Applying the Asterisk and Zaptel Patches

Last Updated: 2007-03-31

Note that the < sign in the patch commands is required! I am also assuming you have a working Asterisk configuration already in place. Substitute /path/to/download with whatever directory path where you've your downloaded files.

Keep in mind that my current patches, zaptel-1.2.13-cnet4.patch and asterisk-1.2.16-cnet.patch, work fine with Zaptel 1.2.16 and Asterisk 1.2.17, respectively.

WARNING: Pulse dialing on T1 channel bank FXO ports may or may not work for you! I've noticed that the pulses from an FXO on an Adtran 750 channel bank are rather irregular-sounding, and also sound like they have an improper break/make ratio. If you need to pulse dial into a step switch, I suggest using either a TDM400P or X100P card!

First, you need to unpack Zaptel. You should be logged in as root and use the following commands:

cd /usr/src

tar xvfz /path/to/download/zaptel-1.2.16.tar.gz

tar xvfz /path/to/download/asterisk-1.2.17.tar.gz

cd zaptel-1.2.16

patch -p1 < /path/to/download/zaptel-1.2.13-cnet4.patch

make

make install

cd ../asterisk-1.2.17

patch -p1 < /path/to/download/asterisk-1.2.16-cnet.patch

make

make install

An explanation of the commands:

cd /usr/src sets your current directory to /usr/src (which is a good place to put source code).
The tar commands unpack the Zaptel and Asterisk tarballs; think of them as .ZIP files, but they are a different format.
Since you are already in /usr/src, the cd zaptel-1.2.15 command will change your current directory to /usr/src/zaptel-1.2.15 (which is where you should be).
The first patch command applies the Zaptel patch to the Zaptel source code. Basically, the patch file contains differences between my modified Zaptel and the box-stock version, and the command modifies the original code to turn it into my version.
make without any parameters applies the default rule in the Makefile - which builds the Zaptel drivers.
make install applies the install rule written in the Makefile - which installs the drivers into their location within the current Linux kernel tree.
cd ../asterisk-1.2.16 changes your current working directory to /usr/src/asterisk-1.2.16 (which is where you need to be to patch and build Asterisk).
The second patch command applies my changes to the Asterisk source code.
As before, make and make install will build and install Asterisk, respectively.

Now, you will need to modify the /etc/zaptel.conf file. In particular, you will need to add:

hearpulsing=<channel list>

with a list of channels where you want the open audio path. For instance, if you had FXOs on channels 1 and 2, hearpulsing=1-2 would work. If you had FXOs on channels 6,7,8,9, and 25, then hearpulsing=6-9,25 would be appropriate option to use.

You then need to modify /etc/asterisk/zapata.conf as well. You will need to find the place where you are setting the FXO parameters, and add:

hearpulsing=yes

BEFORE the "channel => x" statements. For instance, following the example of channels 1 and 2 being your FXOs:

; other parameters for FXO ports precede this

signalling=fxs_ks	; fxs_ls might be needed in some circumstances

hearpulsing=yes

channel => 1

channel => 2

Once this is done, you should restart the system (rebooting is one way to do it, or you could shut down Asterisk, unload the old Zaptel modules, load the new modules, and restart Asterisk).