I don't understand how the X_SkipCallScreening with GV is supposed to work when unchecked.
I'm completely mixed up, and frustrated on this, and don't understand it if my setup is working the way it's supposed to be, or if something is wrong or missing.
Setup: In GV, the setting is Call Screening, it's set on On, and 'Ask unknown callers to say their name' is checked. GV calls the feature 'Audio Caller ID', I'll use that term here also. GV help link: http://support.google.com/voice/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=115083.
With the above GV settings, and with X_SkipCallScreening set in an Obi202 (and with no other phones set under Forwards calls), when the Obi phone rings with a call, this is what happens: I answer, I hear no one on the other end. If I do nothing, the Obi hangs up the call after about 15 seconds. The caller is then sent to GV Voice mail.
By accident I discovered that if when I answer the Obi call, and press 1, I am immediately connected to the call. Immediately connected means no 'Audio Caller ID' happens. I tried pressing 2, and the the GV ListenIn™ feature comes into play, i.e., you can listed in. Although I didn't explicitly try it, I assume you can then press 1 and connect (as advertised, it's like picking up a traditional hardware answering machine call in the middle of a message being recorded).
Now introduce to the above setup (Call Screening, unknown callers checked and X_SkipCallScreening unchecked) a second forwarding phone, GV: Phones > Forwards calls to: check a second phone. This is what I observe to happen: The Obi phone behaves same as above, however on the 2nd forwarding phone, the 'Audio Caller ID' works as advertised, a voice on GV announces the first recorded name of the caller, and you either accept "1", or send to VM by pressing "2".
What I was expecting is the 'Audio Caller ID' to work on the Obi phone just like it works on a cell phone or other forward to phone. IMO having to press 1 or 2 on the Obi phone with no prompt makes it seem like some piece is missing. In fact, I read a lot of the product documentation, and a lot more on here, and was surprised by this behavior. And worse still, only discovered by accident that pressing 1 or 2 makes the call on the Obi phone complete, I probably tried it 20 times varying different settings and wondering why the Obi phone just hang's up and the call goes to GV VM with no voice prompts heard on the Obi phone.
Can someone answer 'is this the way it's supposed to work?', If yes, 'why is that so', and is this the behavior you get on your Obi202?
Edit: On this thread http://www.obitalk.com/forum/index.php?topic=1207.0, I read someone gets a voice prompt when they answer their obi connected phone ("To accept, press 1..."), not sure what Obi model is in use there, but I get no voice prompts whatsoever.
Quote from: CoalMinerRetired on July 31, 2012, 08:47:50 PM
With the above GV settings, and with X_SkipCallScreening set in an Obi202 (and with no other phones set under Forwards calls), when the Obi phone rings with a call, this is what happens: I answer, I hear no one on the other end. If I do nothing, the Obi hangs up the call after about 15 seconds. The caller is then sent to GV Voice mail.
By accident I discovered that if when I answer the Obi call, and press 1, I am immediately connected to the call.
SkipCallScreening enabled only works in combination with GV. The OBi dials the "1" for you when the setting is enabled. It simulates the expected operation of a phone call and what users expect when picking up a call using the GV+OBi.
Quote from: QBZappy on July 31, 2012, 09:01:41 PM
Quote from: CoalMinerRetired on July 31, 2012, 08:47:50 PM
With the above GV settings, and with X_SkipCallScreening set in an Obi202 (and with no other phones set under Forwards calls), when the Obi phone rings with a call, this is what happens: I answer, I hear no one on the other end. If I do nothing, the Obi hangs up the call after about 15 seconds. The caller is then sent to GV Voice mail.
By accident I discovered that if when I answer the Obi call, and press 1, I am immediately connected to the call.
SkipCallScreening enabled only works in combination with GV. The OBi dials the "1" for you when the setting is enabled. It simulates the expected operation of a phone call and what users expect when picking up a call using the GV+OBi.
Thanks. The part about it sending a 1 I understood, from reading on here. And the simulates the expected operation I inferred.
But how about with it disabled? Are you confirming that with SkipCallScreening disabled you also hear nothing on the line, Obi line hangs up after 15 +/- secs, unless you press 1 or 2?
When SkipCallScreening is disabled on the Obi, the caller will continue to hear ringing and when you answer the phone you will be presented with the call screening and have to press the appropriate digits.
Google voice mail will pick up after 25 seconds if the phone is not answered at all.
Quote from: jimates on August 01, 2012, 05:56:16 AM
When SkipCallScreening is disabled on the Obi, the caller will continue to hear ringing and when you answer the phone you will be presented with the call screening and have to press the appropriate digits.
