The Firefox and Thunderbird Add-on Telify recognizes phone numbers on web pages or in email messages and converts them into clickable links. This works with many CTI applications, SIP clients, Skype, Netmeeting, snom phones, the AGFEO TK-Suite client, SerVonic IXI-PCS and others. In general, all telephony software, devices or interfaces which can be controlled by using a URL, will most likely enable you to call a phone number directly from your browser or email client.
This is done by passing the phone number to the configured system protocol handler and from there to the application which registered this protocol handler. Just like an URL starting with "http", a link can also start with other protocol handlers, e.g. "tel", "sip" or "skype". Applications like Skype or X-Lite register an appropriate protocol handler in the system upon installation. So after installing Skype and using an URL starting with the protocol handler "skype", a phone number can be called directly from the browser.
Phone numbers on a webpage or in an email which are recognized by Telify are highlighted with a light yellow background. When you click on a number, a small menu appears which is initially mostly empty. The first row contains the number as shown on the web page. By clicking on this menu item the phone number is dialed "as is". Unfortunately, in most cases this is not what you want.
In most cases, for successfully dialing a phone number given on web page or in an email message, you need the correct country calling code, either because you want to call to another country or because the application you are using doesn't work without one. Most web page authors don't account for that, especially in the US. Please note, that Skype and many other applications don't work with a phone number without a country code. This also applies to phone numbers of your own country!
Fortunately the solution is just one click away. The last menu item of the phone number menu is "Edit phone number". When you click on this item, a dialog appears where you can choose a suitable country calling code for every country in the world. After choosing a country code and clicking the Dial button, this code is prepended at the start of the phone number and it is dialed as if it had this country code in the first place. Moreover, the Add-on is storing your most recently used country codes and from now on you can select every phone number with this country code directly from the dial menu. The size of this list can be configured.
When clicking on a phone number on a web page whose URL ends in a country-code top-level domain (e.g. .de or .uk) or a top-level domain specific to some country (e.g. .mil, .gov or .edu), the corresponding country calling code is automatically listed in the dial menu for convenience.
What happens when you have a phone number on a web page, but Telify doesn't recognize it as a phone number? Just select the number with the mouse and click right to open the context menu. Choose "Phone number selection" from the context menu to open the usual dial menu. This also works with vanity phone numbers. The letters are automatically converted to their corresponding digits.