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GSM and Asterisk Integration?
MistabewM asks: "Would it be possible to place a GSM transceiver within you home that can be tied into Asterisk in a way that would allow you to place calls from your GSM phone across your VOIP connection or though your local landline? An analogous system is being introduced on airplanes that will allow passengers to use their GSM phones in flight. I feel this would be a fantastic hack and could even be scaled up to provide large areas of free GSM service."
http://www.voip-info.org/tiki-index.php?page=How+t o+connect+VoIP+GSM+gateway+to+Asterisk+PBX
Sounds like an interesting hack indeed, but I'm not sure how it will result in a free service. Someone needs to administer the Asterisk server, pay for electricity, the bandwidth to the server and lastly don't you need a license to use GSM frequencies? If you'd be willing to cover all these costs, then sure, it will be free.
Check out how it prints the URL in this post: http://hardware.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1586
So it may not be the fault of the poster or the editor.
, the search term 'GSM Picocell' turns up these guys who appear to sell a GSM-to-IP product exactly like that.
-EvilMagnus
See here
But you're looking at some serious changes to your wireless hub. If you are asking, I doubt you'd be able to do it.
That's not meant as a slight, but just the truth. It's a very difficult thing to set this up. It requires more than just running some daemon. It also requires authenticated sessions on the servers. If you aren't Ericsson, you aren't getting into the network.
That isn't to say that you couldn't implement this yourself. Skype, for example, doesn't run across the traditional long distance network, but it provides long distance phone service over the Internet. If you are willing to dive headlong into a long and arduous development plan, sure, you could implement this.
Don't hold it against me that I'm not holding my breath for this, though.
Jesus saved me from my past. He can save you as well.
And also hopefully, the handsets will use low enough power that it doesn't result in the equivalent of a 35000-foot cell tower.
http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=17017
...could even be scaled up to provide large areas of free GSM service.
How exactly do you get large numbers of GSM transceivers for free? This sounds suspiciously like a dot-bomb business model. I mean, I'm willing to buy a wifi router and give away my internet connection because any tool with a wifi card can figure out how it works and take advantage of it. But buy a GSM transceiver, host an Asterisk server, and manage it all for strangers who walk past my house? What a tech support pain in the ass.
What's your damage, Heather?
This is like attaching a cellphone to your asterisk. It allows you to make calls across the GSM network and to receive calls to the number programmed on the SIM card and pass them to the asterisk box.
There have been some attempts to do what the parent is asking about, but I do not know of any that have been rolled out for public consumption.
It only does that to URLs. And it's intentional. If you want to link something in a comment, you need to use the proper HTML formatting, otherwise, that's what they do it. The before-mentioned typo is an honest typo and not a Slashcode issue.
Let me rephrase the poster... ;-)
Hello Slashdot,
I want to start a mobile phone company with no money down. I am very poor but I want to provide GSM, voice mail, fax, voip, free calls, etc. Can you people help me?
To legally set up a GSM transceiver you would need to purchase a licence. Well, I'm sure thats the case in most countries anyway.
I know that the mobile phone companies in the UK spent a hell of a lot of cash to secure 3G licences, they wouldn't be too happy if you got to set up your own transceiver for free.
Yes, I know a handset is a transceiver, but that probably comes under some kind of different licence.
I have seen such a device at Cisco Networkers in Orlando back in 2000. There was a "GSM transceiver" that was tied into the Cisco VOIP system. The "GSM transceiver" was not a Cisco device and I can't remember the manufacturer name, but it did work. I can't see why you would not be able to make it work with Asterix.
Just a quick search comes up with a few companies like www.ipscellular.com that makes custom gms and cdma equip that you could put togather with a system like that, I dont know about the free part though, seems like someone would have to be footing the bill.
Short answer: No.
Long answer: The main restriction here is the use of restricted frequencies, and some "minor" technical hurdles.
while it's perfectly OK for you, as a lone individual, or a company, to operate a GSM handset, operating a base-station is another thing. First, you'd have to get your greedy paws on a basestation, then you'd have to make your own SIM cards (hijacking calls that should be on the regular operator's network is highly illegal (DMCA); there's all sorts of (broken) encryption going on), and you'd have to outfit phones with 2 SIM cards, switching from your own network to the other (which entails switching the phone off and on again) every time you enter or leave the building. (This is doable, but annoying).
Now, assuming you don't want the legal hassles of paying for multi-million dollar cell network licenses, you could operate a "pirate" basestation on some frequencies that aren't used too much where you're at (you'd have to measure it through first).