Google voice mail will pick up after 25 seconds if the phone is not answered at all.
Thanks.
Based on your reply, 'presented with the call screening', and what is said in this thread (http://www.obitalk.com/forum/index.php?topic=1207.0) I think something is not working in my setup.
I hear nothing when I pickup, and if I do nothing the Obi disconnects the call. Any ideas what settings to look at? I'm guessing it's some interaction between GV and the signaling protocol the Obi uses, because as I said, it all works as expected on a call forwarded to a cell phone.
SkipCallScreening is checked by default now when set up with Google Voice.
Check the call history for the calls and see if the Obi shows the call as being connected or just ringing.
If you do not answer the phone at all, does google voicemail take the call?
jimates, thanks for your responses. Replies to your questions below, one in great detail.
Question for you: Exactly what do you hear on the Obi phone when you answer, the GV voice prompts? Have to ask because I'm beginning to question this, I've read twice on here people (you being one of the two) get the GV prompting, and now have read contradictory things indicating people get no prompts.
> SkipCallScreening is checked by default now when set up with Google Voice.
Thanks, I'm aware of this, and am well past this point in understanding how this works.
Check the call history for the calls and see if the Obi shows the call as being connected or just ringing.
See details below, I tested under several combinations.
If you do not answer the phone at all, does google voicemail take the call?
Yes.
------ Answer to Check the call history...
With: One Forward To Phone (Google Chat only), and
Do not answer the Obi Phone:
Status shows,
Direction Inbound
07:58:23 Ringing
07:58:46 End Call
The Obi log never shows "Call Connected"
Answer the ringing Obi Phone, and press "1":
Direction Inbound
08:01:58 Ringing
08:02:05 Call Connected
08:02:21 End Call
Answer the ringing Obi Phone, do not press "1", or any other phone pad button:
Direction Inbound
08:04:44 Ringing
08:04:50 Call Connected
08:05:05 End Call
With: Two Forward To Phones (Google Chat and a cell phone):
Do not answer the Obi Phone, do answer the ringing Cell phone:
-Hear expected spoken GV prompts "Call From ..., to accept press 1, to send ... etc., etc"
-Press 1 and call is connected.
-etc.
Obi Log :
As expected for an unanswered call:
Direction Inbound
08:10:34 Ringing
08:10:52 End Call
Never shows connected.
*Do* answer the Obi Phone, do not answer the Cell phone:
Do not press any keys on Obi phone after answering:
Call will go to GV Voicemail
Obi Log shows:
Direction Inbound
08:16:13 Ringing
08:16:24 Call Connected
08:16:39 End Call
Press 1 after answering on Obi phone.
Obi Log Shows
Direction Inbound
08:19:01 Ringing
08:19:12 Call Connected
08:19:26 End Call
Do not answer the Obi Phone, do not answer the Cell phone:
As expected, call goes to GV VM.
If anhone can help out with an answer or insight here it will be greatly appreciated.
The call screening for Google Chat is different than that for other forwarding phones. You cannot turn off call screening for Google Chat. so the Obi will press one for you by configuration. You can turn off call screening for the other forwarding phones in your google voice settings.
With the Obi pressing one for chat, you will still get the screening on the other phones unless you turn it off.
Answering the call on the Obi and not pressing one is the same as not answering as far as goolge voice goes. The Obi will show that IT connected to the call, but without pressing one the call is not actually answered and will go to google voice mail after the 25 seconds.
Quote from: jimates on August 15, 2012, 06:01:00 AM
The call screening for Google Chat is different than that for other forwarding phones. You cannot turn off call screening for Google Chat. so the Obi will press one for you by configuration. You can turn off call screening for the other forwarding phones in your google voice settings.
With the Obi pressing one for chat, you will still get the screening on the other phones unless you turn it off.
Answering the call on the Obi and not pressing one is the same as not answering as far as goolge voice goes. The Obi will show that IT connected to the call, but without pressing one the call is not actually answered and will go to google voice mail after the 25 seconds.
I understand the first two paragraphs in blue. However, the third paragraph is confusing. Because I've read on here people are getting/hearing the call screening prompts, and successfully responding to them (with 1, 2, 2, 2 + stay on line, or 4), and I thought you replied somewhere as one of the people who saying you hear the prompts?
In any case, the behavior I am experiencing is as you describe in the third section of the reply.
as you say, it's not clear if anyone is successfully been able to set up OBIHAI with Google voice such that they hear the caller's name announced and can then press one or two. I would very much like to have mine set up this way.
