Building and Testing USSD and SMS Applications

Building and Testing USSD and SMS Applications, available at $59.99, has an average rating of 4.5, with 153 lectures, based on 158 reviews, and has 851 subscribers.

You will learn about Uses of USSD applications Relationship between USSD applications and mobile network operators (MNO) Types of SMS – Two-way SMS (shortcode), Premium SMS (selling content to users using SMS) and branded SMS (sender ID/alphanumeric) USSD handling (USSD-MO & USSD-MT) The HTTP protocol, Object Oriented PHP and PHP inbuilt functions Designing USSD menus USSD menus navigation – Going forward, going back and going back to main menu Handling Invalid entries in USSD menus Testing USSD menus using postman and ngrok Connecting USSD menu to application logic Connecting USSD application to MySQL database Adding SMS functionality to USSD application Testing USSD application using simulator/sandbox Moving USSD application from sandbox to live environment Exploring Africas Talking USSD and SMS gateway Monetizing USSD and SMS application This course is ideal for individuals who are College students in IT and computer science or College professors/lecturers or Marketers or Industry experts in IT or Entrepreneurs It is particularly useful for College students in IT and computer science or College professors/lecturers or Marketers or Industry experts in IT or Entrepreneurs.

Enroll now: Building and Testing USSD and SMS Applications

Summary

Title: Building and Testing USSD and SMS Applications

Price: $59.99

Average Rating: 4.5

Number of Lectures: 153

Number of Published Lectures: 153

Number of Curriculum Items: 153

Number of Published Curriculum Objects: 153

Original Price: $29.99

Quality Status: approved

Status: Live

What You Will Learn

Uses of USSD applications

Relationship between USSD applications and mobile network operators (MNO)

Types of SMS – Two-way SMS (shortcode), Premium SMS (selling content to users using SMS) and branded SMS (sender ID/alphanumeric)

USSD handling (USSD-MO & USSD-MT)

The HTTP protocol, Object Oriented PHP and PHP inbuilt functions

Designing USSD menus

USSD menus navigation – Going forward, going back and going back to main menu

Handling Invalid entries in USSD menus

Testing USSD menus using postman and ngrok

Connecting USSD menu to application logic

Connecting USSD application to MySQL database

Adding SMS functionality to USSD application

Testing USSD application using simulator/sandbox

Moving USSD application from sandbox to live environment

Exploring Africas Talking USSD and SMS gateway

Monetizing USSD and SMS application

Who Should Attend

College students in IT and computer science

College professors/lecturers

Marketers

Industry experts in IT

Entrepreneurs

Target Audiences

College students in IT and computer science

College professors/lecturers

Marketers

Industry experts in IT

Entrepreneurs

In this course, you will have the opportunity to learn how USSD apps are related the GSM network. The course covers how to build menu driven USSD apps and how to integrate it with different types of SMS such as shortcode, branded SMS and premium SMS. USSD menu navigation will cover, go back, go forward, go to main menu and detecting invalid entries.

The course will teach you how design and build apps, which will deliver services to any type of phone – including feature phones. It also teaches you how to choose an SMS and USSD gateway as well as how to monetize you USSD skills (especially for entrepreneurs).

This course is hands on and throughout it, we will build a complete mobile money application based on USSD using PHP, MySQL. In addition, throughout the course we use other tools such as Postman, Composer, Ngrok, apache web server and USSD simulator as well as the HTTP protocol.

In summary, the course is organized into the following sections:

Introduction to USSD and SMS Applications

Introduction to PHP programming language and HTTP protocol

Building and Testing USSD Application Menu

Adding application functionality or logic to the USSD Menus

Adding SMS functionality to the USSD application –two-way, branded, and premium SMS

