Brand new install FreePBX 17.0.21 failing all softphone connects

[BobD]

Greetings,
I finished setting up a new instance of FreePBX 17.0.21 on a Ubuntu 24.04.3 LTS VM under VMWare.
I had multiple issues, like so many other newbies to FreePBX I assume.
Anyway, I managed to get it installed and seemingly functioning correctly.
My goal is absolutely the simplest configuration ever with only one mobile phone using a wireless connection to my local LAN and a Win 10 desktop machine also on the local LAN, or 2 desktop machines on the LAN.
Doesn’t get any simpler.
I do not want ANY outside the LAN connections involved, and really NO cell phone actual phone number involved. If the mobile can’t do this, then I will only use 2 desktop machines with no mobile phone at all.
I wish to be able to use some softphone software on the LAN devices to connect to my instance of FreePBX and be able to call extensions and leave/retrieve voice messages.
I can access the server http://192.168.0.7/admin link in a browser from the anywhere on the LAN and the administration screens seem to function fine. The dashboard shows as it should I believe and System Alerts No critical issues.
I configured 2 users and 2 extensions seemingly ok.
I had some issues with the password limits complications, but overcame the gumbo successfully I believe.
In any event, the server looks fine, I can enter the UCP screens via a browser using either users credentials and all seems fine. I can do this from any device on the LAN and so access to the server from the LAN does not seem to be an issue either with desktops or mobile phones attached via wireless to the LAN.

My problem is this.
I have tried multiple softphone apps on the mobile phone and multiple progs on the desktop and none of them can connect to the server using either username/pwd.
They all seem to fail on authentication. I am using only the IP of the FPBX server and the user name/password in these softphone progs. I am not even trying any app that requires an account configuration. I intend to keep all on the LAN ONLY behind my firewall and NO data will go anywhere except on my LAN so nothing can phone home in any way.
Some of the softphone stuff requires a “domain” with absolutely no explanation whatsoever. Very confusing. Does not seem to be any reference to “domain” in all the FreePBX stuff or documentation so I am lost on this.

Can anyone give me any assistance here ?
I must have not configured right, but lacking any direction, I am a bit lost.
Do I need to set up a Trunk ? Dunno, not sure what a Trunk is for, cant find newbie readable explanations for it.
In going through the configs for a Trunk, it seemed to me that I did not need one setup for my requirements. So I left it unconfigured.
The few howto’s I found kind of leave one hanging after the system is configured and one can access the web admin UI. None of them really explain configurations well if at all that I found.
What is the absolute minimum setup to allow for 2 extensions as simple as possible ?

[Stewart1 (Stewart)]

Unfortunately, you didn’t mention the names of any softphones or mobile apps you had trouble with, so here is some general information:

You usually need to provide only three parameters to configure a softphone or mobile app:

1. Username, sometimes also needs to be put in Auth User or similar. This should match the pjsip extension number you created in FreePBX.
2. Password, this must match the value of Secret for the extension. Some apps have problems with long passwords or special characters. In that case, create a password of no more than 12 letters and digits and put it into both Secret and the password in the app. Use copy/paste to make certain that they match.
3. Server; this may be called Proxy, SIP Server, or Domain. Put the PBX IP address there, which I assume is 192.168.0.7 .

A few softphones ask for SIP Address, where you put something like
sip:[email protected]:5060
(replace 1234 with the extension number and 5060 with the value of Port to Listen On, if you have changed it from the default of 5060)

If you still have trouble, tell us the softphone name and version, and what non-default settings you are using.

[HawaiianHopeOrg (Curtis)]

HI !
On your cell phone, do you have WiFi enabled and connected to your local lan ? (my dumb ass had this problem the other day, normally i only connect over the internet and instead I had my WiFi on and was belly aching why the cell phone would not connect. the WiFi was overriding the cell service)

AS Stewart mentioned, but its sometimes not really clear. when the softphone apps ask for “password” it is NOT the user password, it is the phone extensions “SECRET” (password) in the Extensions list.

Zoiper is free, i think it is crap on a cell phone but pretty good on a desktop. I can tell you how to config that if that is what you are using. We use GroundWire on the cell phones and I really like it. I think it was $10 on the app store.but they do not make a desktop version.