Can anyone confirm whether or not OBIHAI can be configured so we hear the caller's name announced and then press one or two? If so could they please specify the required settings. Twenty posts into this thread that simple basic question is still not clearly answered.
Thanks very much
I do agree it's been hard and frustrating to get a clear and definitive answer to that question.
However, I just had a thought on what might be going on here: If jimates statement is true (
Answering the call on the Obi and not pressing one is the same as not answering as far as Google Voice goes. ...), as much as I don't want it to be true, I'm tending to believe it is, then possibly the people who are reporting they do have the GV voice prompts working on Obi are in reality forwarding their GV calls to CallCentric (or Simon or whatever) and then picking up the CallCentric call on the Obi, and not the true/real GV line or call. EDIT: This thread, and links in posts 2 and 3: http://www.obitalk.com/forum/index.php?topic=3609.0
Technically, this setup would not be an Obi answering a GV call, to GV the call would appear to be forwarded to another forwarding telephone, which as jimates explains (and which is not in question here), GV call screening works as expected for all forwarding phones, whether they be mobile phones, landlines or VoIP phone numbers.
If someone could do a brief experiment and confirm this idea, we can assume this is why some people are reporting 'it works' and some, (count me as one), are frustrated they cannot make it work with GV straight to an Obi.
The jimates statement I'm referring to:
QuoteAnswering the call on the Obi and not pressing one is the same as not answering as far as Google Voice goes. The Obi will show that IT connected to the call, but without pressing one the call is not actually answered and will go to Google Voice mail after the 25 seconds.
Sorry for the absence, been working.
At first I didn't realize the problem was the misunderstanding that there are in fact two separate call screenings when using google voice.
All forwarding phones, except google chat/gmail/Obi, use the main "Call Screening" which is controllable from your google voice page. It was originally called "Call Announce".
Google chat/gmail/Obi have a mandatory call screening that is different from the other one. It does not give the caller name. It only has the "....press 1 to accept .....". The Obi by default presses the 1 for us. If you answer the call in gmail you will always get the prompt, and have to press the 1 yourself.
Anyone that is hearing the main call screening when answering on the Obi must be answering on a service other than google voice.
Not sure you're mistaken or misunderstanding, or if I (we) have a setup issue. I suspect you're not understanding the issue entirely.
The issue is: When a GV call on the Obi is answered, and with GV Call Screening turned on and Obi X_SkipCallScreening unchecked, we have no GV 'audio' Caller ID/Call Announce (http://support.google.com/voice/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=115083) and no "....press 1 to accept .....". We hear nothing whatsoever when we answer the call, total silence on the line, and if we do nothing whatsoever (do not press 1 or 2) after picking up the handset then after 20 seconds +/- the GV call goes to GV Voicemail, even though we answered it. And, so this point is also clear, since the call rolls to GV VM, that means the caller does not hear any prompts to 'say your name' or any other prompts, he hears ringing until the call rolls to GV VM.
In my experience, this behavior was a big surprise (not documented anywhere, that I can see) and I only accidentally discovered, by accidentally pressing 1 or 2, that even though the Audio Caller ID and the GV Prompts to press 1 or 2 were not there, the call is expecting you to press either 1 or 2 (or else the caller rolls to GV VM).
What I (now others, so we) want to be able to do is have the call screening work on the GV Obi call same as on any other forwarding phone. And we (currently) cannot get that working. I'm reluctantly leaning toward believing, in spite of what you said above, it will never work. Although reading what you said above (and reading this (http://obihai.com/googlevoiceFAQ.html#08) in the Obi documentation) at least raises a possibility that some people had (past tense) or have (present tense) it working. Either that or there's a misunderstanding somewhere.
What I (now others, so we) want to be able to do is have the call screening work on the GV Obi call same as on any other forwarding phone.
This you will not get. As I pointed out in my previous post, there are 2 separate call screenings. One for Google Chat (aka Obi) and one for all other forwarding phones. This is the way google has it.
.....and if we do nothing whatsoever (do not press 1 or 2) after picking up the handset then after 20 seconds +/- the GV call goes to GV Voicemail, even though we answered it.
even though we answered it.
If you don't press 1 or 2, the call was not "answered" (as far as google is concerned) and will/should go to VM.
.....the caller does not hear any prompts to 'say your name' or any other prompts, he hears ringing until the call rolls to GV VM
In order for the caller to hear a prompt to say their name, call screening will have to be turned on under the "calls" setting on your google voice page. Nothing in the Obi settings has anything to do with that.
If the call screening setting is enabled at google voice:
1 - The caller will get a prompt to say their name (or not depending on whether they are a known caller etc).
2 - If you answer the call on one of your forwarding phones, you will get call screening announcement A.
