Hello Everybody,

for a free Art Project I would like to setup a System which is able to receive regular phone calls and sms. I have been searching around for a while and must honestly confess that this whole topic is kind of huge, since there are so many technologies involved with a whole bunch of acronyms like: PBX, GSM, DECT, PST, SIP etc. So please correct me if I am wrong, but as far as my research brought me, to receive calls and sms on a pc, I need hardware, which is generally referred to a GSM (VOIP) Gateway, isn't it? Just to get that right, GSM is the »Protocol/Network« regular cellphone calls operate on and a GSM Voip Gateway translates the signal arriving at the antenna to a digital Protocol which can be transferred on a »regular« network. That protocol is called SIP, right? Furthermore, there is the asterisk project, which is a PBX, (really?? ) used to manage this whole lot?

So right now I am on the quest to get some hardware, which should be able to handle the following:

- Handle multiple call simultaneously to the same number,
- is of course compatible to linux (THE FAVORITE OS OF CHOICE),
- Receive SMS,
- just needs one SIM-Card and/or a landline connection,
- is not too expensive

I have heard that this is possible with those USB Surfsticks, but I wonder if that is true. Next to this I have seen images of big and bigger boxes for whole loads of money, but I seriously do not know which features are required and which not.

I do not expect a »buy this« response to this question, I am after the specifications the hardware needs to have, if possible at all, so that I have some orientation on what to search for.

I appreciate any help and I guess I have to read some more stuff, to get a better understanding of what I am planning here, so links to resources would be of great help, too.

Thanks in ahead!

I don't want to spoil your party here, but GSM on PC is just not a thing, especially in GNU/Linux. There are several reasons for this. GSM is an industry standard proprietary technology with patents and technological hinderances to non-authorized use.

GSM is a complex technology of hardware, sim card, software, encryption and other components that must all work together to make it useable. Nobody is granted access to this technology, except the industry that owns it. Several efforts to reverse engineer this technology has existed, and several parts of the GSM technology has been reverse engineered. But for it to work as an open source technology, all parts have to be reverse engineered and put together, and appropriate hardware has to be available at the same time. Those who would offer something like that would most likely face legal issues.

No such projects exists in the public, and even if they did, it would still need the combination of all those mentioned parts to make it work. Certainly it can be imagined that groups of people who can both deal with hardware and have reverse engineered everything, can put together their own GSM stuff and use this in a variety of ways.

Anyways, very few computers exists that have hardware such as mobile signal receivers and sim card readers (not that one would be absolutely required).

Can I ask you, what exactly is it what you want to do, and why? I have had several USB sticks and/or modems, aka "self contained" devices that can be connected and used on a GNU/Linux PC. On these devices I have been able to receive SMS, as they have a phone number and built in interface for that, which I could access over a web-interface. But calls could not be made or received.

What you are asking for is basically impossible unless you are a very resourceful individual with the right skillset who want to use it privately.

Could it be done as a mobile phone to pc interface on GNU/Linux, possibly, but what would be the point?

Perhaps I should soften this a little bit.

The reason for me asking, "what is it that you want to do exactly?", is that most likely you can do what you want with other types of technology that does not include any GSM technology (no SMS, no GSM networks calls etc). Many such technologies exist in the free computing world.

Thanks for mentioning the non-open-source nature of the phone network. But if I am not wrong, at time of writing this, the broad majority of the world has access to gsm based cellphones, no smartphones, so by using gsm I can reach out to the broader audience I'd like to have. Thus I have the choice between choosing a proprietary technology to actually reach my goal, or tell everyone who should take part: »Participation requires a smartphone or a pc«, or telling myself: Would have been a nice project, if only everybody would have a smartphone…

Well, for the reasons mentioned above, knowing a bit more about what you are trying to do exactly, would be helpful.
Perhaps something like a phone/pc interface would be a solution in that case.

Also, internet is widely available in many countries, and there are open source solutions that can send messages and do phone calls (for free) over the internet. But if having a PC could be an issue, well..

It is true that the majority have access to GSM based phone, both feature phones, simple phones and smartphones, all GSM based. GSM is the most widely used communication technology in the world aside from the internet.

But does this thing you want to do, require YOU to not use a phone?

A computer shall be able to process the audio stream of each connection, so YES. I am in an early planning stage here and I would like to create a kind of prototype for a proof of concept, therefore I need some Hardware to get started. That is as well the reason why I cannot go much deeper into detail, I hope you understand…

My solution is to use a "virtual private server" running an instance of slackware linux; and on that instance I run asterisk. I use flowroute to handle DID (phone numbers that any phone, gsm, or otherwise can use to call the asterisk server. The server answers the call and routes it according to a configurable dialplan. It can accept simultaneous calls. It can conference call. It can SMS. It can video-conference too. It's amazing. I hope you found a solution that works for you. You were on the I hope you found a solution that works for you. You were on the right track with asterisk!