NCID 1.7 Released

Network Caller ID (NCID) Release 1.7

Overview

This release:

Fixes and improves ncidd, improves ncid, improves the gateways, and improves
Hangup Extensions.

Adds a new feature, called dial, to both ncidd and ncid.

Adds three new Hangup Extensions.

Updates the user manual, man pages, API.

The ncid client has its own icon in Fedora, debian, and Windows.

The TiVo package has been discontinued. It can still be built from source with the appropriate cross compiler.

Features and fixes for this NCID release

Server

NEW FEATURE:

The ncidd server will accept a request from a client to dial the number. The user is expected to pick up the phone before the server hangs up the modem after a 5 second timeout. A modem must be present to dial the number but the Caller ID can come from a gateway.

If using a gateway for Caller ID, this feature requires the use of either the --cidinput command line option or the cidinput variable in the ncidd.conf file.

Fixed a Segmentation fault if the modem GCI country code is unknown to the server.

Modified ncidd to work with a USRobotics modem in Internal Hangup mode 3.

The noserial and nomodem command line options are obsolete and replaced by the cidinput command line option. They still function but will be removed in a future release.

The noserial and nomodem variables are replaced by the cidinput variable in the ncidd.conf file. All references to them have been removed but they still function so older ncidd.conf files will continue to work with the current server. However, the new Dial Feature will not work using a gateway for Caller ID without using cidinput.

The server now passes hupmode to the Hangup Extension script. This allows hangup scripts to determine if the proper hupmode was selected for it.

The server now checks for an optional HangupReason: line to be returned from the Hangup Extension script. If detected, the reason will be appended to the NAME before the HUP: line is sent to clients.

Server Hangup Extensions

All extensions except for hangup-calls use hupmode to determine the type of hangup wanted.

All extensions that return the hangup line to the server will now also return a HangupReason:.

Two new extensions for use within the US are hangup-fakenum and hangup-fcc.

A new default extension hangup-nohangup that's executed if hupmode is enabled but hupname is not changed from the default.

New hangup-combo-skel template extension calls hangup-fakenum and hangup-fcc. This is user changeable.

Client

NEW FEATURE:

The ncid client has a new menu item under Server to request ncidd to dial the number of a selected call in its history window. The dial menu has an option of including a leading 1 in the number dialed, if the Country Code is US.

NEW FEATURE:

The ncid client has expanded the Preferences/Font menu item to control the font and size of the Help items messages.

NEW FEATURE:

The ncid client has new menu items under Preferences to select the month display format. The display can be either MM/DD/YYYY or DD/MM/YYYY. The / can be replaced with - or .

A dial prefix can be added in the ncid.conf file. It will always be added before the number is dialed.

Fixed the Server Menu growing larger with duplicate menu items every time ncid is reconnected
to the server.

Fixed set NoGUI 1 in the ncid.conf file to start the client in no-gui mode.

The client running under windows has improved. You can now set configurations in ncid.conf. Client modules are still unavailable.

Client Output Modules

Fixed the ncid-notify module conversion of 24 hours to 12 hours.

Gateways

All gateways have a new option to include the hostname in its IDENT string sent to the server.

Gateways that support information on outgoing calls indicate [OUT] at the end of its IDENT string sent to the server.

Tools

New get-fcc-list tool for use with Internal Hangups and the new hangup-fcc Hangup Extension script.

Windows

The windows client no longer uses FreeWrap for TCL/TK. It is installed as ncid.tcl and requires the installation of ActiveTcl.

The ncid windows configuration file can now be modified by the user.

The windows client still does not support OUTPUT MODULES but Win10 can run Ubuntu Linux. Refer to the Windows Complete Install in the User Manual

NOTE: NCID has not been installed or tested in Win10 Ubuntu. Any feedback would be appreciated if you try to install and test NCID.

Important Client Notes

Requires TCL/TK version 8.6 or newer for all operating systems.
On maintained Fedora releases, with google-noto-emoji-fonts or google-noto-emoji-color-fonts installed, the ncid client, in GUI mode, will cause an X-Windows error and then die when doing a Re-scan in the Change Fixed Fonts window.

The fix is to upgrade google-noto-emoji-fonts to version 20170928 or later, and if installed, uninstall google-noto-emoji-color-fonts until the issue is resolved.

Newer versions of Mac OS X no longer ship with X-Windows (X11). This results in the $DISPLAY environment variable not being set at all, and causes the client to fail to launch in GUI mode.

The fix is to export DISPLAY=:0 prior to launching the client.

Fedora Upgrade Note

When doing an upgrade from NCID 1.2 on Fedora, the client post-script (installed with NCID 1.2) fails. Everything is installed properly but if you have had any clients with output modules running, you may need to restart them after the upgrade.