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LINUX REQUIREMENTS AND A2BILLING
a2billing 1.4 includes the following third party software:

• phpagi 2.14 Copyright 2003, 2004, 2005 Matthew Asham and David Eder
• smarty  2.6.22 Copyright 2001­2005 New Digital Group, Inc
• jgraph 1.27 Copyright 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004 Johan Persson Aditus Consulting 
• adodb 4.991 Copyright (c) 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004 John Lim 
• html2pdf Copyright (C) 2004­2005 Renato Coelho 
• famfamfam.com Icons from Mark James 
• phpconfig (C) 2003 Dave Packham and Rob Birkinshaw 
NOT GETTING LOST, WHAT IS THE INSTALLATION 
ABOUT?
In a nutshell installing a2billing requires nine steps: 
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
Download and unpack source code 
Setup the database 
Edit a2billing.conf file. Setting up the database parameters 
Fix permissions and folders 
Installing the web based graphical user interfaces (Customer and Admin) 
Place the AGI files 
Prepare your dialplan 
Add your cronjobs 
Configure your callback daemon (only for callback) 
To help you to understand what we are doing consider that: 
1. The mother of all components of a2billing is an AGI file (a2billing.php) that is 
called from asterisk dialplan. (See Step: 6, 7) 
2. The overall goal of the installation is to make sure that the AGI file that is placed 
in the asterisk agi­bin folder and invoked from the dialplan can (1) access a mysql 
database and (2) connect to Asterisk manager to place and receive call related 
commands and information. (See Step: 2, 3, 4) 



3. A2billing is managed via three different user interfaces (admin, agent and customer) 
that needs to run via the apache2 web browser with the right owner and permissions 
(See Step: 5) 
4. There are other components as cronjobs, callback daemon, etc that are needed for 
advance added value services (See Step: 8, 9) 
HOW ALL FITS TOGETHER?
A2billing is a complex software but the main idea can be summarized as follows:
When a call comes into Asterisk, it falls into a context (a part of the dialplan) that will 
execute a2billing.php  PHP file in one of its operational modes. The PHP file is the AGI 
(Asterisk Gateway Interface) software that is responsible of retrieving information of the 
call from the AMI (Asterisk Manager Interface) and interact with the Mysql database. All 
actions related to the call (routing, playing a IVR, etc) are executed talking to Asterisk via 
the AMI.
a2billing.php (the AGI code in the dialplan) uses a PHP class known as phpagi to talk 
with the AMI and adodb to connect with the mysql database.  To separate functionality 
from presentation a2billing 1.4 is using smarty.



Pre­required Packages
A2billing requires the packages of a LAMP (PHP5) installation. 
To install the necessary packages, run the following commands:
#apt­get install libapache2­mod­php5 php5 php5­common 
#apt­get install php5­cli php5­mysql mysql­server apache2 php5­gd 
#apt­get install openssh­server
Version 1.4 requires  Mcrypt for PHP5
#apt­get install php5­mcrypt
Asterisk is of course also needed.
#apt­get install asterisk 
PART 2.  INSTALLATION OF A2BILLING
In a nutshell installing a2billing requires seven steps: 
1. Download and unpack source code
2. Setup the database
3. Edit a2billing.conf file. Setting up the database parameters 
4. Fix permissions and folders
5. Place the AGI files 
6. Installing the web based graphical user interfaces (Customer, Agent and Admin)
7. Prepare your dialplan 
8. Add your cronjobs 
9. Configure your callback daemon (only for callback) 



STEP 1.  GET A2BILLING SOURCE CODE
Download the source code (wget) and unpack it (tar).2
#cd /usr/local/src/
#wget http://www.asterisk2billing.org/downloads/A2Billing_1.4.0.tar.gz 
#tar zxvf A2Billing_1.3.4.tar.gz
We will now create a symbolic link to the new directory 
#ln ­s /usr/local/src/a2billing_1.4.0 /usr/local/src/a2billing 
Make sure you have all the code under /usr/local/src/a2billing
STEP 2.  PREPARE THE DATABASE
We will now create a MySQL database (mya2billing) for the billing software. The file 
a2billing­MYSQL­createdb­user.sql  includes a script that creates the database with the 
correct access control users and permissions.
#cd /usr/local/src/a2billing
#mysql ­u root ­p < DataBase/mysql/Mysql­5.x/a2billing­MYSQL­createdb­
user.sql
After creating the database structure, we will create a set of tables and insert some initial 
basic data  that A2Billing needs to work.
#mysql ­u root ­p mya2billing < DataBase/mysql/Mysql­5.x/a2billing­
schema­MYSQL.5.X­v1.4.0.sql
Checkpoint 1: Check that the database (my2billing) and that (89 ?) tables have been 
created.
#mysql ­u root ­p mya2billing
  mysql>show tables
mysql>exit
2 If you are a developer consider using the SVN version 
svn co ­­username guest ­­password guest http://svn.a2billing.net/svn/asterisk2billing/trunk



