Save Lono

As the age of the netbook arises; the ability to provision Operating Systems over the network becomes highly useful.  More and more these days, it’s less common to see CD/DVD ROM drives in laptops.  In my particular situation my laptop DVD-ROM drive failed.  This prompted me to embark on journey of sleepless nights, sifting through bad information and countless hours of ‘trial & error’ troubleshooting to make Windows 7 install from PXE boot server.

When I first started this project I had no idea what I was getting into or how difficult and poorly documented the PXE remote installation process is.  I imagined that I would use some kind RAM disk to load an ISO image of a Windows CD.  However, the process to boot an ISO image varies greatly between Operating Systems and Windows versions. So if you plan to install Windows XP or Linux using this tutorial…  you will fail.  This Tutorial is step by step for installing Windows 7(only) from a Fedora 10 provisioning server.  This tutorial assumes you have basic Linux, Windows, and Networking knowledge.

Goals of this post:

- Configure Linux Provisioning Server
- Prepare installation media and installation files
- Boot from PXE to Windows PE 2.0
- Install Windows 7 over Network

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Recently we covered the installation of Asterisk 1.6 + Asterisk GUI 2.0.  In this article we will talk about the details necessary to enable Polycom provisioning from the ‘Users’ tab of the Asterisk 2.0 GUI.  By default auto-provisioning will not work out of the box.  You would think when the GUI is installed that it would be setup as well, considering that you have the option to enter a MAC address in the user extension creation process.

Nor are their docs related to configuring this in the source packages(that I could find).  Online forums and tutorials were of no help either.  There are many post online claiming that you need to set up DHCP, ‘option 66′ for Polycom provisioning to work.  This is true of TFTP provisioning from AA50 appliance, but not from the Asterisk 2.0 GUI that relies solely on HTTP.  At least as far as I can tell.

I think Digium is being vague on purpose about this because they do not want to undermine their Asterisk Appliance product.  While I understand this line of thinking, it’s not consistent with the Open Source business models that have succeeded.

Open Source depends on reaching vast amounts of people due to the low cost.  When my customers have to choose between a Avaya system(running Linux) that cost $45,000 /w phones or a Asterisk system w/ Polycom phones for $19,000; it makes the lesser known Asterisk product attractive.  Over time the base builds up and Digium collects on hardware and support fee’s.

So from my perspective, any Asterisk installation helps Digium’s bottom line eventually.  Even if Digium doesn’t see money from every Asterisk user, simply the presence of those users makes Asterisk a more credible product.  Bringing more and more Enterprise and Government contracts to everyone, thus more money and investment into Digium.

Alright my tirade is over, back to business!  This post assumes you have installed a recent version of Linux, Asterisk 1.6 and the Asterisk 2.0 GUI installed.  If you do not, read my post:How to setup the Asterisk 2.0 GUI with Asterisk 1.6.

The Goals of this Post:

-configure phoneprov for Asterisk 2.0 GUI

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Recent versions of Asterisk 1.6 are compatible with the Asterisk 2.0 GUI.  This wasn’t always the case, as the Asterisk GUI was developed for the 1.4 branch.  Although I wish Digium had gone for the LAMP model, the GUI is pretty good and getting better all the time.  However the instructions to install are difficult to find on the asterisk.org website.  That is, if they are there at all.  My guess is that Digium doesn’t want to make it to easy to get a free GUI.  I think this a very poor strategy, but that’s another article….  Today we will run through a quick install of asterisk and the 2.0 GUI.  A far superior option as compared to to Trixbox and FreePBX.

GOALS OF THIS POST:
- Install Asterisk 1.6
- Install Asterisk 2.0 GUI

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I’ve been using Windows 7(Home Premium) for about a week now… and I gotta say I’m impressed.  It’s interface is almost as nice as Windows XP.  Running multiple programs doesn’t slow game frame rates nearly as bad and the desktop effects are pretty good.  Congratulations Microsoft!  You made a decent OS…  Only took 7 years, thus the name, ‘Windows 7′.  Although this is a huge leap forward there are still many, many problems.

