[asterisk-users] IMAP and ODBC voicemail storage

[Russell Bryant]

Olivier wrote:
> Do you mean it is possible (in voicemail.conf) to specify how to look at 
> the message headers ?
> Here ( http://www.voip-info.org/wiki-Asterisk+config+voicemail.conf), I 
> can see how to customize voicemail sending with mailcmd but how would 
> you teach Asterisk to read messages with specific header ?

You don't need to.  Asterisk adds special headers to the email when it puts it 
into IMAP.  Then, when it goes through the folder looking for voicemails, it 
reads these headers to get information like the callerid of the person who left 
the voicemail.  If these headers aren't present, it knows it is not a valid 
voicemail message.

> Another set of questions :
> 3. Let's say you're browsing your incoming emails with your favorite 
> email client. You've got some voicemails among them but you don't want 
> to disturb your neighbours listing to them with your PC speakers. How 
> would you forward the voicemail audio files to your desktop phone ?
> Calling your own voicemail is an obvious way to listen to those files 
> but I'm wondering if there is a better way to do it

It is by far the easiest way.  You may have to be more specific as to what 
behavior you are looking for.  I presume it could be done with some sort of 
"click-to-dial" development and special links in the voicemail email messages.

> 4. I've never heard of email software (client or server) accessing an 
> ODBC storage. Does it exist or shall I understand that voicemail ODBC 
> storage is mainly here to ease custom web application development ?

No such email client exists that I know of.  Ease of application development is 
one benefit of ODBC storage, but not the only one.  It also gives you a method 
of sharing the same database of voicemails between different servers. 
Admittedly, this is not the most efficient way to do this, but it is one way.

-- 
Russell Bryant
Software Engineer
Digium, Inc.