Category Archives: Telephony

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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If you’re lucky enough to be living in one of the old BellSouth territories of the new AT&T, then you won’t want to miss AT&T’s new DSL offer. It’s the perfect backup for your Asterisk® system. Beginning today, customers ordering new phone service can sign up for 768K DSL service for just $10 a month (prepaid for the first year). The deal lasts for two and a half years, but you must sign up online at fastaccess.com. Not surprisingly, the site has been down most of the morning.

The Fine Print. Well, this was a special offer to fulfill a promise reportedly made in exchange for approval of the AT&T merger with BellSouth and Cingular. The company obviously isn’t too thrilled with the deal as we found out when we tried to sign up at the link above. Once you get to their web site using Internet Explorer only, you’ll notice a little Chat with Live Person icon. So I clicked on that and asked where to find the $10 DSL special for new customers. This may come as a shock to you, but I was disconnected by my PenPal four times in a row. Persistence, however, paid off and my helper finally settled into Royal Runaround mode where she was equally adept.

Suffice it to say, whenever there’s a Live Chat application that won’t let you cut-and-paste the conversation, you should know at the outset that things can only go downhill. And downhill it went… quickly. We’re only sorry that we didn’t capture screen shots of all of the dialogue, but you get the gist of it from the snippet above which transpired at about the 10-minute mark in our little chat. Law school wasn’t nearly enough training to deal with Runaround Sue Jessica.

First, we were told that the special was only available to existing customers. That’s just the opposite of what all the trade rags are saying. Next we were told that we’d have to sign up for dial-up Internet service first ($19.95 a month!) in order to get the "special modem" required for this DSL service. Later, we were told that 768K DSL service was only available in areas where fiber-optic cable (rather than copper) had been run to the neighborhood curb. That wipes out about 99% of the country.

So-called IFITL service is typically a prerequisite for getting AT&T’s 6 megabit DSL service. You can certainly understand why fiber might be necessary to support top performance DSL. But why would you need a fiber optic cable to support rot-gut DSL when the next two higher speeds of DSL service (at additional cost, of course) work perfectly well with copper? Ever heard of a bandwidth shaping router? Well, you can bet that the AT&T folks have because they use traffic shaping routers routinely to restrict bandwidth on their other tiers of DSL service. So why not with 768K service? Uh, because then they’d have to sell it for $10 a month. Why didn’t we think of that?

Bottom Line: AT&T isn’t that thrilled about signing up new customers that only want $10 DSL service. We, of course, will do the only right thing and forward all of this information to our Congressmen and the FCC. In the meantime, if you’ve got a little spare time, go online and chat with Jessica. You probably will get Jessica since everyone we chatted with at BellSouth over a period of almost twelve hours just happened to be named Jessica. Then post your results here so we can enjoy a good chuckle. Just don’t hold your breath waiting for your $10 DSL connection to arrive. Here’s the Monday, June 16 version from our workaholic Jessica.

It's free software day again at Nerd Vittles, and today we're updating our Telephone Reminder System for Asterisk® to version 3. The original system let you schedule reminders for future events and, when the appointed date and time arrived, Asterisk swung into action and placed a call to the number you designated to deliver your customized reminder message. Today we add the bells and whistles that just about everyone using the original application requested. Now you can set up recurring reminders that call daily or on weekdays as well as weekly, monthly, and annually. This means it can be used to wake you up in the morning, or to remind Granny to take her medicine every day, or to remind your Little League team of practice times and locations, or to remind you and your customers of scheduled and recurring events.

The smarts for the original system already have been incorporated into our TeleYapper 2.5 Voice Messaging System. But that's a real-time system meaning it begins calling immediately after you choose a group of people to call. This phone reminder system is different in that you can schedule the calls for the near or distant future, you can specify different numbers for the calls, and you can customize the recorded messages for each call. In short, it's perfect for appointment reminders, birthday reminders, anniversary reminders, and anything else you want to remember. All it takes is a phone call to set up each reminder. There's no web page to fill in and no database required to manage the reminders. You can schedule as many reminders per phone number as your little fingers care to dial! And, in our next article, we'll show you how to use a single entry from the new Asterisk Telephone Reminder System to contact a small or large group of people on a recurring basis.

Prerequisites. We've tested version 3 of our appointment reminder system with ISO-installed versions of Asterisk@Home 2.5 and TrixBox 1.2.3 in addition to the Nerd Vittles VMware builds of TrixBox 1.2.3. If you wish to use it with later versions of TrixBox or with a "pure Asterisk" system (not 1.4!), then you shouldn't have any problems. It won't work with version 1.x of Asterisk@Home or 1.4 releases of Asterisk. Post a comment if you have problems. You also will need a system which includes PHP to run this application. We've tested it with PHP 4.3.9, but PHP 5 systems probably will function without many changes in the underlying code. You should be able to install this project and get everything working in under 30 minutes. For those using our VMware TrixBox builds or our Linux PBX-in-a-Flash script for TrixBox 1.2.3 which can be downloaded at the top of this page, we'll walk you through the 5-minute upgrade drill so that you can take advantage of the new Version 3 recurring reminders feature set. If you're installing Telephone Reminders for the first time, complete installation instructions are available on our Best of Nerd Vittles site.

How It Works. The reminder system is actually quite simple to use. You dial extension 1-2-3 on your Asterisk system, enter your password, and then you'll be prompted to record a reminder message. Next you enter the phone number, date, and time for delivery of the reminder message. Finally, you're prompted whether to schedule a single reminder or recurring reminders (weekdays, daily, weekly, monthly, or annually). When the appointed date and time arrives, Asterisk will place the call to the number you specified using your default dialing rules and will play the customized reminder when the call is answered. If the call is not answered, the call will be repeated n number of times with a delay between calls of x minutes before giving up on the call. You'll get an email with the call reminder setup if desired. You also get to configure the number of retries and the delay between calls. Finally, end of the month recurring reminders pose a special problem. Why? Because not all months end on the same numbered day. January has 31, February has 28, April has 30. You get the idea. So the default behavior is as follows, If you schedule monthly reminders on the last day of any month, then we assume you want the reminders delivered on the last day of every month. You can alter this behavior by setting a flag in the reminder.php script if you want monthly reminders to always be delivered on the 28th day of the month, for example.

