BLF to indicate ALL trunks in use

Yeah, I know - BLF again…

Anyway, here’s my question: I have only 2 copper lines incoming to my system. The users were used to a key system (sigh, I know). What I would like to do is have a single BLF light that indicates all trunks are in use, not indicate them individually (which I can do now).

From what I understand (which is very little) of the hint/subscribe/notify mechanism, I would have to somehow emulate a new extension that is a combo of the other trunk lines. I’m searching for the info in the documentation that describes the (Zap/x&Zap/y) construct.

Any ideas? Can this be done?

thanks

[quote]Yeah, I know - BLF again…

Anyway, here’s my question: I have only 2 copper lines incoming to my system. The users were used to a key system (sigh, I know). What I would like to do is have a single BLF light that indicates all trunks are in use, not indicate them individually (which I can do now).

From what I understand (which is very little) of the hint/subscribe/notify mechanism, I would have to somehow emulate a new extension that is a combo of the other trunk lines. I’m searching for the info in the documentation that describes the (Zap/x&Zap/y) construct. [/quote]

I am interested in this too. It will saves one on a whole lot of issues relating to the so called BLF from some client.

Has anyone done this??

Take a look at this wiki with devstate examples, it shows ISDN BRI B channels but it is the same principal.

http://www.voip-info.org/wiki/view/Asterisk+func+device_State

that is good, but i don’t know where i have to put the state idle again, the dial plan is made by freepbx, so is really difficult

you can combine multiple devices into a hint as we do this all the time.

However, you are not gonna get what you are looking for since there is “implied” logic when combing hints.

In the case of a multiple device hint, if the component states are a mix between busy and idle, it will show busy. The would all have to be idle to show idle. That algorithm is hardcoded in how these are evaluated (and for good reason in almost all use cases).

For example, in FreePBX we combine the actual device state with a custom device for DND. If you press DND on your phone, this results in that custom device reporting busy and the combined hint (your device plus the DND state) as busy, which is the desired result since if someone is subscribed to you or the dialplan is checking if you are busy, and you have pressed DND, it is generally accepted as meaning “don’t bother me, I’m busy…”