In other words; you're better off investing in a handset that does both GSM and DECT(or whatever you use for domestic wireless phones in the US) or even both GSM and WiFi. There aren't many of those (though BritishTelecom has announced their model), but there should be some out there.
SCO employee? Check out the bounty
If you were close to a "free" or open picostation like the one ipaccess.com has, would it then be free minutes then, or would the cellular company still ding you for using the frequency since the phone is registered to them?
What are the costs on a system like this?
Ok, the equipment:
One microcell, coming right up.
Ok, simple omnidirectional antenna.
Then you need the base station that drives that antenna.
Then you need the base station controller that drives the base station.
Then you need MSC (mobile switching center...) that actually gets the calls from the base station and forwards it accordingly to an SS7 network.
Then you need to set up Asterisk to talk to that SS7 network and grab your phone calls.
And all the rest of the components that I have forgotten.. In effect, you need to become a full-blown telco, albeit with only one base station.
All the equipment can be bought from Nokia, Ericcson or other mobile network vendors. Price range is not for home users.
Then, you need to get a license to operate that basestation. 900/1800/1900MHz is a licensed band. This *might* be quite easy if the location is just a single cell.
Anyway, then you need to apply for Mobile Network Identifiers (MCC + the rest) to distinguish yourself as a GSM operator, so when you search for networks with your GSM phone, you'll see your own network as one.
Then you need to get a SIM Card to use with your phone that has access to your network. (Or, you may be able to set it to "open for all" mode).
(Of course, if the question was simply if you can reaac GSM network via Voip and want to set up the gateway your own home, then that's easy, just plug a phone or wireless modem to your Linux box....but I was under the impression that this meant the ability to use your GSM phone as a "cordless phone".)
With landline this is of course easy, all you need is a modem waiting for calls..
May not be exactly what you're looking for, but I am investigating GSM solutions right now, for a slightly different reason: I want to make all my GSM-to-land calls appear "in the network", and eliminate the huge costs associated with cell-to-land calls. Here are a couple of links:. htm I GSM.htm ? tech=GSM / gsm/eurotech1/
http://www.westlakecommunications.co.uk/Bluetower
http://www.qiiq.com/products/productsGoldenGatePR
http://www.telular.com/products/product_index.asp
http://www.mobilecomms-technology.com/contractors
(sorry - I did not have the time to "a href" beautify the above)
== With enough Will Power, one could move mountains. With enough Brains, one would just leave them where they are ==
Is there an EASY way to route from POTS to VoIP and back? I'd like to be able to call my home phone number from my cell, and then punch in a number which will be dialed via VoIP.
The same goes for the other way around, when somebody calls my VoIP number, I'd like it to forward the call using my home phone line to my cellphone.
I know that this is possible, but what's the easiest way to achieve it?
Martin May
http://store.voxilla.com/customer/product.php?prod uctid=16136
Basically, get two phones and a plan with free mobile-to-mobile minutes. Leave one at home in the base station and connect it to Asterisk with a DTA.
Call home with your mobile, then call again from there to where ever via VoIP. Basically a cell-to-VoIP gateway.
There is a FAQ somewhere around that explains exactly how to do this.
-Charles
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
The article explains how to do what the poster asked for: make a call on the cell phone and route it through asterisk. It looks like the GSM gateway acts as an extension in the Asterisk PBX network, so you should be able to do anything that a locally attached phone is permitted to do (based on configuration). That inclues placing outgoing calls on the land line.
I ould not recommend GSM anymore beause, come on, it's a little bit outdated, no? ;)
;)
I know that some companies want to use wifi as nexgeneration cell phone network. So i would simply look for a wifi-compatible smartphone and a sip-client for it. the rest should be no problem and you would even be able to use oter wifi access points (using encryption of course)
I guess this will also be my plan for the future, even if i can't put off my tinf^H^H^H^Hnanotube beret because of the poor "all over the place" radiation.
Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
Umm, that routes calls through a cell phone. He wants a mini cell tower. He wants GSM to IP, not IP to GSM.
I have an 'unlimited incoming local calls' feature on my phone, combined with 100 minutes (practically nothing) of outbound calling per month. I pick up my mobile, dial a number, punch in an extension, and then hang up. This process takes about 5-6 seconds.
After I hang up, my home phone number calls my mobile phone and gives me an IVR (Voice Menu) where I can dial out using VOIP long-distance.
The call is free, because it looks like an incoming call from my home, but I'm using my home line to make the VOIP call outbound from my cell phone.