3 - If you answer the call using gmail, you will get call screening announcement B.
4 - If you answer on the Obi, you will get call screening announcement B (or not, depending on the x_skipcallscreening setting of the Obi).
If the call screening setting is not enabled at google voice:
1 - The caller will not get a prompt and will hear ringing.
2 - When you answer one of your forwarding phones you will be directly connected to the caller (no screening).
3 - If you answer the call using gmail, you will get the call screening announcement B.
4 - If you answer on the Obi, you will get call screening announcement B (or not, depending on the x_skipcallscreening setting of the Obi).
As far as hearing silence when you pick up the phone on the Obi, this is definitely an Obi issue. Since you can press 1 while hearing silence, this shows the screening is working as far as google is concerned.
I was able to get the call screening to work when picking up the call on the Obi110. The drawback is that there is 20 seconds delay from the time I pick up the phone until I hear the announcement to press 1 or 2 to accept or send to voicemail.
If I don't pick up the phone right on the first ring it takes too long and GV will end up sending the caller to voice mail.
My settings in GV Call Screening are "On" and "Ask unkonwn Callers to say their name" unchecked.
My setting on Obi is X_SkipCallScreening unchecked.
The 20 sec delay makes it unusable, so I rather not use the call screening.
if I've understood this thread correctly and done my own tests properly,I reach the following conclusion and solution:
Conclusion: because OBi connects to Google voice via a "Google talk" configuration, the default configuration for OBi will not yield proper call announce/call screening.
Solution: to overcome this the workaround is for OBi NOT to receive calls directly from Google Voice, and instead 1) within Google voice add an additional forwarding phone (a phone Google voice forwards too) 2) have that phone be a sip or Skype number which can be can directly accessed by your OBi. 3) on your OBi set up that sip/Skype line to ring while keeping Google voice as your primary outgoing line. [ 4)OPTIONALLY: uncheck the forward to Google talk box within Google voice as it won't be needed since you're not directly accessing incoming calls from your OB].
By doing the above OB does not directly receive Google voice calls, but instead receives them via the new sip, etc. line. Because this sip line is not accessed through the Google talk method (as a OB does), it properly receives call announce/call screening from Google voice. Because this sip line is directly accessed by your OBi, the call is instantaneously forwarded from Google voice to OBi with full call announce/call screening capability.
I have tried this and do not find any delay nor quality reduction versus direct access through OB to Google voice.
as stated above, Google voice can remain your primary outgoing trunk.
Good luck
ccclapp,
I think that you may have lost CID. That alone could be the deal breaker. All inbound call routes in the OBi rely on obtaining proper CID in order to manipulate the call route.
Quote from: QBZappy on August 23, 2012, 02:11:07 PM
ccclapp,
I think that you may have lost CID. That alone could be the deal breaker. All inbound call routes in the OBi rely on obtaining proper CID in order to manipulate the call route.
QBZappy: could you be more specific? I am not having a CID problem that I am aware of. Under the configuration I described, the CID flow would be:
Incoming call CID-> to Google voice [Google voice set to transmit original call CID]-> Sip line [receiving original call CID passed through Google voice]-> Answered on OBi via direct sip connection to the sip line [receiving original CID and call announce/call screening]
Is there something mistaken in my thinking, or do you mean something other than this?
Thanks
Quote from: ccclapp on August 23, 2012, 02:00:54 PM
By doing the above OB does not directly receive Google voice calls, but instead receives them via the new sip, etc. line.
I believe that this is what you have described as the call flow:
Leg 1 2 3
Call->GV->sip->OBi
The only way that CID can pass from the second leg to the third leg (OBi) is if the sip provider allows spoofing the CID number. Most voip services providers don't allow this. Once the call reached the OBi, I would expect to see the DID number of the SP and not the original CID. You may be using a SP that does allows spoofing. Who is your voip SP? Call Centric is one provider which allows spoofing.
pc44 has described such a call strategy here:
Callcentric and Google Voice Setup Guide (with CNAM)
http://www.obitalk.com/forum/index.php?topic=3640.msg24230#msg24230
Quote from: QBZappy on August 23, 2012, 08:08:50 PM
Quote from: ccclapp on August 23, 2012, 02:00:54 PM
By doing the above OB does not directly receive Google voice calls, but instead receives them via the new sip, etc. line.