STEP 3.  EDIT A2BILLING CONFIGURATION FILE
We need to edit the A2Billing configuration file (a2billing.conf file). The file contains all 
the configuration information for the Asterisk2Billing to connect to the database.  
First, we need to copy the default configuration file from the source code (/usr/local/src) 
to Asterisk (/etc). Notice that in previous versions the a2billing.conf was under 
/etc/asterisk 
#cp /usr/local/src/a2billing/a2billing.conf /etc/
Open the file with your favorite text editor (vi is used in this example). If you are new to 
Linux, we recommend you to use the text editor Gedit3.
#vi /etc/asterisk/a2billing.conf
The only parameters that you need to change here is the database connection information, 
an example follows: 
[database] 
hostname = localhost 
port = 3306
user = a2billinguser 
password = a2billing 
dbname = mya2billing 
;dbtype = postgres 
dbtype = mysql 
3 Gedit is a graphical text editor and can not be run from a console. In that case, we recommend vi.


STEP 4.  FIX PERMISSIONS, FILES AND FOLDERS 
In this step, we will tweak the file permissions of Asterisk to fit the A2Billing software. We 
will also create a number of additional files and folders that A2Billing needs, which does 
not come with the default installation.
1.  SIP and IAX
First we will set a few file permissions (chmod, chown) and create (touch) the SIP and 
IAX configuration files for Asterisk.
chmod 777 /etc/asterisk
touch /etc/asterisk/additional_a2billing_iax.conf
touch /etc/asterisk/additional_a2billing_sip.conf
echo \#include additional_a2billing_sip.conf >> /etc/asterisk/sip.conf
echo \#include additional_a2billing_iax.conf >> /etc/asterisk/iax.conf
chown ­Rf www­data /etc/asterisk/additional_a2billing_iax.conf
chown ­Rf www­data /etc/asterisk/additional_a2billing_sip.conf
2.  Sound files
We need to copy (cp) a few files from A2Billing package to Asterisk sounds folder. Use the 
installation script as follows:
      /usr/local/src/a2billing/addons/install_a2b_sounds_deb.sh
      chown ­R asterisk:asterisk /usr/share/asterisk/sounds/
3.  Configure Asterisk Manager
Configure the Asterisk Manager by editing the manager.conf file. 
#vi /etc/asterisk/manager.conf
[general] 
enabled = yes 
port = 5038 
bindaddr = 0.0.0.0 
[myasterisk] 
secret=mycode 
read=system,call,log,verbose,command,agent,user 
write=system,call,log,verbose,command,agent,user 



STEP 5.  INSTALL THE AGI COMPONENTS 
Place the entire content of the directory AGI into your agi­bin directory. 
mkdir /usr/share/asterisk/agi­bin
cd /usr/local/src/a2billing/AGI               
cp a2billing.php /usr/share/asterisk/agi­bin/
cp ­Rf lib /usr/share/asterisk/agi­bin/
Make sure the script is executable
chmod +x /usr/share/asterisk/agi­bin/a2billing.php
STEP 6.  INSTALL WEB­BASED GRAPHICAL INTERFACES 
In this step, we will install the three graphical interfaces of A2Billing, the Administration 
(admin), Agent (agent) and the Customer interface (customer).
Place the directories admin, customer, agent and common into your webserver document 
root. 
      mkdir /var/www/a2billing
      cp ­rf /usr/local/src/a2billing/admin /var/www/a2billing
      cp ­rf /usr/local/src/a2billing/agent /var/www/a2billing
      cp ­rf /usr/local/src/a2billing/customer /var/www/a2billing
      cp ­rf /usr/local/src/a2billing/common /var/www/a2billing 
      
     chmod 755 /var/www/a2billing/admin/templates_c
     chmod 755 /var/www/a2billing/customer/templates_c
     chmod 755 /var/www/a2billing/agent/templates_c
      chown ­Rf www­data:www­data /var/www/a2billing/admin/templates_c
      chown ­Rf www­data:www­data /var/www/a2billing/customer/templates_c
      chown ­Rf www­data:www­data /var/www/a2billing/agent/templates_c
Restart your webserver (Apache).
/etc/init.d/apache2 restart
Checkpoint 2: Direct a browser to the administrative web interface (http://<ip­
addr>/a2billing/admin) and login (check for all default passwords at the end of this 
document). 