This is my trick; the only inconvenience is that you have to dial a number BEFORE you make outbound calls, but I can live with it. =)
-Jesse
No, in most juristictions, it's illegal to operate your own base station on any of the frequencies supported by GSM (850, 900, 1800, and 1900MHz, I think 450MHz is coming on stream in various places too. But that's also a problem.)
However, there's a new system called UMA that tunnels the GSM protocols through an IP connection provided by either an 802.11 base station or some form of bluetooth receiver. The system has some limitations in its present form, the major ones being:
- Few carriers support it. In the US, practically none do.
- Few phones are available that support it. In theory, most bluetooth supporting phones could be made to support it with a firmware update. But that's not likely to happen. I know the UK version of Motorola's RAZR V3 now supports the feature, but it's in a small class of phones and the US version doesn't yet.
- Each "base station" has to be registered by the GSM operator, I have NO IDEA why. That means plain old open WAPs in malls wouldn't provide a solution to poor coverage inside them, for instance, and you (probably) couldn't use the system to defeat roaming charges by using a Starbucks WiFi connection in the UK with your Cingular phone.
It also isn't exactly what you've asked for. It's largely seen as a system to help phone users improve their reception and reduce their dependence on the capacity of the wide range GSM network. It's designed to be seamless, you can start a call on the 802.11 network, step "out of range", and the call will transfer to a nearby GSM tower just as it would if you were going out of range of any other GSM tower.By comparison, it looks like you're just after a way to turn a GSM phone into a cordless handset.
I've covered the system in my journal. It'd be nice to see it better supported, and to see other standards also adopt it such as the CDMA ones. Much of the issues of capacity and poor reception would be dealt with if the system became a standard part of most people's mobile phones.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
There is a device called cellsocket that my company uses to connect regular analog telephones up to cellphones. You pick up the phone, hear a dial tone, then dial as you normally would, but it uses your cellphone for the connection. You could possibly connect something like this to your house POTS wiring and use your regular phones in the house while your cellphone sits and charges.
As far as making VOIP calls, there is the Sipura-3000 which mentions something similar to what you are asking. The manual is located at:
http://www.sipura.com/Documents/SPA-3000.pdf/
You could purchase or set up an Asterisk server for this purpose, integrating a POTS line, Cell line,and various SIP services, etc. That will run into quite a bit of an expense and configuration though. A Digium card Wildcard TDM400P http://www.digum.com/ with a combination of FXO and FXS modules would probably be what you need.
It's a lot of effort though, and possibly a lot of expense. I would try out the Sipura-3000 and a CellSocket type adapter first. I have 3 Sipura devices so far, and they work nicely, and are fairly easy to set up.
--dingletec--
This sounds like nothing more than a DIY micro-cell, for people who feel the cell towers provided by the phone company aren't already good enough.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
When I worked for L3 (Level 3) almost 5 years ago, we had implimented a similial solution that would let your GSM cell phone turn into a local extension on the PBX. Thus allowing to make various calls such as VoIP, internal (calling another extension) and outgoing calls. Granted I never was around the equiptment, so I couldn't tell you what it was, but just the fact that it was available many moons ago.
This article nerdy... ...even by Slashdot standards.
Now seriously...listen to yourself...how do you look yourself in the mirror each morning?
Why waste all that money on a GSM base station, when a WiFi/3G phone is so much cheaper? And has 10-1000x the bandwidth, with existing protocols, interop'ing with public/friends' hotspots? The Asterisk integration still makes perfect sense, especially when virtualizing one's telecom out of a home server.
--
make install -not war
Not really. The GSM gateway discussed is not a GSM cell - its just another GSM client. You can of course call it and be connected to your local PBX - but you'd do so using some GSM operator's cells, which is hardly what the post asked. You seem to be confusing GSM with peer-to-peer radio. I know peer-to-peer is all the rage now, but please, do get a clue.
This is like attaching a cellphone to your asterisk.
I attach disclaimers to my asterisks.
I live in a twisty little valley, so my Verizon phone works everywhere I go but home. It wouldn't be worth it for Verizon to put a tower in to serve my valley, because only a handful of people live there.
European phone carriers have researched the possibility of a dual mode phone that switch from GSM to DECT (digital cordless) depending on what's available, but they never commercialized it. I think they don't want to lose control of their network.
For people like me, the best answer would be a micro-cell that covers just a few hundred feet around my house. However, business and politics get in the way -- even if Verizon wanted to do it, I have a different carrier for my landline phone.
He wants to "place calls from your GSM phone across your VOIP connection or though your local landline". You can do that with the gateway as described. Nothing is mentioned about setting up a private cell.
