How to convert phones from SIP to SCCP

[Jose Mendez]

Requirements

• 7940 or 7960 phones
• A Linux machine to edit one of the required files (I haven't tried other methods in Windows machines but I have read it is possible), and possibly also to use as TFTP
• Windows TFTPD32 or CallManager as a TFTP, or tftpd-hpa in a Linux host

Procedure

1. First we will set up the TFTP. If using TFTPD32, configure it in such a way that we can download files from it. A good test is to create a dummy file inside the root folder selected to server requests, and then from the same computer, on a command prompt type: tftp <IP used to listend to TFTP requests> get <name of the dummy file>.
2. Download the firmware package you would like. In our case, we will be using cmterm-7940-7960-sccp.8-1-2.zip. Inside you will find 4 files:
   1. P00308010200.sbn
   2. P00308010200.loads
   3. P00308010200.bin
   4. P00308010200.sb2
3. Put those files inside the TFTP path
4. On the Linux machine, open a terminal
5. Run VI to  create the Universal Bool Loader:               
   • vi OS79xx.txt
6. Press lower case 'i' to start introducing characters
7. Type the SCCP load name that we have available in the TFTP, in our case it will be P00308010200 , without any extension
8. Press escape, then press and hold shift + zz, this will save and exit the editor. I have had bad experiences with Windows editors because a space character is added at the end of the string, which makes the phone look for a file that the TFTP server can't find. This can be easily avoided if we all use Linux instead as our Operating System. This situation is documented in bug CSCdv19260
9. Now we need another file, the SIPDefault.cnf. This file contains a statement called "image_version", and needs also to be included in the TFTP Path. The format to follow is image_version : "P00308010200". This one can be edited and saved in Windows I think. Here is an example file
10. Put it in the TFTP path
11. Configure the IP Phone to point to the computer running TFTPD32 as the TFTP server and reboot it
12. In TFTPD32 an entry like this will be logged (refer to the troubleshooting section in case of troubles):       
    • Connection received from 172.30.2.81 on port 50209 [20/04 17:26:39.973]
      Read request for file <P00306000300.loads>. Mode octet [20/04 17:26:39.973]
      Using local port 3055 [20/04 17:26:39.973]
      <P00306000300.loads>: sent 1 blk, 461 bytes in 0 s. 0 blk resent [20/04 17:26:39.989]
13. At this point the phone will start installing the SCCP firmware and the next entries will be those related to a SCCP registration:
    • Read request for file <CTLSEP00156219BB2F.tlv>. Mode octet [20/04 17:27:16.020]
    • File <CTLSEP00156219BB2F.tlv> : error 2 in system call CreateFile  The system cannot find the file specified. [20/04  17:27:16.035]Connection received from 172.30.2.81 on port 49980 [20/04  17:27:16.098]
    • Read request for file <SEP00156219BB2F.cnf.xml>. Mode octet [20/04 17:27:16.098]
      File  <SEP00156219BB2F.cnf.xml> : error 2 in system call CreateFile The  system cannot find the file specified. [20/04 17:27:16.113]
    • Connection received from 172.30.2.81 on port 49981 [20/04 17:27:16.145]
      Read request for file <XMLDefault.cnf.xml>. Mode octet [20/04 17:27:16.145]
    • File  <XMLDefault.cnf.xml> : error 2 in system call CreateFile The  system cannot find the file specified. [20/04 17:27:16.160]
14. No need to get those, we can now configure the phone manually to point to a different TFTP, most likely CallManager where it can then find its configuration file (SEP00156219BB2F.cnf.xml)
15. If the phone still keeps asking for a SIP load (something like P0S3-8-12-00.loads), then create a SEP00156219BB2F.cnf.xml file with these contents, where P0030801SR02 is the name of the SCCP phone load:

<device>

<deviceProtocol>SIP</deviceProtocol>

<loadInformation model="IP Phone 7960">P0030801SR02</loadInformation>

</device>

Troubleshooting

Problem:

After pointing to TFTPD32 and resetting, the phone gets stuck in a loop. It will say "Configuring VLAN / Configuring IP / Resetting" and never finish. You read the TFTP logs and they complain about the phone trying to read a file that doesn't exist. CallManager TFTP traces will display a connection request with the correct file name, but it just won't find it. TFTPD32 is actually more efficient and detects a filename with strange characters. The linefeed looks like this:

Solution:

This is most likely the bug about the linefeed introduced by Windows text editors. Make sure the file goes out of the Linux machine as in step 5 without ever been opened in Windows, and then deposited in the TFTP path.

Solution:

If the file is being transferred from the linux PC to the TFTPD32 PC by email, I have had bad experiences with Outlook, the file will still get corrupted during download from Exchange. Use SCP to securel-copy it or just use a linux based TFTP server, or use Firefox to download the attachment. The file transaction should look like this:

[jochaver]

Great help Jose, as always!

[Muthurani Lavanya Paneerselvam]

Jose

Document is very helpful !