Telephone Reminders 4.0.3 Adds 3 New Functions

voipaddict

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So does that mean that I won't be able to implement this add-on? What a shame if that's the case. I'm confused since there's a writeup on how to implement this on straight Asterisk systems, but it didn't work for me. I know it's designed for PIAF, and there's no support for non users, but one can always ask and wish......

I'm running CentOS 4.5 with Asterisk 1.4.13 and would really like to get it working. I have a similar problem in that the voice message is recorded and sent to the /spool folder, but the call is never made. I also can't schedule a web based reminder, even though the interface tells me it was completed successfully.
 

wardmundy

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Here's the problem. We worked our a$$e$ off putting a distribution in place that has the best of ALL worlds: Asterisk, Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP, and FreePBX. It's expandable by anybody. It works and it's free for the taking!! No tricks... if you know what I mean.

Now we build components that work perfectly with the basic build... also for free!! Along come some folks that rolled their own, and stuff doesn't work. Where would you devote your resources in a similar situation? How would we ever debug your code and your design... much less for free??

Not being ugly, but... if you can make your build match PBX in a Flash or trixbox, then all of our stuff will pretty much work. Otherwise, it probably won't. Whether to be compatible is your job, not ours. If you choose not to use FreePBX, then much of our stuff simply isn't going to work. Nerd Vittles does not intentionally cripple stuff to keep others from using it. But the burden is still on the "non-believer" to get the components integrated so that they work reliably just like our basic build. Unlike some others, we even provide the source code (for the basic build AND the application) so you can see what we've done. Can't do much better than that. :cool:
 

voipaddict

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wardmundy,

I understand your position. It's not that I'm a non-believer in PBXIAF, my needs are quite unique. I'm a member of a group called the Collectors Net (CNET). We're hobbyists and former telco people that have restored and maintained vintage (electro-mechanical) central office switching equipment and similar PBXs. We have created a network that allows us to interconnect our switches using Asterisk and an ENUM server. We have vintage PBXs and Asterisk boxes up and running across the globe.

I have two T1's in my basement connected to a four port T1 interface board so I can run my requisite FXS and FXO ports. I use Asterisk because of the freedom and flexibility that's required to make this vintage stuff accessible to everyone else on the system. I run a 1940s era Step by Step switch, a British step PAX and other systems - all of the same vintage.

PBXIAF seems like it's designed to make is easy for people to get a system up and running who may not necessarily have the complex needs that someone like I do. Feel free to check out our project at http://ckts.info.

I understand that you do this for free and have to spend your time and resources on your project. All that I'm asking is some help trying to understand where the tweaks need to be made in the scripts, php, etc.

Thanks
 

voipaddict

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jroper,

Thanks for that lead. I already figured out those conf file differences. What I'm trying to wrap my head around is the problem of the reminder .call file being sent to var\spool\asterisk\outgoing folder but not being executed in to a call by the system. My dial plan is defined in the extensions context, so I modified the php to use that context. I thought I could assign any valid zap channel to originate the call from, but nothing is happening. The web interface is a completely different beast at this point and will deal with that after I get the other component working. This is what my "pending" call file looks like:

Channel: Zap/1/3496000@extensions
Callerid: "Reminder" <123>
MaxRetries: 5
RetryTime: 300
WaitTime: 40
Account: Reminder
context: extensions
extension: s
priority: 1
Set: MSG=1222.20080306.3496000
Set: APPTDT=20080306
Set: APPTTIME=1222
Set: APPTPHONE=3496000
Set: CALLATTEMPTS=5
Set: CALLDELAY=300
 

wardmundy

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New Telephone Reminders 4.03 Beta II

Just a heads up that there's a new 4.03 beta for Telephone Reminders that adds web support support for intercom calls (*80205 to send a call to intercom on extension 205) and direct calls to voicemail (*205 sends a call to the main voice mailbox of extension 205).

Before loading this update, you must first install Telephone Reminders for Asterisk 1.4. Today's release of Beta II also adds support for deleting previously scheduled reminders of all flavors.

For those of you using Telephone Reminders 4.0 that also have an Aastra 5xi-series phone or any other SIP phone for which you have the intercom function (*80) functioning, we have an enhancement for you to test. Once installed, you can use the web interface to Telephone Reminders to schedule messages for delivery directly to a local user's voicemail box or to their intercom/paging facility in addition to the normal v.4 functionality.

