CN1378371A - Communication system and method for automatically setting basic data of Internet telephone equipment - Google Patents

Abstract

A communication system for automatically setting basic data of network telephone equipment features that after the network telephone equipment is connected to Internet, its MAC address is transmitted to the management end equipment according to DHCP or BOOTP protocol and the related set data is required to be obtained.

Description

Communication system and method for automatically setting basic data of Internet telephone equipment

The present invention is a communication system and communication method, especially a communication system and method for automatically setting the basic data of network telephone equipment. The equipment obtains its own basic setting data, so that the network-type telephone equipment has the function of plug-and-play on the network, successfully completes the connection with each other, and immediately conducts a call.

Generally, the Internet phone used today is very popular among consumers in recent years because it allows users to communicate with other people in a distant place through the Internet without spending expensive international long-distance calls. In line with this market trend, by adding VoIP (Voice Over IP Device) to provide network users with long-distance and international communication services, this will not only save users' expenses on long-distance and international communications, It also brings great market opportunities for network communication system operators. In addition, according to research data, up to 70% of traditional telephone users will be interested in switching to Internet-based telephone equipment for long-distance and international communication in the future. This huge number of communication users and needs, It is bound to make the management end of Internet telephone equipment (such as: Internet telephone service provider (Call Agent...) etc.), face the following problems:

1) How to identify the user of the IP phone device;

2) How to specify the IP address of the IP phone device;

3) How to replace or change the setting data of the management terminal at any time without affecting the use of the network telephone equipment;

4) How to make the Internet phone device at the user end without any artificial modification of settings;

5) How to automatically execute the software upgrade action of the Internet-based telephony equipment...etc.

In addition, when using the existing Internet-based telephone equipment to communicate online, it is generally necessary to perform basic settings and management on the following settings:

1) The IP address or DNS name of the management terminal (Call Agent...) and/or the number of the default connection port (Default Port number): so that the network type telephone device can find the management terminal by the IP address or DNS name, and Communicate with it.

2) IP address of the DNS server: the IP address of the IP phone device is used to find the DNS server, and use the DNS name of the management terminal (Call Agent...) to convert it into a corresponding IP address.

3) Identification name of network-type telephone equipment (such as: gateway domain name in MGCP endPointidentifier): the network-type telephone equipment uses this identification name to make the management terminal (Call Agent...) identify the identity of the user instead of using The IP address of the telephone device is used to confirm the identity of the user. Therefore, the network telephone device may be assigned a different IP address at any time.

4) The driver software filename (filename) of the network type telephone equipment and the IP address of the TFTP (Trivial FileTransfer Protocol) server: the described network type telephone equipment is to use the information to judge whether to upgrade the software version.

The network telephone equipment can mainly complete the setting or modification of the aforementioned setting values in the following two ways:

1) An RS-232 connection port is provided by the network type telephone equipment, so that the management personnel can connect the COM connection port of the computer directly to the RS-232 connection port, and then use the software installed on the computer (such as : win98 terminal), log in to the setting screen of the Internet phone device, and directly set or modify it. The disadvantage of this setting method is that the management personnel must directly go to the location where the Internet phone equipment is placed to set or modify it. Therefore, wherever the Internet phone equipment is placed, the management personnel must go to the placement location to make adjustments to it. Setting or modifying will cause great waste of manpower and time.

2) An HTTP server (or TELNET server) is provided by the network type telephone equipment, so that the management personnel can use the computer to surf the Internet at the remote end, and log in the settings of the network type telephone equipment through a network browser (or TELNET) screen to set or modify it. The disadvantage of this setting method is that the administrator must know the IP address of each network-type telephone device in order to log in to the setting screen of the telephone device correctly, and any telephone device cannot communicate with another telephone device. The same IP address will cause great trouble to the administrator.

