Category Archives: Telephony

NOTE: The system referenced in this article is no longer supported by Nerd Vittles as this version of Asterisk has been phased out. For the latest and greatest, please consider our new PBX in a Flash offering.

It's been almost a year since we released our turnkey trixbox 1.2.3 system for Windows which relied upon CentOS 4 and Asterisk 1.2 and included all of the Nerd Vittles goodies. There have been dozens of security patches not to mention entirely new generations of Asterisk, trixbox, FreePBX, CentOS, MySQL, and PHP code. Just look at our pathetic graphic, and you'll know how much things have changed in the last year while we were building applications. As school begins this week, we decided to get a little education on our own, and we've begun the process of building a VMware image of trixbox 2.x with CentOS 5 and Asterisk 1.4 support. As frequent readers of our column already know, our #1 Pet Peeve is programmers that write new code that breaks other folks' existing code for no reason. We can quibble about what that means but basically Asterisk 1.4 needlessly breaks a lot of applications because of rip-and-replace syntax changes. It's certainly okay to add new command syntaxes, but why would you trash thousands of perfectly functional applications by refusing to add a few lines of code to translate the old syntax into the new one? Here's a good example. In previous versions of Asterisk, you set the timeout for responses from an IVR system with code that looked like this: exten => 611,4,ResponseTimeout(7). To do the same thing in Asterisk 1.4, the syntax looks like this: exten => 611,4,Set(TIMEOUT(response)=7). No big deal, you might be saying. Well, it's a VERY BIG DEAL! It breaks every IVR application on Planet Asterisk. <end of rant... well, almost>

Way back when we actually worked with programmers in years' past, we always started with the proposition that you shouldn't break something that already works when new versions of code are released. Unfortunately, this is a problem in the open source community and especially in our VoIP World. People get so excited to include new stuff in a new version that they forget/ignore/don't test features that were previously available. But we understand that betas do not have complete code sets, and we're using a trixbox 2.3 beta today to have some fun on the bleeding edge. So, be forewarned that everything may not be quite perfect. And, unfortunately, the new trixbox design makes it virtually impossible for mere mortals to add much code on their own to fix things. Lucky for all of us, there are some terrific scripts produced by Tom King. Tom has single-handedly taken over much of the drudgery of smoothing out some of the wrinkles in trixbox. And, thanks to Tom, we've pretty much gotten out of that business... until today.

One of the concerns expressed when Fonality acquired trixbox was that the trixbox code would languish. It certainly hasn't done that, but Bleeding Edge code can pose some problems of its own. We're going into this with our eyes wide open and our sleeves rolled up so... not to worry! We would hasten to add that Andrew and Kerry and the rest of their crew at Fonality have been tireless in their dedication to the trixbox platform. We're all grateful for all that they've done and continue to do. And Chris Lyman's support of the open source Asterisk community has been nothing short of fantastic as well! We just hope that some of what we cover today will find its way into the final trixbox 2.4 release... so we don't have to do this all over again in a month or two.

First, the Bad News. We don't have a finished VMware product for you yet because there was lots of Nerd Vittles code to rewrite. But we're darn close to a perfect Asterisk 1.4 platform with a huge helping hand from Tom. We thought it might be equally useful to walk through some of the challenges that await anyone who decides to try this alone (without Tom's script) on a dedicated Linux box. So here we go...

Let's begin with a summary of what we're starting with and what our objective will be. Digium® is pushing everyone to get off the 1.2 Asterisk® platform and move on to Asterisk 1.4. In fact, the end of life date for Asterisk 1.2 was August 1, 2007. We're going to avoid the temptation of explaining how unreasonable that date is in the telephony business (most phone systems are designed to last for a decade, not a year). Well, we did tell you. But let's move on. Then there's freePBX which is the terrific front-end to Asterisk. Remember, Asterisk 1.4 broke large chunks of their code. Here's their take on life with 1.4. The silver lining is that the freePBX development crew released the production version of 2.3 supporting Asterisk 1.4 this past Saturday. Now we get to trixbox which rolls together dozens of other products and has had to make generational leaps in the Linux distribution, MySQL,and PHP plus upgrades to the web server, FTP server, Perl, and on and on. When you recall that none of these products were designed by the same groups, you'll start to appreciate how daunting this task can become. Then there are the whiners like us that just write application software so that people can do cute tricks with their phone systems.

Once we get all the pieces talking to one another and functioning, there's the final issue of hardware. With CentOS 5 and Asterisk 1.4, the processor demands particularly to run this Asterisk-based PBX under VMware on your Windows desktop are substantial. For those accustomed to our speedy TrixBox 1.2.3 image, this one is not equivalent. We've always recommended using the free Process Explorer tool to bump up the Process Priority of vmware-vmx.exe and vmware.exe to 13 (High) on your Windows Desktop. Just highlight each application in the list of running apps and click Process, Set Priority, High. To get equivalent voice synthesis performance with CentOS 5 and Asterisk 1.4 on the identical machine now requires a setting of 24 (Realtime) for these apps which is all but unheard of on a Windows machine. If you happen to have a multi-processor machine or a new dual-core system with lots of RAM, you may be able to avoid this step. Just be forewarned that this new application probably isn't going to run satisfactorily on grandma's 3-year old Windows XP desktop.

Let the Downloads Begin. We begin this process by downloading the trixbox image. The one you'll want is 2.3.0.1 (not 2.3.0.2!). It has CentOS 5, Asterisk 1.4, and freePBX 2.3. Unfortunately, they're not the current and patched versions of any of these products because the world keeps changing every day. So you have a Hobson's Choice to make here. You can stick with the trixbox team and wait for them to release each little piece of the puzzle. Or you can convert your system into a more vanilla Linux distribution so that you can make changes yourself. Once you do this, however, you may break some of the cradle-to-grave trixbox support and the trixbox upgrade mechanism which also happens to require registration. Tom indicates that for most updates, this is not the case. Either way, we're doing this to enjoy the bleeding so, of course, we want the free and open model. This assures we can load what we need. YMMV! This conversion process used to be really painful, but now it's not. Why? Because Tom King has made it easy by providing a script that does all the conversion and upgrade work for you. Documentation for the script can be downloaded from Tom's site. We would hasten to add that we've been comparing notes with Tom so today's edition of Tom's script now includes almost all of the tweaks that follow.

After you install trixbox 2.3.0.1 (and we're doing this using VMware Workstation on a Windows desktop but it'll work similarly on a dedicated Linux installation), it's time to run Tom's script. Log into your trixbox server as root and issue the following commands. Note to NEWBIES: This column probably is not the best place for you to start your Asterisk exploration. Try one of the links at the top of this page. They just work... out of the box.

cd /root
wget http://nerdvittles.com/trixbox2/updatesrc14.sh.gz
gunzip updatesrc14.sh.gz
chmod +x updatesrc14.sh
dos2unix updatesrc14.sh
./updatesrc14.sh


The script takes a while to run and you're well advised to also open a separate SSH session to your new trixbox server with putty (also free) so that you can supply needed commands when prompted without having to stop and reboot your server to continue the upgrade process. The script may stop once in a while and, if it does, pressing <enter> will gets things moving again.