Finally, a word about failed calls. Reminders are important to most folks, or you wouldn't be scheduling them. So failed calls are problematic. On the one hand, you don't want to overburden your phone system placing thousands of reminder calls just because the calls continue to fail. You may have entered an incorrect phone number, for example. So our middle-of-the-road solution to failed calls is this. You can tell the system how many times to repeat the call and how much time to eat up between attempts. If the call still fails, non-recurring reminders will be deleted from the system. But the reminder message is preserved as well as the recurring reminder for the next date on which to place the call. If you look in /var/lib/asterisk/sounds/custom on your system, you will see some custom sound files (such as the reminder prompts which all begin with reminder). In addition, you will see the actual reminder messages for each of your reminders. The naming convention is HourMinute.Date.PhoneNumber.gsm. If you see entries in this directory with dates before today's date, those are failed call reminders. You can play the sound files on most computers by simply double-clicking on the files. You can delete old reminders for a specific date while logged in as root on your Asterisk system with a command like this:

rm -f /var/lib/asterisk/sounds/custom/*.20060123.*.gsm

Be sure you don't delete today's reminder messages or messages with a future date, or your entire reminder system will be toast!

Here are the components that make up the complete system:

Limitations. There are a few limitations you need to be aware of. First, you can't schedule delivery of a reminder within the first 5 minutes after midnight each night. That's when the reminder system does its housekeeping. Second, you must schedule reminders at least 5 minutes after you place your call to set up the reminder. This gives the system ample time to generate the configuration files it needs and to put them in the right places. Third, the current reminder system does not fully support simultaneous scheduling of multiple reminders. The current system uses unique names to identify sound files generated by multiple simultaneous callers. However, it still is theoretically possible for two different callers to schedule two reminders for the same phone number and the same reminder time and to do so at the exact same time. This would cause one of the reminders to be discarded. We just wanted to alert you to this remote possibility. But we hasten to add that the chance of this happening is pretty small even in a very large Asterisk system with hundreds of users.

License. This software is licensed for your use under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.5 license. Before using this software, please read the terms of the license. A Plain English version of the license is available here. You may not charge a fee for something we are giving you for free. Finally, we ask that you preserve our copyright notice in any copies of the software you make. The same applies to derivative works. If you do not accept the terms of the license, do not use the software. Even if you accept the terms of the license, keep in mind that BY USING THIS SOFTWARE, YOU ASSUME ALL RISKS OF USE AND NO WARRANTIES EXPRESS OR IMPLIED ARE PROVIDED WITH THIS FREE SOFTWARE INCLUDING FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR USE AND MERCHANTABILITY. In short, it's up to you to determine, at your own risk, whether this software meets your needs. Don't assume that it will, and don't assume that the code is error-free. It's probably not.

The Game Plan. In today's article, we're going to walk you through upgrading a system on which you already have installed an earlier version of our Telephone Reminders system. As mentioned, if you're installing the software for the first time, stop here and use our Best of Nerd Vittles tutorial. To get the Reminder System upgraded, we're first going to move all of the code into the proper places. This includes the modifications to the dialplan contexts, installation of a new Allison voice prompts, and installation of the upgraded PHP/AGI scripts. Then we'll walk you through configuring the system. And finally we'll schedule a reminder to make sure everything went according to plan.

Modifying Your Dialplan. Step #1 is to replace some code that's already in your dialplan. The original contexts in extensions_custom.conf looked like this. Find ALL of this code (toward the bottom of the extensions_custom.conf file or, for TrixBox systems, extensions_trixbox.conf in the /etc/asterisk directory on your system) and delete it. The contexts to delete are the following: reminder, reminder2, reminder3, reminder4, reminder5, reminder6, reminder7, reminder8, reminder9, remindem, and remindem2. Replace the deleted contexts with this version 3.0 code.

For Step #2, make sure the following code snippet is still located in the top section of extensions_custom.conf in the [from-internal-custom] context or, for TrixBox systems, extensions_trixbox.conf in the [from-internal-trixbox] context:

exten => 123,1,Answer
exten => 123,2,Wait(1)
exten => 123,3,Authenticate(12345678)
exten => 123,4,Goto(reminder,s,1)

If, for some reason, you already are using extension 1-2-3 on your Asterisk system for some other purpose, then simply adjust the 123 extension in the four lines above to another number that works on your system. This is the number you will dial to schedule reminders. Line 3 is important as well. This is where you set a password for scheduling reminders on your system. Anyone that knows the password can schedule reminders. Simply replace 12345678 with a password that's secure enough for you to sleep well.

Finally, a head's up. When you do the cut-and-paste, double-check the long lines of code such as h,1 in [reminder9] and be sure all of the text ends up on a single line. Otherwise, things won't work correctly. Once you've added the two sections of code above, save your new config file and reload Asterisk.

Installing Reminder Voice Prompts. These voice prompts are free for the taking subject to the terms of the license agreement, and they're all the same as version 2.5 except there is a new reminder6.gsm. Just log into your Asterisk server as root and enter the following command to install the new voice prompt:

cd /var/lib/asterisk/sounds/custom
wget http://nerdvittles.com/aah2/reminder6.gsm
chmod 664 reminder*.gsm
chown asterisk:asterisk reminder*.gsm


If you need all of the voice prompts, then use these commands instead:

cd /var/lib/asterisk/sounds/custom
wget http://nerdvittles.com/aah2/nv-reminder3_voice.zip
unzip nv-reminder3_voice.zip (be sure to overwrite existing files!)
chmod 664 reminder*.gsm
chown asterisk:asterisk reminder*.gsm
rm -f nv-reminder3_voice.zip


