Connect Zoiper free Android soft-phones to RasPBX

Hello there.

I wanted to install Asterisk and FreePBX on one of my machines, so as to get acquainted with VoIP technology.  As an easy solution, I chose a Raspberry pi 2 B (Rpi 2) as my hardware and two android phones with zoiper intalled.

As far as the software used, I selected the image downloaded from this link. It is actually RasPBX – Asterisk for Raspberry Pi image, based on the Raspbian Distribution (a Debian fork, customized for raspberry pi).

After downloading the image and unzipping it, i had to write it on a sdcard. As I am a linux user (fedora 29), I used the dd command. Before that, I had to be sure about the device name of my sdcard. I used gnome disks application to find out so (dev/sdc in my case). The command I used is:

«sudo dd bs=1M if=/home/user_name/Downloads/raspbx-04-04-2018.img of=/dev/sdc»

After the image was written on my sdcard (I originally used a 8GB sdcard), I inserted the card in my Rpi 2, connected my raspberry on my home router (with an ethernet cable ) and to my screen (via hdmi) and powered it up (standard micro usb 3Amp power supply).

I used ssh to connect to my Rpi 2 :

«ssh root@raspbx«, password: raspberry

When connected we see the following screen.

The first thing to do is updating the system with the following command: «raspbx-upgrade», as described in that link and the following image.

Then I have followed steps 1, 3 and 5 of that link.

Step 1 has to do with expanding the filesystem to the whole extend of the sdcard (4GB image when installed on card), if your sdcard is bigger. The command is: » raspi-config». Select 7 «Advanced options» and then A1 «Expand Filesystem».

Also you can change the your hostname, by choosing 2 «Network options» and then N1 «Hostname». In my case I have changed hostname to «raspbx1»

Step 3 is about changing ssh keys [command : «regen-hostkeys»], changing timezone [command :»configure-timezone]» and configuring locale settings [command :»dpkg-reconfigure locales»].

Finally with Step 5 you can change Rpi 2’s password  [command : «passwd»].

After that we are ready to connect and set up FreePBX via webpage, at the following address: «http://raspbx1». Alternatively, you can get there if you know the IP address of the machine (e.g. with the command «ifconfig» from the ssh terminal on Rpi 2). In my machine the IP is assigned via a DHCP server, providing IPs on a Ethernet bridge of my provider router, but it is a good practice to set the IP as static.

Then, set the Administrator user name, password and email, like in the image below.

Then select FreePBX Administration

Enter user name and password created on previous screen

update locale

and then we are presented with the dashboard of FreeBPX, as shown on the following picture

In the next step we will create extensions (VoIP soft-phone numbers) that will be connected to our IP PBX. Go to «Applications» and select «Extentions».

Then select «Add Extension»-> «Add New CHan_SIP Extention»

On Tap «General», set «User Extention», «Display Name» and «Secret» and hit «Submint»

Then for my test environment, I have created a second user, SIP user 102. Don’t forget to «Apply Config» in every step. So at the end I have two users, as shown in the picture bellow.

Now, we have to install zoiper on two android phones, configure them an try to call one another.

The configuration of the application, in each phone, is as shown bellow. We found out that the IP address of  RasPBX machine is «192.168.1.6» (e.g. by executing ifconfig). Both cell phones and RasPBX are on the same subnet e.g. 192.168.1.0/24.

This video shows one soft-phone calling the other.

References:

1. http://www.raspberry-asterisk.org/downloads/
2. http://www.raspberry-asterisk.org/documentation/#nextsteps
3. HOW TO: Install FreePBX on Raspberry Pi
4. FreePBX 14 playlist