Building Enterprise Ready Telephony Systems with sipXecs 4.0
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About this ebook
Open source telephony systems are making big waves in the communications industry. Moving your organization from a lab environment to production system can seem like a daunting and inherently risky proposition. Building Enterprise Ready Telephony Systems with sipXecs delivers proven techniques for deploying reliable and robust communications systems.
Building Enterprise Ready Telephony Systems with sipXecs provides a guiding hand in planning, building and migrating a corporate communications system to the open source sipXecs SIP PBX platform. Following this step-by-step guide makes normally complex tasks, such as migrating your existing communication system to VOIP and deploying phones, easy. Imagine how good you'll feel when you have a complete, enterprise ready telephony system at work in your business.
Planning a communications system for any size of network can seem an overwhelmingly complicated task. Deploying a robust and reliable communications system may seem even harder. This book will start by helping you understand the nuts and bolts of a Voice over IP Telephony system. The base knowledge gained is then built upon with system design and product selection. Soon you will be able to implement, utilize and maintain a communications system with sipXecs. Many screen-shots and diagrams help to illustrate and make simple what can otherwise be a complex undertaking. It's easy to build an enterprise ready telephony system when you follow this helpful, straightforward guide.
A clear and concise approach to building a communications system for any organization with the open source sipX Enterprise Communications Server
ApproachThis book was written to be a step by step approach to building a communications system for any organization. Care was taken to clearly illustrate with diagrams and screen shots all of the steps and concepts along the way.
Who this book is forThis book is written for network engineers who have been asked to deploy and maintain communications systems for their organizations.
Michael W. Picher
As an industry veteran with over 20 years in Information Technology consulting, Michael brings a network engineer's perspective to the Telephony business. After receiving a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Engineering from the University of Maine, Michael worked hard to build up a computer manufacturing business which he left in the mid '90s. Following the manufacturing endeavor Michael worked with two close friends to build what became one of Maine's largest home-grown technology consulting and software development firms. After successfully selling the consulting business to a large out of state firm, Michael turned his attention to the growing IP Telephony space. Michael has helped successfully deploy some of the region's largest IP based communications systems and the infrastructure required to support those systems. Away from technology, Michael enjoys life with his wife Debra and son Matthew on their large Maine wild blueberry farm in rural Maine. Snowmobiling and hunting are the family choices for fun and Michael is also a long time Autocross fanatic with multiple class wins in his beloved Mini Cooper S.
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Building Enterprise Ready Telephony Systems with sipXecs 4.0 - Michael W. Picher
Table of Contents
Building Enterprise-Ready Telephony Systems with sipXecs 4.0
Credits
About the Author
About the Reviewer
Preface
What this book covers
What you need for this book
Who this book is for
Conventions
Reader feedback
Customer support
Errata
Piracy
Questions
1. Introduction to Telephony Concepts and sipXecs
Traditional phone system concepts
Telecommunications provider interface
Telephones on a traditional phone system
Voicemail systems
Call routing logic
Calling functions and features
Call hold
Call park orbits
Call pickup
Call transfer
Call forwarding
Speed dial
Direct Station Selection/Busy Lamp Field
Hunt groups
Automatic Call Distribution
Dial plans
Intercom
Paging
Conferencing
sipX Enterprise Communications System overview
The iPBX
Gateways
Telephones
sipXecs features
Voicemail
Auto Attendant
Music on Hold
Call park orbits
Page groups
Intercom
Conference server
Automatic call distribution
Device management
User management
User self-service portal
Time-based call forwarding
Localization
Internet calling and NAT traversal
Call detail records
Clustering
Summary
