Solved How to move from on premises to cloud

[billtepe]

I am a 3cx newbie. I have an on premises system set up to do a test in our office. So far we really like the software. I would like to test the cloud hosted version. Is there a way to "copy" the configuration that I have on the computer in my office to the cloud. I'm trying to avoid all or as much of the setup job as possible.

Thanks for any help you may be able to give.

Bill

 

[cobaltit]

Backup and restore. You'll need to shut down your on-prem system after backup and before restoring. Can't have two systems with the same key on at the same time (unless enterprise).

https://www.3cx.com/docs/manual/pbx-backup-restore-failover/

 

[Lee Cramman]

Your phones will need to be re-provisioned.

For all but the simplest setups consider an SBC - it will simplify your 3CX life greatly and is a low / zero cost option that has the added benefit of improving security.

Remember, any SIP trunk providers will need to know your new IP address. The free tier of Google hosting allows for one fixed IP address.

 

[YiannisH_3CX]

Hello @billtepe

The easiest way to do this is to backup the existing system and restore it on the cloud. I would recommend creating a backup without licence and FQDN.
Use PBX express to install the system in the cloud using the same key and once done restore your backup. Make sure that your on premise installation is turned off to avoid licencing and DNS issues.
Your configuration will be transferred but you will need to re-provision the phones are remote devices. You could also use 3CX clients

 

[billtepe]

Ok, hope I can still get some help on this. I did the backup on the On Prem system (minus the license and FDQN). Restored on the Cloud (AWS LIghtsail). Seems to have gone smooth. Except, I can not seem to get the phones to provision. I looked at the documentation on provisioning and have followed them to the letter. However, nothing seems to happen. The doc states that you can see this info in the event log..

1. You can make sure that the extension is ready to be configured via RPS by checking the “Event Log” from the dashboard: If the message appears as a “Warning” follow the instructions outlined in the message and use the Manual Link Provisioning method outlined here.

However, nothing at all shows up in the event log.

I'm kind of lost. Is there something I need to do in my On Prem router to open up some ports?

Thanks for any help you may be able to give.

 

[Allen_Miller]

Your phones are not LOCAL anymore. They will have to be provisioned either as SBC or STUN. As mentioned above - I suggest you use SBC. You will have to set up the SBC client software on a windows computer in your LAN or on a Raspberry Pi in your LAN. After you set up your SBC, factory reset your phones and they should then show up in your Phones page and you can Assign them to the extensions.

 

[cobaltit]

What phones?

 

[Lee Cramman]

From my post above:

"For all but the simplest setups consider an SBC - it will simplify your 3CX life greatly and is a low / zero cost option that has the added benefit of improving security."

I've been where you are. I tried an SBC and never looked back.

Unless you are planning to have a tiny number of phones in each location I would stick to an SBC (I would use one for any number except a single phone and even then I would consider it). If you do have a tiny number of phones and you really don't want to go SBC then you could always manually provision (using the provisioning link).

Given the SBC software is free, easy to configure, runs on just about anything, saves you time configuring firewalls and gives you plug and play provisioning for your phones it's what our American friends call a no-brainer.

 

[YiannisH_3CX]

@billtepe

Since your PBX changed location you need to re-provision the phones with a different provisioning method as the phones are now remote to the PBX. You will need to factory reset the phones and change the provisioning method in the management console. It is up to you if you will use STUN or SBC. Details for both provisioning methods can be found in the links below
https://www.3cx.com/3cxacademy/videos/intermediate/configuring-remote-extensions/

 

[billtepe]

Thank you for all the replies. Looks like the SBC is the proverbial "no brainer" in this case. I'll get a raspberry pi and try it out.

Also, the phone I was trying to work with was a Yealink T38G. Not exactly on the recommended list, but worked sufficiently well on the "On Prem" system. I will be replacing this with one that is recommended (T29G) when I buy all the other phones. I will have maybe 12 phones to provision, so I think the SBC will be the way to go.

Thanks again for the responses, I really do appreciate it.

 

[cobaltit]

@billtepe

The T38G will work remotely. You'll need to make sure it's on the latest firmware and provisioning it manually:

https://www.3cx.com/sip-phones/manually-provision-yealink/

You'll also need to turn off the PCI compliant security setting in 3CX.

 

[YiannisH_3CX]

The T38G has reached its end of life and does come with some limitations outlined here:
https://www.3cx.com/sip-phones/yealink-t32g-t38g-t42g-t46g/#h.jxjgb5q0uv96
You will need to disable the certificate check in the phone settings as it does not support Lets Encrypt and turn off the PCI compliance from the management console Settings / Security.

 

[billtepe]

Ok, I installed SBC on raspberry PI 3+, Raspian OS. I have assigned the PI the IP of 192.168.1.79.
I changed my router in office to reflect the port 5060 and 5090 to forward to the IP 192.168.1.79. I simply changed all the port entries that I had for the OnPrem 3cx from its IP to this new one.

