5 ms·

SIP Trunking to Replace My Landline Phone Using Plivo

71 points by dhfromkorea 13y ago

deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
Rubinous 13y ago
Haven't used landline for a long time but the more I've used Skype, the more frustrated I've got with it. Really really frustrated on some days. Even plain old-fashion analog telephony was better experience I recall. Maybe there's something in this Plivo SIP thing that could take us to the next level on telephony.
- linker3000 13y ago
  2/10
nimish79 13y ago
Nice. Makes you wonder why no one did this so far.
josh2600 13y ago
This is cool. It's nice that you can register an ATA. This is not really new functionality though, I mean any service can do this from voip.ms to flowroute. I think it would be cooler if the article showed how you can use the scriptability of Plivo in tandem with their SIP registration to really make a professional supplemental phone. In addition, demoing how to provision your cellphone to call forward to your landline on no-answer would be useful. Not a bad blog post, just missing that extra sauce that would really make it pop for me. Source: I'm a big telecom nerd.
- haroldp 13y ago
  Just chiming in to say that I'm a satisfied voip.ms customer. They support e911, have very featureful web-based configuration and very low prices.
  - nishadmusthafa 13y ago
    Hey Harold, You are not locked into using Plivo's carriers. You can still use voip.ms with Plivo. Ping support@plivo.com and they will help you out.
- sologoub 13y ago
  Funny enough, I did this last month using the Telephone Mac application (just as the author initially did). The real story that the article doesn't quite do justice to is how easy it was. From zero to a functioning phone (making and receiving calls) in less than 30 mins. If you were to recreate this via FreeSWITCH/Flowroute, it's more like an hour and change from scratch. (Register for VPS, install everything, etc.)
  - josh2600 13y ago
    That's exactly my point. In the article they highlight the end result, which is frankly boring, instead of the setup, which is where they shine. There's always a market for well done abstraction.
    - sologoub 13y ago
      Agreed. Also, got to give them props on support. I've stepped away from doing this for a living, but wanted an easy way to call my relatives overseas. The first attempt resulted in poor quality to the foreign landline. Cell was crystal clear. I notified Plivo team via the built-in chat and they had it fixed promptly. This was a request from an extremely low-volume user calling European country Plivo doesn't support for anything other than dialing to. In other words, not a lot of $$$ to be made, but service was top notch!
thesis 13y ago
One thing to be wary of as with most voip providers is E911. I'm not sure if Plivo offers it but it's worth looking into before venturing down this path. From their terms of service it doesn't appear that they do offer it. "You also acknowledge and understand that Plivo does not currently allow you to access any 911 or similar emergency services (no traditional 911, E911, or similar access to emergency services). The Services are not intended to replace any primary phone service, such as a traditional landline or mobile phone, that may be used to contact emergency services."
- JimmaDaRustla 13y ago
  I use voip.ms. E911 is $1.50/month, but I'd be an idiot not to pay it.
  - _JamesA_ 13y ago
    I also use voip.ms. Unfortunately their API and features have stagnated for quite a while. Even a basic feature like the ability to upload a voicemail greeting has not been implemented yet. That being said the features they do have implemented work well and the pricing is attractive. I can't really tell what Plivo offers other than an API to build custom solutions.
    - dedward 13y ago
      I use it as well. It does seem to have slowed in terms of new features.. but it's the absolutely no-hassle, reliable, functional service that I just love. It's cheap, it does what it does properly, you don't get spammed or tricked into anything whatsoever, and if you do happen to have a billing issue or something, their support has always come through over email with no problems at all for me. They have their act together.
JimmaDaRustla 13y ago
Isn't this just a voip setup? I use a Cisco SP112 with voip.ms Yes, it can be quite techy, but nothing new. Edit: Phone bill is approx $10/month with $1.50/month for E911
js2 13y ago
Custom voicemail system with per-contact messages. I just ported my home VoIP service from Time Warner, with their Motorola ATA, to an OBi202 with Anveo. (The OBi202 is also connected to my Google Voice account, so when I'm home where I have terrible cell service, I can still receive/make calls from my "cell" #.) Anveo's Visual Call Flow Builder is pretty neat and can do what the OP mentions. I have a white list of #'s that will ring through to my home, a black list of #'s that have to press 1 to leave a message, and everything else just goes straight to voice mail. It looks like this - http://i.imgur.com/lEe8Nbv.png http://i.imgur.com/lEe8Nbv.png It was all pretty straight-forward to set up and works great so far. Call quality is excellent.
- masnick 13y ago
  OP here. That looks awesome -- exactly the kind of thing I want to set up one way or another. I also want to have a Google Voice-style online interface for voicemail, starting conference calls, etc. I think there's a lot of potential in an open-source web app that has these features and makes the SIP setup stuff a little bit easier than having to go through the general Plivo dashboard.
maikhoepfel 13y ago
For easier setups and ludicrous pricing, I can recommend DIDlogic. Supports call groups, has incoming phone numbers in many many countries and is dirt cheap. Haven't had any issues with them either.
windexh8er 13y ago
Ugh, this is nothing new and the author is relatively uninformed on VoIP in general. SIP trunks got hot in the consumer space around 2005-2006 and there are much better alternatives than the author describes as well as far superior hardware (IMHO that Cisco ATA is junk for the price). Do your research. Use something like the PBXIAF forums and software if you want a good place to start. If you don't need 911, which all providers have to offer (paid is the Q), leverage GVoice with an Obi (someone already mentioned) if you want to get it on the cheap but have hardware you can grow into an actual PBX. $0.02.
- dholowiski 13y ago
  Also, Andorid now supports SIP in the native dialer client and it works over wifi and cellular data, so you don't even have to install anything extra to get it working on an android phone.
  - pdx 13y ago
    Android can support SIP protocol in the native dialer, but most phones I've looked at do not have SIP in the dialer they ship with the phone. If you have a Nexus 4, it does support SIP, but your audio quality is usually terrible in a real world, on the street situation, where there is background noise. I have had no end of complaints, regarding the audio quality on my Nexus 4, from people on the other end of the phone call. Finally, after much grinding and nashing of teeth, and assuming I had bad hardware, I finally found the following thread. http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2228361 http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2228361 Quoting from the thread SIP is unusable on the Nexus 4 because the device doesn't provide an AcousticEchoCanceler[1], AutomaticGainControl[2] or NoiseSuppressor[3]. Additionally, the VOICE_COMMUNICATION[4] audio source designed for VoIP applications returns the same audio as if the application asked for raw microphone data, which is completely unusable for VoIP calls. This has been a source of great frustration to me, since I run my own FreeSWITCH installation, and wanted to use it via my Nexus 4. At this point, I am forced to go back to non-VoIP.
    - rsync 13y ago
rdl 13y ago
While I love VoIP, for terrible cellphone coverage you might want to look at getting a femtocell for your house. They're carrier specific, though.
- js2 13y ago
  If you can get your cellular provider to give you one (typically you have to be on a post-paid plan), great. Otherwise they are a few hundred dollars last time I looked, and still require you to have at least one bar somewhere in your home. I do not consistently have that from anywhere in mine, although maybe a femtocell's better antenna would.