Upgrading freePBX. The most critical component of this new system is freePBX. Complete documentation for this incredible Asterisk web GUI can be accessed here. There's also an active set of forums plus the trixbox forums for more immediate assistance. Of particular note, there are only three known bugs with this version of freePBX, and those are minor. In fact, the final release of FreePBX 2.3 was released as we were putting the finishing touches on this article.

To get things going, restart your system after completion of the script above. Once Asterisk is running, use a web browser to access freePBX at the following address: http://serverIPaddress/admin/. The username is maint and the password is password. Click on the Setup tab and then Module Admin. Click Check for Updates on line. You'll need to download these in clumps. If you get errors loading some of them, skip those and move on. When you finish the rest, go back and try the ones that didn't install again. Then your system will be up to date. When you click the FreePBX System Status tab in the left column, the system will now tell you which new updates are available. Stay current! New goodies arrive regularly. You can safely ignore the warnings about the default MySQL and Asterisk Manager passwords being used. The default setup of trixbox protects these applications from the outside world so, unless you change the default settings to permit Internet access to MySQL or the Asterisk Manager, this isn't a problem.

Restoring Text-to-Speech Capabilities Using Flite. Most of the Nerd Vittles goody bag is dependent upon text-to-speech voice synthesis with Flite. It doesn't work with tribox 2.x as delivered. Here's how to restore it, but Tom's script will now do all of this for you. Otherwise, after a reboot, log into your trixbox server as root and issue the following commands (in order):

cd /root
wget http://mirrors.tummy.com/pub/fedora.redhat.com/fedora/linux/extras/5/i386/flite-1.3-8.fc5.i386.rpm
wget http://mirrors.tummy.com/pub/fedora.redhat.com/fedora/linux/extras/5/i386/flite-devel-1.3-8.fc5.i386.rpm
rpm -Uvh flite*
yum install subversion subversion-devel
svn co https://dialogpalette.svn.sourceforge.net/svnroot/dialogpalette dialogpalette
cd dialogpalette/trunk/asterisk-flite
make
make install
shutdown -r now


If, for some reason, one or more of the above sites isn't working, you can download and install the files directly from Nerd Vittles with these commands:

cd /root
wget http://nerdvittles.com/trixbox2/flite.zip
unzip flite.zip
cd flite
rpm -Uvh flite*
cd dialogpalette/trunk/asterisk-flite
make
make install
cd /root
rm -r flite
rm -f flite.zip
shutdown -r now


Bringing Music On Hold Back From the Dead. After the freePBX updates (and maybe before), Music on Hold didn't function for things as simple as placing an incoming call on hold. Here's how to get it back. Tom's script now includes the necessary code to fix this as well. Suffice it to say, there was a missing directory. And a license file was improperly named which caused Message on Hold to fail. For the time being, you need both a /var/lib/asterisk/moh and a /var/lib/asterisk/mohmp3 directory, and both need to contain all of your music on hold files. You also need to remove the LICENSE text file from both directories and copy one of the existing files to a new file named LICENSE.wav in both directories. Then music on hold will work.

Activating Email Delivery of Voicemail Messages. We've previously shown how to configure any trixbox system to reliably deliver email messages whenever a voicemail arrives unless your ISP happens to block downstream SMTP mail servers. Here's the link in case you need it. Just search for the following heading: Activating Email Delivery of VoiceMail Messages. As it happens, you really don't have to use a real fully-qualified domain name to get this working. So long as the entry (such as trixbox1.dyndns.org) is inserted in both the /etc/hosts file and /etc/extensions/vm_general.inc with a servermail entry of vm@trixbox1.dyndns.org (as explained in the link above), your system will reliably send emails to you whenever you get a voicemail if you configure your extensions in freePBX to support this capability. You can, of course, put in real host entries if you prefer.

Resurrecting phpMyAdmin. Many of the Nerd Vittles applications also rely heavily upon MySQL databases. The only way to make installation of these apps relatively painless to install is to have phpMyAdmin working on your trixbox system. Unfortunately, it's missing from the 2.3 beta and the trixbox repository. The easiest way to remedy this deficiency now is to run Tom's script. If you'd prefer to do it manually, here are the steps. Log into your server as root and issue these commands:

cd /var/www/html/maint
wget http://nerdvittles.com/trixbox2/phpmyadmin.zip
unzip phpmyadmin.zip
cd /var/lib/php
chmod -R o+rwx session

Once installed, you can access phpMyAdmin with your web browser by pointing to the IP address of your Asterisk server with a command like the following:

http://192.168.0.22/maint/phpmyadmin/


Reviving Asterisk Weather Station by Airport Code. We'll finish for today by getting one of the major Nerd Vittles weather apps working under Asterisk 1.4 just to demonstrate that text-to-speech functionality is back from the dead. In coming weeks, we'll fix the rest of our applications. The complete installation tutorial is available on our Best of Nerd Vittles site. Complete the Database Setup and Changing Preferred Airport Codes steps as explained in the tutorial. The Dialplan Setup is already included in the trixbox beta, but it uses some Asterisk 1.2 commands that no longer work. Here's how to fix it. While still logged into your Asterisk server as root, edit the extensions_trixbox.conf file:

nano -w /etc/asterisk/extensions_trixbox.conf

Scroll down the dialplan until you find the lines beginning with exten => 611. Replace lines 3 and 4 with the following new code:

exten => 611,3,Set(TIMEOUT(digit)=7)
exten => 611,4,Set(TIMEOUT(response)=10)

Save your changes: Ctrl-X, then Y, then <Enter>. Then complete the freePBX Setup, AGI Script Setup, and System Setup sections of the tutorial. Restart Asterisk and you're good to go: amportal restart. The whole process should take you less than 5 minutes to complete.

The Future is Now. Now that we've whetted your appetite, take a look at some of Tom's other scripts for trixbox. There's almost nothing you can't do with a few more minutes of work: X Windows/KDE, Daily Backups, G729 and G723 codecs, server SSL, and who knows what else by tomorrow. Enjoy your new sandbox!

Nerd Vittles Demo Hot Line (courtesy of les.net). You now can take a number of Nerd Vittles projects for a test drive... by phone! The current demos include (1) MailCall for Asterisk with password 1111 (retrieve your email by phone), (2) NewsClips for Asterisk (latest news headlines in dozens of categories), (3) Weather Forecasts by U.S. Airport Code, and (4) Weather Forecasts by U.S. ZIP Code. You're not prompted for #4 yet, but it does work! Just call our number (shown above) and take any or all of them for a spin. The sound quality may not be perfect due to performance limitations of our ancient Intel 386 demo machine. But the price is right.

Nerd Vittles Fan Club Map. Thanks for visiting! We hope you'll take a second and add yourself to our Frappr World Map. In making your entry, you can choose an icon: guy, gal, nerd, or geek. For those that don't know the difference in the last two, here's the best definition we've found: "a nerd is very similar to a geek, but with more RAM and a faster modem." We're always looking for the best BBQ joints on the planet. So, if you know of one, add it to the map while you're visiting as well.

Well, our Asterisk® Weather Stations providing U.S. weather reports by zip code and airport code using your phone have come unglued again thanks to some more "improvements" from the National Weather Service. One of the problems with depending upon the web data of other organizations (such as the National Weather Service) is that, when they shift gears, you have to make adjustments to your applications as well. So this week is cleanup time at Nerd Vittles. In its continuing quest for the perfect web site, the National Weather Service decided last week to drop support for their Forecast at a Glance. This caused some wrinkles in both the Asterisk Weather Station by Airport Code and Zip Code applications which didn't know how to interpret the new menu. Personally, we were always big supporters of more federal holidays because it meant the bureaucrats and politicians had less time to screw things up. As we've said before, this new "improvement" is another good example of what happens when federal workers have too much time on their hands.