When the administrator sets or modifies the Internet phone device through the aforementioned web browser, his action is to first find out the IP address of the first Internet phone device, log in to the setting screen, and set it. , and then leave; then find out the IP address of the next phone device, log in, configure it, and then leave; then, find out the IP address of another phone device, log in, make settings, and then leave, and so on Execute until all IP phone devices are configured. Therefore, if there are ten IP phone devices, the manager must perform similar setting actions ten times; if there are thousands of devices, the manager must perform thousands of similar setting actions, and once in the future If the settings are changed, the above-mentioned setting actions (including the management terminal and the user terminal) must be performed again, which is a very labor-intensive and time-consuming project.

In particular, under the circumstance that the number of Internet telephone communication users is increasing rapidly, the huge number of Internet telephone equipment will inevitably cause great troubles to the management industry in terms of setting, management and maintenance. Therefore, how to make the setting and management of the above-mentioned network telephone equipment more automatic, so as to greatly reduce the manpower, shorten the working time, and effectively reduce the errors caused by human settings, so that the management terminal can easily target the distribution Quickly and automatically setting or changing the setting value on the Internet phone equipment at the user end in various places has become an important issue urgently to be solved by the designers, developers and manufacturers of the Internet phone equipment.

Therefore, in order to improve the many shortcomings of the above-mentioned traditional network telephone equipment in setting management, the communication system and method for automatically setting the basic data of network telephone equipment according to the present invention are proposed.

One purpose and technical solution of the present invention is that after the network telephone equipment is connected to the Internet, its MAC address can be transmitted to the management terminal equipment of the network telephone equipment according to a communication protocol installed thereon, so that Ask the management terminal equipment to obtain the relevant setting data, and the management terminal equipment will also search the database for the setting data related to each network telephone equipment according to the request and according to the communication protocol installed on it, And automatically assign an IP address to each network-type telephone device, and when returning each IP address, send other information to each network-type telephone device together. In this way, the network phone device can automatically obtain its own basic setting data from the management terminal device, so that the network phone device has the plug-and-play feature on the network, and it will not be caused by the difference between the user terminal and the management terminal. The setting does not match the problem, and the phenomenon that the phone cannot be connected occurs.

Another object of the present invention is that the communication protocol can adopt DHCP (Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol) communication agreement or BOOTP (Bootstrap Protocol) communication agreement, to realize the aforementioned purpose of automatically setting the basic data of network type telephone equipment.

Yet another object of the present invention and its technical scheme are to include the TFTP file name of the Internet-based telephone equipment and the IP address of the TFTP server in the setting data, so that the person who installs the described Internet-based telephone equipment in the TFTP server The upgraded version of the driver software, so that when the Internet phone device receives the setting data sent back by the management terminal, it can judge whether it needs to be upgraded, and decide whether to download it from the TFTP server according to its IP address (Download ) the updated driver software. When downloading the first data package, the network phone device will use the content of the data package to judge whether the specified upgraded version of the driver software already exists on the phone device, so that the same version of the driver software will not be downloaded repeatedly, which can be effective Reduce unnecessary burden on network traffic.

Yet another object of the present invention is to include in the setting data the setting value that needs to change the function of the Internet phone device, so the Internet phone device can, when receiving the setting data sent back by the management terminal, According to this, the original setting of the network type telephone equipment is changed.

From the above description of the purpose and technical solutions of the present invention, it can be seen that by applying the communication system and method for automatically setting the basic data of Internet telephone equipment of the present invention, said Internet telephone equipment can automatically obtain its own basic set value, and There is no need for managers to change the settings on each of the network telephone devices one by one, which not only greatly reduces the unnecessary waste of manpower and time, but also enables the network telephone devices to have plug-and-play functionality on the network. characteristics, so that the network-type telephone equipment will not be unable to dial due to the problem of mismatching settings between the user terminal and the management terminal when the network is smooth.

Following is the accompanying drawing of the present invention:

FIG. 1 is a schematic block diagram of the communication system of the present invention.