[BobD]

Well,

Great thanks to both Stewart1 and HawaiianHopeOrg.
It’s amazing how a little information and a pich of dogged determination can do.

@Stewart1

Unfortunately, you didn’t mention the names of any softphones or mobile apps you had trouble with, so here is some general information:

No, clearly a faux pas on my part, however being greatly frustrated and knowing that I tried so dadburn many, and always getting the exact same same results kinda ruled those individual apps out. Always (after some kerfuffle) getting a “Bad Authentication” or “Authentication Failure”. This was the result no matter the app.

@Stewart1

You usually need to provide only three parameters to configure a softphone or mobile app:

Yes, I assumed this to be true, however lacking any serious documentation on structure of each this was severely problematic in light of the differences of the configs of the various progs.
Here is the MicroSIP configuration screen and the result of a save:
Compare that to the Zoiper5 config:

Just a might bit difference between these two.
Great for a rook.

I can NOT (even now) get MicroSIP to connect no matter how I set the SIP Server and Domain, Username or Login. Either this error or failed auth no matter what the settings.

I did however experiment with various configurations of the various apps/progs, all to no avail. I knew when the server was not correct it would either hang or error in some way. I new when the server was getting the requests ok the settings were at least getting to the server from the softphone(s) but failing auth as they all said so.

@Stewart1

A few softphones ask for SIP Address, where you put something like
sip:[email protected]:5060

I tried these in multiple variations, again most all failures excepting when my errors would indicate failure to authenticate.
I thank you greatly for your input, it did help me re-focus.

@HawaiianHopeOrg

On your cell phone, do you have WiFi enabled and connected to your local lan ?

Seems so simple and has happened but in this case yes I am sure I was connected, however I did in the process find that my wifi extender in my office went to lunch permanently and the one I was connecting to was kinda far away and not the greatest signal. So bad/slow signal. Gotta love wireless. Anyway, I fixed that and am currently back on a good signal.
Doing this didn’t fix anything sad to say.

@HawaiianHopeOrg

AS Stewart mentioned, but its sometimes not really clear. when the softphone apps ask for “password” it is NOT the user password, it is the phone extensions “SECRET” (password) in the Extensions list.

Wow, this was GREAT advise ! Really ! Seriously thank you. I refocused again.
This is a MAJOR issue with me and FreePbx.
Here a password, there a password, everywhere a {bleeping} password…
I had not been into the “Extensions” since I set them up and the whole pwd in there was way out there for me. W.T.F.? Why in the world is there a user configuration that naturally has password configs and ALSO a password for an extension ?
An extension ? W.T.H. is up with that ?
It seems apparent to me that the “User” is of no importance for my attempted setup.
I guess 50+ years of software development is insufficient to understand why if you set up an extension and have to assign that extension to a user, why the extension needs an additional “secret” password unrelated to the user password.

In any event, it all started to become clearer with that tidbit of confusion cleared up.

On a side note here:

@HawaiianHopeOrg

(my dumb ass had this problem the other day, normally i only connect over the internet and instead I had my WiFi on and was belly aching why the cell phone would not connect. the WiFi was overriding the cell service)

I would think that if you had wifi calling enabled on the cell phone, then you should be able to use the “normal” phone when on wifi. I am not sure if this stopped the pbx connect or not, but maybe.

I believe I have rambled on long enough…
I greatly thank you both for the input, it did allow me to re-focus and after a good nights sleep I went about troubleshooting anew this morning.
Interesting what I have found.

First, the desktop software I tried Zoiper5 needs 192.168.0.7:5060 in the SIP Credentials Domain (no “sip:” included), Username is the Extension number NOT the User (go figure) and the Password is the Extension “secret” password NOT the Users password (again g.f.f.).
Totally unreasonable and completely clear as mud. But works…

As to the “secret”
It seems that the FreePbx system does not “actually” allow bypassing “Strong Secrets”. (What we used to call an undocumented feature)

Even though Settings>Advanced Settings>Device Settings> Require Strong Secrets is set to “No”.
Even with an “Apply Config” done.
Even with a reboot of the server, no such “weak password” is apparently allowed in the “Extension Secret” period.
This secret MUST be compliant with a “Strong” password.
Perhaps there is some “other” settings rat-holed away in some obscure area I am unaware of that can change this, but I have not found them.

