EXEC module

Admin Guide

Overview

The Exec module enables the execution of external commands from the OpenSIPS script. Any valid shell commands are accepted. The final input string is evaluated and executed using the “/bin/sh” symlink/binary. OpenSIPS may additionally pass a lot more information about the request using environment variables:

• SIP_HF_<hf_name> contains value of each header field in request. If a header field occurred multiple times, values are concatenated and comma-separated. <hf_name> is in capital letters. Ff a header-field name occurred in compact form, <hf_name> is canonical.
• SIP_TID is transaction identifier. All request retransmissions or CANCELs/ACKs associated with a previous INVITE result in the same value.
• SIP_DID is dialog identifier, which is the same as to-tag. Initially, it is empty.
• SIP_SRCIP is source IP address from which request came.
• SIP_ORURI is original request URI.
• SIP_RURI is current request URI (if unchanged, equal to original).
• SIP_USER is userpart of current request URI.
• SIP_OUSER is userpart of original request URI.

Note

Any environment variables which are given to the exec module functions must be specified using the ’$$’ delimiter (e.g., $$SIP_OUSER), otherwise they will be evaluated as OpenSIPS pseudo-variables, throwing scripting errors.

Dependencies

OpenSIPS Modules

The following modules must be loaded before this module:

• No dependencies on other OpenSIPS modules.

External Libraries or Applications

The following libraries or applications must be installed before running OpenSIPS with this module loaded:

• None.

Exported Parameters

setvars (integer)

Set to 1 to enable setting all above-mentioned environment variables for all executed commands.

Danger

Before enabling this parameter, make sure your “/bin/sh” is safe from the Shellshock bash vulnerability!

Default value is 0 (disabled).

Set 'setvars' parameter

...
modparam("exec", "setvars", 1)
...

time_to_kill (integer)

If set, this parameter specifies the longest time (in seconds) that a program is allowed to execute. Once this duration is exceeded, the program is terminated (SIGTERM).

Note

Due to internal limitations, a SIGTERM will actually be sent to all job pids once the “time_to_kill” expiration timeout hits. On a standard system, this should have no side-effects, as pids are monotonically increasing in a slow manner, and OpenSIPS should run under the “opensips” user, thus rendering it unable to terminate non-child processes. If this is not the case on your system, do not use the OpenSIPS “time_to_kill” feature — rather implement it within your external app!

Default value is 0 (disabled).

Set 'time_to_kill' parameter

...
modparam("exec", "time_to_kill", 20)
...

Exported Functions

exec(command, [stdin], [stdout], [stderr], [envavp])

Executes an external command. The input is passed to the standard input of the new process, if specified, and the output is saved in the output variable.

The function waits for the external script until it provided all its output (not necessary to actually finish). If no output (standard output or standard error) is required by the function, it will not block at all - it will simply launch the external script and continue the script.

Meaning of the parameters is as follows:

• command - command to be executed.It can include pseudovariables.
• stdin - String to be passed to the standard input of the command. The string can be given as a pseudovariable.
• stdout - pseudovariable where to store the output from the standard output of the process.
• stderr - pseudovariable where to store the error from the standard error of the process.
• envavp - Avp where to store the values for the environment variables to be passed for the command. The names of the environment variables will be “OSIPS_EXEC_#” where # will start from 0. For example if you store 2 values into an avp (“a” and “b”) OSIPS_EXEC_0 will contain the first value and OSIPS_EXEC_1 the second value.

Danger

Any OpenSIPS pseudo-vars which may contain special bourne shell (sh/bash) characters should be placed inside quotes, e.g. exec(“update-stats.sh ’$(ct{re.subst,/‘//g})’”);

Danger

“stdin”/“stdout”/“stderr” parameters are not designed for large amounts of data, so one should be careful when using them. Because of the basic implementation, filled up pipes could cause a read deadlock.