2. System Planning and Equipment Selection
System planning
Information gathering
Existing telecommunications connectivity
Demarcation point
Existing users and phones
Existing call flow
Day call flow example
Night call flow example
Departmental call flow example
Existing auto attendants
Existing hunt groups
Existing ACD queues
Special considerations
Paging
Cordless phones
Existing computer network
Equipment selection
Network equipment
Network switch connectivity
Quality of service
Virtual Local Area Network support
Powering the phones
Gigabit switches
Utilizing existing network equipment
Servers
Gateways
Analog gateways
Digital gateways
Phones
Hard phones
Softphones
Wireless phones
SIP firewalls
Uninterruptable power supplies
Plan the installation
Extension planning
Users and phones
Define permissions for user groups
Call flow
Auto attendants
Hunt groups
ACD queues
Network planning
Physical network
Virtual network
Site preparations
Document additional network information
Summary
3. Installing sipXecs
Complete cabling requirements
Complete network requirements
Installing sipXecs
High availability installation
Install and configure the distributed server
Verify DNS and DHCP operation
Single PBX testing
High availability PBX testing
Summary
4. Configuring Users
Creating users
Extension pool
Internal extension length
Adding a user
Importing users
User groups
Advanced user configuration
Phantom users
Voicemail-only mailbox
Call routing phantom
Call routing phantom example
Summary
5. Configuring Phones in sipXecs
Types of phones
Managed phones
Unmanaged phones
Phone groups
Phone firmware
Advanced phone configuration
Multiple lines on a phone
Multiple phones for a user
Multiple line appearances on a phone
Summary
6. Connecting to the World with sipXecs
Adding gateways
Managed gateways
PSTN Lines
Caller ID
Dial Plan
SIP
Voice Codecs
Proxy and Registration
DTMF & Dialing
Advanced Parameters
Supplementary Services
FXO
Network
Media
RTP/RTPC
Management
Unmanaged gateways
Add gateway
Caller ID
Dial Plan
SIP Trunks
Dial Plans
Voicemail dial rule
Custom dial rules
Long distance dial rules
Local dial rules
Emergency dial rules
International dial rules
Attendant dial rules
Session Border Controllers
sipXecs Session Border Controller
Defining Session Border Controllers
Summary
7. Configuring sipXecs Server Features
Auto Attendant
Auto Attendant example
Intercom
Paging Groups
Hunt Groups
Call Park Orbits
Music on Hold
Phonebooks
Summary
8. Using sipXecs—The User Perspective
The Telephone User Interface (TUI)
Transfer a call directly to voice mail
Directed call pickup
Parking a call
Picking up a parked call
Intercom
Paging groups
Conference room controls
ACD sign in and out
Using the sipXecs voicemail service
Voicemail messages menu structure
Voicemail options menu
Voicemail system administrator options
The user web portal
Voicemail
User information
Call forwarding
User speed dials
Call history
ACD presence
Phonebook
Phones
User training
Training materials
Classroom training
Summary
9. Configuring Advanced sipXecs Features
Conference service
Utilizing DIDs
Phantom users
Live daytime attendant
Create new user account
Turn off voicemail
Set up the work day schedule
Set up call forwarding
Change gateway destination extension
Connecting two sipXecs servers
DNS resolution
Set up gateways
Configure custom dial plan entry
Summary
10. Utilizing the sipXecs ACD Service
Enabling the ACD Service
Configuring the ACD Service
Create an ACD Queue
Configure lines for queues
Agent Availability
Monitoring the ACD Server
Agent Statistics
Call Statistics
Queue Statistics
ACD Reporting
Summary
11. Maintenance and Security
System backup and restore
Backup
Restore
Monitoring system performance
System alarms
External monitoring of system availability
System logs
System snapshots
System security
Isolation
SIP passwords
Updating system software
Summary
A. Glossary
Index
Building Enterprise-Ready Telephony Systems with sipXecs 4.0
Michael W. Picher
Building Enterprise-Ready Telephony Systems with sipXecs 4.0
Copyright © 2009 Packt Publishing
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embedded in critical articles or reviews.
Every effort has been made in the preparation of this book to ensure the accuracy of the information presented. However, the information contained in this book is sold without warranty, either express or implied. Neither the author, nor Packt Publishing, and its dealers and distributors will be held liable for any damages caused or alleged to be caused directly or indirectly by this book.