Explanation of component symbols in the figure:

VoIP equipment 10, 11 Internet 20

Management device 30 Database 40

The present invention is described in detail below in conjunction with accompanying drawing:

Among the communication protocols of today's Internet, a communication protocol called DHCP (Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol) can make an electronic device connected to a client on the Internet communicate with its address on the Ethernet network by broadcasting data packets. (Ethernet Address), through the Internet, sent to an electronic device at the server end, so that the relevant setting data can be obtained from the electronic device at the server end, such as: IP address, netmask, default gateway and DNS value...etc. data, this kind The client electronic device that communicates using the DHCP communication protocol is called a DHCP client in the present invention, and the corresponding server electronic device is called a DHCP server in the present invention. When the DHCP server receives the broadcast data packet sent by the DHCP client, it first searches its database for setting data related to the DHCP client, and then sends the data back to the DHCP client.

Generally speaking, the data stored in the database of the DHCP server can be mainly divided into static data and dynamic data, wherein the static data is the IP address of the DHCP client connected to it, Netmask, default gateway, DNS value... and other basic data. The dynamic data refers to the reserved IP address, so that the DHCP server cannot find its IP address in the static data according to the request data packet sent by the DHCP client. When the ethernet address (ethernetAddress) and the corresponding data are selected, an unused IP address can be selected from the dynamic data and assigned to the DHCP client.

The present invention utilizes the feature of automatically assigning an IP address to each DHCP client end in the DHCP communication protocol, and sets each network type telephone device at the user end as the DHCP client end, then the network type telephone device The basic data management terminal equipment (hereinafter referred to as the management terminal) is the DHCP server, referring to shown in Figure 1, after making each of the network type telephone equipment 10,11 connected with the Internet 20, according to the DHCP protocol , send its address (Ethernet Address) on the Ethernet network to the management terminal 30 in a broadcast manner, and ask the management terminal 30 to obtain relevant setting data, and the management terminal 30 will also be based on this requirement, From its database 40, search for the setting data of each network type telephone device, and automatically assign an IP address to each network type telephone device 10, 11, and when returning each IP address, other information will be combined It is sent to each of the Internet phone devices 10 and 11. In this way, because the management work of setting the basic data of each network telephone device is concentrated on the management terminal, and the management terminal can automatically assign IP according to the requirements of each network telephone equipment according to the DHCP communication protocol. address and other setting data, so the network telephone equipment can automatically obtain its own basic setting values from the management terminal, and it is no longer necessary for the management personnel to set it manually.

Because each network type telephone equipment is provided with a unique MAC address, the management end of the network type telephone equipment in the present invention can use the MAC address as each network type telephone equipment after installing the DHCP protocol. The unique address on the Ethernet to distinguish each telephone device. Therefore, when each network telephone device is connected to the Internet, the driver software installed on it will actively transmit its MAC address to the management terminal according to the DHCP communication protocol, so as to request the management terminal to obtain The relevant setting data, after the management terminal searches the relevant setting data from its database, immediately sends them back to each network type telephone device automatically. In the present invention, the basic setting data of each network type telephone equipment can be respectively:

1) The IP address of each Internet phone device, the IP address is its necessary basic setting data, or/and subnet mask, IP of default router...;

2) The identification name of each network-type telephone device (such as: gateway domain name In MGCPendpoint identifier...);

3) The IP address of the management terminal, the default connection number or the DNS name of the management terminal (including local name, domain name);

4) The IP address of the DNS server.

In the present invention, the setting data still includes the TFTP file name and the IP address of the TFTP server of the Internet telephone equipment, so that when the driver software of the Internet telephone equipment is revised, only the upgrade of the driver software is required. version is installed on the TFTP server, when the network phone device receives the setting data returned by the management terminal, it can judge whether it needs to be upgraded, and then from the TFP server, according to its IP address to download the updated driver software. When downloading the first data package, the IP phone device will use the content of the data package to determine whether the specified upgraded version of the driver software already exists on the phone device, so as not to download the same version of the driver software repeatedly, so as to reduce the Unnecessary burden on the network traffic, and the management personnel do not need to delete the upgraded information (TFTP file name and TFTP server IP address) immediately after the upgrade of the IP phone device is completed, so as to avoid repeated repetitions of the IP phone device Download the TFTP file.

