1 Linux Quicknet-Drivers-Howto
2 Quicknet Technologies, Inc. (www.quicknet.net)
3 Version 0.3.4 December 18, 1999
7 This document describes the first GPL release version of the Linux
8 driver for the Quicknet Internet PhoneJACK and Internet LineJACK
9 cards. More information about these cards is available at
10 www.quicknet.net. The driver version discussed in this document is
13 These cards offer nice telco style interfaces to use your standard
14 telephone/key system/PBX as the user interface for VoIP applications.
15 The Internet LineJACK also offers PSTN connectivity for a single line
16 Internet to PSTN gateway. Of course, you can add more than one card
17 to a system to obtain multi-line functionality. At this time, the
18 driver supports the POTS port on both the Internet PhoneJACK and the
19 Internet LineJACK, but the PSTN port on the latter card is not yet
22 This document, and the drivers for the cards, are intended for a
23 limited audience that includes technically capable programmers who
24 would like to experiment with Quicknet cards. The drivers are
25 considered in ALPHA status and are not yet considered stable enough
26 for general, widespread use in an unlimited audience.
28 That's worth saying again:
30 THE LINUX DRIVERS FOR QUICKNET CARDS ARE PRESENTLY IN A ALPHA STATE
31 AND SHOULD NOT BE CONSIDERED AS READY FOR NORMAL WIDESPREAD USE.
33 They are released early in the spirit of Internet development and to
34 make this technology available to innovators who would benefit from
37 When we promote the device driver to "beta" level it will be
38 considered ready for non-programmer, non-technical users. Until then,
39 please be aware that these drivers may not be stable and may affect
40 the performance of your system.
43 1.1 Latest Additions/Improvements
45 The 0.3.4 version of the driver is the first GPL release. Several
46 features had to be removed from the prior binary only module, mostly
47 for reasons of Intellectual Property rights. We can't release
48 information that is not ours - so certain aspects of the driver had to
49 be removed to protect the rights of others.
51 Specifically, very old Internet PhoneJACK cards have non-standard
52 G.723.1 codecs (due to the early nature of the DSPs in those days).
53 The auto-conversion code to bring those cards into compliance with
54 todays standards is available as a binary only module to those people
55 needing it. If you bought your card after 1997 or so, you are OK -
56 it's only the very old cards that are affected.
58 Also, the code to download G.728/G.729/G.729a codecs to the DSP is
59 available as a binary only module as well. This IP is not ours to
62 Hooks are built into the GPL driver to allow it to work with other
63 companion modules that are completely separate from this module.
65 1.2 Copyright, Trademarks, Disclaimer, & Credits
69 Copyright (c) 1999 Quicknet Technologies, Inc. Permission is granted
70 to freely copy and distribute this document provided you preserve it
71 in its original form. For corrections and minor changes contact the
72 maintainer at linux@quicknet.net.
76 Internet PhoneJACK and Internet LineJACK are registered trademarks of
77 Quicknet Technologies, Inc.
81 Much of the info in this HOWTO is early information released by
82 Quicknet Technologies, Inc. for the express purpose of allowing early
83 testing and use of the Linux drivers developed for their products.
84 While every attempt has been made to be thorough, complete and
85 accurate, the information contained here may be unreliable and there
86 are likely a number of errors in this document. Please let the
87 maintainer know about them. Since this is free documentation, it
88 should be obvious that neither I nor previous authors can be held
89 legally responsible for any errors.
93 This HOWTO was written by:
95 Greg Herlein <gherlein@quicknet.net>
96 Ed Okerson <eokerson@quicknet.net>
98 1.3 Future Plans: You Can Help
100 Please let the maintainer know of any errors in facts, opinions,
101 logic, spelling, grammar, clarity, links, etc. But first, if the date
102 is over a month old, check to see that you have the latest
103 version. Please send any info that you think belongs in this document.
105 You can also contribute code and/or bug-fixes for the sample
109 1.4 Where to get things
111 Info on latest versions of the driver are here:
113 http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://www.quicknet.net/develop.htm
117 Quicknet operates a mailing list to provide a public forum on using
120 To subscribe to the linux-sdk mailing list, send an email to:
122 majordomo@linux.quicknet.net
124 In the body of the email, type:
126 subscribe linux-sdk <your-email-address>
128 Please delete any signature block that you would normally add to the
129 bottom of your email - it tends to confuse majordomo.