Packt Publishing has endeavored to provide trademark information about all of the companies and products mentioned in this book by the appropriate use of capitals. However, Packt Publishing cannot guarantee the accuracy of this information.
First published: June 2009
Production Reference: 1170709
Published by Packt Publishing Ltd. 32 Lincoln Road Olton Birmingham, B27 6PA, UK.
ISBN 978-1-847196-80-4
www.packtpub.com
Cover Image by Parag Kadam (<paragvkadam@gmail.com>)
Credits
Author
Michael W. Picher
Reviewer
Anthony Graziano
Scott Lawrence
Acquisition Editor
Sarah Cullington
Development Editor
Dilip Venkatesh
Technical Editor
Aditi Srivastava
Indexer
Hemangini Bari
Editorial Team Leader
Abhijeet Deobhakta
Project Team Leader
Priya Mukherji
Project Coordinator
Lata Basantani
Zainab Bagasrawala
Proofreader
Chris Smith
Production Coordinator
Dolly Dasilva
Cover Work
Dolly Dasilva
About the Author
Michael W. Picher is an industry veteran with over 20 years of experience in Information Technology consulting. Michael brings a network engineer's perspective to the Telephony business. After receiving a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Engineering from the University of Maine, Michael worked hard to build up a computer manufacturing business, which he left in the mid-90s. Following the manufacturing endeavor, Michael worked with two close friends to build what became one of Maine's largest home-grown technology consulting and software development firms. After successfully selling the consulting business to a large out-of-state firm, Michael turned his attention to the growing IP Telephony space. Michael has helped successfully deploy some of the region's largest IP-based communications systems and the infrastructure required to support those systems.
Away from technology, Michael enjoys life with his wife Debra and son Matthew on their large, wild blueberry farm in rural Maine. Snowmobiling and hunting are the family choices for fun, and Michael is also a longtime Autocross fanatic with multiple class wins in his beloved Mini Cooper S.
I'd like to thank my wife Debra for her support while writing this book, my son Matthew for bringing joy to our lives, and my parents who have always been there to keep me pointed in the right direction. I'd also like to thank Tony Graziano and Scott Lawrence, for their contributions and technical review, and the sipXecs development team and community without whom we wouldn't have this wonderful product. A thank you is also due to the team at Packt Publishing for keeping things moving forward and helping to create an excellent final product.
About the Reviewer
Anthony Graziano has spent the last 25 years working in Information Technology and telecommunications. Recruited by a national carrier from his position at a multistate financial services firm concentrating on IBM mainframes and communications, he worked as a data specialist for one of the largest US facilities-based carriers. After deciding to focus on microcomputing technology, he worked for a Virginia-based consulting and services firm, which he helped to grow before it was purchased by a national firm.
Today he operates a CLEC in Virginia (Cavalier Broadband) with a dedicated focus on data services. His growing consulting practice, myITdepartment, helps commercial clients to identify emerging technologies such as VoIP and SaaS, so they can more easily adapt to changing business trends.
He lives in Charlottesville, Virginia, with his wife Lisa and their three daughters. He enjoys saltwater fishing, especially on the Northern Neck of the Cheaspeake Bay, with friends and family as often as he can.
Preface
Open source telephony systems are making big waves in the communications industry. Moving your organization from a lab environment to production system can seem like a daunting and inherently risky proposition. Building Enterprise Ready Telephony Systems with sipXecs delivers proven techniques for deploying reliable and robust communications systems.
Building Enterprise Ready Telephony Systems with sipXecs provides a guiding hand in planning, building, and migrating a corporate communications system to the open source sipXecs SIP PBX platform. Following this step-by-step guide makes normally complex tasks, such as migrating your existing communication system to VoIP and deploying phones, easy. Imagine how good you'll feel when you have a complete, enterprise-ready telephony system at work in your business.
Planning a communications system for any size of network can seem an overwhelmingly complicated task. Deploying a robust and reliable communications system may seem even harder. This book will start by helping you understand the nuts and bolts of a Voice over IP Telephony system. The base knowledge gained is then built upon with system design and product selection. Soon you will be able to implement, utilize, and maintain a communication system with sipXecs. Many screenshots and diagrams help to illustrate and make simple what can otherwise be a complex undertaking. It's easy to build an enterprise-ready telephony system when you follow this helpful, straightforward guide.
