You can install asterCC on a server, a PC or a Virtual Machine.

You need a trunk for outbound calls in the first place.

Get the following resources according to different types of trunks:

• Network trunk– asterCC supports trunks with SIP and IAX2 protocol. We do not need extra facilities when using such trunk. Different ITSP have different connection way. For instance, most would offer user name, password and server address for connection.
• E1 – we need a E1 voice card and audio gateway (AG) with SIP protocol for transferring E1 calls into SIP calls.
• Analog trunk– we do not recommend analog trunks for outbound system, since most analog trunks do not have reverse polarity signals, thus, the system cannot recognise user status, which means, when the calls are not answered or the numbers do not exist, the system would think there is an answer signal and would transfer the call to IVR. Therefore, we do not recommend an analog trunk in this condition. To build an analog trunk, we need an analog voice card (FXO interface) or an audio gateway (AG) of the analog trunk.

Please refer to：installation

To transfer a broadcast to an IVR, you need the module campaign and the module predictive dialer

• Please refer to: module installation, and finish the installation of these two modules: campaign and predictive dialer
• In fact, go to the bottom left of the astercc configuration panel and click System Modules. That is where the installation and update of modules can be done.

We need at least one account to bill the campaign, and two or more extensions to test the trunk. We also need to take into account the agents which may be used someday.

• Please refer to: quick setup, quick_add_extensions_and_agents_in_bulk
• Considering the system offers 5 agents' license, we now build 5 accounts, and each account has an extension and an agent.

• Please refer to: Adding Trunk, configuring_a_trunks, and build a trunk for campaign.

Now we can test if the extension of the team can call

• Assign the trunk to the team, and make all calls placed by this team go trough this trunk

• In the menu on the left, PBX → Devices, choose an unused extension and double-click it to check its login name and password

• Register a softphone
  • Please refer to: configuration_eyebeam_soft_phone, configure_the_x-lite_soft_phone, configuration_zoiper_softphone
• Try to make calls. If there is a problem, review the settings of the trunk.

To put in place a better service, you will need to build an agent group to answer the customers who need operator services.

• In the menu on the left, choose User→Agent Groups,and Add agent group.
• Portal: When agents login the agent interface, the system will open a page by default. Here we choose default.

• Click [Add Agent], and select the agents into the group, then save.
  • Here we assign agent number 5000 the monitor of the group.

• Each group needs a queue. If the system cannot find one when you save, there will be a pop-up asking if a queue is to be created. Choose “auto add queue”.

• In the menu on the left, Advanced→Queue: In the Queue management page we can see the queue that was automatically added. Double-click to modify it.
  • For a queue which that needs to play an agent number to the caller, you can config “Agent No. Announce”. Select two files for the voice between Agent No. and one for the voice after Agent No. By default asterCC provides “play_agentno_en1”(Agent) and “play_agentno_en2”(is at your service)
  • Please select Autofill so the agents can answer calls as soon as they are connected.

Please refer to configuring_a_simple_ivr

• Campaign→ Campaigns→ Campaign management
• Add a campaign, Dialer Status-Enable, Campaign URL: IVR … Broadcasting IVR
  • Event URL- Event file
  • In pre-dialer, we don't assign customers to agents, so we need to choose no after check reassign.

• After adding a campaign, the system automatically creates a customer package. To see it, go in the left menu and click Campaign→ Customer Packages

To unify the data format, the system supports dictionary matching. Here we take gender as an example to show you how to match the dictionary.

• In the menu on the left, Call center→ Import dict, and Add male and female

• Call Center→ Import
• Select the files to be imported
• Select broadcasting IVR that we just built in the pull-down menu
  • Choose which field to import under each line of data
  • The first 2 boxes are whether to allow agents to view, or whether to allow agents to edit. The third box is whether to match dictionary. In the field just below the boxes, select “Pre dialing phone field” for the column containing the numbers that need to dialed.
  • There is an option to “remove first rows” so we can skip the title line(s)
  • Please ignore the mismatching warning
  • If you are using csv and see “Failure”, please make sure the format of the file is UTF-8

• Go in Call Center→ Shell Import Jobs to see the job you just have just done
  • This is usually finished in two minutes. You can hit refresh in your navigation bar if you want.

• Go in Dialer→ Campaign Diallist. Here you can see the numbers that are to be dialed.

• In Dialer→ Dialer, click the Campaign name to see see how the dialer is progressing.
  • In this case we use the max calls number limit to control the dialer (by default, the dialer module provides simultaneous 20 calls maximum)
  • In Dialer Settings, under the Dialer section (not shown here), change the value of “Max Dialer Concurrent” to a minimum value of 2 and a maximum value lower than the number of corresponding channels that your trunk provider is allowing for the SIP account used in your system. Gateway or trunk providers usually supply 2 channels to allow one call. You can ask them for more channels. They will give them to you if you justify your request and most of all use them.

• If you click [viewDiallist], you will see the numbers that are to be dialed. You can delete data here if you need to.

• Click [Start] and the dialer and the system will automatically start doing its work
  • In the dialer page we can see the work related to the dialer going on.

Predialer has a recycle function. You can re-add the numbers that have already been dialed. The system will then be able to re-dial them again.

• Dialer→ Dialer, click [recover]

• In the check-boxes, mark the the data that needs to be recycled. Then click [collection checked]
• There are numbers in a package, therefore the system will ask you which set of numbers is to be recycled.

• Campaign→Campaigns, and double click campaign and advanced, you can see the stats of predialer campaign.

• In Campaign→ Campaign Cdrs, you can see the detailed call records
  • Choose the campaign you want to check on the top first

• Set a monitor account and sign in before hand.

• As a monitor, the person has a supervisory control on pre-dialer
• When an operator service is chosen, the customer will be transferred to this group. Any agent who has signed in and is online will be rung and popped up.