All of the Nerd Vittles weather applications for Asterisk (except the new Worldwide Weather Forecasts) depend upon NOAA web site information at a web link that looks like the following. You can enter either a zip code or a city and state. When you go to the new links, you'll notice that Forecast at a Glance is no longer the first option on the menu.

http://www.srh.noaa.gov/port/port_zc.php?inputstring=Charleston,SC


Here are the step-by-step instructions to update each application. These instructions assume that you've already installed the Weather Applications previously. If not, just choose your desired installation from the Best of Nerd Vittles site.

Installing Weather by Airport Code Update. To install the Weather by Airport Code update, log into your Asterisk server as root and issue the following commands:

cd /var/lib/asterisk/agi-bin
rm -f nv-weather2-zip.*
wget http://nerdvittles.com/wp-content/nv-weather2.zip
mv nv-weather.php nv-weather.old3.php
unzip nv-weather2.zip
rm -f nv-weather2.zip
chmod 775 nv-weather.php
chown asterisk:asterisk nv-weather.php


Installing Weather by Zip Code Update. To install the Weather by Zip Code update, log into your Asterisk server as root and issue the following commands:

cd /var/lib/asterisk/agi-bin
rm -f nv-weather-zip.zip
wget http://nerdvittles.com/trixbox123/nv-weather-zip.zip
mv nv-weather-zip.php nv-weather-zip.old3.php
unzip nv-weather-zip.zip
rm -f nv-weather-zip.zip
chown asterisk:asterisk nv-weather-zip.php
chmod 775 nv-weather-zip.php


Test Driving the Latest Asterisk Weather Applications. To use the Asterisk Weather Station by Airport Code, pick up any phone connected to your Asterisk server and dial 611. When prompted, key in the three-character Airport Code for the weather report you wish to retrieve. Then sit back and listen to the latest weather report for your Airport Code from the National Weather Service.

To use the Asterisk Weather Station by Zip Code, pick up any phone connected to your Asterisk server and dial Z-I-P (947). When prompted, key in the five-digit Zip Code for the weather report you wish to retrieve. Then sit back and listen to the latest weather report for your Zip Code from the National Weather Service.

Nerd Vittles Demo Hot Line (courtesy of les.net). You now can take a number of Nerd Vittles projects for a test drive... by phone! The current demos include (1) MailCall for Asterisk with password 1111 (retrieve your email by phone), (2) NewsClips for Asterisk (latest news headlines in dozens of categories), (3) Weather Forecasts by U.S. Airport Code, and (4) Weather Forecasts by U.S. ZIP Code. You're not prompted for #4 yet, but it does work! Just call our number (shown in the left margin) and take any or all of them for a spin. The sound quality may not be perfect due to performance limitations of our ancient Intel 386 demo machine. But the price is right.

Nerd Vittles Fan Club Map. Thanks for visiting! We hope you'll take a second and add yourself to our Frappr World Map compliments of Google. In making your entry, you can choose an icon: guy, gal, nerd, or geek. For those that don't know the difference in the last two, here's the best definition we've found: "a nerd is very similar to a geek, but with more RAM and a faster modem." We're always looking for the best BBQ joints on the planet. So, if you know of one, add it to the map while you're visiting as well.

Some Recent Nerd Vittles Articles of Interest...

AsteriDex Security Alert. Because of a security vulnerability in our AsteriDex robodialer, you should download and install the following patch to protect your system if AsteriDex is accessible from the public Internet or if your private network is used by individuals other than your immediate (trustworthy) family. Log into your Asterisk® server as root and issue the following commands. We also recommend you change the name of the asteridex folder to something that only you know. For further security precautions, read the Hardening Your System section of the Best of Nerd Vittles article.

cd /var/www/html/asteridex
rm -f callboth.php
wget http://nerdvittles.com/trixbox11/callboth.zip
unzip callboth.zip
rm -f callboth.zip
chown asterisk:asterisk callboth.php
chmod 775 callboth.php


NOTE: This version of TeleYapper works with Asterisk 1.2 only. For Asterisk 1.4, read our new article on TeleYapper 4.0 or visit our Best of Nerd Vittles site.

WARNING: New federal regulations regarding robodialers go into effect on September 1, 2009. Before you use this software, make absolutely certain that you are in compliance with the new regulations regarding calls that deliver a prerecorded message! You can download the regulations here.

To start July off with a bang, we're back today with TeleYapper 3.0, an updated version of our Asterisk-based telephone broadcasting service. For those with multiple outbound trunks, TeleYapper 3.0 now supports simultaneous calls using multiple trunks. Special thanks to Matt Frederickson for the code. Version 3 works with all flavors of Asterisk@Home 2.x as well as most versions of TrixBox. We haven't tested it with Asterisk 1.4, but tips from others suggest that it'll work just fine with the DigitTimeout and ResponseTimeout tweaks that already are incorporated into TeleYapper 3.0. If you're running an earlier version of Asterisk@Home, use our version 1 code and tutorial. And, just like the original and version 2.5, TeleYapper 3.0 can be used for neighborhood association announcements, schools, little leagues, fundraisers, municipal governments, and anyone else that just wants to pester folks with annoying, but free, prerecorded phone calls.

Everything you'll need to get TeleYapper 3.0 dialing away is in this article. And functionally, TeleYapper still works identically to prior versions. The only problem was version 1 didn't work at all with AAH 2.4 and 2.5. For those new to TeleYapper, here's what happens. You create a recorded message using Asterisk. Then you create a list of phone numbers to call in a MySQL database using a tool such as phpMyAdmin which is bundled with TrixBox and Asterisk@Home. Finally, you place a phone call either to kick off TeleYapper or to redial calls that failed the first time around. The software will dutifully swing into action and call qualifying phone numbers from any of ten calling categories that you specify when you set up your database of callees. TeleYapper then will deliver the message you've recorded. It works much like call-em-all.com and numerous other telephone broadcasting services with one important difference: TeleYapper is FREE! So, instead of paying 15¢ a call or $35 to $100 a month for a commercial service or spending thousands of dollars for a commercial dialer, now you can do it yourself using TeleYapper and your (also free) TrixBox PBX. Look at the top of this page (just below the Nerd Vittles header) for links to Windows, Mac, and Linux versions of TrixBox that are perfectly suited for use with TeleYapper. Today we'll actually get TeleYapper making calls and emailing you the results of those calls. Don't be intimidated by the length of the article. You can still complete this project in about 30 minutes. It's mostly a cut-and-paste exercise. If you're using one of our TrixBox builds which we just described, then this is less than a 5-minute upgrade. In either case, we've done all the hard work for you.

