I entered some of the common phone numbers we get into the Address Book. I set the address and set Speedial to No then save. If I look up the number in the search box, it’s there. So far so good.
However a day or two later when that same number calls again, it comes up as unknown. When I do the same number in the search box it’s unknown again. I’m doing a search for just the last four digits of the number so I’m pulling up both the 1xxx and the xxx numbers. Both come up in the search, and both are unknown. I change each of them again to add the name. However when the person calls next… they’re set back to unknown.
I’ve entered this same person about 8 times now. It happens on other numbers as well (but not all numbers). For example I’ve put my son’s cell phone into the system at least a dozen times now.
I had looked at the address book less than 1/2 hour before the call this afternoon. It was correct. When the person called however it showed up as “unknown” and then the address book entry was also changed to “unknown”. It appears that something is overwriting the address book entry when the call comes in. What would do that?
If you’re using CallerID Lookup with the “Internal” source type, do you have the option to cache results enabled? If so, disable and see if you get different behavior.
I do have “Internal” set as a callerID lookup source, and it IS set to have the cache turned on. I’ll turn it off, modify the address book again and wait for her to call again then post an update, probably tomorrow.
She just called and the caller ID stuck this time. So help me understand what’s happening here.
If the caller ID cache is turned on, it purges the caller ID and changes it to unknown. But if it’s turned off, it allows the caller ID in the address book to show? Isn’t that sort of the opposite of caching an ID?
I’m not fully versed with the CallerID Lookup module nor it’s history. All of its utility is duplicated by Superfecta, which is the one I do use. At some point in the past, a coder decided that caching was needed for this module, and employed the Asterisk Phonebook as the destination for this cache. If you were to use CallerID Lookup to do a database query for a name, then there might be some logic to also writing that result to the Asterisk Phonebook. However, if you’re using ‘internal’ for name lookups, then you are pulling names from the Asterisk Phonebook, in which case caching the result to the Phonebook is useless, or in your case even worse.
I assume your inbound call carries the caller id name with the word “Anonymous” as opposed to being null, and it is this value that is being cached.
I use CallerID Superfecta. I was confused by FreePBX as it seemed like there were different modules trying to do the same thing. I never understood how they work together. I guess I still don’t as caching sounds like it would be a good idea IF there wasn’t already an entry in the Asterisk Phonebook, in which case that should be preserved (my opinion only of course).
I don’t know how the callerID comes from my provider when it’s unknown. I’m on Sipstation trunks. My CallerID source is currently just the Asterisk Phonebook, and TelcoData,(which only comes back with a region). I have OpenCNAM in my Superfecta as well but they keep messing up my payments so it’s not providing results.
So I think you hit it on the head. It was pulling an “unknown” name from TelcoData which was then caching and overwriting the Asterisk Phonebook.
I’m sorry to hear that the billing isn’t going smoothly with OpenCNAM. Send us an email at ‘[email protected]’ and we’d be happy to take a look at your account and find out what the issue is.
In regards to caching, we typically recommend against it as CNAM data is constantly updated by the phone carriers. Depending on the caching configuration, this could lead to stale data and inaccurate results.