I then tried to provision the T38G phone as instructed in the reference articles from above. I did reset it back to factory setting before starting any of this. But, no dice. I connect to the phone via web interface, put in the provisioning URL, clicked Confirm and then "Auto Provision". The web interface said it was done, but there seemed to be no change to the phone. So, I unplugged it and plugged back in. It went through its initializing phase and at the end, I got "no service".

So, not sure where to turn now. If anyone sees anything wrong with what I've done, please let me know! I guess a place to start might be to make certain the SBC stuff is actually running on the Raspberry PI. Can someone tell me what is the program or service called and how I might figure out if it is running or not?

Thanks again for any help you may be able to provide.

Here is what my router port forwarding looks like.

 

[Saqqara]

When running the PI SBC, you do not need to do any port forwarding on the local firewall protecting the network where the SBC is located. You just need to make sure port 5001 , and tcp/udp 5090 is allowed out.

The port forwarding is done at the firewall protecting your 3CX server.

Have you run the firewall test within the 3CX management console, do you see any errors ?

Have you disabled 'ssl certificate check' on the phone, log into the phone web frontend - Security - Trusted Certificate - change 'Only Accept Trusted Certificates' to disabled

Check your blacklist, to see if any IP's have been blacklisted.

May help info on setting up SBC -
https://www.3cx.com/docs/3cx-tunnel-session-border-controller/

 

[YiannisH_3CX]

You will need to disable the certificate check from the phones web interface before provisioning. You will also need to disable the PCI compliance from the PBX security settings before you can get the phone to provision.

 

[billtepe]

Ok, still not working.

By not working I mean... I can not provision a phone. I have disabled all the port forwarding rules in my router. As far as I can tell there is no restriction as to outbound ports 5900 or 5600 in the router's firewall. Here is what that looks like: ( I restarted router after making these changes)


Raspberry Pi is running (not sure if SBC is running on it though)

I can access the 3cx management portal on the Lightsail instance on which the new pbx is running.

I am working with a T29G phone, which is supported by 3cx. I have factory reset it. It says its initializing, then sending provision request, then config updating, then update skipped. It is on the network as it has an IP address.

I have also tried turning off the Raspberry Pi and installing the SBC on a windows computer (win10 pro). Results were the same when I reset the phone.

So a couple of questions

1) How can I tell on the Raspberry Pi if the SBC is installed and running? I'm a newbie to Linux and don't know where to look. I can't seem to see it as a program to run from the GUI anywhwere.

2) The PBX is on a Lightsail instance that I installed using PBX Express. From the 3cx management portal, I do not see the Firewall checker. Am I missing something?

3) Is there anyway to see if all these devices are communicating with each other the way they should.

4) Could there be something being blocked at the ISP layer?

5) Should I be able to, from the network the SBC is on, ping the FQDN?

6) I assume that since I can access the 3cx admin portal that the security on the Lightsail is set correctly, remembering that I used the PBX Express to install it.

I know I'm missing something, I just don't know where else to look.

Thanks for any help you may provide.

Bill

 

[cobaltit]

1. Did you install the SBC on the Pi following the guide? If so, it should be running. Logging via the console or via ssh and running the command 'ps ax' should show you something like this:

614 ?        Ssl  249:00 /usr/sbin/3cxsbc /etc/3cxsbc.conf

2. Firewall checker should be in at the bottom of the middle column in the dashboard:



3. Not really. It's one of the feature requests in the ideas section to show the SBC status in the 3CX dashboard.

4. Anything is possible but unlikely. PBXExpress should have opened the correct ports in the firewall on the Lightsail side and I doubt you are blocking any outbound traffic on the extension side. The firewall checker will confirm the PBX side.

5. On Lightsail, no. ICMP is blocked.

6. If you can access the 3CX Dashboard from the same network the phones are on then you are likely set. The first thing I would do is white list that IP so you don't lock yourself out when trying to get the phones registered.

 

[billtepe]

Thanks to everyone that has helped me out here! I finally figured it out. When I checked back after a couple of hours the other day, the phone provision that I did after I moved the SBC to the Windows computer worked. So, that left me knowing that it was something with my Raspberry Pi that was preventing it from working with that device. Using Coboltits advice, I found that the SBC service was not actually running on the PI. Not knowing much about Linux, I simply reinstalled the OS from scratch and then installed the SBC program. This time it seemed to work. However, the whole provisioning process takes much much longer with this set up. I was able to provision 1 phone so I thought OK, now I can do the rest. I tried provisioning 4 at one time. Only 1 succeded. I then (after scratching my chin wiskers awhile) went back and assigned each phone an extension one at a time, waiting till the communication with the phone completed... and that seemed to work.

Thanks again for all your help.

 

[YiannisH_3CX]

Glad to see the issue has been resolved and thank you for updating the thread with your solution