I believe that this is what you have described as the call flow:
Leg 1 2 3
Call->GV->sip->OBi
The only way that CID can pass from the second leg to the third leg (OBi) is if the sip provider allows spoofing the CID number. Most voip services providers don't allow this. Once the call reached the OBi, I would expect to see the DID number of the SP and not the original CID. You may be using a SP that does allows spoofing. Who is your voip SP? Call Centric is one provider which allows spoofing.
pc44 has described such a call strategy here:
Callcentric and Google Voice Setup Guide (with CNAM)
http://www.obitalk.com/forum/index.php?topic=3640.msg24230#msg24230
Hi
I admit to not yet testing ( phone on obi doesn't have CID capability, will test soon with another ), but im not sure this is correct:
Isn't the obi connection to a sip more like a soft phone's connection than a forwarding connection? If so, the Obi would see the incoming CID of the call to the sip (which in this case is the person calling GV), not the sip CID...again just like a sip soft phone client does not get it's own sip CID. Where is the flaw in this thinking?
As to the CC/GV thread, that was all about getting MORE CID info than GV ever provides...CNAM. I agree if you want ADDITIONAL CID info than GV natively provides you would select a sip which supports CNAM. That is by no means CID "spoofing", it's just a lookup service to give more INCOMMING CID info. SPOOFING is tricking ones OUTGOING CID. Per the above, because of how obi connects to sip clients ( like a sip soft phone) it receives INCOMMING not OUTGOING CID info. This incoming CID info can be further enhanced beyond what GV provides by using a sip that provides CNAM.
Am I wrong?
By the way, curiously the GV / CC thread did not discuss ( or I didn't see it) the topic of this string: enabling Caller Name Announce from GV on ones Obi. To me that is huge and I believe my proceedure above gives us that with no downside.
I think you are correct with your assumption.
Spoofing, in this tense, means displaying information that is different from the identity of the service that placed the call. Normally all forwarded calls carry the identity of the service you receive the call on, in this case CC. If CC allows "spoofing" it will display the identity from the call that was forwarded to it, which is what everyone wants.
Quote from: jimates on August 24, 2012, 06:39:12 AM
I think you are correct with your assumption.
Spoofing, in this tense, means displaying information that is different from the identity of the service that placed the call. Normally all forwarded calls carry the identity of the service you receive the call on, in this case CC. If CC allows "spoofing" it will display the identity from the call that was forwarded to it, which is what everyone wants.
But my underlying point is CC is not "forwarding" a call to Obi. Obi is directly receiving the incoming call to the sip, just like any sip soft phone. Is anything is "spoofing" it's GV which transmits the original call CID, not it's own. Clearly GV is "forwarding", whereas the sip is not.
Having said that, I acknowledge a sip can "process" an incoming call and the info passed to its native ( answering) client, be it soft phone, obi or dedicated app/dashboard. Again that is not spoofing as the term is always used.
None of this really matters, this is just semantics. What matters is that ( subject to further verification ) if one 1) disables google talk in GV, 2) forwards GV to a sip/Skype etc, 3) configures obi to directly that sip/Skype etc...ONE WILL RECEIVE BOTH CID (at least as much as GV provides and more if sip is configured for CMAN lookup) AND CALLER NAME ANNOUNCE GV FEATURE. Isn't that the point of this thread and what we want? ::)
Ps: what you two are saying about "spoofing" would be more accurate if the sip forwarded to another phone ( vs native access via soft phone/ obi). In that case the sip would be forwarding the incoming CID as it makes an outgoing (forwarding) call, rather than it's own CID. Please note, this is exactly what GV does.
ccclapp,
Title of this thread:Re: I don't understand how the X_SkipCallScreening with GV is supposed to work
Quote from: ccclapp on August 24, 2012, 06:57:54 AM
... AND CALLER NAME ANNOUNCE GV FEATURE. Isn't that the point of this thread and what we want? ::)
I just realized what you are talking about. "CallScreening" in this context means pressing "1". It is NOT the CALLER NAME ANNOUNCE GV FEATURE as you are suggesting. It is easy to mix the two concepts as they indeed use similar nomenclature.
Quote from: QBZappy on August 24, 2012, 08:43:32 PM
ccclapp,
Title of this thread:
Re: I don't understand how the X_SkipCallScreening with GV is supposed to work
Quote from: ccclapp on August 24, 2012, 06:57:54 AM
... AND CALLER NAME ANNOUNCE GV FEATURE. Isn't that the point of this thread and what we want? ::)
I just realized what you are talking about. "CallScreening" in this context means pressing "1". It is NOT the CALLER NAME ANNOUNCE GV FEATURE as you are suggesting. It is easy to mix the two concepts as they indeed use similar nomenclature.
I pointed that out in reply #14. I also said that the name of the feature used to be called "call announce", now it is just call screening.