Legalese. For those that are used to buying flawless software such as Microsoft Windows or Microsoft Office, let's be sure we're all on the same page up front. First, you're not buying this software. It's FREE! And, yes, sometimes you get what you pay for. Second, don't assume today's version is error-free. It's probably not. We try pretty hard to write reliable code, but even the best among us make mistakes. Third, by downloading or using this software, you are agreeing to assume all risks associated with use of the software. NO WARRANTIES EXPRESS OR IMPLIED INCLUDING ITS FITNESS FOR USE OR MERCHANTABILITY ARE PROVIDED WITH THIS SOFTWARE. And, finally, read or reread Part I of this series concerning Do Not Call statutes in your jurisdiction and make sure you are in compliance before placing any calls. Failure to heed this advice may subject you to serious criminal and civil penalties. If any of this gives you heartburn, exercise your constitutional right to not use the software.

Overview. Today's TeleYapper update provides a good framework for anyone wanting to write Asterisk AGI scripts using PHP. The code is well-documented to demonstrate how to pass variables to an AGI script from your dialplan and how to retrieve variables from an Asterisk AGI script into your dialplan. We needed this for TeleYapper because we're using a phone call to an Interactive Voice Response (IVR) session embedded in the dialplan to begin the calling process. We use the IVR session not only to determine which group of callees to call but also to give the caller the option of placing a call to everyone in the group or just those to whom the initial call was unsuccessful. After the caller hangs up, the results are passed to the teleyapper.php application to do the heavy lifting. The PHP program takes advantage of an AGI script's ability to actually set dialplan code in motion once a call is answered. In order to log calls and track which ones are successful, we have to pass variables into that dialplan code and then execute another PHP script when the call is completed. Stated another way, every call requires two round-trips from the Asterisk dialplan to PHP/AGI scripts. So, if you can't figure out how to pass variables back and forth using this application, you probably should consider another line of work. For those that just want to use the TeleYapper application and not learn much of anything about programming, you're welcome to do that subject to the license agreement which follows. We hope you'll put it to good use for the betterment of a school, an intramural sports program, or a neighborhood in which you happen to live.

Licensing. We are retaining ownership of this software as well as the copyright. It is licensed for use under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial license. A Plain English summary is available here. We've done this primarily to do our part to stamp out the telemarketing creeps of the world. Those wishing to use TeleYapper in a commercial environment must first request a license outlining your proposed terms of use. We will promptly respond with a yay or nay. Telemarketers need not apply!

TeleYapper in a Nutshell. Before we get to the code, let's briefly cover how this message broadcasting system works. When you dial 674, the TeleYapper system will answer and prompt you for your password. Once you correctly enter the password, an interactive voice response (IVR) system will swing into action and give you several choices. That's what the [yapper] context handles. Pressing 1 lets you listen to your prerecorded TeleYapper message (if you have one). You don't yet so don't press 1. Pressing 2 lets you record a new TeleYapper message. This is handled by the [yapper2] context. Do this first and record something ... anything. You can rerecord a new message at any time by choosing option 2 again. Pressing 3 lets you kick off a TeleYapper dialing spree. It's handled by the [yapper3] context. Don't do this until we add your new database below, or you'll get smoke. If you choose option 3 to initiate a TeleYapper calling session, the system will first prompt you for a group option number to use. This is managed by the [yapper-options] context. Simply stated, when you build your database of callees for TeleYapper, you can specify a one-digit group number for each entry in the file. Then, when you begin a calling session, you can narrow down the calling group by telling TeleYapper which group of callees to call. If you want a callee to be in more than one group, you simply enter that callee into the database multiple times with different group numbers. If you want everyone in the same group, then enter 0 for every person in your database.

Once you specify the group number during your TeleYapper session, the system will actually look up and report back how many messages will be delivered to the callee group you've chosen. Allison will say something like this assuming there were 146 calls to be placed: "The number I have is one hundred and forty six messages." This will give you the count of qualifying records in the database and the option of proceeding with the calls, cancelling the transaction, or just redialing the numbers of the calls that failed to this group on the previous pass through the database. As noted previously, we've endeavored to build this entire application using the voice prompts that are delivered with Asterisk@Home and TrixBox so they're not quite perfect. But they work reasonably well once you understand how the pieces fit together. You're supposed to be nodding in agreement now.

TeleYapper's Calling Process. For those that like lists, it may help to visualize how all the TeleYapper code fits together by laying out the actual program steps in a typical call:

The TeleYapper code not only handles the actual dialing of the callees you've entered in your MySQL database (teleyapper.php), it also plays your message when a callee answers (dialplan contexts), and documents what happened during the calls (teleyapper2.php). Call progress is documented in two ways. First, when a call is completed, TeleYapper will log the date and time of the call as well as a best guess of what happened during the call in your MySQL database. So browsing entries in your TeleYapper database will always show the date, time, and status of the last completed call to each callee. We'll build a web interface for this one of these days. Second, when you install the TeleYapper PHP components, there are some configuration options which will also let you create a detailed log of what happened during the TeleYapper calls. If you have email working reliably on your Asterisk system, you also can enter your email address and tell TeleYapper to email you every log that is produced. There are log entries for the initial call setup (handled by teleyapper.php) and for the placement of the individual calls (handled by teleyapper2.php). Finally, you have the option of creating a new log with each series of calls that are placed (the default setting), or you can configure TeleYapper to keep adding to the end of the initial log. In the latter case, it's up to you to erase the log before it fills up your disk. Individual call entries, if logged, will be appended to the main TeleYapper call setup log (/var/log/asterisk/teleyapper.txt).

To keep things simple, everything you'll need to make TeleYapper work is covered in this article even though we've covered some of this in our previous TeleYapper articles. Here are the components that make up the complete TeleYapper system, and we'll cover them below in the order which simplifies the installation process:

Upgrading from TeleYapper 2.5. If you're using one of our preconfigured TrixBox 1.2.3 systems from the links at the top of this page or if you have an existing TeleYapper 2.5 system which is working, then the upgrade to TeleYapper 3.0 is a piece of cake. You only need to download and replace the teleyapper.php AGI script located in /var/lib/asterisk/agi-bin on your TrixBox system. Just log into your Asterisk server as root and execute the commands below to install the new code. Then adjust the default settings as described below to meet your needs. That's it. You're done!

cd /var/lib/asterisk/agi-bin
wget http://nerdvittles.com/trixbox123/teleyapper30.zip
mv teleyapper.php teleyapper25.php
unzip teleyapper30.zip
rm teleyapper30.zip
chmod 775 teleyapper.php
chown asterisk:asterisk teleyapper.php


Creating the TeleYapper Database. We use the MySQL database management system to manage the list of callees for TeleYapper to dial. It can handle a database of almost any size and generally stands up well in performance comparisons with Oracle. So you're covered on the database front.

To create the MySQL database to support TeleYapper, the easiest way is using phpMyAdmin. On Asterisk@Home systems, use a web browser pointed to your Asterisk server and choose: AMP->Maintenance->phpMyAdmin. On TrixBox systems, choose System Administration and then phpMyAdmin from the maintenancemenu. When phpMyAdmin loads, click on the SQL icon in the left column. When the SQL window appears, clear the existing SQL query and then cut-and-paste the following SQL code into that box and then click the Go button. When the import completes, click the teleyapper.callees table entry in the left column to open the file. Then click the Insert tab at the top of the right column to add entries to the table. You only need to add information for the name, phonenum, and group fields in the corresponding values column. The id, lastokcall, and lastcall fields should be left as is. The id field gets calculated automatically. The lastokcall will record the time and date of the last successful call using TeleYapper. And the lastcall field identifies what happened during the last call to this person, e.g. ok means the call was completed successfully, no answer means no one answered the call, or answering machine means an answering machine took the call.

