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Include SPA932 in auto provisioning - almost done [MTE]

Posted by cfr on Wed, 03/18/2009

Hi,

the SPA962 phone can be extenden by two SPA932 key moduls to get up to 64 speed dial / blf buttons. Its quite easy to provision and our customers are eager to use it. Lets include it:

To get a speed dail on unit 1 key 1 and an blf on unit 1 key 2 the provisioning file should contain his:

<Unit_1_Key_1> fnc=sd;usr=11@$PROXY</Unit_1_Key_1>
<Unit_1_Key_2> fnc=blf+sd+cp;sub=12@$PROXY</Unit_1_Key_2>

So far I modified /etc/asterisk/provisioning/models.txt

[linksys-spa962]
...
blf_template=linksys_blf_9xx.cfg
speeddial_template=linksys_speeddial_9xx.cfg
...

,

/etc/asterisk/provisioning/linksys_blf_9xx.cfg

<Unit_1_Key_${LINE}> fnc=blf+sd+cp;sub=${BLF_TARGET}@$PROXY</Unit_1_Key_${LINE}>

and

/etc/asterisk/provisioning/linksys_speeddial_9xx.cfg

<Unit_1_Key_${LINE}> fnc=sd;usr=${SPEEDDIAL_TARGET}@$PROXY</Unit_1_Key_${LINE}>

BUT for an unknown reason the auto provisioning tool ignores my templates and the desired lines do not show up in the spa${MAC}.cfg file.

I guess the auto provisiong webpage needs to be updated to consider speed dial and blf functions for the SPA962 series.

My templates can not address the second modul. Maybe one can increase the number of available buttons in the list (up to 70-something) wrap it around like $KEY=$LINE % 32 + 1 and $UNIT=int($LINE/32) + 1) in order to spread the keys over 2 modules.

Thanks in advance for your thougts about this.
Christoph


Submitted by eeman on Wed, 03/18/2009 Permalink

I am working on the BLF and speed dial templates for the phones. you must upgrade to the latest version (6.1.3(a) ? ) to use it. Have you also noticed linksys has taken everything down regarding support for this phone. Theres no way to find anything about it or find the firmware even since last week. The part you were missing is the ${BLFS} and ${SPEEDDIALS}. I still cant believe linksys made such a crappy expansion module. White spaces to pencil in phone numbers? What were they thinking? What is this, the 1980's? Should be eInk or LCD, no exceptions :)

Submitted by eeman on Wed, 03/18/2009 Permalink

fwiw my blf file looks more like this

<Extension_${LINE}_>Disabled</Extension_${LINE}_>

<Short_Name_${LINE}_>${BLF_LABEL}</Short_Name_${LINE}_>

<Share_Call_Appearance_${LINE}_>shared</Share_Call_Appearance_${LINE}_>

<Extended_Function_${LINE}_>fnc=blf+sd;sub=${BLF_TARGET}@$PROXY;ext=${BLF_TARGET}@$PROXY</Extended_Function_${LINE}_>

you also need this in your base phone cfg file

<Server_Type>Asterisk</Server_Type>

Submitted by cfr on Thu, 03/19/2009 Permalink

Hi eeman,

thanks for pointing me to ${BLFS} and ${SPEEDDIALS}. I missed to include it in linksys_phone_9xx.cfg. The SPA932 auto configuration due the frontend works now.

Nevertheless one odd thing is left to fix. You can't reuse button numbers like use Button 1 as line on the phone and Button 1 as BLF on the SPA932 key modul.

Is it possible to modify the auto provisioning webpage to accept two times the same button number? Furthermore can we increase the number of available buttons to 32? Thus all buttons on the modul could be addressed.

The linksys firmware and doc stuff ist moved to cisco.com (support -> configure -> voip .. -> ip phones -> cisco small business ip phones). Here is a deep link. Unfortunately you need a cisco account to download stuff.

Here is another deep link my browser cached. The SPA9x2 config guide is still available via linksys.

cheers

Christoph

Submitted by eeman on Thu, 03/19/2009 Permalink

I have BLF working, I have line key labels working when only 1 registration defined, I just need to check on my speed dial string to see how much it needs to differ from my BLF+SD string I defined. Once those are done I could email you the files I have. I made some other tweaks like for example linksys defaults to 30ms packets when everyone else uses 20ms. It sounds a lot better using 20ms packets. Also the config currently bundled with thirdlane is for Europe ( that 6711a crap) Not only does it not sound as rich, you are transcoding unnecessarily.

found a great tool to write these out ...

http://ip.add.of.phone/admin/spacfg.xml

though extra spaces are needed between tags for some reason, otherwise it freaks out.

Submitted by eeman on Thu, 03/19/2009 Permalink

Is it possible to modify the auto provisioning webpage to accept two times the same button number? Furthermore can we increase the number of available buttons to 32?

due to the nature of the way linksys has decided to name these, I am having to create a workaround. We have to work within a given framework in order to not break compatibility with other phones. Even within the world of sidecars its 2 sets of 1-32. In addition the way the 932 is configured is completely different tags than the way the on-phone buttons are turned into BLF. So I am making 2 SPA962 models, one with a 932 and one without. Each using their own templates. The 932 version will use the BLF template for unit 1 and the speed dial template for unit 2, even though the macro's will be identical.

Submitted by cfr on Fri, 03/20/2009 Permalink

Hi eeman,

sounds great, from my experiences most customers will stick to one unit. If this counter wrapping around stuff for two units does not fit in the framework and/or breaks other phone's support, skip it, one modul should be enough.

Can you share your way how to get the current number of lines provisioned on the phone and how to insert a hook to subtract this number from $LINE. Doing arithmetics in the template itself seems to be impossible. Or could you create a new variable containing "ButtonNumber - LinesUsedOnPhone" like it is done in the SNOM templates?

Thanks for your support!

Submitted by eeman on Sat, 03/21/2009 Permalink

Can you share your way how to get the current number of lines provisioned on the phone

how to insert a hook to subtract this number from $LINE

I am unsure what you mean by these questions.

Submitted by cfr on Mon, 03/23/2009 Permalink

I have BLF working, I have line key labels working when only 1 registration defined, I just need to check on my speed dial string to see how much it needs to differ from my BLF+SD string I defined.

I thought you keep track of the number of lines registered on the phone. So you can calculate the offset needed on the SPA932 to align the button number back to one. For example buttons 1 and 2 are used as lines on the phone, button 3 is configured to be a speed dial (on the SPA932). In order to hit the first button on SPA932 we have to subtract the number of lines used on the phone itself.

Maybe your framework provides some sorts of hooks (like sourcing user scripts) where the numbers from the webfrontend are mapped to the variables used in the template, so I can manipulate the value of $LINE.

Cheers,

Christoph

Submitted by eeman on Mon, 03/23/2009 Permalink

no, my script basically is for a 962 with a 932 addon. It will treat the 6 linekeys on the phone as line keys (unless you go into the web interface and re-define them). Then you can setup blf buttons on the 932 starting with button 1. you can declare 2 button 1's in the interface.

Submitted by cfr on Tue, 03/24/2009 Permalink

Hi eeman,

sorry for the noise, you are absolutely right. Somehow when I tried to use button 1 on the SPA932 it didn't work. So I guessed one can't use one button several times.

However it works now, thanks for your patience.