I have no reason for strong passwords actually as I am firmly behind firewalls and relatively safe on my LAN. I also employ robots to keep the LAN clean.

So after setting the extension secrets to a “Strong” password I finally got success in authentication. Whenever I tried a weak secret, no go, no matter the settings, back to the muck.

I have had success with both the desktop stuff and the cell phone apps and I have accomplished my goal.

I have successful operation on various apps on the cell phones all with wifi connected to the LAN or via my VPN to my LAN. Likewise with the desktops connected to the LAN via WIFI, ethernet or VPN.
Wunderbar.

Onwards and upwards.
I can build on this.
Now I need a small pool of outside lines I can use for local calls out.

So again I thank you both.
Best regards.

[HawaiianHopeOrg (Curtis)]

You are very welcome.
Close to you. I am in IT and software design for 45+ years and I struggled with the exact same thing the first time I set up FreePBX about 9 years ago. I was also using the “password” and not the secret. Had the same problem. To answer your question why there is both a user and an extension password is because there is a separation between users and extensions. You can have 1 device programmed with multiple extensions, and where multiple users access it. basically a many to many relationship and each has their own password.

You can have multiple extensions and when a user goes to call out, you can make them enter a password. Each extension can spoof a different outbound caller ID, so it can look like you are a massive multi national company with multiple departments and what you really have is 1 person with a phone and 24 extensions and each extension with their own caller ID.

An “Inbound Route” allows you to define a unique inbound call path for a phone number. We actually have 4 different non profit orgs using a single phone system each with a different inbound route that uniquely routes the calls through the system.

This is “CrossTalk Solutions” a complete video series on FreePBX. This is version 15 but almost all of the topis are still valid. I have watched this multiple times when I first started setting up our system years ago. I still come back to it for reference sometimes.

[HawaiianHopeOrg (Curtis)]

@BobD

I would think that if you had wifi calling enabled on the cell phone, then you should be able to use the “normal” phone when on wifi. I am not sure if this stopped the pbx connect or not, but maybe.

I have GroundWire softPhone installed on the cell phone (x404) and route ALL of our calls through our FreePBX phone system. So I do not actually use the cell phone (cell service) to dial out. I do this so FreePBX records ALL of our orgs phone calls. Yes, The WiFi calling would attempt to use the WiFi connection, but I reconfifged the cell phone to use the soft phone for all outbound calls.
Thus… when WiFi was turned on, it was connecting to our LAN over WiFi and I did not have GroudWire set up on our LAN, only over our public IP. I need to set up another conneciton over our LAN so it will use both.

And if you picked up on that. My cell phone is x404… so when I misplace my phone in our large warehouse, I dial 404 (phone not found) and it rings the extension and i can find it.

Any, If you did not know, FreePBX can record full conversations including the ringing. and pre pickup before someone answers. This is good for multiple reasons. And you will love the voice mail feature where it emails you a copy of the voice mail to your email address and you do not have to call into the extension to retrieve messages. So if you are setting up multiple extensions for your family, even if they do not answer the call you can leave them a message and FreePBX can email them a copy of that message with teh atqached recording.

[BobD]

Wow, thanks.
It’s good to know I am not alone in this.
meanwhile my brain is a bit

over it all. I got a looong way to go.

I guess I just try to simplify the system in my mind to start to learn it. I don’t look at all the “things down the road” it would be too overwhelming for my simple little brain.
Again you give me great information. I think I am like you were, just trying to take it all in, understand some and just get off the ground.
I thank you for the vid, I will check it out.
I am just now thinking of how to trunk out.

Again Danka.

[HawaiianHopeOrg (Curtis)]

Welcome

For the trunks we use Sangoma - store.sipstation.com
You can pick your region and phone numbers. And you can add multiple phone numbers too. We have a total of 50 phone numbers across 7 sites.
Oh, And a single trunk is good for most basic sites. You can turn on call bursting for simultaneous calls. One of our sites processes 3,000 calls a month and their total phone bill (sipstation trunks) is a whopping $75. 2 trunks at $30 a month each plus some bursting.

In FreePBX, SipStation is part of the system (Connectivity>SipStation) , you can create an account and it automatically integrates the trunks with it once they are registered.

What firewall are you using ? We use pfSense and on the outbound NAT you have to make port 5060 a “static” port, otherwise the firewall will randomize the outbound traffic.