You can add up to two records at a time and, by clicking the Insert Another New Row button, you will be returned to this data entry screen after you save your entries by clicking the Go button. The name field allows you to quickly review entries you've made. It won't be used when making TeleYapper calls. The phonenum field is the important one. This is the exact dial string required to place a call on your Asterisk system to this callee using whatever VoIP or PSTN outbound trunk you plan to use with TeleYapper. For example, if your preferred provider requires 11-digit phone numbers with a 1, area code, and number, then that's the way the numbers should be entered into the TeleYapper database. The group field has already been discussed. Just enter a number between 0 and 9 to identify the group with whom this individual should be associated. Finally, after adding records to the table, you can click the Browse tab to review your entries. And, while Browsing, you can click the Pencil icon beside any record entry to edit it. Clicking the red X icon beside a record entry deletes the record. If, for some reason, you wish to delete ALL the records in the file, click the Empty tab at the top of the right column. Under no circumstances should you click on the Drop tab as this removes not only the table's contents but also the table structure itself. In short, you'd have to import the database table again.

Answering the Incoming Call. A simple addition to your dialplan is used to force Asterisk to answer calls to M-S-G (extension 674) and pass them to the TeleYapper contexts for processing. Log into your Asterisk system as root and move to the /etc/asterisk directory. To add TeleYapper to your dialplan, just cut-and-paste the following code into the [from-internal-custom] context near the top of extensions_custom.conf. For TrixBox users, cut-and-paste the following code into the [from-internal-trixbox] context near the top of extensions_trixbox.conf. Be sure to change the 1234 password below to something secure for your system since this will be used to gain access to your TeleYapper system!

exten => 674,1,Answer ; dial MSG on any extension to manage your TeleYapper system
exten => 674,2,Wait(1)
exten => 674,3,Authenticate(1234)
exten => 674,4,Goto(yapper,s,1)

If you're a long-time reader of Nerd Vittles and you're using either our Stealth AutoAttendant or some other AutoAttendant, then you already know why you need to be careful about putting extensions like 6-7-4 in your extensions_custom.conf file. Anyone can call you, dial 6-7-4 while your AutoAttendant is playing, and insert their own obscene message into your TeleYapper system. The solution is adding your own secure password in line 3 above rather than using the default 1234. Another precaution you should always perform is to first play your outgoing TeleYapper message to yourself to make certain it says what you think it should before you kick off a dialing spree to a thousand of your closest friends or business associates.

AutoAttendant Contexts for TeleYapper. Now insert the following chunk of code at the bottom of extensions_custom.conf or extensions_trixbox.conf if you're using TrixBox:

[yapper]
exten => s,1,Set(TIMEOUT(digit)=7)
exten => s,2,Set(TIMEOUT(response)=10)
exten => s,3,Background(T-to-hear-cur-ancmnt)
exten => s,4,Background(press-1)
exten => s,5,Background(to-rerecord-yr-message)
exten => s,6,Background(press-2)
exten => s,7,Background(to-place-outgoing-call)
exten => s,8,Background(press-3)
exten => s,9,Background(to-hear-menu-again)
exten => s,10,Background(press-4)
exten => s,11,Background(to-hang-up)
exten => s,12,Background(press-5)
exten => 1,1,Playback(custom/broadcast)
exten => 1,2,Wait(2)
exten => 1,3,Goto(s,3)
exten => 2,1,Goto(yapper2,s,1)
exten => 3,1,Goto(yapper-options,s,1)
exten => 4,1,Goto(s,3)
exten => 5,1,Playback(goodbye)
exten => 5,2,Hangup
exten => t,1,Goto(s,3)
exten => i,1,Goto(s,3)
exten => o,1,Goto(s,3)
exten => h,1,Hangup

[yapper-redial]
exten => s,1,Playback(speed-dial)
exten => s,2,Playback(activated)
exten => s,3,Wait(1)
exten => s,4,Playback(goodbye)
exten => s,5,Hangup
exten => h,1,DeadAGI(teleyapper.php|${GROUP}|${COUNTER}|3)
exten => h,2,Hangup


Call Processing Contexts for TeleYapper. Finally insert the following chunk of code at the bottom of extensions_custom.conf or extensions_trixbox.conf:

[broadcast]
exten => s,1,Answer
exten => s,2,Wait(2)
exten => s,3,Playback(system-status-msg)
exten => s,4,Wait(2)
;exten => s,5,BackgroundDetect(custom/broadcast|1000|50|3000)
exten => s,5,Playback(custom/broadcast)
exten => s,6,Goto(talk,1)
exten => t,1,Goto(talk,1)
exten => i,1,Goto(talk,1)
exten => o,1,Goto(talk,1)
exten => h,1,NoOp(Callee hung up call before menu. Dialed: ${DIAL} ID: ${ID}.)
exten => h,2,Set(STATUS='EarlyHangup'|g)
exten => h,3,DeadAGI(teleyapper2.php|${ID}|${STATUS}|${DIAL})
exten => h,4,Hangup
exten => talk,1,Goto(broadcast2,s,1)

[broadcast2]
exten => s,1,Set(STATUS='Answered'|g)
exten => s,2,Set(TIMEOUT(digit)=4)
exten => s,3,Set(TIMEOUT(response)=4)
exten => s,4,Background(to-hear-msg-again)
exten => s,5,Background(press-1)
exten => s,6,Background(to-blklist-last-caller)
exten => s,7,Background(digits/2)
exten => s,8,Background(otherwise-press)
exten => s,9,Background(digits/3)
exten => t,1,NoOp(Callee's Answering Machine probably answered. Dialed: ${DIAL} ID: ${ID}.)
exten => t,2,Set(STATUS='AnsMachine'|g)
exten => t,3,Background(restarting)
exten => t,4,Wait(1)
exten => t,5,Playback(custom/broadcast) ; playing again for ans machine
exten => t,6,Background(goodbye)
exten => t,7,Hangup
exten => h,1,DeadAGI(teleyapper2.php|${ID}|${STATUS}|${DIAL})
exten => h,2,Hangup
exten => i,1,Goto(1,1)
exten => o,1,Goto(1,1)
exten => 1,1,Set(STATUS='ReplayedMsg'|g)
exten => 1,2,Goto(t,3)
exten => 2,1,Set(STATUS='Zap'|g)
exten => 2,2,Background(num-was-successfully)
exten => 2,3,Background(removed)
exten => 2,4,Background(goodbye)
exten => 2,5,NoOp(Callee Requested to have number removed. Dialed: ${DIAL} ID: ${ID}.)
exten => 2,6,Hangup
exten => 3,1,Set(STATUS='OK'|g)
exten => 3,2,Background(goodbye)
exten => 3,3,NoOp(Callee Acknowledged Call. Dialed: ${DIAL} ID: ${ID}.)
exten => 3,4,Hangup


Once you finish adding all of the new contexts above to extensions_custom.conf or extensions_trixbox.conf, save your changes to disk. There's no need to reload Asterisk just yet. We've still got our AGI scripts to install.

If you're using freePBX, then make the following addition to your freePBX configuration. Log into your TrixBox server with a web browser. Choose freePBX and then choose Setup, Misc Destination. Add a new entry for TeleYapper with 674 as the Dial entry. Save your change and click the Red Bar to update the freePBX configuration.