Installing the Reminder PHP/AGI Scripts. Now we're getting to the new code for version 3. While you're still logged in as root, let's install the final pieces of code that you'll need to get things working. Just execute the commands below:

cd /var/lib/asterisk/agi-bin
mv reminder.php reminder25.php
mv run_reminders run_reminders.25
mv checkdate.php checkdate25.php
mv checktime.php checktime25.php
wget http://nerdvittles.com/aah2/nv-reminder3.zip
unzip nv-reminder3.zip
chmod 775 reminder.php
chown asterisk:asterisk reminder.php
chmod 775 check*.php
chown asterisk:asterisk check*.php
chmod 777 run_reminders
chown asterisk:asterisk run_reminders
chmod 777 run_recurring
chown asterisk:asterisk run_recurring


Creating Reminders Directories. While you're still logged in as root, create the following directories to store your reminders until the day arrives to execute them. Just issue the following commands. You should already have the reminders directory, but it won't hurt execute the command again just to be sure.

su asterisk
cd /var/spool/asterisk
mkdir reminders
mkdir recurring
exit


Setting Up the Crontab Entries. Now we need to set up the cron jobs to actually move reminders and recurring reminders into the Asterisk call processing directory on the day they are scheduled to run. Be very careful here. If you already have a working Telephone Reminders system, then there will already be an entry for run_reminders. For the new system to work, you MUST adjust the time that the run_reminders script executes so that it occurs AFTER the run_recurring script each day. While logged in as root, edit the crontab file: nano -w /etc/crontab. Be sure you typed the exit command in the last step, or you'll be logged in as asterisk instead of root. And you won't be able to edit the file! Now insert the following commands at the bottom of the crontab file and delete the existing run_reminders entry if you have one. Each command below should go on its own line.

0 0 * * * root /var/lib/asterisk/agi-bin/run_recurring >/dev/null 2>&1
3 0 * * * root /var/lib/asterisk/agi-bin/run_reminders >/dev/null 2>&1

Once you've added the two news lines and deleted the existing run_reminders line, save your changes: Ctrl-X, Y, then press Enter. Whew! That's it for the Reminder code. Now let's configure the system, and you'll be all set.

Configuring the Reminder System. To configure the reminder system, you'll need to edit the reminder.php script while logged in as root: nano -w /var/lib/asterisk/agi-bin/reminder.php. You'll notice a section of variables at the top of the file that looks like this:

$endofmonthflag=1 ;
$extensionmaxdigits=4 ;
$debug = 1;
$newlogeachdebug = 1;
$emaildebuglog = 0;
$email = "yourname@yourdomain" ;
$trunk = "local" ;
$callerid = "6781234567" ;
$numcallattempts=6 ;
$calldelaybetweenruns=300 ;
$timetoring=40 ;
$acctcode= "Reminder" ;

This is the only section of code you ought to mess with. When we update the code, we'll assume everything else has been left intact. Be very careful when editing this file. Don't remove any semicolons or quotation marks, or nothing will work! Here's a quick run-down on what each of the above variables does:

Once you've configured the Reminder System to meet your needs, save your changes: Ctrl-X, Y, then press Enter. HINT: You may want to start with the defaults which will work well for most folks.

Scheduling A Reminder. We're ready to take the Reminder System for a trial run at this juncture. Make sure you've reloaded your Asterisk system, and then dial 123 from an extension on your system. Enter the password you set up for your system and then press the pound key.

Entering a Reminder Message. You'll first be prompted to record a reminder message. This is the message that will be played when someone answers the reminder call. If you're not scheduling this reminder for yourself, then the message ought to explain who's calling and what the purpose of the call is. Once you've recorded your message, press the pound key to end the recording. You can replay or rerecord the reminder if desired while you're in this step of the reminder creation process.

Entering the Callback Number. When prompted for the reminder callback number, there are a couple of things to keep in mind. First, if you've specified "local" as the trunk to use for reminders in the reminder.php script, then the phone numbers can be entered in any format supported by your dialplan. Press the pound key after entering the appropriate number. The calls will be placed using the trunks specified in your dialplan rules. The one exception is extensions on your local Asterisk system since these can't be routed by Asterisk@Home or TrixBox systems using your outbound calls dialplan rules. The way we handle extensions is by examining the length of the phone number. At the top of reminder.php, you can specify the maximum number of digits for local extensions by setting $extensionmaxdigits. So long as the callback number is less than or equal to this number of digits, the system has the smarts to correctly route the call to a local extension.

If you have designated a particular trunk for placement of reminder calls, then you'll need to make certain that the format of the phone numbers entered for reminders on your system matches a dial string supported for this outbound trunk in your dialplan. For example, if this trunk requires that calls be entered with a 1 and then an area code and 7-digit number, then that is the only format that should be used for entering callback numbers in your reminder system. Again, the one exception is calls to local extensions. So long as the number of a local extension is entered with less than or equal the number of digits set for the $extensionmaxdigits variable in reminder.php, the call will be routed properly to the local extension regardless of the trunk setting.

Finally, here's a shortcut that can be used if the phone you're using to schedule the reminder is the same one on which you want to get the reminder callback. In this case, just press the pound key when prompted for the number to which to deliver the reminder message. This will set the callback number as the caller ID of the phone you used to schedule the call. If it's a local extension, then the caller ID will be set to the local extension number of the phone from which you placed the reminder scheduling call. Just be sure your $extensionmaxdigits is set correctly or calls to local extensions will fail.

Entering the Date of the Reminder. Once you accept the reminder message, you'll be prompted to enter the date on which this reminder will be delivered. Dates are entered using a four-digit year, then a two-digit month, and then a two-digit day using the time zone of the Asterisk system running the Telephone Reminders System. There is some error correction but not much. You obviously can't schedule reminders in the past! And you don't need to press the pound key after entering the eight digits. Beginning in version 2.5, you now can press the pound key (#) instead of entering an 8-digit date, and the system will set the reminder date to today. Once you've entered a date, the system will tell you what date you entered including the day of the week. If the entry is correct, just press 1 to move on.

