rate-files(5)

NAME
rate-files - Format of rate-files

DESCRIPTION
The rate-files used by isdnlog(8) and by isdnrate(1) are textfiles defining the telefon fees for different destinations at certain dates/times for all providers of one country.
The rate-files have the following overall layout:

Header entries

Provider entries

Comments starting with a hash-sign '#' and empty lines are ignored. The first letter (tag) followed by a colon discerns the entries. Additional white space may be used after the tags to group content more readably.

  Special entries

I:includefile

i:includefile

    includefile get's substituted at the current position. There are two possibilities. In the rate source file (which get prepared by pp_rate) a small 'i' puts the contents of the include file in the outputfile. An 'I'-Tag means, for the preprozessor, write a new output file (the includefile) and leave the tag in the rate-files. This is for real include files.
    Includes may be nested twice. The filename should not contain any paths (except for 'i' of course), they are taken relative to their parent file.

  Header entries

V:versionsstring

    e.g. V:1.0-Germany [18-Mar-1999]

S:Servicename

N:Servicenumber[,Servicenumber...]

    This defines Services with special numbers. Special numbers are numbers which a) start with no '0' or b) can not be dialed with every provider. A number with a variable length should have the wildcard '*' at the end, eg. 07189* which matches all numbers startig with 07189. Numbers with wildcards should be placed after numbers which would match the wildcard, because matching is done straight top down. There may be multiple N: tags for one Service.

    e.g.
    S:Internet
    N:07189*,19430
    N:19440

U:currencyfmt currency

    e.g. U:%.3f DEM

  Provider entries
A new provider starts always with a P: tag and consists of a Providerheader followed by Providerzones.

  Providerheader

P:[daterange] providernumber providername

    daterange is [[fromDate][-toDate]]
    This defines a time range for the validity of rates for this provider. Dates have to be numeric in format dd.mm.yyyy. Note: as time is assumed as 00:00, take for toDate the day+1. The daterange has to be enclosed in square brackets. Either fromDate or -toDate or both may be given.
    The providernumber may be a simple number, normally the last digits of the VBN-number, or providernumber,variant if a provider has different connection fees.
    e.g.
    P:02 UTA
    or
    P:[01.01.1999] 1,1 Telekom Minimumfee

B:vbn

VBN-Number for provider

    e.g. B:1002
    This is the number to select this provider and depends on your country.

C:COMMENT: comment

COMMENT may be an arbitrary string, but the following entries are used already:

    C:Name: | Providername
    C:Maintainer: | Who did the hard work
    C:TarifChanged: | and when
    C:Address: | Provideraddress
    C:Homepage: | http:URL for provider
    C:TarifURL: | URL for tarif info
    C:EMail: | EMail-Address
    C:Telefon: | Telefon number
    C:Telefax: | Fax number
    C:Hotline: | Telefon number
    C:Zone: | Textual info about zones
    C:Special: | Guess
    C:GT: | Additional charge text
    C:GF: | Additional charge formula

If there are multiple comments with the same comment name, they get appended separated by a newline char.

D:zone

Name of zone file (inserted for %s in ZONEFILE = /usr/lib/isdn/zone-CC-%s.dat from isdn.conf)

    e.g. D:1001 # zone file is zone-at-1001.gdbm

Note: if the provider has no different domestic zones, you should not define a D:tag.

  Providerzones
A Providerzone entry starts with a Z: tag followed by one or more A: and T: tags.

A zone is a region of areas, for which the same rates apply. Interior and foreign zones should not be mixed and all foreign zones should follow domestic zones.

Z:zonelist zonename

where zonelist is zone[-zone][,...]

    e.g. Z:1-2,4 Interior

A:area[,area...]

area may be a telefonnumber (including +countrycode for numbers which may be reached from everywhere, a telefonnumber without +countrycode for numbers only reachable in the own country) or an area name or alias as defined in country-de.dat. Country names have to be translated to their code by the rate-preprocessor pp_rate.

    e.g. A:19430,07189 # Online

    e.g. A:+31,Belgium # Int 1

Note: There should always be exactly one zone with your countrycode or countryname respectively:

    Z:4
    A:+49
    T:...

Countrynames like Belgium in the above example are replaced by their ISO-Code (or TLD) with the rate preprocessor pp_rate.

T:[daterange]daylist/timelist[!]=chargelist chargename

where daterange is [[fromDate][-toDate]] like the corresonding provider entry. Note that the daterange is enclosed in sqare brackets, either fromDate or -toDate are optional.

daylist is day[-day][,...] and day is a daynumber (1=Mon, 2=Tue, ...) or W (weekday), E (weekend), H (holiday) or * (everyday).

timelist is hour[-hour][,hour] where hour is a number 0..23 or * for everytime.

After daylist/timelist follows = or != which means, provider doesn't adjust rates on a rate boundary e.g. at 18h00.

A chargelist consists of

[MinCharge|]Charge[(Divider)]/Duration[:Delay][/Duration...]

where MinCharge| is an (optional) minimum charge, Charge the rate per Duration seconds or optional rate per (Divider) seconds, Duration is the length of one charge impuls in seconds. After Delay the next duration is taken. If delay ist not given it equals to the duration. The last duration may not have a delay and may not be zero.

    EXAMPLES
    T:1-4/8-18=1.5(60)/60/1 workday

    Monday until Thursday, daytime the charge is 1.50 per minute, first charge is for one minute after this charging is calculated in seconds interval.

    T:W/18-8=0.30|1.2(60)/1 night

    On weekday, night, charge is the bigger of 1.20 per minute or 0.30

    T:*/*=0.50/0,1(60)/1 always

    Everyday, everytime there is a connection fee of 0.50, then charge is 1 per minute.

    T:H/*=0.5/60:600,0.5/30 holidays

    On holidays, everytime a charge of 0.5 per minute in a minutes interval, after 10 minutes 0.5 per half minute in half a minutes interval.

    T:*/*=1.3/0,0/1

    Everyday, everytime the charge is 1.30 independent of duration, which could also be written as T:*/*=1.3|0/1.

    T: [-01.02.2000] */17-19=0.79(60)/60/1 Happy Hour
    T: [-01.02.2000] */19-17=0.90(60)/60/1 Normal

    Until the first of Feb 0:00h (i.e. end is 31.1.2000 24:00), everyday between 17 and 19h a charge of 0.79 per minute, the first minute is always charged fully, after this, charging is calculated in seconds interval.
    The second entry defines a charge of 0.90 in the time outside the happy hour.

    T:[15.11.1999-01.02.2000]*/17-19=0.79(60)/60/1 HH

    Like above, but a full date range is given.

SEE ALSO
isdnlog(8), isdnrate(1), isdnlog/README, rate-at.dat

AUTHOR
Leopold Toetsch <lt@toetsch.at> (of this man page of course).