Moving from SANDBOX environment to LIVE environment

Monetizing USSD and SMS Applications

Course Curriculum

Chapter 1: Course Introduction

Lecture 1: USSD and SMS course preview

Lecture 2: USSD and SMS course outline

Lecture 3: Skills and tools

Lecture 4: Which programming language do you need

Chapter 2: Introduction to USSD and SMS Applications

Lecture 1: Chapter 2 outline

Lecture 2: USSD Handling or signaling

Lecture 3: What is USSD, why USSD, USSD and SMS compared

Lecture 4: Types of SMS

Lecture 5: Options available to building USSD application

Lecture 6: Length of USSD sessions

Lecture 7: Benefits and Drawbacks of USSD Applications

Lecture 8: Uses or Applications of USSD Apps

Lecture 9: The Applications we Will Build in this Course – Mobile Money App

Chapter 3: Introduction to PHP programming language and HTTP protocol

Lecture 1: Chapter 3 preview

Lecture 2: Setting up Apache webserver and MySQL DBMS using XAMPP

Lecture 3: Setting up Postman

Lecture 4: PHP variables and data types

Lecture 5: PHP functions

Lecture 6: PHP functions – substr

Lecture 7: PHP functions – str_replace

Lecture 8: PHP functions – explode

Lecture 9: PHP functions – array_shift

Lecture 10: PHP functions – count

Lecture 11: PHP functions – array_slice

Lecture 12: PHP functions – array_merge

Lecture 13: PHP functions – join

Lecture 14: PHP functions – array_search

Lecture 15: PHP functions – unset

Lecture 16: PHP functions – array_splice

Lecture 17: PHP POST and GET HTTP methods

Lecture 18: Object Oriented Programming PHP (classes, objects member variables) – Part 1

Lecture 19: Object Oriented Programming PHP (classes, objects member variables) – Part 2

Lecture 20: PHP, PDO and MySQL Database – Connecting to database and handling Transactions

Lecture 21: PHP’s hashing API – password hash and password verify

Lecture 22: Understanding HTTP protocol structure

Chapter 4: Building and Testing USSD Application Menu

Lecture 1: Building and testing USSD menus chapter preview

Lecture 2: Factors to consider when choosing USSD gateway aggregator

Lecture 3: The Application USSD Menu

Lecture 4: Designing our Application Database – Part 1

Lecture 5: Designing our Application Database – Part 2

Lecture 6: Two ways of consuming an API

Lecture 7: Setting up in Ngrok

Lecture 8: Exploring USSD aggregator

Lecture 9: Creating the entry point to our USSD and SMS application

Lecture 10: Creating a USSD service code and adding a callback URL

Lecture 11: Testing your first USSD application

Lecture 12: Understanding the source code for your first USSD application

Lecture 13: How to track your USSD sessions and session errors

Lecture 14: Restructuring app entry point file and the Menu class

Lecture 15: Adding the USSD main menu

Lecture 16: Completing the logic for the application entry point file

Lecture 17: Completing the USSD register menu

Lecture 18: Testing the USSD register menu

Lecture 19: Adding a constants file – util.php file

Lecture 20: Completing send money menu

Lecture 21: Testing the send money menu

Lecture 22: Completing the withdraw money menu

Lecture 23: Testing the USSD withdraw menu

Lecture 24: Completing the check balance menu

Lecture 25: Testing the USSD check balance menu

Lecture 26: Testing USSD menus using Postman

Lecture 27: Designing ‘Go back’ and go to ‘Main menu’ USSD navigation

Lecture 28: Completing the ‘Main menu’ USSD menu

Lecture 29: Completing the ‘Go back’ USSD menu

Lecture 30: Testing the ‘Go back’ and ‘Main menu’ on Postman

Lecture 31: You can use Finite state Machine to create the menu

Chapter 5: Linking application functionality or logic to USSD Menus

Lecture 1: Linking application Logic to USSD menu chapter preview

Lecture 2: Establishing a database connection

Lecture 3: Designing the User class

Lecture 4: Completing the register user logic

Lecture 5: Wiring user registration logic to USSD menu

Lecture 6: Testing user registration from end to end

Lecture 7: Handling invalid menus instead of ending user session

Lecture 8: Replay USSD menu for invalid menu option

Lecture 9: Persisting user invalid menu option in a database

Lecture 10: Removing invalid menu options from user USSD string

Lecture 11: Testing the invalid menu option functionality

Lecture 12: Other locations where you will handle invalid input menu

Lecture 13: Completing check user wallet balance and user PIN correctness

Lecture 14: You can store invalid menu options in in-memory databases such as Redis instead

Lecture 15: Adding country code to user receiver phone number

Lecture 16: The structure of the Transactions class

Lecture 17: Send money logic

Lecture 18: Wiring send money logic to send money menu

Lecture 19: Removing a runtime syntax error in our code

Lecture 20: Testing send money feature from end-to-end

Lecture 21: Wiring check balance logic with check balance menu

Lecture 22: Test the check balance feature

Lecture 23: How do we withdraw cash

Lecture 24: Structure of the Agent class

Lecture 25: Completing withdraw cash logic

Lecture 26: Wiring withdraw cash logic to withdraw cash menu

Lecture 27: Testing the withdraw feature

Lecture 28: Testing the working application with simulator instead of Postman

Lecture 29: Receiving USSD notifications in your server

Instructors

Dr. Derdus Kenga
Software Engineer and Teacher

Rating Distribution

1 stars: 0 votes

2 stars: 2 votes

3 stars: 13 votes

4 stars: 59 votes

5 stars: 84 votes

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