Entering the Time of the Reminder. Now you'll be prompted to enter the delivery time for your reminder. Times are entered as a two-digit hour and two-digit minute using the time zone of the Asterisk system running the Telephone Reminders System. For times less than 1200, you will be prompted whether you meant AM or PM. For those that understand military time, you can avoid this step by entering times using the format: 1345 which means 1:45 p.m. You don't need to press the pound key after entering the four-digit time for delivery of your reminder. Keep in mind that you cannot schedule a reminder for delivery in the first five minutes after midnight. Other times "in the midnight hour" should be entered in the format: 0045 which means 12:45 a.m. Keep in mind that reminder times always must be at least 5 minutes in the future. Finally, you cannot schedule two reminders for the exact same date and time for delivery to the same phone number. Once you enter a delivery time, the system will play back both the date and time for the reminder as a precaution. Press 1 to accept your entries.

Entering Recurring Reminders. Beginning with version 3, you now will be prompted whether to schedule (1) a single reminder, (2) a recurring reminder every weekday (M-F), (3),a recurring reminder every day, (4) a recurring reminder every week, (5) a recurring reminder every month, or (6) a recurring reminder every year. Once you make a selection, your reminder will be scheduled. If you choose an option other than 1 through 6, a single reminder will be scheduled.

Where Reminders Are Stored. There are actually two files that make up each reminder: the .call file which places the actual call and the .gsm file which is the reminder message itself. The file naming convention is HourMinute.Date.PhoneNumber with either a .call or .gsm extension. The sound files are all stored in /var/lib/asterisk/sounds/custom. For recurring reminders, duplicates of the .call script and the .gsm message are stored in /var/spool/asterisk/recurring with the date of the next recurring reminder. At midnight on the next scheduled date, the two files are copied to the /var/spool/asterisk/reminders and /var/lib/asterisk/sounds/custom folders respectively. Then the next scheduled reminder date is set in the two filenames. For single reminders, prior to the delivery date of the reminder message, the .call file is stored in /var/spool/asterisk/reminders. Then, at 12:03 am on the date the reminder is scheduled for delivery, the run_reminders script in /var/lib/asterisk/agi-bin moves the affected .call files to /var/spool/asterisk/outgoing. The .call files in the outgoing directory are reviewed every minute of the day by Asterisk. By examining the time stamp of the file, Asterisk looks for a match with the current hour and minute of the day. Once the time for the call arrives, Asterisk processes the .call script and places the call. All dialing retries are handled internally by Asterisk with no user or program control so it's important to set your default values correctly in the reminder.php script as explained above. Once the .call file is processed, Asterisk discards the file whether the call was successful or not. As noted above, the reminder message file is only discarded if the call is completed successfully. So, from time to time, you do need to review the contents of /var/lib/asterisk/sounds/custom and discard reminder messages, if any, with dates in the past. Note also that, if you begin scheduling a reminder and change your mind and hang up after recording a reminder message, that recorded message will still exist in /var/lib/asterisk/sounds/custom.

Finally, a word of caution about the reminder message files: be very careful in deleting these files. The message files and .call files are linked by filename only, and there is no error detection or correction if the message file gets discarded before the time for the reminder call arrives. What would happen in such a situation is the call would be placed, someone would answer, Allison would say "please hold for an important reminder," and then there would be a brief silence followed by Allison saying "to repeat this reminder, press 1; otherwise, press 2" which is not entirely helpful. To delete a recurring reminder, delete both the .call and .gsm files from /var/spool/asterisk/recurring. Note that the .call file will have an additional extension which tells the recurring type, e.g. .daily, .weekly, etc.

Reminder and Wakeup Call Processing. It has been documented that flooding Asterisk with a bunch of .call scripts simultaneously can cause some of the scripts to be discarded without being executed. We hope this has been resolved in Asterisk 1.2.4, but just be alert to the possibility of a problem if multiple calls are scheduled at exactly the same time to different numbers.

When you're first getting started with the reminder system, it's probably a good idea to fire up Asterisk's Command Line Interface (CLI): asterisk -rvvvvv. Then you can watch as the reminders are scheduled and reminder calls are placed. Just schedule a reminder for five minutes from the time you begin the reminder call, and you'll be all set to give it a whirl. By default, there's also a reminder log file produced for the last reminder call placed. You can display this file with the following command: cat /var/log/asterisk/reminder.txt.

For Programmers Only. If you're just getting into PHP and AGI programming with Asterisk, then have a second look at reminder.php. In particular, take a look at the section of code that begins with parse agi headers into array. As best we can tell, our initial tutorial on Telephone Reminders was the first version of this subroutine written in PHP that actually worked. We've tried to repeat our success here. If you review the log file (reminder.txt), you will see a listing of all the AGI headers which are passed by Asterisk to PHP. But this is the first code we've seen that correctly reads the headers into variables where you can actually retrieve the content. We call it a feature. For example, the commented out line ($tmp = $agi['dnid']) shows the syntax to retrieve the DNID value from Asterisk. Just make a mental note that the parse AGI headers code in reminder.php actually works. Some of our previous code inherited the mistakes of others, but we've now taken the time to get this functioning properly because we needed it for something else. Here's the complete list of AGI headers that can be saved to variables in your PHP code should the need ever arise:

read: agi_request: reminder.php
read: agi_channel: SIP/204-6a1a
read: agi_language: en
read: agi_type: SIP
read: agi_uniqueid: 1138010325.1367
read: agi_callerid: "Line2" <204>
read: agi_dnid: 123
read: agi_rdnis: unknown
read: agi_context: reminder9
read: agi_extension: h
read: agi_priority: 2
read: agi_enhanced: 0.0
read: agi_accountcode:

You'll also want to take note of a little quirk in Asterisk (compared to some PBXs). To decipher the extension which actually placed a call, you must parse the agi_channel variable for the data between the slash and hyphen characters since the DNID (dialed number identifier) returns the extension being called (as opposed to the originating extension) when an internal call is placed. Here's one PHP approach to get the answer which in this case happens to be extension 204. Regex wizards could probably save a line of code, but who cares.

