This simple Flask server with Twilio integration is designed to help us conduct a daily survey, as part of our cultural probe for our human computer interaction project. The server is hardcoded to send text messages at 9:00AM every day for roughly 7 days, asking users how many times they expect to take the bus each day. The users can respond with a number (0-10) and the server records the users' responses in data.csv. If a user enters invalid input, the server will store their response in a separate file error_logs.txt.
Before doing anything, you'll need to download ngrok and relocate it to the root of this project's directory.
Next, enter Twilio credentials in the start.sh shell script, change permissions on the script file using chmod <number> start.sh so that it is executable (if not already). The <number> should probably be 700 if you want the script to be private (i.e. only you can read, write, execute) or 755 if you want those same permissions but everyone else will only have read and execute permissions.
Also make sure to update participants.json so the Flask server knows to whom it should send the survey!
- Run
./start.shto run the Flask server. - In a separate shell, run
./ngrok http <FLASK_PORT> - Copy the last entry that ngrok displays (the 'https' one). Use it to configure your Twilio webhooks for the appropriate outgoing phone number. Make sure to add '/sms' at the end so it matches the route we declared in our simple Flask app!
Flask, Twilio's Python SDK, ngrok