Making a phone call in an iOS application - ios

Question

I have some code which attempts to make a call within an application, but it doesn't seem to be working:
UIApplication *myApp = [UIApplication sharedApplication];
NSString *theCall = [NSString stringWithFormat:#"tel://%#",phone];
NSLog(#"making call with %#",theCall);
[myApp openURL:[NSURL URLWithString:theCall]];
Sometimes, the variable phone is something such as #"[phone]". How can I make a call with a phone number like this? Do I need to manually extract the numbers out of it and get rid of all the extra punctuation?

Answer 1

Yup. You need to take those out yourself. Or you can use the snippet below...
NSString *cleanedString = [[phoneNumber componentsSeparatedByCharactersInSet:[[NSCharacterSet characterSetWithCharactersInString:#"0123456789-+()"] invertedSet]] componentsJoinedByString:#""];
NSURL *telURL = [NSURL URLWithString:[NSString stringWithFormat:#"tel:%#", cleanedString]];
Note: you may be tempted to use -stringByTrimmingCharactersInSet:, but that one only removes characters at the start and the end of the string, not if they appear in the middle.

Answer 2

To go back to original app you can use telprompt:// instead of tel:// - The tell prompt will prompt the user first, but when the call is finished it will go back to your app:
NSString *phoneNumber = [#"telprompt://" stringByAppendingString:mymobileNO.titleLabel.text];
[[UIApplication sharedApplication] openURL:[NSURL URLWithString:phoneNumber]];
just an update on above answer.

Answer 3

Here's a simple method that can be used to make a call and return to the app after the call is finished.
Add the following to your .m file
- (void) dialNumber:(NSString*) number{
number = [#"telprompt://" stringByAppendingString:number];
[[UIApplication sharedApplication] openURL:[NSURL URLWithString:number]];
}
Then add the following code wherever you want to make the call from:
[self dialNumber:#"5031234567"];