I just assumed from first glance that this was an early April Fools (I guess it must be April 1st in Australia by now) But after seeing full API docs... is this real? I'm so confused!
There is a TON of faxing still going on
Programmable Fax – API for sending and receiving faxes
31–40 of 174 posts
Re: Programmable Fax – API for sending and receiving faxes
#32Came up with a use case for this within our current product within 30 seconds of seeing this, love it!
Re: Programmable Fax – API for sending and receiving faxes
#33now if they could implement barcode recognition for inbound faxes and plug into taskrouter they would have a very compelling offering.
What's the use case for barcode recognition? Sorry I've never had to use faxes much myself so I'm curious.
Re: Programmable Fax – API for sending and receiving faxes
#34Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes. I'm not skeptical that fax is safer than email. I'm skeptical that it's safe. I see all sorts of things I shouldn't see when searching the pile of papers on the fax machine at a large company for my fax.
> I see all sorts of things I shouldn't see when searching the pile of papers on the fax machine at a large company for my fax. That's not an issue of the security of fax as a transmission method, it's a problem with your company's security at the fax endpoint.
Does it matter? The point is that fax isn't inherently a great idea for confidential info.
There's also the issue that many fax endpoints that are fax to email gateways. Or fax to non https website gateways.
Edit: Nobody is arguing for using email instead of fax. The argument is to use something better. Like paypal or stripe instead of full cc info + cvv2 on a piece of paper.
Re: Programmable Fax – API for sending and receiving faxes
#35now if they could implement barcode recognition for inbound faxes and plug into taskrouter they would have a very compelling offering.
Is there a reason why you can't do that yourself? It looks like you get image data access; plug in any old barcode reading library and you're golden.
Re: Programmable Fax – API for sending and receiving faxes
#36I just assumed from first glance that this was an early April Fools (I guess it must be April 1st in Australia by now) But after seeing full API docs... is this real? I'm so confused!
It seems like it actually isn't, though this was my first thought too: https://techcrunch.com/2017/03/31/twilio-now-lets-developers...
(I'm glad 1st April is a Saturday this year so I can mostly not be near a computer for it to avoid the intensely twee irritation of it all.)
Re: Programmable Fax – API for sending and receiving faxes
#37The shocking thing about this is that there must still be enough Faxes being sent to actually justify this new product. Where are they still used at 'scale'?
A lot of the Uber-for-food-delivery startups use them for ordering at restaurants because there is no text-based API to restaurants and the UX of receiving an automated phone call is poor. They're pervasive in finance, insurance, employee benefits, etc. They're also a good one-to-many API multiplexer. So many businesses can take a fax and have a human operate on it that many software companies can use them to add act…
My understanding is that holding a fax copy of a contract with a signature is as good in court as holding the contract itself.
But holding a PDF of same is not.
Re: Programmable Fax – API for sending and receiving faxes
#38This has been kicked around for a really long time and I'm happy they finally launched it. Around 2013 or so, one of the junior engineers on the Twilio Voice team pitched his innovation week project with a single slide saying "Fax: The time is now." The time has finally arrived! Congrats John.
Guessing this will kill Phaxio. Compare the pricing: https://www.twilio.com/fax/pricing https://www.phaxio.com/pricing/
it's amazing that phaxio have gotten away with such high prices for so long.
Re: Programmable Fax – API for sending and receiving faxes
#39The shocking thing about this is that there must still be enough Faxes being sent to actually justify this new product. Where are they still used at 'scale'?
A lot of the Uber-for-food-delivery startups use them for ordering at restaurants because there is no text-based API to restaurants and the UX of receiving an automated phone call is poor. They're pervasive in finance, insurance, employee benefits, etc. They're also a good one-to-many API multiplexer. So many businesses can take a fax and have a human operate on it that many software companies can use them to add act…
> food-delivery
So it's easier/cheaper for a restaurant to have a dedicated phone line for faxing (plus fax and supplies) than connect a printer to a PC?
Is this because someone needs to actually print incoming emails or orders? And if yes, is there an opportunity for some kind of software solution that would always print what it receives, with no human intervention?
Re: Programmable Fax – API for sending and receiving faxes
#40The shocking thing about this is that there must still be enough Faxes being sent to actually justify this new product. Where are they still used at 'scale'?
Very widely used in health care and insurance industries.