BT Broadband Talk and Asterisk

Hopefully this will be of some use to those wanting to use their Asterisk setup with Broadband Talk - assuming you have the right BT Broadband option, this means various free calling options and billing on your normal telephone bill. Quality also seems good.

1. Confirming BBT Details
Go to https://service.btbroadbandvoice.bt.com ... umerConfig
Enter your Broadband Talk phone number (without any leading 44's) and the password in your Welcome email.
On the following screen, click Configure Router/Hub. Another window will pop up. Right click on the Configure button and choose 'Copy Link Location' (Firefox) or similar in your browser. Paste this into a text file.

This will contain one long line of SIP configuration items, but crucially it includes your actual SIP password for Broadband Talk.

Look for the entry &SIPPassword1= and copy all the following characters until the next & sign. Mine is 18 characters.

Save this information somewhere safe!

2. Setting up your hosts file
The BT SIP server does not have a domain entry, and relies on use of a proxy. To make this work, it's necessary for your Asterisk system to think it's talking to btsip.bt.com rather than the proxy (sip.btsip.bt.net).

To do this, edit your /etc/hosts file, and add a line:
<ip address> btsip.bt.com

(there is a tab after the end of the IP address)

The IP address should be obtained by doing an 'nslookup' or similar on sip.btsip.bt.net. Only add one address.

3. SIP.conf - Register String
The format for the register string is:

<BBTNumber>:<BBTPassword>@btsip.bt.com/<BBTNumber>

The number must be stated in the format 44xxxxxxxxxx. The BBT Password is the long one identified in Stage 1.

4. SIP.conf - Definition
[broadbandtalk]
type=peer
context=incoming_bbt
username=44xxxxxxxxxx
authuser=44xxxxxxxxxx@btsip.bt.com
secret=<long password from Stage 1>
host=btsip.bt.com
insecure=very
fromuser=44xxxxxxxxxx
fromdomain=btsip.bt.com
dtmfmode=rfc2833

Other things to watch:
BT have different expiry settings for SIP registrations. I had to play around to find settings that worked, but eventually went for:
maxexpiry=4000
defaultexpiry=2000

Note that all of the above assumes you have a working Asterisk installation, no NAT issues, etc, I found it best to verify everything with a more straightforward service like VoipUser before getting into this.

Hope this helps somebody!

Richard.

Reply from Moonrakre on Aug 07, 2007 - 12:35 PM

Fabulous - Many Thanks.

I spent a long time on the 'phone to BT's help line, slowly working my way up to the technical guys, who didn't have a clue. Now I have this working.

I am on AAH so for others I will show what I did.

Quote:

To do this, edit your /etc/hosts file, and add a line: <ip address> btsip.bt.com

I access my Hosts files using WinSCP from http://winscp.net and added the line using wordpad, I noticed that the file had a carriage return at the end so I made sure that was still in place. The lookkup on sip.btsip.bt.net gave me a load of addresses, I happened to pick the second.

Quote:

62.239.169.136 62.239.169.164 62.239.169.196 62.239.169.200 62.239.169.228 62.239.169.232 62.239.169.236 81.144.106.8 81.144.106.36 81.144.106.40 81.144.106.228 62.239.169.132

In Sip Trunk Setup I used dial rules that removed the 0 and added 44 for dialling (I don't know if this was neccessary but I strip the 0 in oubound routing and add the 44 in dial rules as standard)

I gave it a Trunk Name of broadbandtalk


PEER Details:

Quote:

authuser=44**********@btsip.bt.com context=ext-did dtmfmode=rfc2833 fromdomain=btsip.bt.com fromuser=44********** host=btsip.bt.com insecure=very secret=***************** type=peer username=44**********

And the registery string of <BBTNumber>:<BBTPassword>@btsip.bt.com/<BBTNumber>

I then changed the maxexpiry and defaultexpiry values which I found in sip.conf. This proved to be important as until I did that I couldn't get registration an eventually got a message Got SIP response 423 "Interval Too Brief".

Many thanks for this post, riverlea45, it is a great help.

Best wishes

Adrian

Reply from Moonrakre on Aug 08, 2007 - 09:20 AM

And I added a DID route for the inbound routing, the DID route name was 44**********

Sorry, forgot that in the first post because I already had it following earlier attempts!

Reply from treston on Aug 15, 2007 - 07:29 PM

Everything working Ok with my new setup, not getting the broadband for another 3 days but the broadband talk is setup already ( using Virgin Media ). If only there was an easy way to only allow calls on this after 6pm when its free without having to dial a seperate access code, i.e. users just dial as normal and the real low cost routing comes into play, also using "freecalls" but have run out of free days so using up credit for normal calls.

Reply from Guntha on Sep 05, 2007 - 10:41 AM

Treston

This is possible. Asterisk has a GotoIfTime() application for the Dial Plan (extensions.conf).

Try http://www.voip-info.org/wiki-Asterisk+cmd+GotoIfTime for more info. Not the easiest thing to read but there are a few examples.

I actually just read this the other day in Asterisk The Future of Telephony otherwise I wouldn't have known myself.

Hope this helps.

Reply from Guntha on Sep 11, 2007 - 07:17 PM

Been playing with this. Asterisk registers okay and I can make inbound calls. Only problem is I can't do outboubnd. I just get an engaged tone.

Any chance someone can post their sip.conf and extensions.conf so I can check mine.

Cheers.

Reply from mintmitny59 on Oct 10, 2007 - 07:16 PM

I am in dire straights.

I was using this setup very very well indeed , until a blunder at BT caused a server outage and since then I have been unable to get a registration. It sticks on 120 Registration sent. I have tried all the IP numbers without vail. It is possibly my understanding now they have blocked all non BTbroadband IP numbers from registering with the server thus not allowing you to use a more reliable ISP for this service.
Has anyone else had this problem and if so how did you overcome it. Thanks in advance

Reply from rgower on Oct 10, 2007 - 09:39 PM

Ignoring the obvious point you are on BTbroadband whether you are with them or not (unless on LLU when you will know what connection problems are). The most likely cause would be they have changed one or more IP addresses for their servers and as you have written your own lookup table with hosts Asterisk can no longer find them.

Try resetting the list, or better simply delete the entries from hosts

Reply from defaultuser on Dec 02, 2007 - 08:30 AM

I've got both BT Broadband Talk and a Nokia E61. I can connect to a sip server with the Nokia, but would I be able to connect to my BT account with the phone whilst out of the office, say in a hotel with a wifi connection?

In theory, it should work. Doe anyone have any ideas?

DU

Reply from rgower on Dec 03, 2007 - 12:31 AM

From experience, the biggest problem with the Nokia E series is to get them to do anything on Wi/Fi. Once cracked, then there should be no problem

Reply from defaultuser on Dec 03, 2007 - 10:16 AM

the wifi works fine both in the office and out on the road, but does BT allow me to connect via sip? Will they even notice?

If you have any connection suggestions I'll attempt it and report back here.

Reply from morango on Jan 02, 2008 - 02:19 AM

Hi,

I got my asterisk (sitting behind much unloved bt home hub) to register as per your instructions with btsip.bt.com

Command> sip show registry

Host Username Refresh State Reg.Time
btsip.bt.com:5060 445600XXXXXX 1985 Registered Wed, 02 Jan 2008 02:11:37

it works!

But i'm unable to dial out or recive calls .. still what am i missing?

thx martin

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