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Initiating a Gradwell call directly from a custom Internet Explorer Context Menu
Posted by: | CommentsI recently read some documentation on the Gradwell website which detailed how to initiate calls via the web:
http://www.gradwell.com/support/kb/article.php?id=159
I wrote a powershell script to test the system and it worked well, but I didn’t really have a practical use for dialing from the command line. Yesterday I was by chance reading about Extending the Internet Explorer Context Menu.
I decided to put together a quick bit of code that would allow me to initiate calls directly from Internet Explorer to my Gradwell extension, and it works really well! I ditched the original Powershell version in favour of javascript because it made the solution much neater.
To make this work for you need to setup an authentication token for your extension on the Gradwell VoIP control panel first. Make a note of your extention and authentication token.
Download this HTML File (right click - Save Target as) and store it locally somewhere on your machine. Open the file for editing and modify with your own extension number and authentication token:
Now we just need to create the internet explorer context menu, create the following registry key:
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\MenuExt\&Gradwell Call]
@=REG_SZ:”C:\some\path\to\View\DialGradwell.htm”
Contexts=REG_DWORD:10
You will need to change “c:\some\path\to” to the actual folder where you saved “DialGradwell.htm”.
Open Internet Explorer again and highlight some text or a link and right click and you should now have the option to call the number directly from your browser:
If you have done everything right, simply click on the “Gradwell Call” context menu option and your phone should start ringing right away. Answer the call and you’ll hear the ringing of the destination number right away.
I might see about doing the same thing for Chrome and Firefox.
SPA Call Manager Pro Released!
Posted by: | CommentsI’ve been working on a project for some time to enhance the usability of the IP Phones that we use internally. Namely the Linksys SPA 942 and the Cisco SPA 504g. The product is called SPA Call Manager Pro and it enables you to control the phone directly from your Windows desktop.
I’ve written a few little tools for the SPA series of phones but this one required a lot more effort. We’ve been using it internally for while now and it really does make using the phones so much easier and quicker.
It took me a while to figure out how to control the call functions of the phone, but I am very pleased with the results. Here is a screenshot of the main application window:
The program has a number of features to make working with the Linksys SPA 942 and the Cisco 504g easier, such as autocomplete dialing from the phone and applications personal directory and the ability to directly dial any number stored in the phones Dialed/Answered and Missed call logs.
We’ve also added the ability to dial any number stored in your windows clipboard, really handy when you are web browsing and just want to get hold of someone quickly without having to look back and forth between the phone and your screen.
You can import numbers from your own databases via the CSV import utility and easily build up your own contact database within the application and then export it for use on collegues machines.
We have put together a dedicated website for the application, if you use one of these phones I urge you to check it out to make your life easier!
SPA Call Manager Pro
Outlook: Your message did not reach some or all of the intended recipients.
Posted by: | CommentsHad a problem with a customer today sending an email and instantly getting a response that the message was undeliverable, with the message:
Your message did not reach some or all of the intended recipients.
Subject: FW: Offer
Sent: 20/09/2011 10:33
The following recipient(s) cannot be reached:
‘user@domain.com’ on 20/09/2011 10:33
None of your e-mail accounts could send to this recipient.
This problem is caused when the email address has been pasted into to the to: field with the mailto: portion still intact.
Go into the sent items and open the email that failed to transmit and then choose “resend this message” and then double click on the email address you will probably see something like this:
As in the picture the “E-mail type:” is set to MAILTO. Clicking on the Internet type button will reset it back to SMTP and should be able to send the message.
Sometimes the incorrect address can also get cached into your NK2 file, so you will need to remove it from your autocomplete cache to make sure that you don’t get the problem again.
Dell Openmanage Server Administrator E-Mail Alerts – Powershell & VBScript versions
Posted by: | CommentsLast year I posted a script written in VBScript which enables email alerts from Dell OMSA without the need for IT Assistant. This script has proved to be very popular, but a number of users have not been able to make it work because it depends on CDO, which is not included in Windows Server Core.
So, I have rewritten the script in Powershell and it should now work on any system which has Powershell installed. The new script is easier to read and includes support for SMTP over SSL, making the use of a Gmail account for sending the alerts very straightforward.
The whole process is very similar to the previous script, so if you used that one, this will be immediatly familiar.
Installation:
After you have downloaded the Zip file extract it to a folder on your server, e.g “C:\Script”
You will then need to edit the variables at the top of the script to make them appropriate for your environment:
If you do not specify an SMTPServer, it will default to localhost. If you do not specify an SMTPPort it will default to port 25.
If you intend to use the script with a gmail account set:
$SMTPServer = “smtp.gmail.com”
$SMTPUser = Your gmail account name (without the @gmail.com part).
$SMTPPassword = Your gmail account password
$SMTPPort = 587
$EnableSSL = true
Test Email is functional
Now that you have the script installed open up a powershell prompt and run the script with the “testemail” parameter e.g:
c:\script\dellalerts.ps1 testemail
If everything is working properly you should receive a test alert in your inbox.
Setup Alerts from OpenManage
Once the email function has been tested you can go ahead and setup the script to run from open manage, simply run the script again with the “setup” parameter, and you should see something like this:
Testing
There are a few easy ways to test the script in practice with a real alert generated by OpenManage:
- Pop the side off the server casing, this will generate a chassis intrusion alert.
- If you have a dual powersupply system you can pull the power to one of the supplies and the server should report the power loss.
The problem with these methods is that you have to be in the same place as the server. So I prefer to trigger a tempreture alert like this:
Just set the warning threshold to be a couple of degrees lower than your current reading. Warning: If you have a thermal shutdown action configured, this could trigger that process off and shutdown your server. Once you have received your test emails, set the tempreture wanrings back to default values.
Please let me know of any issues you have with the script and I will work on them as soon as possible. I have installed this updated version on a number of systems and it is working well.
The download includes both the new version and the older VBScript version.