asterisk users - Nov 2004 - manager api originate doesn't give detailed information

Hi all,
I am playing with Asterisk since few monts and I have some problems in 
mastering faiulre handling
I built an application which call many outgoing calls through the 
manager-api  command originate.
I set the outgoing channel i.e zap/g1/$EXTEN and also the context, 
extension, priority triple  .
Unfortunately the answer of originate call doesn't give details about 
different failure cases: busy line,  user unreachable, channel unavailable.
The only message I got is "Originate failed".
The problem is , in my understanding,  until the call is not answered I 
dont have any extension mechanism. Is it true?
It should be useful to get the same information as  from applications 
like  chanIsavail, dial, ecc,.
Is there a way to start an originate command with a pseudo channel and 
than start from a context where I can use the applications I talked before.
Cheers
Luca Casavola