I have read about Asterisk and wanted to test it out as I will be managing/troubleshooting it at work anytime soon, so I thought of getting my hands dirty and getting some basic experience on it. First, I set up a box with Linux RedHat ES4 but I think any Linux distro would do. Kubuntu/Ubuntu, Fedora or Mandriva would work fine.

In this howto I will show you step-by-step how to successfully set up a long distance calls service in your Cybercafé, using open source software. The main element is *starShop-OSS, an open source application designed to monitor and bill, in real time, calls made via Asterisk PBX. This service is commonly called callshop or taxiphone.