And how am I confusing GSM with peer-to-peer radio? Why did you feel a need to be insulting, rather than provide useful information?
Pretty easy, you take this:
http://www.2n.cz/products/gsm_gateways/voip.html
And add your local equivalent "in network calling/call buddy/unlimited calling partner" plan for the mobile in the field and the SIM card in the gateway device. Your Mobile is now an office line, all unlimited calling to the PBX where the incoming/outgoing calls are handled..
If it is just being able to make outgoing calls with your cellphone, then why not make them using the bluetooth audio channel that your phone probably supports. Have a look at the software on: http://crazygreek.co.uk/chan_bluetooth
This allows you to pair your cellphone with your asterisk phone and make outgoing calls via bluetooth.
Pretty easy, you take this: http://www.2n.cz/products/gsm_gateways/voip.html And add your local equivalent "in network calling/call buddy/unlimited calling partner" plan for the mobile in the field and the SIM card in the gateway device. Your Mobile is now an office line, all unlimited incoming calling to the PBX where the incoming/outgoing calls are handled.. or dialing to the pbx and then out...
I have just integrated an asterix into "GSM":
GS*M
Your hybrid is not saving the environment. Its purpose is to make you feel good about buying something.
You walk into the building and your mobile would switch to pbx mode - local extension at your desk mobile style. Low output power too - no brain tumours.
GSM might be still one of the most common mobile phone standards but it is the fastest declining one, making way to the fastest growing one ever which is WiFi in the flavors of 802.11b/g and very soon WiMax(802.16). Low-cost WiFi phones are already on the market.
GSM picocells will become available for home use. The problem, initially, is likely to be that although they'll talk IP over your broadband Internet connection they will be tied to a particular telco (who might even subsidise the hardware, I suppose). And unless the hardware is cryptographically authenticated, I don't expect it would be long before someone came up with an open source basestation controller, at which point what the OP wants would be possible. Spectrum licensing will be taken care of by the picocell vendor. The SIM card is a non-issue.
"within YOU HOME"?
Oh boy.
The problem with PicoCell and Nanocell is twofold - cost and SIP Compatibility. What you want is something like this device from 2N.
Voice Blue Lite
This device is supposed to cost about 3500$ USD (only reference I could find online), and creates a mini-gsm cell backed by a SIP provider. This device has been tested with Asterisk.
It's called a Picocell and they are EXPENSIVE. They also require a landline to the carrier and that's EXTPENSIVE too.
I really shouldn't have used someone else's email address for this account.
As many others have pointed out, running your own GSM network is pretty much out of the question, since you wanted to save some money, not brun through a couple million.
Unsurprisingly, some vendors have already trialled products that allow a GSM handset to be used as a local wireless phone, too. I remember Sagem having one that would double as a DECT handset if in range of the DECT base station, but continue to be booked into the GSM network. More recently, people have put SIP and Skype software on smart phones that communicate with a host PC via Bluetooth or 802.11b/g. I'm too lazy right now to google them.
As usual, the network operators are not thrilled by technology that drives revenue away from them, so don't expect such things to be easily available from or be possible on handsets from those operators.
This is a general reply to all the +5 comments that are saying stuff like 'picocell' and 'well, you could modify xyz and ... but you'd still need to sign on to the provider's network'
Look. It is very simple. Take advantage of the 'free calling to other members' most providers offer. I.e. Add a tmobile phone to your plan and make your plan a shared-minutes plan. Get free tmobile to tmoble. Make liberal use of the headset port.
Take ANY GSM phone that has a good USB and headset interface. A bit of straightforward hacking (as asterisk already supports sound cards for in and outbound sound channels) gets the headset connected to the asterisk box. Now all you need to do is press buttons on the phone.
Enter the usb interface, basically a com port in disguise. ATDT ring a bell? A lot of phones support this last time I checked. Most motorola phones for sure so you can dial folks in your bluetooth organizer with the click of a wand. Instead, you can just have Asterisk decode the DTMF and (with a dialing rule) when you've dialed 7 or 10 digits, it will encode it as an ATDT string, send to the phone, and connect the audio channels.
Ta-Da. It works, by the way (though instead of a USB interface I just hacked the keypad interface as it was more convenient for me to do that with the equipment I have. My interface is on a com port and tied together with an Atmel microcontroller FYI I did this initially because I was annoyed I had to pay to call to check my VM on my office phone).
Wasn't it Nathan Hale who said, "I regret only that I have but one asterisk for my country"?
"But all your emitter and collector are belong to me!"