$CallingID = substr(stristr($agi['channel'],"/"),1);
$CallingID = substr($CallingID,0,strrpos($CallingID,"-"));


Web Interface to Telephone Reminders. We've built a very simple web page that will let you review which reminders are pending on your system. Recurring reminders are NOT yet included excepted those scheduled for delivery today. You can access the web page directly at http://192.168.0.111/reminders/ using the IP address of your Asterisk system. To install the Telephone Reminders web interface, log into your Asterisk system as root and then issue the following commands:

cd /var/www/html
mkdir reminders
cd reminders
wget http://nerdvittles.com/aah2/webreminder.zip
unzip webreminder.zip
rm webreminder.zip


Be advised that we are just getting started with a web interface to the Telephone Reminders application. Stay tuned for loads of additional features!

Security Reminder. If you plan to open the Asterisk web interface on your system to the public Internet, make sure to take security precautions to reduce the risk of a stranger trashing your system or running up your phone bill. Just click here and search for our articles on security to get your system up to speed.

Hot Tip! O'Reilly's must-have book, Asterisk: The Future of Telephony, is still available for free download here under a Creative Commons license. This is a cleaned up version of the original PDF which fixes pagination and compresses the file size to 3.9MB using Acrobat's Reduce File Size tool. Requires at least Acrobat 4 to load. Special thanks to Alexander Burke for all the hard work cleaning this up.

Email Delivery of Reminders. Assuming you have email messaging working on your Asterisk system, Telephone Reminders has the ability to deliver an email copy of reminders to the recipient in addition to a phone call. Be advised that, if the phone call is never completed, the email copy of the reminder will not be delivered. The reason for this is because Asterisk never passes the call to the context which handles delivery of the email message until the call is connected. So ... no connection, no email. However, if the recipient has an answering machine or voice mail, that would trigger delivery of the email message.

Once you've installed the new contexts to support email messaging, step two is registering email addresses for extensions and phone numbers to which you want email reminders delivered. Log in to your Asterisk server as root, and start up the Command Line Interface (CLI): asterisk -r. For each extension and phone number for which you want to activate email reminders, enter a command at the CLI prompt that looks like this: database put EMAIL 6781234567 joe@schmo.com where 6781234567 is the phone number of the reminder recipient and joe@schmo.com is the recipient's email address. You can display all existing EMAIL addresses that have been entered into your Asterisk database with this command: database show EMAIL. If you need to modify an existing entry, simply delete it and reenter it. To delete an existing entry, use the following syntax: database del EMAIL 6781234567.

MIME-Construct: Wherefore Art Thou? A Linux utility, MIME-Construct, made it easy to convert images (like faxes) to PDF documents and also facilitated the emailing of just about any other document including reminder messages. Unfortunately, it came up missing in TrixBox, and it's difficult to install because of all the Linux dependencies. So here's a simple solution that restores the original functionality of MIME-construct thanks to the programming genius of Rob Thomas. Since Rob's fax-process.pl code (included in freePBX) mimics the old MIME-construct application, the simple solution was just to tweak it a bit for Nerd Vittles and TrixBox compatibility and then copy a renamed version into the PATH (remember the DOS PATH!) on your Linux box. Log in as root and issue these commands, and you'll be back in the mime-construct business with TrixBox:

cd /usr/local/bin
wget http://nerdvittles.com/trixbox123/mime-construct
chmod +x mime-construct


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...

For those that are new to Nerd Vittles, you may not recall that, on Valentine's Day in 2006, we released TeleYapper, a telephone broadcasting system that distributes reminders and other messages to large or small groups of people by phone, of course. Believe it or not, it still works with almost all versions of TrixBox and Asterisk@Home 2.5 or later. But, it's one thing to develop a piece of software that can send unattended telephone reminders to your clients, patients, or Little League team. It's quite another to actually use it for a huge project and find out where all the warts are. As the resident cheerleader in our new neighborhood, I was wrestling with how to get detailed information about a meeting to review a proposed zoning change to a group of 700+ homeowners... in a hurry. Delivering flyers door-to-door was not going to happen. E-mail was certainly an option, but that unfortunately is hit and miss these days. With spam blockers, spam filters, missing email addresses, and verification requirements from companies such EarthLink, we decided we could only count on a delivery success rate of about 50 per cent.

The one piece of technology that everyone in the neighborhood had was a telephone. And our neighborhood database showed only 7 people with unlisted or do-not-call telephone numbers. So it was time to dust off our very own, free TeleYapper software and put it to the test using Asterisk®. Could it really deliver 700 phone calls using Voice Over IP with a home broadband connection in a reasonable time at a reasonable cost without any problems? To preserve our existing home phone system, we decided to really push the envelope by running it on a Windows desktop using our out-of-the-box VMware version of TrixBox 1.2.3.

Picking a Provider. It may not sound like a big deal, but choosing a really good VoIP provider matters when all of your neighbors are going to be listening to a 60 second message that has your name all over it. Can you imagine getting complaints from all your neighbors that go something like this: "I got some funny message from you last night on my answering machine, and I couldn't understand a single word of it. There was all this echoing, and I finally deleted the message after listening to about 10 seconds of gibberish." So, yes, there was the personal reputation to preserve. And picking a high-quality VoIP service provider was crucial in getting the actual message content delivered reliably. But there was more to consider as well.

First, you can't really use an all-you-can-eat VoIP service for something like this because it will trigger virtually every safeguard mechanism providers have put in place to make certain that folks aren't making unlimited, automated business calls on a residential phone plan. Second, with the exception of TelaSIP, most all-you-can-eat providers won't let you adjust the CallerID of the outbound calls. We wanted to do this to identify the call as coming from the neighborhood association's telephone number, not mine! Then there's the cost factor. We didn't mind paying by the minute within reason, but 2¢ per minute was just too expensive, and we'll explain why in a moment.