71 points by dhfromkorea 13y ago

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

Haven't used landline for a long time but the more I've used Skype, the more frustrated I've got with it. Really really frustrated on some days. Even plain old-fashion analog telephony was better experience I recall. Maybe there's something in this Plivo SIP thing that could take us to the next level on telephony.

linker3000 13y ago
2/10

nimish79 13y ago

Nice. Makes you wonder why no one did this so far.

josh2600 13y ago

This is cool. It's nice that you can register an ATA. This is not really new functionality though, I mean any service can do this from voip.ms to flowroute. I think it would be cooler if the article showed how you can use the scriptability of Plivo in tandem with their SIP registration to really make a professional supplemental phone. In addition, demoing how to provision your cellphone to call forward to your landline on no-answer would be useful. Not a bad blog post, just missing that extra sauce that would really make it pop for me. Source: I'm a big telecom nerd.

haroldp 13y ago
Just chiming in to say that I'm a satisfied voip.ms customer. They support e911, have very featureful web-based configuration and very low prices.
- nishadmusthafa 13y ago
  Hey Harold, You are not locked into using Plivo's carriers. You can still use voip.ms with Plivo. Ping support@plivo.com and they will help you out.
sologoub 13y ago
Funny enough, I did this last month using the Telephone Mac application (just as the author initially did). The real story that the article doesn't quite do justice to is how easy it was. From zero to a functioning phone (making and receiving calls) in less than 30 mins. If you were to recreate this via FreeSWITCH/Flowroute, it's more like an hour and change from scratch. (Register for VPS, install everything, etc.)
- josh2600 13y ago
  That's exactly my point. In the article they highlight the end result, which is frankly boring, instead of the setup, which is where they shine. There's always a market for well done abstraction.
  - sologoub 13y ago
    Agreed. Also, got to give them props on support. I've stepped away from doing this for a living, but wanted an easy way to call my relatives overseas. The first attempt resulted in poor quality to the foreign landline. Cell was crystal clear. I notified Plivo team via the built-in chat and they had it fixed promptly. This was a request from an extremely low-volume user calling European country Plivo doesn't support for anything other than dialing to. In other words, not a lot of $$$ to be made, but service was top notch!

thesis 13y ago

One thing to be wary of as with most voip providers is E911. I'm not sure if Plivo offers it but it's worth looking into before venturing down this path. From their terms of service it doesn't appear that they do offer it. "You also acknowledge and understand that Plivo does not currently allow you to access any 911 or similar emergency services (no traditional 911, E911, or similar access to emergency services). The Services are not intended to replace any primary phone service, such as a traditional landline or mobile phone, that may be used to contact emergency services."

