

// JIM decides to end the communication
[JIM] -> ALTER APPLICATION toru DISCONNECT joe:1
[JIM] <- ALTER APPLICATION toru DISCONNECT joe:1
// .. and when stream is closed it is notified
[JIM] <- APPLICATION toru STREAMS 

// Also JOE receives notification that stream was closed
[JOE] <- APPLICATION toru STREAMS 

// JIM unregisters applicaton
[JIM] -> DELETE APPLICATION toru 
[JIM] <- DELETE APPLICATION toru

// JOE unregisters applicaton
[JOE] -> DELETE APPLICATION toru 
[JOE] <- DELETE APPLICATION toru

My Profile enhancements

PROFILE object allows to * set and get all profile fields as UI * setup the call forwarding rules

-> GET/SET PROFILE
   { FULLNAME text
   | BIRTHDAY yyyymmdd           // 0 is returned if not set; no partial birthday allowed
   | SEX {MALE|FEMALE|UNKNOWN}
   | LANGUAGES [lang[ lang]*]    // lang is two letter ISO code (en, de, et)
   | COUNTRY iso2 name           // iso2 - two letter ISO code; name - country name
   | PROVINCE text
   | CITY text
   | PHONE_HOME text
   | PHONE_OFFICE text
   | PHONE_MOBILE text
   | HOMEPAGE text
   | ABOUT text
   | MOOD_TEXT text
   | TIMEZONE offset             // offset is given in minutes from GMT
   }

Notes: * Windows 1.4 UI does not publish MOOD_TEXT and TIMEZONE (planned in 1.5) * Windows 1.4 UI allows only setting one language

Call forwarding setup

-> GET/SET PROFILE
   { CALL_NOANSWER_TIMEOUT timeout                    // timeout for call forwarding
   | CALL_NOANSWER_ACTION {reject|forward|voicemail}  // action if user does not answer
   | CALL_FORWARD_RULES [start_time,end_time,{username|+PSTN}[ start_time,end_time,{username|+PSTN}]*]
   }

• start_time - in seconds when connecting to this number/user starts
• end_time - in seconds when ringing to this number/user ends
• username - another Skype username to forward call
• +PSTN - PSTN number to forward a call (on forwarder expense)
• call can be forwarded multiple numbers: 0,45,jim 46,150,joe
• numbers can overlap in time (all ring, first one to pick wins): 0,45,jim 0,45,joe

Notes: * Skype Windows 1.4 UI defaults to no-answer timeout 15 seconds * Skype Windows 1.4 UI defaults to 0,45 start and endtime in rules * Skype Windows 1.4 UI allows to set max 3 numbers

More control over UI

New OPEN commands:

-> OPEN
   { PROFILE                // view my profile
   | USERINFO username      // view other user profile
   | CONFERENCE             // open create conference dialog
   | SEARCH                 // open search form
   | OPTIONS [page]         // open options dialog
   | CALLHISTORY            // focus call history tab
   | CONTACTS               // focus contacts tab
   | DIALPAD                // focus dial tab
   | SENDCONTACTS           // open send contacts dialog
   | BLOCKEDUSERS           // open blocked users dialog
   | IMPORTCONTACTS         // open import contacts wizard
   | GETTINGSTARTED         // open getting started wizard
   | AUTHORIZATION username // open ask authorization dialog (this can change) 
   }

• Options page: general, privacy, notifications, soundalerts, sounddevices, hotkeys, connection, voicemail, callforward, video, advanced

Notification of when contactlist focus changes:

<- CONTACTS FOCUSED username  // when contact gains focus
<- CONTACTS FOCUSED           // when loses focus

Other improvements

New USER object properties

-> GET USER username 
   { MOOD_TEXT              // mood text for user
   | ALIASES test           // list of assigned aliases
   | TIMEZONE offset        // time offset from GMT in minutes
   }

Following privacy settings apply: * ALIASES is visible only as result of direct match for alias search * MOOD_TEXT is visible only for authorized contacts

Notes: * Windows 1.4 UI does not publish MOOD_TEXT and TIMEZONE (planned in 1.5)

Query if ringtones are enabled:

-> GET RINGTONE  STATUS
<- RINGTONE  {ON|OFF}

• notice that "GET RINGTONE id" command still returns filename

Expressive content (see http://personal.skype.com/) support for SET RINGTONE/AVATAR

Support expressive content ID-s

-> SET RINGTONE 
   * 1101 - Ringtone
   * 1102 - Ringback tone
   * 1103 - Busy tone
   * 1104 - Dialing tone
   * 1105 - Connecting sound
   * 1202 - Resume sound
   * 1203 - Hangup sound
   * 1204 - Incoming message sound
   * 1205 - Online alert sound

Supports .skype files:

-> SET RINGTONE id filename:idx    // idx refers to content number (0,...)
-> SET AVATAR id filename:idx

Notes: * .skype files can contain multiple contents which are enumerated by integer ID-s (idx)

skype: URI handler (not related to API)

Not related to API but could be useful in development.

General syntax

SKYPE_URI    = "skype:" [targets] ["?" query ] ["#" fragment ]

targets      = 1* (target / ";" )

target       = identity / PSTN

identity     = skypename / alias

skypename    = 1*(ALPHA / DIGIT / "." / "," ) ; to be clarified

skypenames   =  1*( skypename / ";")

alias        =  ... ; see ["TechGroup/DataFormats"]
                    ; unicode chars are in UTF-8 and % encoded; see RFC3987 uchar mapping

PSTN         = "+" (DIGIT / ALPHA ) *(DIGIT / ALPHA / "-" )   ; supports +800-FLOWERS

query        = action [ *( "?" term "=" conditon ) ] 

term         = 1*ALPHA

condition    = 1*unserved   ; to be clarified

fragment     = 1*unserved   ; to be clarified

Skype for Windows 1.4 version handles following:

skype:                           ; focus / open skype UI
skype:                  ; take default double-click action on contact 
skype:?call             ; call to target(s): can be skypename, alias or PSTN
skype:?chat          ; start chat/multichat with skypename(s)
skype:?voicemail      ; leave voicemail to skypename
skype:?add            ; add skypename to contactlist; show authorization dialog
skype:?sendfile      ; open sendfile dialog to skypenames
skype:?userinfo       ; show info (profile) for 
skype:?chat&id=[#time]       ; open existing multichat with ; time: YYYY-MM-DDThh:mm:ssTZ / YYYY-MM-DDZhh:mm:ss

Examples: * skype:echo123 * skype:echo123?call * skype:echo123?chat

Notice that there is no “//” in skype: URI - skype://echo123 does not work.