(29 Jan 2008) - Asterisk is an open source PBX software project sponsored by Digium, a company that sells PBX hardware. It has just about all of the commercial PBX features and then some.

The following is a journal of the information that we've (friends and I) have used to get our own Asterisk systems working the way we want. The assumed starting point is "completely ignorant about Asterisk", hopefully this will help others who follow in the same path. We'll try to keep each part to a mini-howto (AKA a recipe) so that we can attack problems in bite-sized chunks and so that you can follow along. Please consider this to be a work in progress.

Our only request is that if you find this useful, send us an email (or comment below) and let us know.

Installation

• Things to do first
• Installing Asterisk
• Taking a test drive

Bits of Theory

• What's the difference between FXS and FXO?
• Asterisk configuration syntax
• sip.conf
• Asterisk and Speech Synthesis

CallerID

• Installing Hoodahek
• Using Gastify without installing app_notify

Dial plan recipes

• Asterisk and overhead paging
• Basic Music On Hold
• Logging Calls in MySQL
• Viewing CDR Data with Asterisk CDR Analyzer
• Asterisk and chan_skype
• Asterisk and Icecast (via Ices)
• Asterisk and TalkShoe
• Asterisk and Gizmo
• Asterisk, Gizmo, and GrandCentral
• Inbound PSTN Calls to Asterisk, via Gizmo5 and GoogleVoice
• Gizmo Project as an Asterisk Client
• Homebrew Asterisk Conference Manager
• SuperDeluxe Conference Manager
• Music on hold - configuration alternatives
• Installing CDR Using Postgres
• Installing CDR Using MySQL
• Adding in Free World Dialup
• Installing ZFone
• Asterisk and PSGw
• Realtime Extensions with MySQL
• Realtime MeetMe Conferences with MySQL
• IMAP Interface for Voicemail
• Passing values back to the dial plan
• Simple hot-desking
• 1-800 Calls via Google411
• Wake-up calls with the weather
• Configuring Asterisk BLF for the Grandstream GXP-2000
• Paging via Grandstream speakerphones
• Streaming TalkShoe to SqueezeBoxes
• Asterisk on a Linksys NSLU2
• Controlling the lights with Asterisk and X-10

OpenFire

• Resetting the admin password for OpenFire
• Openfire tarball install
• Openfire notes
• Openfire's IM Gateway
• OpenFire and JIRC

Other stuff

• Installing the Asterisk Desktop Manager
• Call Notification via IRC
• Numbers to Call
• Sources for Asterisk Sound Files
• Asterisk - Needing Further Research
• Grandstraem GVX3000 surveillance
• List of service providers
• Online conference services
• Enabling distinctive ring tones for the Grandstream GXV-3000 with Asterisk
• Enabling video support for the Grandstream GXV-3000 in Asterisk
• Manipulating the Grandstream GXV-3000 Busy Lamp with Asterisk
• Paging mode on the Grandstream GXV-3000 with Asterisk
• Scheduling calls in the future with .call files
• Changing the Asterisk console prompt

Speech Synthesis

• Connecting Cepstral to Festival
• Creating IVR sound files with text2wav
• Installing app_swift
• Transcoding files generated with Cepstral

Troubleshooting

• Kphone - squeaky playback
• Music on hold starts and stops

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