JimmaDaRustla 13y ago
I use voip.ms. E911 is $1.50/month, but I'd be an idiot not to pay it.
- _JamesA_ 13y ago
  I also use voip.ms. Unfortunately their API and features have stagnated for quite a while. Even a basic feature like the ability to upload a voicemail greeting has not been implemented yet. That being said the features they do have implemented work well and the pricing is attractive. I can't really tell what Plivo offers other than an API to build custom solutions.
  - dedward 13y ago
    I use it as well. It does seem to have slowed in terms of new features.. but it's the absolutely no-hassle, reliable, functional service that I just love. It's cheap, it does what it does properly, you don't get spammed or tricked into anything whatsoever, and if you do happen to have a billing issue or something, their support has always come through over email with no problems at all for me. They have their act together.

JimmaDaRustla 13y ago

Isn't this just a voip setup? I use a Cisco SP112 with voip.ms Yes, it can be quite techy, but nothing new. Edit: Phone bill is approx $10/month with $1.50/month for E911

js2 13y ago

Custom voicemail system with per-contact messages. I just ported my home VoIP service from Time Warner, with their Motorola ATA, to an OBi202 with Anveo. (The OBi202 is also connected to my Google Voice account, so when I'm home where I have terrible cell service, I can still receive/make calls from my "cell" #.) Anveo's Visual Call Flow Builder is pretty neat and can do what the OP mentions. I have a white list of #'s that will ring through to my home, a black list of #'s that have to press 1 to leave a message, and everything else just goes straight to voice mail. It looks like this - http://i.imgur.com/lEe8Nbv.png http://i.imgur.com/lEe8Nbv.png It was all pretty straight-forward to set up and works great so far. Call quality is excellent.

masnick 13y ago
OP here. That looks awesome -- exactly the kind of thing I want to set up one way or another. I also want to have a Google Voice-style online interface for voicemail, starting conference calls, etc. I think there's a lot of potential in an open-source web app that has these features and makes the SIP setup stuff a little bit easier than having to go through the general Plivo dashboard.

maikhoepfel 13y ago

For easier setups and ludicrous pricing, I can recommend DIDlogic. Supports call groups, has incoming phone numbers in many many countries and is dirt cheap. Haven't had any issues with them either.

windexh8er 13y ago

Ugh, this is nothing new and the author is relatively uninformed on VoIP in general. SIP trunks got hot in the consumer space around 2005-2006 and there are much better alternatives than the author describes as well as far superior hardware (IMHO that Cisco ATA is junk for the price). Do your research. Use something like the PBXIAF forums and software if you want a good place to start. If you don't need 911, which all providers have to offer (paid is the Q), leverage GVoice with an Obi (someone already mentioned) if you want to get it on the cheap but have hardware you can grow into an actual PBX. $0.02.

dholowiski 13y ago
Also, Andorid now supports SIP in the native dialer client and it works over wifi and cellular data, so you don't even have to install anything extra to get it working on an android phone.
- pdx 13y ago
  Android can support SIP protocol in the native dialer, but most phones I've looked at do not have SIP in the dialer they ship with the phone. If you have a Nexus 4, it does support SIP, but your audio quality is usually terrible in a real world, on the street situation, where there is background noise. I have had no end of complaints, regarding the audio quality on my Nexus 4, from people on the other end of the phone call. Finally, after much grinding and nashing of teeth, and assuming I had bad hardware, I finally found the following thread. http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2228361 http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2228361 Quoting from the thread SIP is unusable on the Nexus 4 because the device doesn't provide an AcousticEchoCanceler[1], AutomaticGainControl[2] or NoiseSuppressor[3]. Additionally, the VOICE_COMMUNICATION[4] audio source designed for VoIP applications returns the same audio as if the application asked for raw microphone data, which is completely unusable for VoIP calls. This has been a source of great frustration to me, since I run my own FreeSWITCH installation, and wanted to use it via my Nexus 4. At this point, I am forced to go back to non-VoIP.
  - rsync 13y ago

rdl 13y ago

While I love VoIP, for terrible cellphone coverage you might want to look at getting a femtocell for your house. They're carrier specific, though.

js2 13y ago
If you can get your cellular provider to give you one (typically you have to be on a post-paid plan), great. Otherwise they are a few hundred dollars last time I looked, and still require you to have at least one bar somewhere in your home. I do not consistently have that from anywhere in mine, although maybe a femtocell's better antenna would.