Communication protocols for channels in Aura

Introduction

Channels can talk with Aura through two different communication protocols: Microsoft Direct Line and Auraline or through any aura-bridge adapter.

• On one hand, Aura platform is based on Microsoft Azure Bot Service and Bot Framework and leans on the mechanisms, SDK, tools, and techniques provided by this bot engine to implement intelligent bots.
  Microsoft Azure Bot Service allows the integration of different channels used by final users to interact with bot instances through a general-purpose communication mechanism called Direct Line API.
  Channels can use this protocol through the Aura Request – Response Semantic Model, within the channelData property, used by Aura to define the model in any of the available versions: v1, v2 or the normalized one v3.

  Find detailed information regarding Direct Line communication protocol

• On the other hand, Aura Platform Team has developed a new communication protocol: Auraline. It is based on Direct Line but with significant advantages as it is a proprietary one and, consequently, eliminates the dependency on Microsoft.
  Channels can use this protocol through the Aura Request – Response Semantic Model, within the version v3 of the channelData property.

  Find detailed information regarding Auraline communication protocol

• Other channels that do not support Direct Line (and consequently, Auraline) will be able to connect to Aura through aura-bridge adapters. This is the case of WhatsApp and Google RCS channels. These adapters “translate” the information coming from the channel to a language Aura can understand. The adapters are provided by aura-bridge and are based on the last version of the standard Aura request/response model.

Flowchart of general scenario regarding communication protocols in Aura

The feasible scenario for channels to communicate with Aura is schematically shown below:

• Aura communication protocols:
  Communication through Direct Line, Auraline or aura-bridge channel adapter

Auraline communication protocol is firstly conceived for a call center that aggregates different individual channels (call-center as a service), due to Direct Line limitations to manage this scenario. See details in the section Specific scenario for the use of Auraline communication protocol: CCaaS.