asterisk users - Sep 2003 - The sounds of silence: silent soundfiles available

As has been noted before on this list, the Wait() application does 
not listen for keystrokes from users.  Many of you, like me, have 
looping Background(), Wait(), and Goto() application priority chains 
that prompt users to enter some data, and then repeat the 
instructions if no keys are pressed.  The problem of course is if the 
user doesn't start pressing keys during the Background() call and 
delays until the Wait() application is called, those keys are lost.

I had solved this some time back by creating a few random length 
files of silence, that would replace Wait() routines in some 
circumstances.  I have finally created a formal measured group of 
files, each with 1-10 seconds of silence, and put them in my sounds 
directory for public consumption.  Not a big deal for most of you to 
create these files yourselves, but perhaps a minor pain that 
hopefully I've removed for some people who don't have sound tools 
handy.

http://www.loligo.com/asterisk/sounds/silence/

JT

On Fri, 2003-09-05 at 00:05, John Todd wrote:
> As has been noted before on this list, the Wait() application does 
> not listen for keystrokes from users.  Many of you, like me, have 
> looping Background(), Wait(), and Goto() application priority chains 
> that prompt users to enter some data, and then repeat the 
> instructions if no keys are pressed.  The problem of course is if the 
> user doesn't start pressing keys during the Background() call and 
> delays until the Wait() application is called, those keys are lost.
> 
> I had solved this some time back by creating a few random length 
> files of silence, that would replace Wait() routines in some 
> circumstances.  I have finally created a formal measured group of 
> files, each with 1-10 seconds of silence, and put them in my sounds 
> directory for public consumption.  Not a big deal for most of you to 
> create these files yourselves, but perhaps a minor pain that 
> hopefully I've removed for some people who don't have sound tools 
> handy.
> 
> http://www.loligo.com/asterisk/sounds/silence/
And you missed the right way to deal with this. You may have to break
your extensions into more contexts, but you let the timeout function do
it's work. 

[learning_the_way]
exten => s,1,DigitTimeout,5
exten => s,2,ResponseTimeout,10
exten => s,3,background(instructions)
exten => s,4,background(more_instructions)

exten => t,1,Goto(s|3)


This will let the call progress through the backgound apps, and if it
falls out of these rules, then it waits 10 seconds and falls into the t
extension where you can do whatever you like even going back and
repeating the instructions. 
 
-- 
Steven Critchfield <critch@basesys.com>

You could use ResponseTimeout together with Background instead of playing
silence files.

Martin

On Thu, 4 Sep 2003, John Todd wrote:
>
> As has been noted before on this list, the Wait() application does
> not listen for keystrokes from users.  Many of you, like me, have
> looping Background(), Wait(), and Goto() application priority chains
> that prompt users to enter some data, and then repeat the
> instructions if no keys are pressed.  The problem of course is if the
> user doesn't start pressing keys during the Background() call and
> delays until the Wait() application is called, those keys are lost.
>
> I had solved this some time back by creating a few random length
> files of silence, that would replace Wait() routines in some
> circumstances.  I have finally created a formal measured group of
> files, each with 1-10 seconds of silence, and put them in my sounds
> directory for public consumption.  Not a big deal for most of you to
> create these files yourselves, but perhaps a minor pain that
> hopefully I've removed for some people who don't have sound tools
> handy.
>
> http://www.loligo.com/asterisk/sounds/silence/
>
> JT
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