Manually Adding Intercom Containers

Adding a Container

To add a container manually, navigate to the Containers tab and click on the "+Add container" button.

Figure 1 - Adding a container

Enter a name for the container, typically in the format of "vipNN" where "NN" is the container number.

Important! It is possible to enter a container name that is already in use which results in the original container being destroyed and overwritten by the new container. Be sure to choose a unique name for each new container.

Next, change the Registry from "Dockerhub" to "Quay" and select the image.

• intercom:latest = The image used for all VIP panels

• intercom-dashboard:latest = The image used for Dashboard

Figure 2 - Creating the registry and selecting an image

Adding a Volume

Add a volume mount for storing container configurations by navigating to the Volumes tab.

Figure 3 - Adding a volume

Important! The mount for /opt/telos/vipNN must be unique and not used by another container. Otherwise, both containers will try to use the same (and sometimes wrong) configuration stored therein. This location normally uses the Name that was previously entered, for example:

Name: vip23 host: /opt/telos/vip23

Network

Select "telosmacvlan" as the Network, then enter "dashboard" as the Hostname for the container.

Figure 4 - Network setup

Environmental Variables

In Advanced Container Settings, click on "Env" then click "Add an environment variable".

Figure 5 - Environmental variables

Possible DEVTYPES for containers using image:quay.io/telosalliance/intercom include:

Devtype Value	Description
vip4	4 Key Virtual Intercom Panel
vip8	8 Key Virtual Intercom Panel
vip16	16 Key Virtual Intercom Panel
vip36	36 Key Virtual Intercom Panel
link8	8 Codec Virtual Infinity Link Gateway
vipserver	Platform Server; handles sending and receiving invites to VIP panels
link	Virtual Infinity Link Gateway (quantity determined by license)

Runtime and Resources

In newer versions of Docker, the maximum number of IGMP is far too small. Add this system control (sysctl) variable to the container configuration:

net.ipv4.igmp_max_memberships=96

Figure 6 - Increasing the number of IGMP

Capabilities

Navigate to the Capabilities tab, then enable SYS_NICE so that containers can change their process nice values and set real-time scheduling and CPU affinity.

When finished, click on "Deploy the container".

Figure 7 - Capabilities

Starting, Stopping, and Naming Containers

Upon starting for the first time, the management container tool Portainer is the only application that is set to autorun. The applications listed below must be set to run once their network settings have been configured:

• Dashboard: Used to manage both VIP and hardware panels. This container must be running to configure Groups, Partylines, etc.

• Vipserver: Sends invitations to connect to VIP. It also handles authentication from users and must be running for remote users to connect.

• Vipx: Invitations to users are sent to match individual intercom panels. The number of panels shown here may differ from available licenses shown at /license as licenses are only consumed by running panels. It is possible to operate Infinity VIP with just one of these applications or a combination of multiple applications. For example, if an Infinity IP intercom already exists with multiple hardware panels, then Dashboard may be running on another server and will not be required within Infinity VIP. Or, if VIP-server is not required, it may be necessary only to operate Dashboard and Vipx.

Although this flexibility may be useful in some applications, a standard configuration requires all three containers to be set to running. The diagram below shows how Dashboard is changed from “stopped” by selecting it, clicking on “start”.

Figure 8 - Starting and stopping containers