For those that are curious, you'll notice there is a commented out line 5 in the [broadcast] context. It's an Asterisk command called BackgroundDetect. What this command is supposed to do is play a sound file while listening for silence at the callee's end of the call. Once silence is detected, the call processing drops to talk. We couldn't get it to work reliably although we haven't tried it with Asterisk 1.4. So the current release blindly plays your message and then asks for an acknowledgment. If it doesn't get one, it plays your message again, and then hangs up. The theory here is that, even if a callee has an answering machine, the second playing of your message usually will get recorded. Just be aware that there may be further adjustments down the road. In the meantime, you can check back and read the latest comments to this blog entry.

Installing checkgroup.php AGI Script. Now let's install the checkgroup.php script in your /var/lib/asterisk/agi-bin directory and change file ownership and permissions on the file. Log in to your Asterisk server as root, and then execute the following commands:

cd /var/lib/asterisk/agi-bin
wget http://nerdvittles.com/checkgroup.zip
unzip checkgroup.zip
rm checkgroup.zip
chmod 775 checkgroup.php
chown asterisk:asterisk checkgroup.php

This script includes a debug log. The default settings are to create a new log file (/var/log/asterisk/telecheck.txt) each time the script is executed. This doesn't take up much room and is always there for you to read if something comes unglued: cat /var/log/asterisk/telecheck.txt. There are some other options. You can turn off the log file entirely ($debug=0). You can choose not to erase the previous log file each time the script is run ($newlogeachdebug=0) in which case the file continues to grow until your hard disk fills up. And you can have the log file emailed to you each time the script is executed ($emaildebuglog=1) by adding your email address ($email=youremailaddress). The last option obviously assumes you have followed our previous tutorials and gotten outbound email working reliably on your system. The functions are controlled by the following lines at the top of the checkgroup.php file. 1 means yes, and 0 means no. Just edit the file carefully: nano -w checkgroup.php. And save your changes when you're finished: Ctrl-X, Y, then press Enter.

$debug = 1;
$newlogeachdebug = 1;
$emaildebuglog = 0;
$email = "yourname@yourdomain" ;


NOTE: If you're using TeleYapper with Asterisk 1.4.x, comment out lines 168-172 in checkgroup.php to get the script to function properly. Special thanks to Lee Azzarello for the tip.

Installing teleyapper.php AGI Script. This code only works with Asterisk@Home 2.4 or 2.5. To install the teleyapper.php script in your /var/lib/asterisk/agi-bin directory, execute the following commands while logged into your server as root:

cd /var/lib/asterisk/agi-bin
wget http://nerdvittles.com/trixbox123/teleyapper30.zip
mv teleyapper.php teleyapper25.php
unzip teleyapper30.zip
rm teleyapper30.zip
chmod 775 teleyapper.php
chown asterisk:asterisk teleyapper.php


The teleyapper.php script has a number of configuration options including a debug log. Edit the file carefully while positioned in the correct directory: nano -w teleyapper.php. And save your changes when you're finished: Ctrl-X, Y, then press Enter. All of the options are shown below.

$maxlines=1 ;
$maxretries=1 ;
$retrytime=60 ;
$waittime=60 ;
$callspread=2 ;
$debug = 1;
$newlogeachdebug = 1;
$emaildebuglog = 0;
$email = "yourname@yourdomain" ;
$trunk = "local" ;
$callerid = chr(34) . "TeleYapper" . chr(34) . " <6781234567>" ;

The first line lets you set the number of simultaneous calls which can be placed. Be sure you have sufficient outbound trunks to support the number you insert and be sure to use the "local" setting for $trunk. The callspread variable determines the spacing of calls (or groups of calls if you have multiple outbound trunks) to your various callees. The default has been changed from one minute to minutes based upon extensive testing with large numbers of calls. This means the call to the second callee (or group of callees if you have specified $maxlines > 1) begins two minutes after the first call starts. Because a broadcast message is usually more than about 20 seconds long, we have found the 2 minute setting to be better since it allows sufficient time to complete the first call before the next one begins. Otherwise, calls will start failing if you only have a single outbound trunk. If you're going to be placing hundreds of calls, be sure to read our previous article which covers a real-world example using a 700-call database.

The debug flags in this file are set the same way as in the checkgroup.php script above: 1 means yes, and 0 means no. The default settings are to create a new log file (/var/log/asterisk/teleyapper.txt) each time the script is executed. This doesn't take up much room and is always there for you to read if something comes unglued: cat /var/log/asterisk/teleyapper.txt. There are some other options. You can turn off the log file entirely ($debug=0). You can choose not to erase the previous log file each time the script is run ($newlogeachdebug=0) in which case the file continues to grow until your hard disk fills up. And you can have the log file emailed to you each time the script is executed ($emaildebuglog=1) by also adding your email address ($email=youremailaddress).

Two settings you will need to review and perhaps adjust to get calls to complete properly are the trunk and callerid variables. If you wish to use a specific trunk in your dialplan for outbound calls, the syntax for the outbound trunk is the same as it is in your dialplan, e.g. sip/telasip-gw or iax2/voxee. Look at the OUT settings at the top of your extensions_additional.conf file if you're not sure. At the request of a number of users, we've now added a new option which allows all outbound TeleYapper calls to be placed using the default dialplan rules on your server. The advantage of this approach is that different VoIP providers can be used automatically for different types of calls in your TeleYapper database. To use your default dial rules, set the trunk in all lowercase letters to local and TeleYapper will handle the rest of the setup for you.

The callerid variable should be set to the callerid number of your outbound trunk unless your service provider allows callerid spoofing (most don't!). The callerid setting is ignored if you choose to use your default dialplan rules with a trunk setting of local. Don't delete the variable! Just leave the default value.

Finally keep in mind that the format of the numbers to be dialed in your database must exactly match the syntax your trunk provider is expecting to see unless you're using your default dialplan rules. Otherwise, all of the outbound calls will fail. For example, if your provider requires that calls begin with a 1 followed by a 3-digit area code and 7-digit number, then that's the way the numbers must be entered in your TeleYapper database.

Installing teleyapper2.php AGI Script. Install the teleyapper2.php script in your /var/lib/asterisk/agi-bin directory, change file ownership and permissions on the file, and decide if you want to adjust the default debug configuration setup. Log in to your Asterisk server as root, and then execute the following commands:

cd /var/lib/asterisk/agi-bin
wget http://nerdvittles.com/aah2/teleyapper2.zip
unzip teleyapper2.zip
rm teleyapper2.zip
chmod 775 teleyapper2.php
chown asterisk:asterisk teleyapper2.php


The only configuration options in the teleyapper2.php script are for the debug log on individual calls that are placed. We recommend you leave the existing settings, or you'll get a new email every time a call is placed by TeleYapper. You can edit the file while positioned in the correct directory: nano -w teleyapper2.php. And save your changes when you're finished: Ctrl-X, Y, then press Enter. All of the options are shown below.

$debug = 1;
$emaildebuglog = 0;
$email = "yourname@yourdomain" ;

The debug flags in this file are set the same way as in the teleyapper.php script above: 1 means yes, and 0 means no. The default settings are to append individual call information onto the teleyapper.txt log file (/var/log/asterisk/teleyapper.txt) each time a new call is placed. Unless you're planning to call hundreds of thousands of people, this doesn't take up much room and is there for you when something comes unglued. The other options are as follows. You can turn off the individual call logging entirely ($debug=0). And you can have the entire teleyapper.txt log file emailed to you each time a call is placed ($emaildebuglog=1) by also adding your email address ($email=youremailaddress). For your initial test calls, this may be desirable just so you can see what's going on ... if you're too lazy to read the log.

