Page 191 - Asterisk™: The Future of Telephony

Handy Asterisk Features

Now that we’ve gone over some more of the basics, let’s look at a few popular functions
that have been incorporated into Asterisk.

Zapateller()

Zapateller() is a simple Asterisk application that plays a special information tone at
the beginning of a call, which causes auto-dialers (usually used by telemarketers) to
think that the line has been disconnected. Not only will they hang up, but their systems
will flag your number as out of service, which could help you avoid all kinds of tele-
marketing calls. To use this functionality within your dialplan, simply call the
Zapateller() application.
We’ll also use the optional nocallerid option so that the tone will be played only when
there is no Caller ID information on the incoming call. For example, you might use
Zapateller() in the s extension of your [incoming] context, like this:
[incomimg]
exten => s,1,Zapateller(nocallerid)
exten => s,n,Playback(enter-ext-of-person)

Call Parking

Another handy feature is called call parking. Call parking allows you to place a call on
hold in a “parking lot,” so that it can be taken off hold from another extension. Pa-
rameters for call parking (such as the extensions to use, the number of spaces, and so
on) are all controlled within the features.conf configuration file. The [general] section
of the features.conf file contains four settings related to call parking:
parkext
This is the parking lot extension. Transfer a call to this extension, and the system
will tell you which parking position the call is in. By default, the parking extension
is 700.
parkpos
This option defines the number of parking slots. For example, setting it to
701-720 creates 20 parking positions, numbered 701 through 720.

context
This is the name of the parking context. To be able to park calls, you must include
this context.
parkingtime
If set, this option controls how long (in seconds) a call can stay in the parking lot.
If the call isn’t picked up within the specified time, the extension that parked the
call will be called back.

Handy Asterisk Features | 163