131 To send mail to the list, address your mail to
133 linux-sdk@linux.quicknet.net
135 Your message will go out to everyone on the list.
137 To unsubscribe to the linux-sdk mailing list, send an email to:
139 majordomo@linux.quicknet.net
141 In the body of the email, type:
143 unsubscribe linux-sdk <your-email-address>
151 You will need at least one Internet PhoneJACK or Internet LineJACK
152 cards. These are ISA or PCI bus devices that use Plug-n-Play for
153 configuration, and use no IRQs. The driver will support up to 16
154 cards in any one system, of any mix between the two types.
156 Note that you will need two cards to do any useful testing alone, since
157 you will need a card on both ends of the connection. Of course, if
158 you are doing collaborative work, perhaps your friends or coworkers
159 have cards too. If not, we'll gladly sell them some!
164 Since the Quicknet cards are Plug-n-Play devices, you will need the
165 isapnp tools package to configure the cards, or you can use the isapnp
166 module to autoconfigure them. The former package probably came with
167 your Linux distribution. Documentation on this package is available
170 http://mailer.wiwi.uni-marburg.de/linux/LDP/HOWTO/Plug-and-Play-HOWTO.html
172 The isapnp autoconfiguration is available on the Quicknet website at:
174 http://www.quicknet.net/develop.htm
176 though it may be in the kernel by the time you read this.
179 3.0 Card Configuration
181 If you did not get your drivers as part of the linux kernel, do the
182 following to install them:
184 a. untar the distribution file. We use the following command:
185 tar -xvzf ixj-0.x.x.tgz
187 This creates a subdirectory holding all the necessary files. Go to that
190 b. run the "ixj_dev_create" script to remove any stray device
191 files left in the /dev directory, and to create the new officially
192 designated device files. Note that the old devices were called
193 /dev/ixj, and the new method uses /dev/phone.
195 c. type "make;make install" - this will compile and install the
198 d. type "depmod -av" to rebuild all your kernel version dependencies.
200 e. if you are using the isapnp module to configure the cards
201 automatically, then skip to step f. Otherwise, ensure that you
202 have run the isapnp configuration utility to properly configure
205 e1. The Internet PhoneJACK has one configuration register that
206 requires 16 IO ports. The Internet LineJACK card has two
207 configuration registers and isapnp reports that IO 0
208 requires 16 IO ports and IO 1 requires 8. The Quicknet
209 driver assumes that these registers are configured to be
210 contiguous, i.e. if IO 0 is set to 0x340 then IO 1 should
213 Make sure that none of the cards overlap if you have
214 multiple cards in the system.
216 If you are new to the isapnp tools, you can jumpstart
217 yourself by doing the following:
219 e2. go to the /etc directory and run pnpdump to get a blank
222 pnpdump > /etc/isapnp.conf
224 e3. edit the /etc/isapnp.conf file to set the IO warnings and
225 the register IO addresses. The IO warnings means that you
226 should find the line in the file that looks like this:
228 (CONFLICT (IO FATAL)(IRQ FATAL)(DMA FATAL)(MEM FATAL)) # or WARNING
230 and you should edit the line to look like this:
232 (CONFLICT (IO WARNING)(IRQ FATAL)(DMA FATAL)(MEM FATAL)) #
235 The next step is to set the IO port addresses. The issue
236 here is that isapnp does not identify all of the ports out
237 there. Specifically any device that does not have a driver
238 or module loaded by Linux will not be registered. This
239 includes older sound cards and network cards. We have
240 found that the IO port 0x300 is often used even though
241 isapnp claims that no-one is using those ports. We
242 recommend that for a single card installation that port
243 0x340 (and 0x350) be used. The IO port line should change
246 (IO 0 (SIZE 16) (BASE 0x0300) (CHECK))
250 (IO 0 (SIZE 16) (BASE 0x0340) )
252 e4. if you have multiple Quicknet cards, make sure that you do
253 not have any overlaps. Be especially careful if you are
254 mixing Internet PhoneJACK and Internet LineJACK cards in
255 the same system. In these cases we recommend moving the
256 IO port addresses to the 0x400 block. Please note that on
257 a few machines the 0x400 series are used. Feel free to
258 experiment with other addresses. Our cards have been
259 proven to work using IO addresses of up to 0xFF0.
