How to make phone call using modem in Linux

[Kieu Minh Thang]

Hi everyone,

I have used Linux on a computer with modem included. How to use this
modem to make phone call. Is there a software like Phone Dialer on Windows?

Regards,

Thang Kieu

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[Roby]

Kieu Minh Thang wrote:

> Hi everyone,
>
> I have used Linux on a computer with modem included. How to use this
> modem to make phone call. Is there a software like Phone Dialer on
> Windows?
>
> Regards,
>
> Thang Kieu

dtmfdial accepts a numeric string command line and sends it as dtmf
tones via the modem. I use it with kaddressbook to dial out.

[Kieu Minh Thang]

Thank you Roby,

I have install dtmfdial, but it seems my Debian doesn't have driver for modem. But I see that dtmfdial is very simple program, just a binary file, no config file. How does this know what device used to dial, where can I config modem device for it ?

Thang Kieu

[Jeff D]

On Sat, 11 Aug 2007, Kieu Minh Thang wrote:

> Thank you Roby,
>
> I have install dtmfdial, but it seems my Debian doesn't have driver for
> modem. But I see that dtmfdial is very simple program, just a binary file,
> no config file. How does this know what device used to dial, where can I
> config modem device for it ?
>
> Thang Kieu

you might want to check out wvdial, I've used it before with good results.

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[Ken Irving]

On Fri, Aug 10, 2007 at 11:20:20PM -0700, Jeff D wrote:
> On Sat, 11 Aug 2007, Kieu Minh Thang wrote:
>>
>> I have install dtmfdial, but it seems my Debian doesn't have driver for
>> modem. But I see that dtmfdial is very simple program, just a binary file,
>> no config file. How does this know what device used to dial, where can I
>> config modem device for it ?
>>

> you might want to check out wvdial, I've used it before with good results.

Minicom is useful to manually control a modem, also cu and probably
others, by typing commands to the modem. The serial interface, or
"driver", to the modem is well built into the Linux system

An automated "phone dialer" probably exists as a package or project;
I'd try googling for those terms, use 'apt-cache search ...', look on
sourceforge and other software development sites.

I wrote a simple and not very flexible "phone dialer" as an exercise
to learn Perl/Tk one time, using the perl Expect module to handle
the interactive nature of the problem, and cu as the backend to talk
to the modem. It presents a few buttons in a window to connect to a
phone voice message system, listen and delete messages, and disconnect,
and optionally puts up a keypad. I suspect you might be looking for
something like this, and you're welcome to it, but there are also likely
more fully featured and configurable gizmos out there.

You described what you wanted by saying it was "like" some other program;
without being familiar with that program, it's hard to know what you want.

(Hmm, reminds me of the Microsoft approach to "office" software
standards...)

Ken

--
Ken Irving, fn...@uaf.edu

[Kieu Minh Thang]

I have checked wvdial and have use minicom before.
wvdial seems to used to dialup connect, not to make phone call
I have used minicom to handle some circuit (it's likely to HyperTerminal on Windows), I think this can be use to dial because it handle modem with AT commands. If I know AT commands, I can make phone call too.
Maybe dtmfdial is a solution too, but I don't know how to configure it yet.

any other idea, who have make phone call using modem on Linux before? Please let me know.

Thank you all. ;)

Thang Kieu

[Kieu Minh Thang]

Hi all,
That's great, I have tried with minicom and looking around for some AT commands.
Have been successful to dial with minicom.
connect to modem.....
ATDT <phone_number>
quality is good enough

Thang Kieu

[Kieu Minh Thang]

testing again, wvdial can make phone call too but quality is not good. the sound too noise.
just modify config file. provide phone, username, password (don't care about username/password here)

[Ken Irving]

On Fri, Aug 17, 2007 at 10:26:31AM +0700, Kieu Minh Thang wrote:
> testing again, wvdial can make phone call too but quality is not good. the sound too noise.
> just modify config file. provide phone, username, password (don't care about username/password
> here)
>
> Thang Kieu

I'm not really sure what you're trying to do, but I guess you want to have
the computer dial and then use the voice phone, maybe over the computer
speaker. I sometimes use this for checking voice mailbox messages,
but you can also use a regular telephone handset after the computer dials.

You'll probably need to search/google for the appropriate AT commands for
your modem and/or telephone host system if you want to do anything fancy.
I sometimes need to dial in spite of a "pulsing" dial-tone due to pending
messages, suspend call-waiting interruptions, etc., and there are code
sequences to do those kinds of things.

The main "trick" in using the computer as a dialer is to end the AT command
sequence with a semicolon (I think) in order to return the modem to "command
mode". Otherwise, the default behavior of the modem is to progress to
negotiating with a modem on the other end, with all the funny-sounding tones
and beeps.

In general, I find it's best to first figure out how to do something manually,
as you're doing with wvdial or minicom, before trying to automate it.

Ken

--
Ken Irving, fnkci+de...@uaf.edu