[asterisk-users] extensions not being detected consistently

[Terry Nathan]

Hi Brandon,

Thanks for getting back to me about my problem, I really appreciate it 
(going a bit nuts with this problem) I made the changes that you 
suggested but I can't tell if they've made a difference or not, as the 
problem seems to have shifted a bit but is still inconsistent and 
difficult to pin point. However you did get me thinking about what to 
try next and that you mentioned dialing extensions in macros could be a 
problem was news to me. Our dialplan is a bit of a kluge so I'm going to 
fix it first and see if the problem goes away on its own. Either way, 
thanks for your help!

Cheers,
Terry

Brandon B. wrote:
> Extensions that are dialed within macros like the following lines
> could cause the type of problems as you mentioned:
>
>     exten => s,n,Macro(dial-us)
>     exten => s,n,Macro(hangupcall)
>
> This line:
>
>   exten => s,n,Wait(0.5);
>
> should be changed to "exten => s,n,WaitExten(0.5);" and  these lines:
>
>     exten => Wait(10)
>     exten => s,n(open),NoOp(open)
>
> are not valid. Try this:
>
> exten => s,1,Set(TIMEOUT(digit)=10)
> exten => s,n,Set(TIMEOUT(response)=15)
> exten => s,n,Background(cassandra/CustomWelcomeMessage)
> exten => s,n,GotoIfTime(09:00-17:30,mon-fri,*,*?open)
> exten => s,n,Background(cassandra/OfficeHours)
> exten => s,n,Background(cassandra/NextRep)
>
> exten => t,n,Macro(dial-us)
> exten => i,1,Playback(pbx-invalid)
> exten => i,2,Goto(s,open)
> exten => #,1,Macro(hangupcall)
>
>
>
>
>
>
> On Mon, Jun 1, 2009 at 1:47 PM, Terry Nathan <tnathan at aiinc.ca> wrote:
>   
>> G'afternoon everybody,
>>
>> I'm having a problem with consistently being able to ring our extensions
>> from an outside line. I don't have a problem reaching the number, but
>> during our calls to Background(msg) that I am having a problem. It seems
>> to be an issue with timing. If I press the extension towards the end of
>> the Background(msg) the it often works. However, in the middle of the
>> message it will not work at all.
>>
>> What is also strange is that I can dial an extension any time if I call
>> from one of our ip phones. This seems to be strictly a problem with
>> regular phones, then the timing of dialing the extension becomes important.
>>
>> The fact that the ip phones always work seems to suggest that I need to
>> look at tone detection, but after googling and searching the bowels of
>> every conf file I could find, I haven't found any magic bullet.
>> I should mention that the first call to Background() usually works, even
>> for the regular phones, I think this is because it is short enough that
>> the timing of dialing the extension is relatively easy.
>>
>> I don't know if it is significant or not but it seems that once a callee
>> tries to dial an extension and it doesn't work, even the next few calls
>> will also not work. And similarly, sometimes it works and then a few
>> calls will go through, but then it will go back to not detecting
>> properly again. Asterisk is running on its own box and there is nothing
>> unusual happening with the system, or even people on other lines, that
>> is happening.
>>
>> Checking the log files when I call in Asterisk tells me that either it
>> only detects 1 of the 3 digits (usually the second or third one) or, if
>> I dial the extension at a different point in the message, that the first
>> digit was pressed twice e.g. '22' instead of just '2'. The inconsistency
>> of the problem is starting to drive me bonkers as I can't accurately
>> nail down the problem.
>>
>> Ideally I'd like our callees to be able to dial an extension as soon as
>> the call to Background() is hit in the context, from any phone that
>> calls in, not just ip phones. My setup is an installation of
>> asterisk-now (Centos 5 with Asterisk 1.4.24)
>>
>> If anyone has seen a problem like this before or has even an inkling of
>> what it might be, that would be awesome :D Thanks in advance.
>>
>> My dial plan:
>>
>> [incoming-our-number]
>>
>> exten => s,1,Answer
>> exten => s,n,NoOp(incoming-our-number)
>> exten => s,n,Background(cassandra/CustomWelcomeMessage)       ****This
>> line is usual fine, I think because the message is short enough that
>> timing the dialing of the extension is less of an issue.
>> exten => s,n,GotoIfTime(09:00-17:30,mon-fri,*,*?open)
>> exten => s,n,Wait(0.5);
>> exten => s,n,Background(cassandra/OfficeHours)
>> exten => Wait(10)
>> exten => s,n(open),NoOp(open)
>> exten => s,n,WaitExten(0.5);
>> exten => s,n,Set(TIMEOUT(digit)=10)
>> exten => s,n,Set(TIMEOUT(response)=15)
>> exten => s,n,Background(cassandra/NextRep)
>>      ****This is the line where I have a problem with dialing an
>> extension. The timing is very fickle and heaps of our callees cannot get
>> to the right extension properly.
>> exten => s,n,WaitExten(10,m[default])
>>
>> exten => s,n,Macro(dial-us)
>> exten => s,n,Macro(hangupcall)
>>
>> exten => i,1,Playback(pbx-invalid)
>> exten => i,2,Goto(s,open)
>> exten => t,1,Macro(hangupcall)
>> exten => #,1,Macro(hangupcall)
>>
>>
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