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PCQLinux 2007 VoIP Appliance

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CIOL Bureau
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Anindya Roy

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Welcome to  pre-configured VoIP Exchange To install this  All you have to do is to copy the compressed file into your PCQLinux 2007 Enterprise Server machine and start it up with VirtualBox.

Prerequisites

Here we are assuming that you have a pre-installed PCQLinux 2007 Enterprise server machine with at least 1 GB of RAM and 5 GB of free space. The machine should have a good spec because your VoIP Exchange will run on this machine as a virtual instance and will require at least 512 MB of RAM dedicated to it. Now, run the following commands to let the network get configured for the guest OS so that it can get a real IP address from the network.

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Applies To: IT Managers

USP: Deploy Trixbox using PCQLinux Appliance

Primary Link: http://asteriskathome.sf.net

Google Keywords: Trixbox, Asterisk

On CD: PCQXtreme

After this, copy the PCQLinux VoIP Appliance from this month's PCQLinux Xtreme DVD to your machine and uncompress it by running the following command:

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#bunzip PCQLinux VoIP Appliance.vdi.bz2

This is the main page of Trixbox. Go to the Settings menu to start configuration

Attaching the Appliance

As PCQLinux Enterprise doesn't come with a graphical windows system, go to any machine which has XWindows and from there connect to the PCQLinux Enterprise machine by running the ssh command with –X switch like this:

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#ssh –X ip_addr_of_pcql_ent

This will enable the graphical applications of PCQLinux Enterprise machine to run remotely over ssh. From the sshed window browse to the /opt/virtualbox/bin folder and run the following command to start the VirtualBox server:

#./VBoxSVC &

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Start the VirtualBox interface by running the following command:

#./VirtualBox

A nice looking interface will open. From here, click on the start button to initiate the wizard for creating a new GuestOS. Follow the wizard till it asks for the amount of RAM you should dedicate to the Guest OS. Here allocate atleast 512 MB of RAM to the OS and proceed. Now, when it comes to the Virtual HardDisk window, click on the 'Existing' button and select the Appliance's .vdi file which you have just uncompressed. Now continue the wizard till it finishes. Once done a new instance of a Guest OS will be created in your VirtualBox. Boot up with the Guest OS by first selecting GuestOS and the clicking on the 'Start' button.

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Once it boots, give it an IP address manually, as tunctl doesn't work very well with DHCP. Your Virtual Appliance for VoIP is now up and running.

Configuring Asterisk

The virtual appliance is based on Trixbox Linux so most of the configuration steps are exactly similar to what you do in TrixBox and FreePBX. So the first thing you have to do is to open up a browser on any machine on the network and open the Trixbox interface by providing the IP address. From

the Web page that opens, click on the 'System Administrator' link and it will ask you for a username and a password. If you have not changed it yet then the username will be maint and the password will be password. After you provide the authentication it will open up a new page. Here click on the FreePBX link and the main configuration page for your IPPBX will open up.

 

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Fill up all the information about a user when you're adding his VoIP extension

Now the first thing you have to do is to enable features such as FollowMe, Call Waiting, IVR, Conference, Call Forwarding, etc. To do so click on the Module Admin link at the extreme left corner of the window. A list of all the features available will be presented in front of you. Here you can enable the modules which you require. But don't forget to enable the 'Core' module else nothing will work. The best practice here will be to enable all the features and use them whenever required. The only disadvantage of doing so will be a slightly slow loading of the FreePBX configuration page.

Now comes the most important part: creating extensions. To do so, go to the 'Extensions' link on the FreePBX page, then go to 'Add an Extension' page. This page will ask you which protocol your extensions are going to use. Here select SIP which is the most common of all available protocols today and proceed. In the next screen you have to provide all the details for your extensions such as extension number, display name and password. Provide all the details and create a few extensions.

 

Click on the checkboxes to select the modules you want to add into Asterisk from here

With this your basic IPPBX is ready to work. Go to some of the phone terminals (hard or soft) and long in to them using the extension which you have just created, and start dialing.

There are hundreds of features available in Trixbox but not all can be covered in a two page article. For a more detailed configuration, you can download a pdf version of Trixbox configuration from http://dumbme.voipeye.com.au/trixbox. This is a 200-pages document which talks about each and every aspect of Trixbox with lots of visuals and tables.

#tunctl –t tap0

#parprouted eth0 tap0

#echo 1 > /proc/sys/net/ipv4_ip_forwarding

Now allocate an IP to virtual device tap0 by running the following command:

#ifconfig tap0 netmask 255.255.255.0 up

#tunctl –t tap0