We ended up picking Vitelity for a number of reasons. Most importantly, they have outstanding VoIP service with support for unlimited outbound trunks if you have the bandwidth to support it. We chose to use up to 4 simultaneous trunks which worked well using Comcast broadband service. They also have the best and most flexible configuration options in the business. You can even create your own sub-accounts. Thus, we could set up a new TrixBox system with a sub-account even though we also use Vitelity as a fallback provider on our home system. Most providers don't support sub-accounts or even multiple accounts. With any other provider, you would have been forced to disable the existing trunk on your main system before you could use it on another system. With a Vitelity sub-account, none of this juggling is necessary. Vitelity also provides adjustable CallerID and excellent call accounting with detailed, tailorable logs which made it easy to print a report and get reimbursed for the calls. And, last but not least, their pricing was reasonable at 1.39¢ per minute with six second billing increments and no charges for failed calls. We made the right choice. Setup was easy using their Asterisk and TrixBox templates, and the calls were flawless with no hiccups.

Setting Up the Database. Now things get interesting. As installed, TeleYapper comes with a MySQL database that is preconfigured to work with TeleYapper. The problem is that you either have to do a lot of typing to get the data into that database before you make the first call, or you need a way to quickly assimilate information from an alternate source. Since we were working with a fairly large number of records, we didn't relish banging in 700+ names and phone numbers. So here's a little trick that works with just a little bit of database knowledge. There is no easy way to "import" data from a text file or other MySQL database because the fieldnames and field sizes won't match up. However, you can do something similar. What we did was export the neighborhood database into a comma-delimited ASCII text file. Then, using phpMyAdmin which comes with TrixBox, you can create a MySQL database table using this file as your source. There are hundreds of good tools for importing data into MySQL. Just do a little Googling. Or you can try Navicat which works for many formats. That's only half the battle unfortunately.

You still need to get the data into a format that TeleYapper can use, or you have a good bit of programming work ahead of you. We wrote the TeleYapper code, but we still didn't want to muck around in it to make this database work. So here's the trick. When you create your new table (we'll call it XYZ), create it as part of the teleyapper database on your system. Then take a look at the callees table that comes with TeleYapper. You'll notice that it has the following fields with the field types and lengths shown in parentheses:

id (medium integer 9)
name (varchar 40)
phonenum (varchar 20)
group (tiny integer 1)
lastokcall (datetime)
lastcall (varchar 7)

Using phpMyAdmin, you want to modify the structure of your new XYZ table so that it includes the fields shown above. For example, if your XYZ table has a field called LASTNAME, simply rename it to name and adjust the field length. You won't lose your existing data. Do the same thing with the phone number field. You'll probably have to add new fields to your XYZ table for id, group, lastokcall, and lastcall. Don't leave any of the fields out or TeleYapper will croak when you try to run it. For the id field, be sure to choose the auto-increment and index options so you get a unique field in your table. Once you're finished, browse through the file and make sure everything looks right. For phone numbers, be sure they're in one of the two following formats: 404-123-4567 or 4041234567. That's what TeleYapper is expecting to find.

When we originally wrote TeleYapper, we weren't really focused on folks using external databases, but you may need to. So, if your phone numbers aren't in this format, you can edit the teleyapper.php file in /var/lib/asterisk/agi-bin and add a few lines of code that look like this to convert 404.123.4567 and (404) 123-4567 to 4041234567 and to get rid of spaces in entries like 404 123 4567:

$phonenum = str_replace( ".", "", $phonenum );
$phonenum = str_replace( " ", "", $phonenum );
$phonenum = str_replace( "(", "", $phonenum );
$phonenum = str_replace( ")", "", $phonenum );


This new code should be inserted immediately after existing line 231 which reads: $phonenum = $row["phonenum"].

Now where were we? Once your new database table looks good to go, delete the existing callees table using the Drop icon. Then rename your XYZ table to callees. Now your TeleYapper database is ready for use. If you want to be able to use subsets of the table to make calls, you'll need to fill in appropriate group numbers. Otherwise, every entry will have a group entry of zero.

Calling Logistics. We built some flexibility into TeleYapper to handle multiple, simultaneous calls as well as redials. Call us nervous, but we like to watch what's going on when calls are placed. And when you get too many things going on at the same time, it's difficult to monitor with asterisk -rvvvv. This is especially true if the length of the message you plan to deliver is 50 seconds or more. Why? Well, answering machines don't typically pick up on the first ring, and neither do people. So, if you only separate your calls by one minute and you permit redials for calls that go unanswered, you can quickly have 7 or 8 calls going on at the same time since TeleYapper is designed to replay your message once if an answering machine picks up or no one presses a key after the initial message plays out. Our solution was to space out the calls a bit more (2 minutes instead of 1) and turn off the automatic redial of failed calls. To do this, edit the TeleYapper app and make the following entries using your desired CallerID number, of course: nano -w /var/lib/asterisk/agi-bin/teleyapper.php:

$numcallattempts=0 ;
$callspread=2 ;
$callerid = "6781234567" ;


Unexpected Surprise. Some folks are never home when you try to call them, and we expected that when TeleYapper was designed. But, believe it or not, about 50 people out of 700 in our neighborhhood don't have an answering machine. In short, they don't seem to care if they miss that all-important call announcing that they've won the latest lottery sweepstakes in England. To be honest, I hadn't really appreciated the scope of that wrinkle when TeleYapper was being developed. Yes, there was a way to kick off another round of calling, but this quantity of redials forced us to adjust the redial option ($numcallattempts) to 0 to avoid dozens of simultaneous outbound calls. Here's a little tidbit of practical wisdom for would-be programmers. If someone isn't answering their phone at 10:02 on a weekday morning, chances are they're probably not going to answer at 10:04 a.m. either. They're at work, stupid! So you can waste the entire day with fruitless redials, or come up with a new Plan B. Our solution was pretty simple, we placed a round of calls beginning at 9 a.m. in the morning, and then we placed another round of calls (to pick up the failed calls) starting at 6 p.m. the following night. Keep in mind that, if you want to cancel your round of calls in the middle, you can't just shut down Asterisk and pick up where you left off the next day. Why? Because TeleYapper schedules each call for a specific time of the day on the specific day that you first run the application. If you shut down your system and restart it the following morning, it will try to place all the remaining calls at once. The solution is fairly simple. Just delete all the files in /var/spool/asterisk/outgoing with commands like this. The first command is a good idea when you first start your calling spree. Look at the last entry in the directory to decipher what time your last call will be placed. If it's in the middle of the night, you might want to delete some of the entries and place those calls on a subsequent day during daylight hours.

ls -all /var/spool/asterisk/outgoing
rm -f /var/spool/asterisk/outgoing/*

The next day when you're ready to pick up where you left off, initiate another TeleYapper session with the same group ID and choose option 3 to dial calls that never were completed.