In addition, in the present invention, the setting data may also include setting data that needs to change the function of the network phone device, so when the network phone device receives the setting data returned by the management terminal , the network phone device then downloads the configuration file specified by the management terminal, checks the content of the configuration file, and changes the setting value of the network phone device accordingly. Such as: whether to enable DNS, DTMF relay, NAT or DHCP server... functions; change the value of Transmit Gain or Receive Gain; change the frequency value of Dial Tone, Ring Back Tone or Busy Tone... etc. information.

In another embodiment of the present invention, because the communication agreement called BOOTP (Bootstrap Protocol) also has the aforementioned characteristics of the DHCP communication agreement, and the two data packet formats are also very similar, so the present invention can also use the BOOTP communication The protocol has the feature of automatically assigning an IP address to each BOOTP client. Set each Internet phone device on the user end as the BOOTP client, and set the management end as the BOOTP server, so that each After the network telephone device is connected to the Internet, it can transmit its MAC address to the management terminal according to the BOOTP communication protocol, and ask the management terminal to obtain relevant setting data, and the management terminal will also Requirements, search for relevant setting data from its database, and automatically assign IP addresses and other information to each IP phone device.

The above is only the best specific embodiment of the present invention, but the design of the present invention is not limited thereto, and any change or modification that can be easily thought of by those skilled in the art in the field of the present invention should include Within the protection scope of the present invention.

Claims (9)

1. A communication system that automatically sets the basic data of network type telephone equipment, is characterized in that: the system includes: a management device; More than one Internet phone device connected to the management terminal device through the Internet; A communication protocol including a database storing information about said VoIP Device configuration data. 2. the communication system of automatically setting network type telephone equipment basic data as claimed in claim 1, is characterized in that: described setting data comprises: The IP address of the IP phone device; the identification name of the IP telephony device; The IP address of the management device; The IP address of the DNS server. 3. the communication system of automatically setting the basic data of network type telephone equipment as claimed in claim 1, is characterized in that: described setting data also comprises the TFTP file name of described network type telephone equipment and the IP address of TFTP server . 4. The communication system for automatically setting the basic data of the network telephone equipment as claimed in claim 1, wherein the setting data further includes setting data for changing the functions of the network telephone equipment. 5. The communication system for automatically setting the basic data of network telephone equipment as claimed in claim 1, 2, 3 or 4, characterized in that: the communication protocol can be a DHCP communication protocol. 6. The communication system for automatically setting the basic data of network telephone equipment as claimed in claim 1, 2, 3 or 4, characterized in that: said communication protocol can be BOOTP communication protocol. 7. A communication method for automatically setting the basic data of network telephone equipment in the system as claimed in claim 1, characterized in that: said system can transmit its MAC address to the management terminal according to the communication protocol installed in it equipment, to request the management terminal equipment to obtain relevant setting data; and the management terminal equipment will also search for the relevant setting data of the network telephone equipment from its database according to the request and according to the communication protocol, and automatically send the The setting data is distributed to the Internet phone device. 8. The communication method for automatically setting the basic data of network type telephone equipment as claimed in claim 7, characterized in that: when the driver software version of the network type telephone equipment changes, only the upgraded version of the driver software needs to be installed In this TFTP server, when the setting data sent back by the management terminal can be received by the network type telephone equipment, it can be judged whether the TFTP file name and the IP address of the TFTP server exist. On the TFTP server, download the upgraded version of the driver software according to its IP address; when downloading the first data packet, the VoIP device will use the content of the data packet to determine whether the specified upgraded version of the driver software has been downloaded. It exists on the phone device, so that the driver software of the same version will not be downloaded repeatedly, so as to reduce the unnecessary burden on the network traffic. 9. The communication method for automatically setting the basic data of network type telephone equipment as claimed in claim 8, characterized in that: when said network type telephone equipment receives the setting data sent back by the management terminal, said The Internet phone device then downloads the configuration file specified by the management terminal, checks the content of the configuration file, and then changes the setting value of the Internet phone device accordingly.

Images