To send a message directly to voicemail, simply prepend an asterisk to the desired Phone#, e.g. *250 would send the reminder to the voicemail box for extension 250. For the text of the message, be sure to include the following sentence at the beginning of any message you wish to send to assure that none of your actual message is cut off when the voicemail prompts are played: This is a telephone reminder message from Nerd Vittles. So long as this sentence precedes the rest of your message, you can add any desired text message you like without worrying that part of it will be cut off by the introductory message in the Asterisk voicemail system.

To send a message blast directly to the intercom or paging facility of an internal extension, be sure that you have configured paging in FreePBX and also followed the revised Nerd Vittles instructions for paging in this week's Aastra article. Then use the web interface to Telephone Reminders to schedule the message. Simply prepend *80 to the Phone#, e.g. *80250 would send an intercom message to extension 250.

WARNING: Unless your system is protected from Internet access by a firewall, do NOT use this update without password-protecting the reminders directory because the code has NOT been hardened for open use on the Internet!! A malicious user could easily delete other critical files from your server with a maliciously constructed web request.

To install the update which overwrites /var/www/html/reminders/ and makes Cepstral the default TTS engine, log into your server as root and execute the following commands:

Code:
cd /root
rm -f reminders-beta.tgz
wget http://pbxinaflash.net/scripts/reminders-beta.tgz
cd /
tar -zxvf /root/reminders-beta.tgz
There's also a new [remindem] context for /etc/asterisk/extensions_custom.conf which works better with answering machines because it injects music on hold while waiting for input from the callee. Just swap out the existing code with the following and reload your dialplan:
Code:
[remindem]
exten => s,1,Answer
exten => s,2,Wait(2)
exten => s,3,Set(TIMEOUT(digit)=7)
exten => s,4,Set(TIMEOUT(response)=10)
exten => s,5,Playback(custom/reminder5)
exten => s,6,Wait(2)
exten => s,7,Playback(custom/${MSG})
exten => s,8,Set(TIMEOUT(digit)=4)
exten => s,9,Set(TIMEOUT(response)=5)
exten => s,10,Set(counter=1)
exten => s,11,Background(to-hear-msg-again)
exten => s,12,Background(press-1)
exten => s,13,Background(otherwise-press)
[COLOR=Blue] exten => s,14,Background(digits/2)
exten => s,15,WaitExten(11|m)
exten => 1,1,Goto(onemo,1)
exten => 2,1,Goto(alldone,1)
;exten => s,14,Read(lepick,digits/2,1)
;exten => s,15,GotoIf($["${lepick}" = "2"]?alldone,1:onemo,1)
[/COLOR] exten => onemo,1,NoOp(Callee Replayed Message. Dialed: ${APPTPHONE}.)
exten => onemo,2,Playback(custom/${MSG})  ; playing again by request
exten => onemo,3,Set(counter=${counter}+1)
exten => onemo,4,GotoIf($["${counter}" = "1+1+1"]?alldone,1:s,11)
exten => alldone,1,Background(goodbye)
exten => alldone,2,NoOp(Callee Acknowledged Call. Dialed: ${APPTPHONE}.)
exten => alldone,3,Hangup
exten => t,1,NoOp(Callee's Answering Machine probably answered. Dialed: ${APPTPHONE}.)
exten => t,2,Background(restarting)
exten => t,3,Wait(1)
exten => t,4,Playback(custom/${MSG})  ; playing again for ans machine
exten => t,5,Background(goodbye)
exten => t,6,Hangup
exten => i,1,Goto(t,2)
exten => o,1,Goto(t,2)
exten => h,1,Set(email=${DB(EMAIL/${APPTPHONE})}) ; see if number to call has an associated email address
exten => h,2,GotoIf($["foo${email}" = "foo"]?4)
exten => h,3,system(mime-construct --to ${email} --subject "Telephone Reminder" --file /var/lib/asterisk/sounds/custom/${APPTTIME}.${APPTDT}.${APPTPHONE}.gsm --type audio/gsm)
exten => h,4,NoOp(Callee hung up. Dialed: ${APPTPHONE}.)
exten => h,5,System(/bin/rm -f /var/lib/asterisk/sounds/custom/${APPTTIME}.${APPTDT}.${APPTPHONE}.gsm)
exten => h,6,Hangup
Enjoy!