What this book covers
Chapter 1 introduces some important telephony concepts to establish some necessary background information and an overview of sipX Enterprise Communications Server (sipXecs), its features, and its functionality.
Chapter 2 covers data collection about the existing systems, equipment selection, and the planning for phone system programming.
Chapter 3 covers steps involved in completing the cabling requirements, network infrastructure requirements, and installing sipXecs. In this chapter we learn to install the base PBX operating system and software. We also learn some important testing steps for verifying DNS and DHCP functionalities.
Chapter 4 covers creating and managing user accounts, managing the extension pool, utilizing user groups, and importing users. We also explore how to use phantom users for voicemail-only mailboxes and for some advanced call routing needs.
Chapter 5 covers the typical day-to-day functions that a communications systems manager needs to perform. The reader gets a good basic knowledge of adding users and phones to the system in this chapter.
Chapter 6 covers adding managed and unmanaged gateways, setting up the Session Border Controller, and working with Dial Plans.
Chapter 7 covers the configuration of sipXces server features. sipXecs has several server-side features that provide additional functionality. These functionalities are not otherwise available in the phones themselves. Many of the basic features will be covered in this chapter while some of the more advanced features will be described in Chapter 9.
Chapter 8 covers all of the information needed as an administrator to help the users acclimatize to their new communications system.
Chapter 9 explores the built-in conference services provided by sipXecs and then explores some more advanced sipXecs call routing features. It also covers some call routing tricks that will find use with the sipXecs installation.
Chapter 10 covers the configuration of ACD services. It also covers how to enable and monitor their operation.
Chapter 11 explores various system maintenance tasks and steps that can be taken to keep the phone system secure.
A glossary is also included at the end of the book. This appendix includes all the important words and terms used throughout the book.
What you need for this book
sipXecs can be installed from a single CD installer. The recommended system should have the following components:
Two or four (or dual/quad-core) processors operating at 1.8 GHz or better
2 gigabytes of system memory (RAM)
32 gigabytes or larger SCSI hard drive
Single Ethernet adapter (100 Mbps or 1000 Mbps)
Who this book is for
This book is written for network engineers who have been asked to deploy and maintain communications systems for their organizations.
Conventions
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: The nslookup tests are combined.
A block of code is set as follows:
;; Query time: 0 msec
;; SERVER: 127.0.0.1#53(127.0.0.1)
;; WHEN: Thu Nov 27 07:00:37 2008
;; MSG SIZE rcvd: 103
When we wish to draw your attention to a particular part of a code block, the relevant lines or items are set in bold:
> set q=srv
> _sip._tcp.xyzcompany.com
Server: sipx.xyzcompany.com
Address: 172.16.1.2
Any command-line input or output is written as follows:
nslookup
>set q=srv
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: Under Quick Links on the right side of the page is an Add Line hyperlink.
Note
Warnings or important notes appear in a box like this.
Note
Tips and tricks appear like this.
Reader feedback
Feedback from our readers is always welcome. Let us know what you think about this book—what you liked or may have disliked. Reader feedback is important for us to develop titles that you really get the most out of.
To send us general feedback, simply send an email to <feedback@packtpub.com>, and mention the book title via the subject of your message.
If there is a book that you need and would like to see us publish, please send us a note in the SUGGEST A TITLE form on www.packtpub.com or email
If there is a topic that you have expertise in and you are interested in either writing or contributing to a book on it, see our author guide on www.packtpub.com/authors.
Customer support
Now that you are the proud owner of a Packt book, we have a number of things to help you to get the most from your purchase.