STEP 7.  CREATE DIALPLAN
The extensions.conf is the Asterisk dialplan. Calls that interact with the billing software 
need to be handled inside of one or many a2billing related contexts.
The calls that reach the context are processed using the a2billing.php AGI script. The 
a2billing.php script can be invoked in many different modes (standard, did, voucher, 
callback, etc). In the example, we create two different contexts, the first context [a2billing] 
handles all the calls from our VoIP clients. When a call arrives, any extension number _X. 
(2 digits or more) reaches the script a2billing.php
The second context [did], will be used to route incoming calls back to the users. Calls to 
the clients (DID) are handled inside of the [did] context. The script a2billing.php in did 
mode is responsible of routing the call back to one of our users.4
Edit extension.conf  (/etc/asterisk) and add the following two extensions.
[a2billing]
; CallingCard application
exten => _X.,1,Answer
exten => _X.,2,Wait,2
exten => _X.,3,DeadAGI,a2billing.php
exten => _X.,4,Wait,2
exten => _X.,5,Hangup
[did] 
; CallingCard application 
exten => _X.,1,DeadAGI(a2billing.php|1|did) 
4 DeadAGI is a variant of AGI that you use when the channel is hung up. 



STEP 8.  CONFIGURE RECURRING SERVICES
Recurring services are handled via the /etc/crontab 
You can add the following cron jobs to your /etc/crontab or create a file with the jobs in 
/var/spool/cron/a2billing 
# update the currency table
0 6 * * * php /usr/local/src/a2billing/Cronjobs/currencies_update_yahoo.php
# manage the monthly services subscription
0 6 1 * * php 
/usr/local/src/a2billing/Cronjobs/a2billing_subscription_fee.php
# To check account of each Users and send an email if the balance is
less than the user have choice.
0 * * * * php /usr/local/src/a2billing/Cronjobs/a2billing_notify_account.php
# To check all the accounts and send an notification email if the
balance is less than the first argument.
0 */6 * * php /usr/local/src/a2billing/Cronjobs/a2billing_check_account.php
# this script will browse all the DID that are reserve and check if the 
customer need to pay for it
# bill them or warn them per email to know if they want to pay in
order to keep their DIDs
0 2 * * * php /usr/local/src/a2billing/Cronjobs/a2billing_bill_diduse.php
# This script will take care of the recurring service.
0 12 * * * php /usr/local/src/a2billing/Cronjobs/a2billing_batch_process.php
# To generate invoices and for each user.
0 6 * * * php /usr/local/src/a2billing/Cronjobs/a2billing_invoice_cront.php
# to proceed the autodialer
*/5 * * * * php 
/usr/local/src/a2billing/Cronjobs/a2billing_batch_autodialer.php
# manage alarms
0 * * * * php /usr/local/src/a2billing/Cronjobs/a2billing_alarm.php



STEP 9.  CALL BACK DAEMON (ONLY FOR CALL BACKS) 
The call back daemon is responsible of reading from the database the pool of calls stored 
for call back and trigger those calls periodically. The daemon is written in Python. Install 
the python­setuptools and use easy_install to install the callback_daemon 
     apt­get install python­setuptools python­mysqldb python­psycopg2 
python­sqlalchemy
     cd /usr/local/src/a2billing/CallBack
     easy_install callback­daemon­py/dist/callback_daemon­1.0.prod_r1527­
py2.5.egg

Install the init.d startup script 
    cd /usr/local/src/a2billing/CallBack/callback­daemon­py/callback_daemon/
    cp a2b­callback­daemon.debian  /etc/init.d/a2b­callback­daemon
    chmod +x /etc/init.d/a2b­callback­daemon
Make sure the daemon starts 
     
     update­rc.d a2b­callback­daemon defaults 40 60
If you need to remove the daemon in the future run 
       
     update­rc.d ­f a2b­callback­daemon remove
PART 3.  DEFAULT PASSWORDS AND URL
Type Username Password
Admin UI root changepassword
Manager myasterisk mycode
MySQL database  a2billinguser a2billing
Database  
mya2billing
Note! The first character in all usernames and passwords is a small letter (not capital).