Warning: Don't use the modified [remindem] code as written if you plan to send reminder messages to voicemail boxes on your own system. With the music-on-hold activated in s,15, the timer does NOT work in Asterisk 1.4.15. Hence, you get verrrrrrrrry long musical messages. exten => s,15,WaitExten() works fine. You can adjust the voicemail timeout in vm_general.inc to 12 if you want to assure that messages play twice thus guaranteeing that a message isn't truncated. I'll report the bug to the Asterisk Dev Team.
 

voipaddict

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Got it working on Asterisk system

For those of you who may want to run Reminders 4.0 on a standard Asterisk system, here's what I did to get it working.

I opened the reminder.php script in the \var\lib\asterisk\agi-bin folder.

Since this is a straight Asterisk system and not PBXIAF I had to tweak the context reference on line 238 from @outbound-allroutes to @extensions, since that's the context that my dial plan is defined in. You will need to make the change appropriate to your dial plan context name.

Tweaking the web interface is next.
 

lopaka

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For using this as an appointment reminder for clients, how hard would it be to include 2 selectable message options off the web interface. For example, "this call is to remind you about your appointment tomorrow" then select time from drop down. There would be 2 choices one english, one spanish.

TIA
 

jebradley

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I appreciate the work that's been done on 'Telephone Reminders,' and I'd like to add it as a choice to my IVR. I'd like to be able to call my system from the outside and schedule the reminder call. What needs to be done to do that?

Also, a feature that I'd like to see added to the web interface, is the ability to delete scheduled reminders. I can easily go to the subdirectory and delete the files, but it would be nice to be able to checkmark a message, and have it deleted.

Thanks.
 

wardmundy

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The latest web version includes the ability to delete scheduled reminders.
 

Joelio

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telephone reminders with responses?

How hard would it be to add the ability to let users hit #1 to confirm or #2 to decline a reminder sent via the telephone reminders tool?
 

wardmundy

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My best guess is that it's about a $500 project. Someone wanting this for commercial purposes no doubt will pony up the incentive money sooner or later. :smile5:
 

lopaka

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I'll help chip in for some of it soon. I've got 16K in startup and equipment costs for a new business so I'm a little tapped right now. This is worthy of investment though :)
 

Joelio

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HI, I sent a private note to Ward, I would chip in some $$, how does it work, do I just donate and hope this gets done? One thing I would need is a way to check on a reminder and see if it was accepted or declined via some sort of HTTP GET call.
 

tshif

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Just a heads up that there's a new 4.03 beta for Telephone Reminders that adds web support support for intercom calls (*80205 to send a call to intercom on extension 205) and direct calls to voicemail (*205 sends a call to the main voice mailbox of extension 205).

Before loading this update, you must first install Telephone Reminders for Asterisk 1.4. Today's release of Beta II also adds support for deleting previously scheduled reminders of all flavors.

What is the status of this beta for 4.03? Are there outstanding bugs, issues, or development - or is this one about to become release? :patriot:
 

tshif

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Still Beta?

What is the status of this beta for 4.03? Are there outstanding bugs, issues, or development - or is this one about to become release? :patriot:

*BUMP*
Is there anyone using this software? Is it slated to go from beta to release?
 

lopaka

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I loaded it, tried it's functions and everything worked as described. What I need it to do, it is not configured to do so I am not using it regularly yet.

I like a few others would love to use this to remind clients of their medical appointments, using a pre-configured web menu. I would also like them to be able to confirm by hitting a button on the phone at verbal prompt.

These things I need are all doable, but the good folks in charge need a little monetary incentive to donate the hours necessary to put these features in play ;)

Once I generate some revenue at the new business, I will try to chip in part of this.
 

foneman

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I will join in

I will also help with this effort as not only medical field but others as well.
 

wardmundy

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Sorry this one has fallen through the cracks. The beta update works fine with the caveats that are mentioned. As for new features, kindly reply below with what you need and I'll try to provide an estimate of the time to get it done. Donations still are possible through the Nerd Vittles site. :wink5:
 
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