Pause queue members, when Asterisk starts

lorenzo_campanile · January 13, 2021, 9:13am

I would like to keep a SIP peer in some queues, but in a paused state.

I need this user in this queues because there is a software, built on top of Asterisk (via AMI), that check queue members and show to the user “things” related to him. At the same time, I don’t want this user to ring at any queue call.

So I put this member in all queues and paused him from the queues he doesn’t want to ring in.
I know, it’s not a great solutions, but it works.

My problem is that if the server would be restarted, I have to pause this user again. There is any way to perform some actions when Asterisk starts? I want to pause the peer in some of its queues, when Asterisk starts

Thank you in advance for the help

Chano · January 13, 2021, 2:23pm

Do you have persistent members set on the queue?

If you have, it might be related to this bug https://issues.asterisk.org/jira/browse/ASTERISK-22546 which wasn’t fixed last I checked.

After pausing the member, just do some other action to the queue, like add and remove a random member, and see if that helps. I have no issues with members loosing pause state on restart of asterisk, on the servers I run.

lorenzo_campanile · January 13, 2021, 2:51pm

Thank you Chano :-), that would be a great solution, but I can’t use dynamic queue members.

The software I use (build by the company I work for) handles only static queue members.
Although dynamic persistent members feature would keep the member in the queue, I can’t use this feature because with the software I use it would be useless.

Maybe a quick and dirty way could be to pause the queue members with a command “asterisk -rx XXX” using systemd via ExecStartPost in the .service file but I don’t know is there is a better way to achieve what I need (leave systemd out would be better).

Maybe there is some hook provided by Asterisk? Something like “PostStart” where I can exec some commands? In the manual I don’t find anything.

Thank you for your time

david551 · January 13, 2021, 3:47pm

Although all this seems to be abusing the queue mechanism if you never want to all them from the queue, put them in with a higher penalty than the maximum for the queue

lorenzo_campanile · January 13, 2021, 4:57pm

all this seems to be abusing the queue mechanism

yes, that’s completely true

The fact is that I can’t edit the software and I can’t say “no” because our customer is already angry to us (for other reasons that we can’t handle). I want him to be happy so I’m looking for some even crappy solution that does the job. It’s really a sad situation.

The penalty, as you suggested, isn’t a viable solution because it’s very likely that someone will not answer the phone, making the peer of this guy ring when he doesn’t want.

Thank you for the help

david551 · January 13, 2021, 5:57pm

I was thinking of:

github.com

asterisk/asterisk/blob/master/configs/samples/queues.conf.sample#L457


;
; Asterisk has provided the "joinempty" and "leavewhenempty" options for a while
; with tenuous definitions of what they actually mean. The "joinempty" option controls
; whether a caller may join a queue depending on several factors of member availability.
; Similarly, then leavewhenempty option controls whether a caller may remain in a queue
; he has already joined. Both options take a comma-separated list of factors which
; contribute towards whether a caller may join/remain in the queue. The list of
; factors which contribute to these option is as follows:
;
; paused: a member is not considered available if he is paused
; penalty: a member is not considered available if his penalty is less than QUEUE_MAX_PENALTY
; inuse: a member is not considered available if he is currently on a call
; ringing: a member is not considered available if his phone is currently ringing
; unavailable: This applies mainly to Agent channels. If the agent is a member of the queue
;              but has not logged in, then do not consider the member to be available
; invalid: Do not consider a member to be available if he has an "invalid" device state.
;          This generally is caused by an error condition in the member's channel driver.
; unknown: Do not consider a member to be available if we are unable to determine the member's
;          current device state.
; wrapup: A member is not considered available if he is currently in his wrapuptime after
;         taking a call.

However, in searching for this, I found:

github.com

asterisk/asterisk/blob/master/configs/samples/queues.conf.sample#L64


; Queue(queuename,[options],[optionalurl],[announceoverride],[timeout])
; example: Queue(dave,t,,,45)
; shared_lastcall will make the lastcall and calls received be the same in
; members logged in more than one queue.  This is useful to make the queue
; respect the wrapuptime of another queue for a shared member.
; The default value is no.
;
;shared_lastcall=yes
;
; Negative_penalty_invalid will treat members with a negative penalty as logged off
;
;negative_penalty_invalid = no
;
; log_membername_as_agent will cause app_queue to log the membername rather than
; the interface for the ADDMEMBER and REMOVEMEMBER events when a state_interface
; is set.  The default value (no) maintains backward compatibility.
;
;log_membername_as_agent = no
;
;[markq]

which might also help.

ambiorixg12 · January 14, 2021, 2:58am

you can run this command on cron @reboot

queue {pause|unpause} member – Pause or unpause a queue member

Chano · January 14, 2021, 7:24am

How do you ensure it’s only run AFTER asterisk has started?

lorenzo_campanile · January 14, 2021, 9:00am

These are great options! I should have checked the queues.conf.sample more carefully.

I’ll try them out on my testing PBX.
Then I will update the topic with the results.

Thank you

lorenzo_campanile · January 14, 2021, 9:06am

The problem is that ensuring the command runs only after Asterisk has started can be challenging (as Chano pointed out). Also, if for some reason Asterisk restarts (only Asterisk, not the server) the command wouldn’t be executed.

Thank you anyway

lorenzo_campanile · January 14, 2021, 10:18am

Ok, I’ve tried your options and the result are “interesting” (unfortunately ).

Both when I set the penalty over the QUEUE_MAX_PENALTY and when I set the penalty to a negative value (with negative_penalty_invalid = yes) the same thing happens:

if I ran queue show I see that the member has not penalty:

Normal Man (SIP/xxx1) with penalty 1 (ringinuse disabled) (Not in use) has taken no calls yet
**No Ring Man (SIP/xxx2) (ringinuse disabled) (Not in use) has taken no calls yet**
Normal Man (SIP/xxx3) with penalty 1 (ringinuse disabled) (Not in use) has taken no calls yet
Normal Man (SIP/xxx4) with penalty 1 (ringinuse disabled) (Not in use) has taken no calls yet

Calling the queue I see that changing the penalty (both over QUEUE_MAX_PENALTY and negative value) has the opposite effect: the No Ring Man is always the first to ring!

If I set the penalty to something like 2, everything works as expected (who has penalty 1 rings before, the guy with penalty 2 rings after).

Asterisk version is: Asterisk certified/13.18-cert2

Playing with penalty doesn’t seem to be a viable solution so

ambiorixg12 · January 14, 2021, 12:16pm

Sorry I misread it was only when asterisk is restarted. In this case would try modifying the Asterisk’s start stop & script to run the command

lorenzo_campanile · January 15, 2021, 11:18pm

Tried with ExecStartPost, via systemd .serivce file, but without success.

At the end, I gave up.
I tried everything for make my customer happy but I can’t do miracles.

A big thank you to all of you who helped me.