Taking TeleYapper for a Spin. Once you restart Asterisk (amportal stop then amportal start), you should have a Broadcast Message System that works. First, start up the Asterisk Command Line Interface (CLI) by typing asterisk -rvvvvv from the command prompt on your system after you've logged in as root. The CLI now will track the progress of your TeleYapper sessions.

Using phpMyAdmin, add your cellphone number to your TeleYapper database and specify Group 0 for the entry. Now dial 674 and provide your password, record a message (Option #2), and then place a call (Option #3) to Group 0. Press 1 to kick off the TeleYapper calling spree. Check your CLI and TeleYapper logs if your cellphone doesn't ring in the next two minutes. Enjoy!

Real-World Test of TeleYapper. Be sure to check out our follow-up article on TeleYapper for a real-world example dialing 700+ neighbors with information about a rezoning meeting.

Want More Projects? For a complete catalog of all our previous Asterisk projects, click here. For the most recent articles, click here and just scroll down the page.

From Our Legal Department, moi: The TeleYapper product name (our feeble attempt at humor through parody) has absolutely no affiliation with TeleZapper, the terrific hardware product designed to keep telemarketers from bugging the hell out of you while you're eating your dinner. We confess that our sense of humor got the better of us in coming up with the name for this non-commerical (aka "free") utility designed primarily as an educational vehicle to assist the Asterisk community in recognizing the almost limitless potential of AGI and PHP programming. Our parody seeks to amuse, not to confuse. Our telephony software Yaps. Their telephony hardware Zaps. Other than a telephone line, there is no product similarity as the two conjoined words make clear. And, yes, that is the whole point! The products are opposites, not identical nor even similar. One letter makes all the difference in Night and Light. So it is with Yapper and Zapper. Brand confusion in trademark law arises from synonyms, not antonyms. It is systems like what we're writing about today that TeleZapper is designed to protect against. And it does that very well. In fact, we use TeleZapper hardware in our own home and have for many years. The only problem, of course, is when that tornado comes rolling down the neighbor's street, it would have been nice to get the automated phone call from TeleYapper at the neighborhood headquarters. But, who cares, right? It's only your house. Class dismissed.

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So, you didn’t get one, huh? Well, we did. Just goes to show that some folks don’t have much to do other than stand in line for 8 hours to claim what my wife has labeled "another stupid toy." Yes, the ultimate iToy. Boys and their toys! Apple has had the better part of four years to perfect Mac OS X, and it shows in the iPhone. So here’s our software report card:

The iPhone will take its place as one of the most revolutionary computers in the 21st century. And we think it may well be one of the best computers with one of the best computer interfaces ever delivered. But note that we said "best computers" not "best phones." It’s an incredibly good travelling Wi-Fi device, and that’s probably how it will be remembered ten years from now. And AT&T. Well, they’re still just as lousy as they were 10 years ago.

Before turning to Asterisk®, we wanted to quickly review our iPhone chronology for those who are considering a purchase. Bottom line: buy it from Apple. We didn’t because they don’t yet have a store in the entire state of South Carolina. They still manage to charge sales tax for web purchases, however.

Friday. Let’s start with AT&T. We arrive at a totally deserted store in the middle of a Mattress Factory strip mall at 10:30 a.m. on Friday. There are 12 people in line, the first six of whom are so-called iSitters, people paid a couple hundred bucks to wait in line for someone else. In our case, the #1 iSitter is standing in for Catherine Bell, the star of Lifetime TV’s Army Wives which is being filmed in Charleston. She arrives at 5 p.m. with her daughter in tow… in a brand new Porsche, of course. The TV crew promptly wets their pants. No one much complains that Catherine and her entourage assume their place at the front of the line. But, does the iSitter leave? Well, no. AT&T staff are totally clueless. They’ve been sitting in their (empty) air conditioned store all day doing absolutely nothing except turning down iPhone wanna-be’s asking to use the bathroom. "We don’t have one" is the stock reply. And the Store Manager’s one minute of fame consists of telling the ABC reporters that everyone in line will be taken care of "one way or another." Turns out, most folks get the "another" option. The store gets 15 phones delivered in a book bag by an AT&T delivery truck at about 4:30 p.m. They don’t trust their employees either! So, for most of the hundreds who have waited, their only option is to wait another "two to three days" to have one shipped to them. Heh, heh. Anyone want to take that bet?

Then there was the moment of truth. Six p.m. and the doors swing open for the first five in line. They, of course, make an exception for the Army Wives entourage. By the time they’re finished, there is one 8-gig iPhone and six 4-gig iPhones left. We snag one of the 4-gig models after AT&T recovers thirty minutes later from their first nationwide network implosion. They can’t even process a credit card transaction without a meltdown. Just another day for the A&T repair crews. With our iPhone in hand, we head out the door and do a quick package unopening for the local news crew. They’re thrilled. Then we’re off to play.

Any Windows XP machine with the latest version of iTunes works with the iPhone. But, if you’re a loyal Mac user, you have an extra hurdle. Only the very latest version of Tiger works and you need the latest version of iTunes as well. If any of this were operating system-dependent, we could understand the limitation. But this appears to be a way to sell more Mac OS X upgrades. Back in law school, they called it tying. We decide to use Windows XP and skip the Panther-to-Tiger upgrade hassle.

You register the iPhone and sign up for service using iTunes. The whole process takes less than 10 minutes and is flawless… at least for us. Remember, it’s not yet 6 p.m. on the West Coast. So the second wave of registration meltdowns has not yet begun. We decide to start off lean and mean to see how far 4 gigabytes goes. We load 500 songs, a couple of music videos, and 50 photos plus a dozen or so contacts just to be sure we have a stable system. We then add an IMAP email account and a gMail POP3 account. We still have a gig and a half of storage which looks pretty reasonable to us. We call it a night at midnight after a couple of quick calls to our Asterisk PBX. Everything works swimmingly.

Saturday. We’ve delayed heading out to the beach for a day because AT&T on Friday morning announces that their Georgetown store won’t be stocking the iPhone after all despite their day of training on Thursday and postings on the AT&T web site. Only because we called to see whether you could buy more than one phone are we spared from hating AT&T forever. "Oh, you didn’t hear the news. We’re not getting the iPhone after all. You’ll have to go to Charleston." So we stayed in Charleston Friday and headed out Saturday morning for the beach house. The trip is uneventful. My seven year old daughter masters every feature of the iPhone in less than an hour. Synching the iPhone to the Prius takes less than a minute. My daughter places several calls through the Prius Sound System searching for her beloved Webkinz. Some of the reviews have suggested that the sound quality isn’t all that great. We’ve found just the opposite. Calls are crystal clear. Even the Prius phonebook still works with the iPhone. Bye, bye Treo!