Some get confused because on the google end there is only one process, when enabled at google voice, all recipients get the same greeting. But depending on whether the call is delivered to a forwarding phone or to google chat (aka Obi) the announcement is different for the person making the call. You can turn off the call screening at google voice. This will prevent the recipient from getting any greeting. This will also prevent the call maker from getting the screening prompts; EXCEPT when using google chat (aka Obi). With google chat you can't turn it off, therefore the Obi can handle it for us, or not.
When we used to have to set the Obi to press 1 for us, most people were aware of the feature and the difference between the two. Now that the Obi defaults to pressing 1 for us, no one realizes it is there, and when they do they think the Obi is suppose to control the call screening feature at google.
I don't use the call screening my self, but I think Obi should not change the function of a google voice feature by default. They should have left it for the user to change.
Basic concept, but hard to explain to some.
Impressive analysis and workaround, thank you. I really like how the "Call Screening" (announce) works on my landline and am disappointed that there is not an option for that with OBi... would really like to make the choice of announce or not.
For me, CID with number only is not very useful compared to having GV tell me who it is or "unknown caller."
So far I have added Callcentric "Pay Per Call" in order to get cheap 911 service. Now it sounds like I need to add Callcentric "Pay Per Minute Phone Number" to get a non-GV number that will behave like my old landline.
If this does not work, I have an unopened Ooma sitting here and the OBi will go back... but Ooma is $5/month plus much more expensive to buy... I want to send it back not the OBi.
This is a great example of how "tightly integrated" (GV + OBi) without full control of options can be less useful than non-integrated (GV + landline + cheap Tracfone cell + work phone) at least for some people.
My first day of OBi has been early adoptor paradise... caveat emptor. I have to say the basic setup is mind-bogglingly easy.
I'm not clear what CallCentric number plans you are referring to. What seems to be the accepted (on here) and least expensive way to go is what CC has listed as Receive Calls > Free Phone Number. It's totally free if you do not use their E911. If you use E911, it's $1.50 per month, plus $1.50 one-time set up fee.
As stated in quotes: "Pay Per Minute Phone Number"
I thought the free number was only "available in parts of NY state" but now understand it is available everywhere... you just get that area code.
So I will use the free number instead. Thanks very much for your help!
Later: OK, so I got a free New York 845 number to receive calls on. I currently have
1. GV
2. a 777 number for my 911 service on my OBi 110
Do I need a 3rd SIP or can I forward the 845 to the 777? I tried that and Callcentric says the customer is not available when I call the 845 number.
Thanks!
the 777 is your callcentric number and account number. You only use it to set up your callcentric service on the Obi.
check your preferences at callcentric to enable caller id with name an tweak your other settings.
put the 845 number as a forwarding phone in your google voice. Calls coming into your google voice will be forwarded to the 845 # which will ring your callcentric account and the Obi.
You need to change some settings so that calls to google voice are not also routed to the phone port via google chat. If both sp1 (GV) and sp2 (CC) are delivering to the phone port, sp1 will win and you still won't get the caller id with name from sp2.
You can either uncheck google chat as a forwarding phone in your google voice settings, or you can change the setting for the SP service you have google voice set up on so that it doesn't ring the phone.
I suggest just changing your SP1 inbound call route to this {(1yourgvnumber):ph1},{}
Google voice will still forward all calls to the Obi, but the {} rule will prevent the Obi from delivering the call to the phone. this will allow SP2 to deliver the call to the phone which will result in the caller id with name.
The {(1yourgvnumber):ph1} rule will allow calls from google voice that have your google voice caller id to ring the phone port. This will allow you to use Click2Call.
And since you are answering calls on sp2 (CC) instead of on GV, your call screening feature from google voice will work.
It works, thanks very much for the help!
Quote from: jimates on August 25, 2012, 08:33:06 AM
Some get confused because on the google end there is only one process, when enabled at google voice, all recipients get the same greeting. But depending on whether the call is delivered to a forwarding phone or to google chat (aka Obi) the announcement is different for the person making the call. You can turn off the call screening at google voice. This will prevent the recipient from getting any greeting. This will also prevent the call maker from getting the screening prompts; EXCEPT when using google chat (aka Obi). With google chat you can't turn it off, therefore the Obi can handle it for us, or not.
I'm really confused. Am I reading this wrong, or do you have "call maker" and "recipient" reversed? Isn't the "call maker" the one initiating the call and the one who receives the "Please state your name" greeting if the Google Voice "screen calls" feature is enabled? Isn't the recipient the one who gets the "Press 1 to accept call" greeting?
