Asterisk is a powerful and flexible open source framework for building feature-rich telephony systems. As a Private Branch Exchange (PBX), which connects one or more telephones, and usually connects to one or more telephone lines, Asterisk offers very advanced features, including extension-to-extension calls, queues, line trunking, call distribution, call detail rerecords, and call recording. This book will show you how to build a telephony system for your home or business using this open source application. Asterisk 1.6 takes you step-by-step through the process of installing and configuring Asterisk. It covers everything from establishing your deployment plan to creating a fully functional PBX solution. Through this book you will learn how to connect employees from all over the world as well as streamline your callers through Auto Attendants (IVR) and Ring Groups.
This book is all you need to understand and use Asterisk to build the telephony system that meets your need. You will learn how to use the many features that Asterisk provides you with. It presents example configurations for using Asterisk in three different scenarios—for small and home offices, small businesses, and hosted PBX.
Over the course of ten chapters, this book introduces you to topics as diverse as the Public Switched Telephony Network (PSTN), Voice over IP Connections (SIP / IAX), DAHDI, LibPRI, through to advanced call distribution, automated attendants, FreePBX, and asterCRM.
With an engaging style and excellent way of presenting information, this book makes a complicated subject very easy to understand.
Chapter 1:Introduction to Asterisk introduces you to Asterisk and goes over certain basics such as its capabilities and features, requirements, scalability, and cost of deployment. In addition, it covers the trade-offs of Asterisk, its benefits, and how to determine whether it can fit your needs.
Chapter 2: Making a Plan for Deployment goes over the planning of equipment needed such as phones and adapters, the phone service you will use to power your Asterisk server such as PSTN lines or a SIP service from a VSP. Other planning such as hardware requirements and conducting a sound quality analysis are covered as well.
Chapter 3: Installing Asterisk shows you how to install Asterisk using the source files. A step-by-step tutorial will take you through the entire process.
Chapter 4: Configuring Asterisk shows you how to connect your Asterisk server with either your phone service (through PSTN or SIP, among others) as well as how to deploy some basic PBX features such as queues, voicemail, and music on hold. Other advanced features such as faxing, video conferencing, and using conference rooms are also covered in this chapter.
Chapter 5: Creating a Dialplan focuses on creating your dialplan that determines how your calls are routed through the Asterisk server. You will learn how to create extensions, distribute calls in an orderly manner using queues, and present callers with a greeting using automated attendants (IVR).
Chapter 6: Quality Assurance tells us everything regarding monitoring calls, recording calls, and capturing detailed call logs. Here you learn how to install and use these features.
Chapter 7: Making Asterisk Easy to Manage shows you how to integrate third-party applications that make Asterisk easily manageable all through a web-based interface. The chapter will show you how to install FreePBX as well as give you an overview of its capabilities.
Chapter 8: What is asterCRM? tells us about a useful business application a customer relationship management system (CRM) called asterCRM. Given its open source nature, Asterisk is compatible with many other business open-source applications. This chapter goes over installing and using this application, which can help streamline your business operations.
Chapter 9: Case Studies discusses several case studies to give you real-world examples of how one would deploy Asterisk. The examples will give a summary of the deployment as well as the asterisk configuration code used to carry it out.
Chapter 10: Maintenance and Security is an important chapter as it focuses on keeping your Asterisk system running smoothly as well as keeping it secure. The chapter covers security precautions, network deployment recommendations, as well as maintenance tips such as backups and preparing disaster recovery plans.
Even though this book will provide you with step-by-step instructions, it is best if the reader has a basic understanding of Linux and its commands. For implementing Asterisk, you will need a PC with a P4 CPU or higher, 1 or 2 GB of RAM, and a hard drive of no less than 60 GB, 7200 RPM. Please note that it is possible to run Asterisk on lesser requirements; the configuration mentioned is simply a recommendation.
This book is aimed at anyone who is interested in building a powerful telephony system using the free and open source application, Asterisk, without spending thousands of dollars buying a commercial and often less flexible system.
This book is suitable for the novice and those who are new to Asterisk and telephony. Telephony or Linux experience will be helpful, but not required.
In this book, you will find a number of styles of text that distinguish between different kinds of information. Here are some examples of these styles, and an explanation of their meaning.
Code words in text are shown as follows: "Asterisk provides a number of defaults and we can configure additional ones in the /etc/asterisk/indications.conf file."
A block of code is set as follows:
[default] mode=files directory=/var/lib/asterisk/music-on-hold random=yes
Any command-line input or output is written as follows:
#!/bin/bash
$ tar xjvf asterisk_backup.tar.bz2
$ cp -R etc/asterisk /etc/asterisk
New terms and important words are shown in bold. Words that you see on the screen, in menus or dialog boxes for example, appear in the text like this: "Once installed you will find the Backup & Restore module located under the Tools section of the GUI ".
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