We actually have an iMac running Tiger at the beach house so it’s time to try a partial sync to get our Address Book and Calendars onto the iPhone. The whole process takes about 10 minutes and demonstrates that partial syncs from both a Windows machine and a Mac work well together, just as they do with an iPod. So our iPhone is complete with photos and music from a Windows version of iTunes and calendar and address book data from iTunes on an iMac. Perfect! All of the cousins arrive after lunch, and they spend the rest of the day monopolizing the iPhone… especially YouTube. WiFi at the beach house kicks in automatically to replace AT&T’s Edge network so the performance and display of Web applications is nothing short of amazing. Only limitation thus far appears to be lack of support for Java and Flash technology. Battery life is pretty amazing. Using the phone for most of the day with WiFi and Bluetooth and numerous phone calls consumes about half the battery life. Not bad.

Sunday. A friend of ours strolls into the Lenox Square Apple store in Atlanta on Sunday afternoon and walks out with an 8 gig iPhone in minutes.

The Drawbacks. The lack of Flash and Java technology already have been mentioned. Safari also is missing animated GIF support. Darn. So much for that collection. Most of the other shortcomings have to do with typical, high end cell phone features which aren’t (yet) available on the iPhone. The major one is voice-activated dialing. AT&T probably discouraged this so that they could charge a monthly fee for the service just as Sprint now does. You can’t gain access to the phone to add your own applications… yet. And, there appears to be a memory leak if you use the iPhone for an extended period of time (such as all day). Apps start closing abruptly. It’s easy enough to reboot the iPhone by holding the Power and Home buttons down simultaneously for about eight seconds. Text messaging is currently limited to SMS and email. A lot of folks will want more than that. Tethering to a PC is not yet supported although with Edge that’s not a big loss. GPS functionality also is missing although the Google Maps are great. A software zoom feature on the 2 megapixel camera also would be a nice touch. The photos look pretty great actually. An external memory card also would be a welcome addition. And a Skype application would be terrific. AT&T would be thrilled. Lack of any iPhone insurance plan and no battery access also may be deal breakers for a lot of folks. All things considered, we’re delighted with the iPhone. Let the hacking begin!

Using the iPhone with Asterisk. What remains is integration of the iPhone into our Asterisk system. Two minutes of dialplan changes and calls are automatically forwarded to the iPhone instead of the 3-year old Treo. AsteriDex pops up in the iPhone web browser perfectly with no modifications other than a new phone number for Admin access. If we decide to purchase a landline from AT&T, we then would be eligible for AT&T’s Unity plan. An extra $20 a month gets you unlimited calling to 100 million AT&T landlines and cellphones. Once on a Unity plan, free calls could be made to everywhere through the Asterisk system as we’ve explained in a previous article.

Undocumented RSS Reader on iPhone. One bit of good news. The Safari browser on the iPhone does support the same, cool RSS feed reader that’s found in the Safari browser with the Tiger version of Mac OS X. The syntax to access RSS feeds is also the same. The RSS feed for Nerd Vittles is accessed by going to feed://nerdvittles.com/wp-rss2.php while the Best of Nerd Vittles feed is accessed by going to feed://bestof.nerdvittles.com/rssfeed.xml. Enjoy!

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This Friday marks the introduction of Apple’s new iPhone with their exclusive provider, the new, new AT&T. As much as we might love the new phone, the AT&T Wireless telephony package coupled with an iPhone makes this one of the most expensive cellphone bundles ever to hit Mother Earth. In fact, payments on a midsize automobile might just turn out to be cheaper than an ongoing iPhone contract with AT&T. AT&T may fool everyone and come to their senses on pricing before Friday, but we aren’t betting on it. Our guess is that AT&T is delaying a pricing announcement until the day before the phone’s introduction so that all the dumbest people on the planet won’t have time to do the math. It just goes to show that pairing the marketing genius of Apple with the greedy beancounters at AT&T still spells T-R-A-I-N-W-R-E-C-K. Not that any self-respecting college stud would be caught dead in a Ford Focus, but just for grins, let’s do the math so that everyone has a few days to bask in the real cost of an iPhone.

First, the iPhone hardly qualifies as a bargain. At $499 for the 4GB model and $599 for the 8GB, there’s no pricier phone in the cellphone marketplace. To add insult to injury, AT&T has taken things one step further: NO REBATE WITH AN iPHONE even with a two-year cellphone contract. Suggesting they’re MIGHTY PROUD OF IT is just the beginning of our little tale of woe! So, assuming the iPhone is actually worth its retail price, you begin this exercise paying roughly a $250 to $300 sign-up premium compared to purchasing a new RAZR phone or high end PDA with a two-year AT&T cellphone plan.

And then there’s the matter of picking a cellphone plan. Even Verizon can’t hold a candle to the new AT&T. If you plan to use the iPhone in the manner in which it is being advertised, i.e. to surf the web, to watch YouTube videos, and to send all kinds of messages to everyone on the planet, then hold on to your hat wallet for the ultimate sticker shock. The cheapest individual cellphone plan starts at $40+ a month for 450 daytime minutes plus nights and weekends starting at 9 p.m. To take advantage of free calls to other AT&T phones (100 million wireless and wired phones), add another $20 a month. For earlier nights and weekend calling (7 p.m. instead of 9 p.m.), add another $10 a month. For unlimited data usage, add $40. For unlimited messaging, add another $20 a month. For phone insurance, add another $5 a month. Now add AT&T surcharges and taxes for another $20 a month. That gets us to roughly $155 a month plus the $10-$15 a month no-rebate penalty amortized over the life of the two-year contract because you chose an iPhone. So, the grand total for an iPhone works out to $600 plus tax for the only decent model plus roughly $170 a month for the required two-year service contract. Amortizing the hardware cost of the iPhone over 24 months brings our monthly cost to approximately $195 a month. The early termination penalty actually looks like a bargain with a plan like this one! Now the shocker. To lease a 2007 Ford Focus with air conditioning, you’re looking at less money per month although you’d make payments for additional years. But then, you may want to use your iPhone for more than two years as well… assuming you either win the lottery or have a healthy trust fund. Just don’t plan on more than three years, or it’s another pricey adventure paying Apple to replace the iPhone battery.

To give you a point of reference, our current Sprint family plan with FOUR PHONES and no discounts costs roughly $200 a month. It includes 2500 shared minutes, free calls between home and the four phones, free nights and weekends starting at 7 p.m., free tethering to four PCs (another $20 option per phone with AT&T), free roaming and long distance, free calls to other Sprint phones, and unlimited Internet service and messaging on all four phones. And the total hardware cost for the four phones including two Treos and two Katanas (the better RAZR) is roughly the same as purchasing one iPhone. Call us crazy, but we’ll stick with Sprint a bit longer. If you really want some fun, price out the cost of switching a family of four to iPhones. Then you can kiss that new BMW goodbye forever.

Pricing Update. We’re thrilled that our original article (above) produced dramatic price reductions within hours this morning. The new price is about one-third of the old one. You do think it was our article, don’t you? Steve Jobs has apparently worked his magic with AT&T just as he did with the music moguls. New pricing for the iPhone was just announced with unlimited data, visual voicemail, 200 SMS text messages, 5000 to unlimited night-and-weekend minutes, rollover minutes, and unlimited mobile-to-mobile calling each month. 450 daytime minutes will cost $60 a month while 1350 minutes will run $100 a month. Shared use family plans (700-2100 minutes) are $50 more with two lines activated. Great news for the iPhone and consumers. And there’s more good news. The entire activation and synching process for the iPhone will be handled using good ol’ iTunes in the privacy of your own home.

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