Quote from: Shinelikethunder on February 01, 2020, 11:09:41 PM
Quote from: jimates on August 25, 2012, 08:33:06 AM
Some get confused because on the google end there is only one process, when enabled at google voice, all recipients get the same greeting. But depending on whether the call is delivered to a forwarding phone or to google chat (aka Obi) the announcement is different for the person making the call. You can turn off the call screening at google voice. This will prevent the recipient from getting any greeting. This will also prevent the call maker from getting the screening prompts; EXCEPT when using google chat (aka Obi). With google chat you can't turn it off, therefore the Obi can handle it for us, or not.
I'm really confused. Am I reading this wrong, or do you have "call maker" and "recipient" reversed? Isn't the "call maker" the one initiating the call and the one who receives the "Please state your name" greeting if the Google Voice "screen calls" feature is enabled? Isn't the recipient the one who gets the "Press 1 to accept call" greeting?
You are posting in an eight-year-old discussion, and the comment you quoted is pretty incoherent. Call screening works differently now than it did in 2012.
What, exactly, are you trying to do, and what, exactly, do you want to know?
Quote from: SteveInWA on February 02, 2020, 01:26:19 PM
What, exactly, are you trying to do, and what, exactly, do you want to know?
Sorry. (1) I couldn't find any recent discussion of this, and (2) I was hoping to clarify the concepts, because all of these posts, regardless of age, are important reference material. If you want me to start a new discussion, I can, but I thought it might be better to keep the information in one place. Please let me know what seemed "incoherent" so that together we can clarify these concepts.
I'm trying to suppress the "Call from <name>; to accept, press 1; to send to voicemail, press 2" announcement when "Screen calls" is turned on in Google Voice. I want to know why I can't seem to do so. As far as I can tell by experimenting, X_SkipCallScreening now does nothing. Thanks.
The voice prompt to "press one to accept" comes from Google Voice's optional call screening feature. It has nothing whatsoever to do with any setting for the OBiTALK hardware.
You can disable Google Voice call screening by signing into the Gmail account that holds your Google Voice number, and going here: https://voice.google.com/settings (https://voice.google.com/settings). Scroll down to the "Screen calls" setting and turn it off.
Quote from: SteveInWA on February 03, 2020, 03:19:49 PM
The voice prompt to "press one to accept" comes from Google Voice's optional call screening feature. It has nothing whatsoever to do with any setting for the OBiTALK hardware.
You can disable Google Voice call screening by signing into the Gmail account that holds your Google Voice number, and going here: https://voice.google.com/settings (https://voice.google.com/settings). Scroll down to the "Screen calls" setting and turn it off.
I know most of that, but I thought that X_SkipCallScreening was supposed to automatically send a "1" when I answer. How did X_SkipCallScreening work in 2012? Wasn't there a "Press 1 to accept" prompt with or without "Screen calls" back then? I would like to use call screening to deter robocallers and telemarketers without having to press 1 to accept the call. Apparently, that's not possible, and I'm trying to understand why and whether there's any possible workaround. Thanks.
Just disable it in Google Voice settings.
Your proposed scenario makes no sense. The CALLED party (you) hears the "press one" prompt, not the CALLING party (potential robocaller). The Google Voice call screening feature is not a robocall blocking solution, nor does the current implementation of Google Voice work as it did in 2012.
If you want to limit robocalls, enable the "Filter Spam" setting in Google Voice settings.
No. I've been very polite, and you refuse to even attempt to understand what I'm trying to do. Is anyone else reading this?
Quote from: SteveInWA on February 03, 2020, 03:34:48 PM
Your proposed scenario makes no sense. The CALLED party (you) hears the "press one" prompt, not the CALLING party (potential robocaller). The Google Voice call screening feature is not a robocall blocking solution, nor does the current implementation of Google Voice work as it did in 2012.
If you want to limit robocalls, enable the "Filter Spam" setting in Google Voice settings.
Sorry, I wrote my previous response before you added this part; all I saw was "just disable it."
I have "filter spam" on, and always have. It's as useful as a screen door on a submarine. Call screening
does seem to help stop spam callers, because they're asked to state their name when call screening is on, right? At least that's what happens when
I call from a number that's not in my GV phone book. My OBi call history shows many calls from unknown callers that appear to hang up after 2 seconds. Isn't that because they've been asked to give their name and declined? When I Google those numbers, I frequently see Nomorobo spam reports for them. Exactly
why does my proposed scenario make no sense?
OK, let's start the conversation over.
First: this thread was from eight years ago. Google Voice has undergone a complete refresh since then, and many features have changed. Google Voice now directly supports SIP VoIP calling, without the old XMPP/Google Chat kludge. That OBi X_SkipCallScreening setting is now non-functional and irrelevant.
