[Asterisk-Users] Why use 'Answer'?

[John Hill]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: asterisk-users-bounces at lists.digium.com [mailto:asterisk-users-
> bounces at lists.digium.com] On Behalf Of Rich Adamson
> Sent: Wednesday, December 22, 2004 8:12 AM
> To: Asterisk-a-users-list
> Subject: [Asterisk-Users] Why use 'Answer'?
> 
> 
> Why is it that newcomers always feel like inserting 'Answer' is a
> necessary step in their extension.conf entries?
> 
> >[voiptalk.org]
> >;forwards any calls starting with an "8" thru voiptalk.org
> >exten => _8.,1,Answer
> >exten => _8.,3,SetCIDNum(55555555)
> >exten => _8.,4,SetCIDName(My Name And Surname)
> >exten => _8.,5,Dial(SIP/${EXTEN:1}@voiptalk.org,,g)
> >exten => _8.,6,HangUp
> 
> I fully understand that incoming pstn calls have to be answered (in
> most cases) before executing a Playback(invalid) type statement. But
> there must be some examples, documentation, or somthing that is
> suggesting to newcomers that all sequences have to start with an Answer.
> 


Question:

Do you need to answer to detect a fax?


Excerpt from my conf file.

I would like to tune this. I have tried putting the 800 service checks on a
single line but it fails. Any advice would be useful.

[inbound-pstn]
exten => s,1,NoOp(${CALLERID}) ; log callerID string
exten => s,2,GotoIf($["${CALLERIDNUM:0:3}" = "800"]?s|108)
exten => s,3,GotoIf($["${CALLERIDNUM:0:3}" = "866"]?s|108)
exten => s,4,GotoIf($["${CALLERIDNUM:0:3}" = "877"]?s|108)
exten => s,5,GotoIf($["${CALLERIDNUM:0:3}" = "888"]?s|108)
exten => s,6,GotoIf($["${CALLERIDNUM}" = ""]?s|109)
exten => s,7,LookupBlacklist
exten => s,8,Answer
exten => s,9,Ringing
exten => fax,1,Macro(faxreceive)
exten => s,10,Macro(ringphones)
exten => s,11,Wait(2)
exten => s,12,PlayBack(im-sorry)
exten => s,13,Voicemail(u100)
exten => s,14,Hangup
exten => s,108,Macro(noservice)
exten => s,109,Macro(nocallerid)
exten => h,1,Hangup

--John