PA system - prerecorded announcement

See short system description below.
Questions:

  • Has anybody done this before with DA IP7 systems? Pointers to resources wellcome. I researched a lot before I posted this, but may still have missed something.
  • Can it be done at all? Any tip would help.
  • I really need this. Do you know / can you recommend a paid option (support, professional, etc.) to solve this problem for me? You can write to me directly ( savin, dot, gorup at gmail - if you can read this you are not a robot :smile: with advice whom to hire.

Thank you for your help.


Small, private PA announcement system (no external connections) with

  • Asterisk (FreePBX distribution)
  • Digital Acoustics IP7/SS20 VoIP amplifier + speaker (8 pcs.)

What works?

  1. Prerequisites
  • installed FreePBX
  • softphone (linphone) for testing
  • configure extension for softphone (Applications/Extensions): use
    generic SIP, extension=430,secret=extension
  1. Operator announcement on one speaker
  • configure VoIP amplifiers (IP address/mask/gateway, enable SIP
    protokol, secret=extension, auto answer)
  • configure extension for all amplifiers (Applications/Extensions):
    use generic SIP, extension=71000…79000,secret=extension
  • tested with softphone (dial 71000 etc.)
  1. Operator announcement on multiple speaker
  • define paging group extension=11111 (Application/Paging and
    Intercom/Define new group): select extensions (speakers), apply
  • tested with softphone (dial 11111)
  1. Prerecorded announcement on one speaker
  • announcement file: WAV, 8kHz, mono, 16-bit.
  • Settings-Music on hold-Add category-> sound1 -> upload announcement
    file (this is for operator feedback!)
  • Admin-System recordings-Add -> sound1 -> upload announcement file
    (this is for speaker)
  • edit dial plan /etc/asterisk/extensions_custom.conf
    [from-internal-custom]
    exten => _1XXXXX,1,Answer()
    exten => _1XXXXX,n,Dial(SIP/${EXTEN:1}, 5, A(custom/sound1)L(1000)m(sound1) )
    ; etc

A(custom/sound1) - play sound1 as announcement/ringtone
m(sound1) plays music-on-hold to operator (as feedback what is heard
on PA speakers)
L(1000) drops connection 1s after end of announcement
${EXTEN:1} - dialled extension, without 1st digit

  • tested with softphone (dial 171000)

What does NOT work?

  1. Prerecorded announcement on multiple speakers

On dial of extension: Dial multiple speakers (like a paging group),
play announcement file, end connection(s).
Should support multiple extensions with multiple announcement files!
Tried:

  • fiddled with dialplan’s Dial() options
    [app-paging]
    …
    exten => _PAGE.,1(SKIPCHECK),Macro(autoanswer,${EXTEN:4})
    exten => _PAGE.,n,Set(_DOPTIONS=A(good-morning)m(impressive1)L(1000))
    exten => _PAGE.,n,Dial(${DIAL},${DTIME},${DOPTIONS})
    …

Did not work. m() and L() options were ignored. Announcement was
played, but with certain delay between speakers in group (giving bad
audio quality).

  • tried to use Playback()
    Did not work. I obviously don’t know where in dialplan this should go.
    It had no effect on various places I inserted it.