Google Voice call screening has been completely replaced, and it now has a different behavior. Here is how call screening now works, assuming you have turned it on in Google Voice settings:
- All calls, from all callers, will be screened. "Screened" is defined as: when you answer the call, Google Voice will always announce "Call from..." and then ask you, the Google Voice user and called party to decide -- press 1 to accept the call and talk to the caller, or press 2 to send the caller to your Google Voice voicemail.
- If the calling phone number is not in your Google Contacts, then that caller will be asked to state their name before the call rings on your end. Google Voice will play back whatever the caller said, after "Call from..." It will not save their name, and they will be asked to speak their name on every subsequent call. Even if they say nothing, your phone will still ring, and it will simply have no recorded speech to play back.
- If the calling phone number is in your Google Contacts, then the caller will not be asked to speak their name, however, their call will still be screened. Instead, Google Voice will use that contact's information with text-to-speech, to say the name you entered in their contact.
Over the past couple of years, the majority of robocalling has been using "neighbor spoofing", whereby the robocall software spoofs the caller ID of some random number that has the same area code and prefix as your number. This is a "social engineering" trick to make you think the call is indeed from one of your neighbors or local businesses, doctor's office, etc. Until the new "STIR/SHAKEN" based caller ID authentication system is more widely supported, there is no defense against this, other than to simply not answer calls from numbers you do not recognize, or to build a cumbersome white-list solution.
Note that you can "fork" inbound calls to Nomorobo, to add its blocking database, and that's been discussed in other threads.
Quote from: SteveInWA on February 03, 2020, 05:36:56 PM
That OBi X_SkipCallScreening setting is now non-functional and irrelevant.
Yes, that matches what I've observed.
Quote from: SteveInWA on February 03, 2020, 05:36:56 PM
Google Voice call screening has been completely replaced, and it now has a different behavior. Here is how call screening now works, assuming you have turned it on in Google Voice settings:
- All calls, from all callers, will be screened. "Screened" is defined as: when you answer the call, Google Voice will always announce "Call from..." and then ask you, the Google Voice user and called party to decide -- press 1 to accept the call and talk to the caller, or press 2 to send the caller to your Google Voice voicemail.
- If the calling phone number is not in your Google Contacts, then that caller will be asked to state their name before the call rings on your end. Google Voice will play back whatever the caller said, after "Call from..." It will not save their name, and they will be asked to speak their name on every subsequent call. Even if they say nothing, your phone will still ring, and it will simply have no recorded speech to play back.
- If the calling phone number is in your Google Contacts, then the caller will not be asked to speak their name, however, their call will still be screened. Instead, Google Voice will use that contact's information with text-to-speech, to say the name you entered in their contact.
Yes, I believe that I understand all of that. I have no complaint with the way GV call screening works. I just was under the misimpression that X_SkipCallScreening sent a "1" when I answered and that it should eliminate the need for me to do so myself. If nobody has a workaround that does what I want, maybe I need to make an OBi feature request. I'm just looking for a way to automatically halt the screening announcement and directly connect to the caller.
Quote from: SteveInWA on February 03, 2020, 05:36:56 PM
Over the past couple of years, the majority of robocalling has been using "neighbor spoofing", whereby the robocall software spoofs the caller ID of some random number that has the same area code and prefix as your number. This is a "social engineering" trick to make you think the call is indeed from one of your neighbors or local businesses, doctor's office, etc. Until the new "STIR/SHAKEN" based caller ID authentication system is more widely supported, there is no defense against this, other than to simply not answer calls from numbers you do not recognize, or to build a cumbersome white-list solution.
Note that you can "fork" inbound calls to Nomorobo, to add its blocking database, and that's been discussed in other threads.
Yes, I used Nomorobo for several years and know how to fork to it, but it's no longer effective. I suspect it's because spammers that use "neighborhood spoofing" change numbers as fast as I can blink.
I don't understand why you think that automating pressing "1" does anything useful whatsoever, based on my explanation of how the feature has changed, and how it now works.
Now, when Google Voice's call screening is enabled, ALL inbound calls are screened, and ALL inbound calls will ring on your phone, and ALL inbound calls will present (speak to you) either a stored contact name or whatever the caller says or doesn't say. It doesn't matter whether your aunt Betty or a heinous scammer is calling; their call will still ring the OBi-attached telephone. If you press "1", either manually, or automatically, you will be talking to Aunt Betty or to the scammer. If the OBi device "pressed 1" for you, then you wouldn't even hear the information about who's calling.
So, no; you didn't understand how call screening works now.