For instance, my Soundblaster Live! Value sound card doesn’t have a driver from Microsoft or Creative Labs!  For God sake, it’s one of the most popular sound cards ever fabricated!  Are you *^&!@ing kidding me!?!?  So I ditched my card and re-enabled my Intel on-board audio.  Windows detected the driver just fine.

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I play World of Warcraft on Linux all the time.  I boot into Windows XP for Arena and extended play, but all my causual gaming is on my work computer - that runs Linux.  So for this reason I’ve had an interest in the upcoming Ventrilo Linux client for a long time. A very long time.

Since 2005 when they first announced that the client version for Linux was on it’s way I’ve been excited!  Imagine the Linux Desktop getting support from the industry leader in VoIP group communications!  Unbuntu/Fedora Linux will benifit greatly by making it possible for more Linux gamers to communicate with fellow online gamers of any platform.  The only problem is that the Linux client was never released.  Or at least, not yet.

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The Digium Asterisk Appliance has built-in features for handling Polycom SIP handsets.  It’s very easy to do and will save you the trouble of individually configuring the settings of each phone.  I have a Digium AA50 configured with a standard dial plan and a Polycom Soundpoint IP 501.

Goals of this Post:

- Configure AA50 Polycom Provisioning
- Configure Polycom SoundPoint IP 501 phone

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Just an update to my previous article, ripping ATI for their lame Linux support - I finally got World of Warcraft working on Fedora 10, ATI 4870 graphics card, Catalyst 9.10 drivers!  All it took was down grading from Fedora 11 to Fedora 10, turning off my open GL desktop and waiting 6 months for four driver releases from ATI.  That’s all it took to run a game that works great on Linux… if you bought an NVIDIA card!

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My sister Peyton is 15 today.  Happy Birthday!

-love Matt

PS

The only thing I ask,

is that you become a

Linux Systems Administrator

This is huge news.  This announcement from  AT&T means that third part voice providers will be able to send there VoIP traffic over their mobile wireless device.  This is a giant leap for Net Neutrality(Click on the link to read more)!  Thank you Obama.  When critics say you haven’t accomplished anything as of October 2009 except spend a lot of money, I can say they are crazy.  The FCC’s pressure has been crucial on getting companies like Comcast and AT&T to abandon their crooked packet shaping and filtering schemes.

In the case of Comcast they were reducing the priority of Bit Torrent(popular file sharing protocol) packets at peak hours to avoid congestion on their networks.  However, Comcast marketing in the Seattle area suggest speeds of 11-15 MB/s, with no Data Cap.  I think it is disingenuous to throttle down Bit Torrent while marketing faster download speeds than DSL.  It’s disgusting.  I’m glad the FCC stepped in.

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I was reading Slashdot today and came across an interesting post about the Mono project.  Richard Stallman of GNU/FSF fame is blasting the Mono project.  His argument is that because Mono is developed in C# the project itself is compromised because the threat of future patent litigation.

That is a reasonable concern, but as he points out in his blog post there are other implementations ‘.NET’ framework being developed by GNU.  The point of the Mono project is to create a compatibility with Microsoft’s .NET framework.  If Richard Stallman can bring closer integration without the possibility of infringement then do it!  The Open Source community welcomes the competition. Here is a quote from a July 2009, Stallman post:

Debian’s decision to include Mono in its principal way of installing GNOME, for the sake of Tomboy which is an application written in C#, leads the community in a risky direction. It is dangerous to depend on C#, so we need to discourage its use.


The problem is not unique to Mono; any free implementation of C# would raise the same issue. The danger is that Microsoft is probably planning to force all free C# implementations underground some day using software patents. (See http://swpat.org and http://progfree.org.) This is a serious danger, and only fools would ignore it until the day it actually happens. We need to take precautions now to protect ourselves from this future danger.

Okay, so this is a reasonable opinion.  In a different post he starts making personal attacks against individual developers,
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