Looking for a distro to setup a VoIP server with P2
 

I am currently enrolled in a Voice Over IP class at a local comunity collage, and we just got a new lab assignmet. We were given an old P2 330Mhz server with 64Mb of SIMM ram, and a 20Gb IDE HDD to build into a VoIP Server. As a group we decided to use linux to build this server, but we are all fairly new to the OS. I am hoping to get a few ideas on what distro of linux we should use to build this server. we are willing to try several distros to find the one that is right for our application, but would like some ideas on where to start looking.

Thanks in advance
Thomas and the rest of the VoIP class

Hi Thomas!

I have a few questions for you so that we can help you on your way. First, do you have a particular software package in mind that you are planning on using to implement this server? I've heard of a few implementations but asterisk seems to be the most popular by my count anyhow.

Second, are any of the folks in your class brave enough to take a hands on approach to building this system? Your hardware limitations suggest that for performance reasons it may be best to go with a 'roll your own' distro like Linux From Scratch or something else really small like DSL. The good news in this respect is that you've come to the right place for help in this endeavor. There's no better forum than right here if you decide you wanna roll up your sleeves and go for it.

Keep us posted on the developments!

Slackware 13.0 is the way to go for this...
 

Slackware 13.0 w/Asterisk or Freeswitch

http://store.slackware.com

http://www.voip-info.org/wiki/index.php?page=Asterisk

http://freeswitch.org/

Order or download Slackware and install.

Download the source tarball for, say Asterisk, and then follow the instructions to configure, compile, and install.

To check everything out you're prolly running a wyndoze box and you can connect and make calls anywhere from your pc via a softphone: http://www.asteriskguru.com/tutorial...softphone.html

You can pick up a "BYOD" Account for cheap at http://BroadVoice.com and there are free providers out there too that you can use. A comprehensive list of providers is available at the voip-info.org/wiki site too.

That should be enough to get you into the meat of the matter. respond to this thread when you've blown everything up a couple of times and are ready to get down to some tricks okay?

Hope that helps :)

Kindest regards,

Here's the link to the BYOD program at Broadvoice for six bucks a month, along with the softphone I pointed out to you above

http://www.broadvoice.com/support_in..._xlite_v3.html

Of course, once you get the softphone setup, you're going to want to connect it through your Asterisk (or Freeswitch) server, registering it with that daemon, and set up your broadvoice account with a dialplan, extensions (leading to your softphone by extension), etc.

bbbhhh;

Do not make multiple posts that add no useful information. This is you second warning.

Thanks for your replies on this topic.

we do not have any software in mind right now and are always open to sugestions. I took a look at the web site for asterisk and it looked like it will work for what we need to do, provided it will run on our system, which based on my research we will be in luck. We are aware of the hardware limitations of this system, but that is part of the challenge of the assignment (dealing with legacy issues). We are aloud to upgrade the system as we see fit, however finding hardware for this system in the lab might be a trick. I have already looked for aditional RAM without success.

I don't think that anyone in our group is confident enough with linux to build our own, but I think that something like DSL or Fluxbuntu would do the trick. (I have a little experience with both) I have never used slackware, but i am always willing to try something new.

For this lab we have 2 VoIP deskphones, a POE switch and a gateway connected to an outside line. we need this server to be able to use this computer for special services such as call recording and 3 way calling and others as we see fit.

I hope that i answered all of your questions and that this gives you enough inforamtion to help us narrow down our options.
Again thank you for your time
THomas

The hardware you have is more than adequate as it is
 

Based upon the description of this machine above, it is more than adequate for the job. So no worries there. That's the beauty of UNIX - it runs, and runs well on systems with much less resources than you would need for any windows machine.

And it's an old enough machine that you're not going to be either waiting, or hunting around for modules and drivers to install.


Slackware is the oldest continually published distribution of Linux there is, and for good reason. It's the most simple to install and easy to run with a complete set of secure and stable tools and applications.

Visit this page to actually download an iso image file for free (Pick the x86 architecture of your Pentium II w/256 MBytes of RAM): http://iso.linuxquestions.org/slackw...re-linux-13.0/

Alternatively, you can download iso image files of the 4 CDs, 'd1', 'd2', 'd3', and 'd4'. You'll probably only need d1 and d2 unless you want the full blow GUI - but most GUIs are quite a bit for a machine such as yours, and besides that, you're going to be running Asterisk via an SSH session on the CLI anyway, from a remote PC, ideally - regardless whether you run it locally or via a remote shell from another machine, it's going to run as a simple character line interface anyway (CLI), so there's really no point in installing KDE unless you want to slow the machine down anyway, and if you do, you will soon come to the realization that you need to disable it on that machine because it is worthless to you for the purpose of running an Asterisk Server.

You 'might' need the d3 disk, and d4 is probably just sources. I mention this because you may only have a CDROM drive laying around or that you may be able to borrow You didn't mention whether you had a DVD or CDROM drive on your machine, so my assumption is that you do not have one, and will need to either install one to install an operating system, or, alternatively, Slackware is one of the distributions that you can also download by diskette and install it from 3.5 floppies).

If you have a DVD just download the x86 iso DVD (not the 64 bit one, as you have a 32 bit machine and can't take advantage of that anyway).

Okay, once you download the Slackware disk you merely install the DVD (or the d1 CD) and turn your machine on (You may need to set the BIOS to boot from the CD or DVD, this is for any operating system install on any PC). The machine will boot, then you just follow the prompts, accepting the defaults and it's easiest to just have one disk partition and install everything. You will say no to X Windows, and you may or may not need to assign an IP Address for the machine if you don't have a DHCP Server (Ask your instructor if you do in the lab). The only things you need really are the hostname of the machine - be creative, coz you will come to endear your machine by its name :) )

Go get lunch and when the installation finishes just reboot the machine, enter your root password, and login.

Now, download Asterisk with this command:

Next, you are going to need to unpack the gzipped tarball and install asterisk with the following commands:

Asterisk is now running on your machine and you can begin to play with it. If you don't want the sample files (I recommend that you install them so you can see how to set up dial plans and extensions, etc.) then just leave out the "; make samples" from the commands on that line.

Read the readme file - RTFM'ing is very important in any systems related endeavor! When you want to add things, like modules (you said you are going to want extra support later such as Zap - don't worry about it you'll get there), or other configuration changes, you will merely rerun ./configure from the directory where you upacked your download (/root/asterisk-1.4.26.2/) and simply run make and make install again - it won't overwrite your dial plan and other configuratoin files.

Kewl. You're just going to plug those phones into an ethernet port and configure them with their IP addresses and to register with asterisk as some extension so they'll ring and can make calls.

Keep me posted on how your project goes, I *might* be inclined to loan you an FXO/FXS card which you can install into the Asterisk server so you can play around with POTS (PSTN, or... Plain Old Telephone Service) by plugging a telephone into one port and plugging a cord to a telephone jack on the wall to another port - but let's see how you guys do with what you already are assigned with first, and I would need to speak with your instructor anyway before we go there.

Good luck Thomas, and keep us all posted on your progress okay?

Kindest regards,