Errata
Although we have taken every care to ensure the accuracy of our content, mistakes do happen. If you find a mistake in one of our books—maybe a mistake in the text or the code—we would be grateful if you would report this to us. By doing so, you can save other readers from frustration, and help us to improve subsequent versions of this book. If you find any errata, please report them by visiting http://www.packtpub.com/support, selecting your book, clicking on the let us know link, and entering the details of your errata. Once your errata are verified, your submission will be accepted and the errata added to any list of existing errata. Any existing errata can be viewed by selecting your title from http://www.packtpub.com/support.
Piracy
Piracy of copyright material on the Internet is an ongoing problem across all media. At Packt, we take the protection of our copyright and licenses very seriously. If you come across any illegal copies of our works, in any form, on the Internet, please provide us with the location address or web site name immediately so that we can pursue a remedy.
Please contact us at <copyright@packtpub.com>with a link to the suspected pirated material.
We appreciate your help in protecting our authors, and our ability to bring you valuable content.
Questions
You can contact us at <questions@packtpub.com>if you are having a problem with any aspect of the book, and we will do our best to address it.
Chapter 1. Introduction to Telephony Concepts and sipXecs
In this chapter we'll introduce some important telephony concepts to establish some necessary background information. Then we'll move on to an overview of sipX Enterprise Communications Server (sipXecs), its features, and its functionality.
Traditional phone system concepts
There are two types of traditional phone systems, PBXs and Key Systems. A Private Branch Exchange (PBX) is typically found in larger organizations. Key telephone systems that allow users to directly select outside lines via keys on the handsets were designed with smaller organizations in mind. Both types of systems typically consist of interfaces to a telecommunications provider, interfaces to telephone handsets, a voicemail system for auto attendant and leaving messages, and call-routing logic.
The traditional PBX is usually thought of as being housed in a cabinet with various interfaces and logic boards inserted as cards into a backplane across which all of the cards can communicate. These backplanes are vendor specific, so you are typically locked in to purchase all cards and phones from a single vendor. Additionally, many first-generation IP-based phone systems may also be thought of as traditional systems. These early IP systems use proprietary signaling over IP or protocols that have fallen out of favor (MGCP/H.323).
The PBX communicates with the outside world from the interface to a telecommunications provider. In a traditional PBX, this interface is typically some sort of analog circuit (loop-start or ground-start) or digital circuit (E1/T1, ISDN, or Primary Rate Interface [ PRI]).
The telephone set interface is how the PBX connects with the various user devices that it is in direct control of. This is traditionally an analog interface to a limited-feature phone (like a typical home telephone) or a digital interface to a more feature-rich phone.
Voicemail systems in the traditional PBX are designed to handle recording and playback of messages to users of the system, notifying the users they have messages via a Message Waiting Indicator ( MWI), and also automated attendant duties. The automated attendant's function is to answer inbound phone calls, play a message, and wait for a caller to enter an option or extension.
The call-routing logic in a phone system determines where calls route to, based on a number that was dialed (be that an extension on the system or an external phone number). Other factors may also come in to play with call routing such as permissions, time of day, what line a call came from, and so on.
Telecommunications provider interface
The interface to a traditional telecommunications provider (a phone company) can take different forms depending on how your calls are being delivered. If your calls are being delivered by a traditional provider over E1, T1, PRI, BRI, or analog line, this interface device is a hardware-based gateway.
E1s, T1s, and PRIs are all digital circuits that can carry multiple conversations. E1 is a physical layer protocol, much like Ethernet, that defines a 2Mbps pipe. This pipe can be used for data—split into 32 64Kbps communications channels—or a mixture. If the pipe is used for communications channels, 30 of the channels can carry telephone conversations and the remaining 2 carry signaling and timing information.
A T1 is similar to an E1, and it is common in North America. T1s are 1.544Mbps pipes that can carry 24 telephone channels. There are no signaling channels on a T1. Also, like an E1, T1s can be channelized and utilized to deliver voice and data.
E1 and T1 circuits have some problems associated with them. They are limited in what information they can carry and the circuits are relatively slow to set up. ISDN signaling is a more modern protocol that was designed to overcome these problems. On E1s, EuroISDN signaling is standard. On T1s, different providers utilize different standards. NI1, NI2,