$Id: README,v 1.5 2004/03/18 21:03:55 pnixon Exp $	VOIP ACCOUNTING WITH CISCO VSAINTRODUCTIONCisco VoIP gateways can use radius accounting to log call records,however FreeRadius in it's default configuration is not very wellsuited to the job as the default database config is designed withstandard dial-up ISP Authentication and Post billing in mind.The typical configuration on FreeRadius with a MySQL backend willnot handle the load of accounting for multiple Cisco gatewaysunder full utilisation.The default database config also thows away all non-standardRADIUS attributes which infact contains alot of highly usefulinformation pertinent to VoIP.The good news is that with a few modifications to the configurationfiles and the use of Postgresql (or another heavy duty SQL server)insead of MySQL FreeRadius can be made into a reliable, flexibleand scalable (and free!) billing solution for VoIP providors.MySQL cannot be used as the configuration relies on the connect anddisconnect time as reported by the Cisco gatways (Cisco VSAattributes "h323-connect-time" and "h323-disconnect-time") andMySQL limited date handling does not recognise full Cisco datestamps time as a valid "datetime". (While Oracle and possibly someother high end DBs should support Cisco time format they have notbeen tested at this time). MySQL could possibly be supported infuture but it would require extra pre-processing by a FreeRADIUSmodule to do so and there is no plan currently to impliment this,although working code that impliments this would be happily accepted.This reliance on VSA records REQUIRES that all cisco devices beconfigured to send VSA attributes. This system is not known to workwith any non-cisco equipment, although it is theoretically possiblefor non-cisco equipment to impliment Cisco VSA attributes...This is required as the default FreeRadius SQL configuration (whereRADIUS "Start" records are INSERTed into the database, and thenUPDATEd with information from the associated "Stop" record) does notscale as well as this solution which strictly uses INSERTs. As callstart and stop times are not contained in "standard" radiusattributes (They are added/updated by FreeRadius when the record islogged in the default configuration.)This REQUIRES all equipment be kept is timesync with the use on NTPotherwise similtaneous records from different gateways may havediffering timestamps.CONFIGURATION* Install and configure FreeRadius as appropriate for your system.* Test that FreeRadius is recieving accounting records from your  gateway. Do not proceed until you are certain this is working.* Configure all the NASes to send VSA attributes. On older Ciscos  use one of the following commands (depending if you are using   SIP or H323):	"gw-accounting h323 vsa"	"gw-accounting sip vsa"  On Ciscos with newer versions of IOS need both of the following commands:	"gw-accounting aaa"	"radius-server vsa send"* In /etc/raddb/radiusd.conf set "with_cisco_vsa_hack = yes"* Create a Database to hold your billing records. ie:	"createdb radius"* Add the plperl language to the database. ie:	"createlang plpgsql radius"* Import the SQL schema to your database. ie:	"psql radius < h323_db_postgresql.sql"* Copy the custom SQL queries to raddb/ ie:  	"cp pgsql-voip.conf /etc/raddb/"* In /etc/raddb/radiusd.conf add "$INCLUDE  ${confdir}/pgsql-voip.conf"  You can find the correct section by searching for "sql.conf"* In /etc/raddb/radiusd.conf add "pgsql-voip" to the "accounting {" section  just after the line "detail"* (re)Start radiusdIf you wish to do RADIUS SQL Authentication using the same database, youmust use src/modules/rlm_sql/drivers/rlm_sql_postgresql/db_postgresql.sqlas well as this schema. This is left as an excercise for the reader.   -- Peter Nixon [ codemonkey@peternixon.net ]