TeleYapper's Calling Process. Here are the actual steps in the TeleYapper call setup process:

The Tab. You're probably wondering what the cost was to deliver all of the messages to 700 people since we were paying by the minute. Since the message was about a minute long, that translated into roughly a two minute call for calls in which an answering machine picked up since TeleYapper automatically replays a message if the callee doesn't press a button on their phone. That accounted for roughly 70% of the calls. Even with the large volume of calls to answering machines, the total tab for placing the 700 calls was just under $10. Enjoy!

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...

Here we go again to patch another denial of service problem and some SIP vulnerabilities with Asterisk®. All versions are apparently affected. We obviously can't provide step-by-step instructions for each and every version of Asterisk@Home and TrixBox. But we have thousands of loyal readers that depend upon TrixBox 1.2.3 systems in a production environment. So today's column is for these folks. Our special thanks to Bubba for lending a technical hand as well. We've tested this pretty carefully on Nerd Vittles editions of TrixBox 1.2.3. That includes PBX-in-a-Flash implementations on Linux systems as well as Nerd Vittles VMware builds of TrixBox 1.2.3 which run on Windows and Mac desktop systems. If you're running a different system, you'll have to read between the lines and do the best you can. It reportedly works fine to upgrade Trixbox 2.x sysems as well. If you really get stumped, post your questions on the TrixBox forums and someone will come to your rescue. Make a backup of your system before you begin. For an excellent free backup solution, visit Thomas King's site for Backup 2 and follow the instructions.

The Asterisk Security Problem. Today's issues are well documented on the asterisk-announce mailing list. You can read the archive here. Incidentally, for those that didn't know it, we've provided a convenient link to all of the Asterisk mailing list archives in the right column. Just click on Asterisk ListServ. New versions of both Asterisk and Zaptel are now available, and today we'll show you how to apply the upgrade to Nerd Vittles TrixBox 1.2.3 systems.

Getting the Latest Kernel Source for TrixBox. TrixBox systems don't ship with kernel source code so we have to begin there before we have the necessary pieces in place to compile the new version of Asterisk and Zaptel. Log into your Asterisk server as root and issue the following command:

Addressing the RedHat Bug. Every time there is an update using the Asterisk kernel, module support needs to be rebuilt using the new kernel. Unfortunately, a RedHat bug (inherited by CentOS) causes the rebuilding process to fail. Here's the fix. Log into your new server as root and issue the following commands to determine which new kernel source was loaded on your system:

cd /usr/src/kernels
ls

You should see an entry that looks something like this: 2.6.9-34.0.2.EL-something. Depending upon the processor in your system, the something may be different than our machine. Write down the name of the new kernel directory and substitute it below for 2.6.9-34.0.2.EL-i686. Now issue these commands:

cd /usr/src/kernels/2.6.9-34.0.2.EL-i686/include/linux
mv spinlock.h spinlock.h.old
wget http://nerdvittles.com/trixbox/spinlock.h
shutdown -r now


Fixing Some Source Code Wrinkles. At least one of the existing (older) source modules in the TrixBox 1.2.3 build will cause Asterisk to fail to restart after updating Asterisk. The simple fix below solved it for us. Your mileage may vary. If you have problems, look at the tail of the Asterisk error log (tail /var/log/asterisk/full) and then find the offending source module in the directory shown below. Rename the module and try the compiles again. Here's the error we received (app_speech_utils.so: Asterisk died with code 1.) and what solved it for us without breaking anything (actually it apparently does break Lumenvox; review Comment #7 in our previous security column for how to fix it):

cd /usr/lib/asterisk/modules
mv app_speech_utils.so app_speech_utils.so.old


It also has been reported that some versions of TrixBox may no longer function without adding the openssl-devel module. Thanks to David Josephson for the heads up.

yum install openssl-devel


Installing Asterisk 1.2.18 and Zaptel 1.2.17 and AddOns 1.2.6. Now we're ready to install the updates. While still logged in as root, execute the following commands in order:

amportal stop

shutdown -r now


Now rebuild support for your ZAP devices or ztdummy if you have no ZAP devices. Log in as root again and type the following command: rebuild_zaptel. Then reboot your system: shutdown -r now. Now log in as root again. If you have zaptel devices, type modprobe wcfxo. Whether you have zaptel devices or not, type amportal stop and then genzaptelconf. Reboot your system again, and you should be back in business.

freePBX Cleanup. For some reason, these security updates cause some minor problems with the freePBX configuration. Some users report that Music on Hold stops functioning while others have indicated that the introductory prompt for voice mail stops functioning. Both fixes are simple. Here's how.

For the Music on Hold problem, open freePBX with your web browser. Click MusicOnHold, then click Default under the Add Music Category listing. Now click Enable Random Play button, and click the Red Bar to reload Asterisk.

For the introductory voice prompt with voice mail, click General Settings. The fifth option on the page is Direct Dial to VoiceMail Message Type. Change the setting from Default to Unavailable. Save your change and click the Red Bar to reload Asterisk. You should have smooth sailing after these tweaks. Enjoy!

Securing AsteriDex. If you have a preconfigured TrixBox system that includes our very own AsteriDex, you'll need to download and install this simple patch to resolve a security vulnerability that was discovered. Log into your Asterisk server as root and issue the following commands:

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


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...