261 e5. the last step is to uncomment the activation line so the
262 drivers will be associated with the port. This means the
263 line (immediately below) the IO line should go from this:
271 Once you have finished editing the isapnp.conf file you
272 must submit it into the pnp driverconfigure the cards.
273 This is done using the following command:
277 If this works you should see a line that identifies the
278 Quicknet device, the IO port(s) chosen, and a message
281 f. if you are loading the module by hand, use insmod. An example
282 of this would look like this:
285 insmod ixj dspio=0x320,0x310 xio=0,0x330
287 Then verify the module loaded by running lsmod. If you are not using a
288 module that matches your kernel version, you may need to "force" the
289 load using the -f option in the insmod command.
292 insmod -f ixj dspio=0x320,0x310 xio=0,0x330
295 If you are using isapnp to autoconfigure your card, then you do NOT
296 need any of the above, though you need to use depmod to load the
301 which will result in the needed drivers getting loaded automatically.
303 g. if you are planning on having the kernel automatically request
304 the module for you, then you need to edit /etc/conf.modules and add the
307 options ixj dspio=0x340 xio=0x330 ixjdebug=0
309 If you do this, then when you execute an application that uses the
310 module the kernel will request that it is loaded.
312 h. if you want non-root users to be able to read and write to the
313 ixj devices (this is a good idea!) you should do the following:
315 - decide upon a group name to use and create that group if
316 needed. Add the user names to that group that you wish to
317 have access to the device. For example, we typically will
318 create a group named "ixj" in /etc/group and add all users
319 to that group that we want to run software that can use the
322 - change the permissions on the device files, like this:
327 Once this is done, then non-root users should be able to use the
328 devices. If you have enabled autoloading of modules, then the user
329 should be able to open the device and have the module loaded
330 automatically for them.
333 4.0 Driver Installation problems.
335 We have tested these drivers on the 2.2.9, 2.2.10, 2.2.12, and 2.2.13 kernels
336 and in all cases have eventually been able to get the drivers to load and
337 run. We have found four types of problems that prevent this from happening.
338 The problems and solutions are:
340 a. A step was missed in the installation. Go back and use section 3
341 as a checklist. Many people miss running the ixj_dev_create script and thus
342 never load the device names into the filesystem.
344 b. The kernel is inconsistently linked. We have found this problem in
345 the Out Of the Box installation of several distributions. The symptoms
346 are that neither driver will load, and that the unknown symbols include "jiffy"
347 and "kmalloc". The solution is to recompile both the kernel and the
348 modules. The command string for the final compile looks like this:
350 In the kernel directory:
354 4. make clean;make bzImage;make modules;make modules_install
356 This rebuilds both the kernel and all the modules and makes sure they all
357 have the same linkages. This generally solves the problem once the new
358 kernel is installed and the system rebooted.
360 c. The kernel has been patched, then unpatched. This happens when
361 someone decides to use an earlier kernel after they load a later kernel.
362 The symptoms are proceeding through all three above steps and still not
363 being able to load the driver. What has happened is that the generated
364 header files are out of sync with the kernel itself. The solution is
365 to recompile (again) using "make mrproper". This will remove and then
366 regenerate all the necessary header files. Once this is done, then you
367 need to install and reboot the kernel. We have not seen any problem
368 loading one of our drivers after this treatment.
370 5.0 Known Limitations
372 We cannot currently play "dial-tone" and listen for DTMF digits at the
373 same time using the ISA PhoneJACK. This is a bug in the 8020 DSP chip
374 used on that product. All other Quicknet products function normally
375 in this regard. We have a work-around, but it's not done yet. Until
376 then, if you want dial-tone, you can always play a recorded dial-tone
377 sound into the audio until you have gathered the DTMF digits.