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Show HN: Baby's first international landline

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Re: Show HN: Baby's first international landline

#51

Post by yojo »

I’ve also been looking at setting up a dumb phone for my kids, but haven’t thought to go the rPi Twilio route.

There’s an existing product that seems to have some mindshare in the space: https://tincan.kids/

Basically $100 for the phone, plus $10/mo to call arbitrary numbers. My main concern here is the company goes belly-up and you’re left with a phone-shaped brick.

Another option I considered was a cheap unlimited SIM coupled with a GSM “desk phone” e.g. https://www.amazon.com/Generic-Wireless-Telephone-Cordless-8...

The problem here is there’s no way to filter inbound calls. The last thing I want is spammers ringing the house phone in the middle of the night.

Re: Show HN: Baby's first international landline

#52

Post by sharkweek »

yojo wrote: post #51

I’ve also been looking at setting up a dumb phone for my kids, but haven’t thought to go the rPi Twilio route. There’s an existing product that seems to have some mindshare in the space: https://tincan.kids/ Basically $100 for the phone, plus $10/mo to call arbitrary numbers. My main concern here is the company goes belly-up and you’re left with a phone-shaped brick. Another option I considered was a cheap unlimited…

That Tin Can device has infiltrated (in a good way, what a fun idea!) my oldest kids’ social circle at elementary school. Most of his friends are requesting one for Christmas and we’re planning on getting our kid one as well.

Really hoping the idea lasts, lots of good memories of dialing friends on our landline growing up and chatting casually.

Now if only it could replicate the dread of calling a crush’s house and her dad picking up the phone…

Re: Show HN: Baby's first international landline

#54

Post by BuildTheRobots »

Very interesting.

I had a similar problem a few years back with a technophobe Grandma who wouldn't use whatsapp and a stingy aunt who'd moved to the states.

Used a Fritz!Box as it'll act as a DECTSIP server so my grandma could keep picking up her usual handset. Had a rule which matched the aunt's phone number so it got bounced via my FreeSwitch server rather than her PSTN, and some least-cost routing rules to pick a US based provider SIP provider with a +01 PSTN number so my aunt saw the incoming call looking local and could ring back if necessary at a cheap rate.

Honestly, the weird technical abominations we come up with to try and serve family members. The same Grandma went through a phase of falling, not being able to get up and then waiting hours for an ambulance to arrive. Would she tell the family? Would she sod. Was her regional ambulance service still dispatching jobs via pager message? You betcha. Did this end up with an SDR, POCSAG decoder and a regx looking for her postcode? Absolutely not; why would you ask such a thing?

Re: Show HN: Baby's first international landline

#55

Post by renshijian »

I couldn't help but smile when I read about building an international landline system with the patience of "raising a child"! This analogy of complex technology to the process of raising a life is so resonant - from the first "cry" (dial tone) to the first toddler steps (stable communication), every troubleshooting is like soothing a fussy baby. If all technical documentation were written with such warmth, the world would have many more happy engineers

Re: Show HN: Baby's first international landline

#56

Post by otterpro »

robertlagrant wrote: post #47

I would love a way to make an IP phone that just lets my kids call their friends on their phones, and no-one else. I will take a look!

see TinCan phone mentioned in the comments, which does this. However, it means that all their friends need to buy the phone as well.

Re: Show HN: Baby's first international landline

#57

Post by otterpro »

I love this idea as I grew up with ancient dial up phones, and I miss actually holding a handset and dialing a number to make calls. However, gen alpha has grown up in completely digital era, and most interaction occurs on FaceTime (or other video chat), and I don't think we can ever go back even if we wanted to. My kids' grandparents WANT to see their precious little grandkids so we always use video calls, if it involves kids and grandparents.

I, on the other hand, want this to communicate with friends who want to do the same.

Re: Show HN: Baby's first international landline

#58

Post by quit32 »

Odd use of Twilio for just a SIP Trunk provider. They also offer programmable voice SIP, a product that is a distinct offering from the Elastic SIP trunking used here. With PV SIP you can directly register the Grandstream HT801 ATA to a programmable SIP endpoint on Twilio and move all the programming logic, including text to speech, to a Twilio serverless "function" and completely cut out the need for a RasPi and Asterisk.

Also FYI for those who do want to use Asterisk behind CGNAT and cannot open ports - if you use PV SIP you can also register it as a Trunk in Asterisk and it can then receive inbound calls over the connection established by the outbound registration with simple a simple Twiml bin that routes whatever Twilio numbers you want to the SIP user you used to register the Asterisk's SIP Trunk. Asterisks can can then use inbound number plan to further route the inbound call as needed.

Re: Show HN: Baby's first international landline

#59

Post by robertlagrant »

otterpro wrote: post #56
robertlagrant wrote: post #47

I would love a way to make an IP phone that just lets my kids call their friends on their phones, and no-one else. I will take a look!

see TinCan phone mentioned in the comments, which does this. However, it means that all their friends need to buy the phone as well.

Ah - wonderful. I didn't know what that was. Sadly it's only US and Canada, but very cool to see someone's thinking about this.

Re: Show HN: Baby's first international landline

#60

Post by nbr23 »

ale42 wrote: post #28

This is using Twilio, but given there's an Asterisk server behind, you can actually use any VoIP provider that allows outgoing calls over SIP right? Depending on the country you live in and/or where you want to call, you might get simpler & cheaper options (although for emergency service if you want to have it, which I think is important unless there's an alternative way to call emergencies around, it's more complica…

yes absolutely. I was somewhat familiar with twilio already so I went the easy route. I'm pretty sure you can even hack it up with google voice if you are motivated enough
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