The way to do it would be to use a software defined radio (SDR), I know that several manufactors are looking to use SDR for their latest UMTS (3G) basestations, and eventually for the phones as well. http://www.gnu.org/software/gnuradio/ would be a good starting point, but you would need some specilised hardware to work at GSM frequencies.
We all have mobiles and landlines, and the ease and use of a mobile to dial and make calls does sometimes overide the use of landlines were we can just tap the green button for conveniance. Now with VOIP we have another optional way to save money.
Now if you could just link the two I wondred and easily... Having thought about it the only neat way (least UK) would be to avail one of these tri-band phones, we use 900/1800 in the UK for networks but alot of phones handle the USA variation of 1900. Hmm what if you had a 1900 base station inyour house (low power) and set that as your preferes network with your normal operator network being next in lone.
Then anytime your inrange of your house you would be dialing over your landline.
DOwnsides to this simple (least from handset aspect and ease of use) are many. Main one being illegal use of 1900 frequency I can see and then there is the small aspects of you cant recieve mobile calls unless you get involved diverting calls when out of signal to yoru landline, semi negating the savings.
Whilst a form of intergrated mobile/landline/VOIP would be neat a mojority of handsets are brought and reso0ld/sold by network operators and as such are dectated spec wise by said operators who amazingly enough seem to like that your kinda tied to making all your call over there networks and to offer break out to PSTN networks would be detramental to there profits. Lets face it there are a fair few handsets that have bluetooth but cant do the full range of profiles so you cant use your mobile as a mic/earpeace setup over bluetooth for VOIP calls. There are hacks but generaly all handsets are basterdised to squash any form of call managment that dont go over the network provider. Handsets locked to networks is mearly the icing on the cake. So many GSM and mobile standards get bastardised due to some factpr or another. 56bit encryption - ew yeah right and lets set x number of those bits to all 0's, you see the issue's. The technology is there and easily doable, as long as the providers can cash in on the market. Maybe when the network providers do landlines/mobiles packages then we might get somewere but then you can bet somebody will cry foul and the big mopnopoly commision gets involved to kill that off eventual due to all the other providers crying foul and slinging mud.
Nothing is mentioned about setting up a private cell.
Well, not in those words. But he did ask about using his normal GSM handset which would connect to a GSM transceiver connected to his asterix pbx, in other words a private cell.
You make the mistake of thinking you can educate the fundamental stupidity out of people. You can't.
We have one in the office right now. We have a Nokia GSM transceiver connected to the Asterisk PBX and we can call our VoIP numbers from our cell phones thru the Nokia - savings us a couple of pesos by having cell-to-cell calls instead of cell-to-landlines. The same goes true for VoIP calls to cell phones.
nt
Hooking a GSM terminal up to Asterisk is totally bass ackwards.
What you really want is to have a handset that can roam across any available network, be it a private WiFi network or a public GSM/UMTS network.
Then your don't have to reboot your phone or do something else crazy to get it work. Plus, since the network has to handle IP based calls, it now no longer matters WHAT or WHERE you happen to be making your call from.
Let's say you have a Cingular phone and SIM. You can roam onto a T-Mobile tower, because Cingular has arranged to have T-Mobile permit it, and they bill your account through Cingular. Now, if you built your own tower (or picocell), you get to decide who accesses it, right? So you could make a list of SIM IDs that are permitted, which could be any of a number of GSM carriers worldwide. You wouldn't have to bill anyone, so you wouldn't have to communicate with their cell provider at all to complete the call.
It's actually quite clever. The use of the frequencies is where you have to watch yourself. As long as you don't interfere with licensed users, there's a lot you can get away with...
well i guess terrorist wont be making many calls in the air
http://accessories.skype.com/item?SID=5d9ba1d6cf62 52723dd960807ee8ad5ac20:4515&sku=3045PH
...
and btw, could you let me know how it goes ? I'd love to know how this thing performs
Check out
_ un.html
http://www.voip-news-net.com/2005/08/verisign_and
for a bit more on this "type" of thing, I dont know if theyre using Asterisk or not, they ought to be though, but this is happening.
Hopefull this URL will be of use to someone.
Peace.
Jason
No, it does it to any long string. Try posting "thisisaverylongstringwithoutanyspacesorpunctuatio n". It it there to prevent page-widening by very long strings within tables. It's only obvious within URLs, though.
"Go to CNN [for a] spell-checked, fact-checked summary" -- CmdrTaco
Apparenly, that changed about 4 months back... Asterisk SS7 support became available in April.
"Go to CNN [for a] spell-checked, fact-checked summary" -- CmdrTaco