Last year's demise of Kelly Pickler prompted us to put on our programming hat to conquer FOX TV® network's American Idol® and this year they've destroyed the singing career of poor Sanjaya Malakar. You'll have to agree that there's nothing quite as mind numbing as an hour of American Idol and 50 of your favorite commercials. As if that weren't enough, they expect you to sit by your telephone for TWO FOUR HOURS voting for your hero after the commercials end.

Since our original release of The Idolizer, much has changed. Not only are there new contestants, but now there's freePBX and TrixBox. Enter, The Idolizer II. So today's Asterisk® project is for those that have better things to do than dialing a tollfree number for two hours every Tuesday evening now that we're getting down to the wire on American Idol. And, no, the show's producers don't like autodialers. We don't like commercials (especially ten at a time), but they're still showing those. So here's the deal. Cut out the commercials, and we'll turn off our autodialer. And we'd bet DialIdol.com will, too. And, no, we're not affiliated with the Fair and Balanced® network nor the American Idol® show. We just don't want to waste two hours dialing the same phone number over and over ... when we could be doing our Honey-Do's to make the Little Mrs. happy.

Prerequisites. To use The Idolizer II autodialer with Asterisk, you'll need a free TrixBox PBX or at least a copy of the VMware version of TrixBox 1.2.3 for Windows or a Mac. Both run in a window on your desktop machine of choice. This works on any version of TrixBox or a plain Asterisk system running a current version of freePBX. Our tutorial will get you up and running in under an hour. Then you'll need an account with a hosting provider that gives you free calls to toll-free numbers or unlimited outbound calling in the U.S.

Installation. Using a web browser, open the TrixBox Control Panel and choose System Administration->Config Edit->extensions_trixbox.conf and add the following custom context to the bottom of the file:

[custom-idolizer]
exten => s,1,SetGlobalVar(COUNTER=1)
exten => s,2,Answer
exten => s,3,Wait(2)
exten => s,4,Dial(sip/8664365701@telasip-gw|18|L(10000:2000:5000)) ; 18 for TelaSIP, 22 for FWD
;exten => s,4,Dial(iax2/*18664365701@fwd|22|L(10000:2000:5000)) ; 18 for TelaSIP, 22 for FWD
exten => s,5,Goto(h,1)
exten => s,105,NoOp(BUSY)
exten => s,106,Goto(h,1)
exten => h,1,SetGlobalVar(COUNTER=$[${COUNTER} + 1])
exten => h,2,NoOp(Counter: ${COUNTER})
exten => h,3,Wait(6)
exten => h,4,GotoIf($["${COUNTER}" < "999"]?s,2) exten => h,5,Hangup

Once you know the phone number of the contestant you wish to vote for, make the following adjustments to the code above:

Now move to the top of the file and insert the following code in the [from-internal-trixbox] context using an available extension number on your system (default=4365 which spells I-D-O-L on your trusty Asterisk telephone):

exten => 4365,1,Goto(custom-idolizer,s,1)


Click the Update button to save your changes. Now open freePBX and choose Setup->Misc Destinations. For the Description, enter Idolizer II. For the Dial entry, type 4365. Click Submit Changes and then the Red Bar to reload your Asterisk settings.

Tweaking the Settings. If you find that your calls aren't being completed or that your votes aren't being registered (i.e. the call disconnects before you are thanked for voting), it's easy to fine tune the script. The number 18 in s,4 tells the dialer how many seconds to wait for an answer when placing calls. The number 10000 in s,4 (in thousandths of a second) tells Asterisk how long to stay connected once a call is answered. And the number 6 in h,3 tells Asterisk how many seconds to wait between placing calls. After making changes, log into your server as root and type: amportal restart.

Using the AutoDialer. When you're ready to begin your dialing spree, pick up an extension on your system and dial the extension number you assigned to The Idolizer II. Remember, the default number is 4365. Put the receiver down (don't hang up!) and enjoy the rest of your evening while The Idolizer II does the dialing for you. When you're ready to stop voting, hang up the phone. If you'd like to follow the progress of your calls, fire up the Command Line Interface (CLI) on your Asterisk system (asterisk -rvvvvv) after logging in as root. Enjoy the show!

The Year of Flash. If you're a slow learner like us, be glad you waited until now to tackle Adobe's Flash technology. The unbelievably simple tools that are now available to build Flash applications are nothing short of mind-boggling. We've been prototyping some of this technology for a new neighborhood web site. Have a look at this link, and click around the various Flash applets. We built it all from nothing in UNDER 3 HOURS! They look almost as good as Apple's Dashboard Widgets except they'll run on any platform: Windows, Mac, or Linux. All you need is a current web browser with a Flash Player to run these babies. Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Safari all work just fine. If you want to do a little experimenting, here's the deal of the year. The best flash tools on the planet are made by CoffeeCup Software. A close runner-up is Amara Software. You can visit their sites and get free demos to try out. Then you can buy all the tools from CoffeeCup for about $700 or from Amara for $129... or you can sign up for a year of hosting with Lunarpages and get every single CoffeeCup application for free. And, just so you don't feel totally ripped off by the one-year web hosting fee of $84, Lunarpages throws in support for 10 domains, 250 gigs of storage space, 2.5 terabytes of monthly bandwidth, and a free domain registration for as long as you host with them. Use the coupon code blog25 when you sign up to save an additional $25. That makes the total cost $59 for all you math wizards. Our site link to the Flash Widgets is actually hosted at Lunarpages so you can judge the performance for yourself. If you want them to back up your data every night and restore any or all files from a backup at any time, add another whopping $1.50 a month. Yes, we get a spiff if you sign up using our link. Sure beats clicking on the Donate button, doesn't it? And, if you happen to work in a K/12 school, the deal is even sweeter: the web hosting is free and so are five of the very best CoffeeCup Software applications. Now go learn something new or, better yet, teach it to a kid!

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 User 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." The map still isn't quite representative of where all of our visitors are coming from, but we're getting there. 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. We'll check it out one of these days.

Some Recent Nerd Vittles Articles of Interest...