This function can be used from REQUEST_ROUTE, FAILURE_ROUTE, LOCAL_ROUTE, STARTUP_ROUTE, TIMER_ROUTE, EVENT_ROUTE, ONREPLY_ROUTE.

exec usage

...
$avp(env) = "a";
$avp(env) = "b";
exec("ls -l", , "$var(out)", "$var(err)", "$avp(env)");
xlog("The output is $var(out)\n");
xlog("Received the following error\n$var(err)");
...
$var(input) = "input";
exec("/home/../myscript.sh", "this is my $var(input) for exec\n", , , "$avp(env)");
...

exec_dset(command) (DEPRECATED)

WARNING - this function is deprecated and it will be remove in the next version - please use the exec() function ( exec sync exec ).

Executes an external command. The current R-URI is appended to the command as its last parameter. The output of the command will rewrite the current R-URI. Multiple lines of output lead to multiple branches.

Meaning of the parameters is as follows:

• command (string, pvar) - command to be executed. It can include pseudo-variables or ’$$’ delimited UNIX environment variables

WARNING: most OpenSIPS scripting variables should be quoted before being passed to external commands, as in: exec_avp(“log-call.sh ‘$ct’”). This may help avoid some unexpected behaviour (e.g. unwanted extra parameters, errors due to special bash characters, etc.)

This function can be used from REQUEST_ROUTE, FAILURE_ROUTE.

exec_dset usage

...
exec_dset("ruri-changer.sh");
exec_dset("ruri-changer.sh '$ct'");
...

exec_msg(command) (DEPRECATED)

WARNING - this function is deprecated and it will be remove in the next version - please use the exec() function ( exec sync exec ).

Executes an external command. The current SIP message is passed to it in the standard input, no command-line parameters are added and the output of the command is ignored.

See sip-server/modules/exec/etc/exec.cfg in the source tarball for information on usage.

Meaning of the parameters is as follows:

• command (string) - command to be executed. It can include pseudo-variables or ’$$’ delimited UNIX environment variables

WARNING: most OpenSIPS scripting variables should be quoted before being passed to external commands, as in: exec_avp(“log-call.sh ‘$ct’”). This may help avoid some unexpected behaviour (e.g. unwanted extra parameters, errors due to special bash characters, etc.)

This function can be used from REQUEST_ROUTE, FAILURE_ROUTE, LOCAL_ROUTE, TIMER_ROUTE, EVENT_ROUTE, ONREPLY_ROUTE.

exec_msg usage

...
exec_msg("call-logger.sh '$ct' >> /var/log/call-logger/'$rU'.calls");
...

exec_avp(command[, avplist]) (DEPRECATED)

WARNING - this function is deprecated and it will be remove in the next version - please use the exec() function ( exec sync exec ).

Executes an external command. Each output line of the command is saved in its corresponding AVP from avplist. If avplist is missing or is incomplete, the populated AVPs will be 1, 2, 3… or N, N+1, N+2…

Meaning of the parameters is as follows:

• command (string) - command to be executed. It can include pseudo-variables or ’$$’ delimited UNIX environment variables
• avplist (string) - comma separated list with AVP names to store the result in

WARNING: most OpenSIPS scripting variables should be quoted before being passed to external commands, as in: exec_avp(“log-call.sh ‘$ct’”). This may help avoid some unexpected behaviour (e.g. unwanted extra parameters, errors due to special bash characters, etc.)

This function can be used from REQUEST_ROUTE, FAILURE_ROUTE, LOCAL_ROUTE, STARTUP_ROUTE, TIMER_ROUTE, EVENT_ROUTE, ONREPLY_ROUTE.

exec_avp usage

...
exec_avp("get-subscriber-details.sh '$rU'", "$avp(credit) $avp(contract_model)");
...

exec_getenv(environment_variable[, avp]) (DEPRECATED)

WARNING - this function is deprecated and it will be remove in the next version - please use the exec() function ( exec sync exec ).

Obtains the value of a UNIX evironment_variable. The value is saved in ‘avp’. If ‘avp’ is missing, output will be stored in $avp(1). If there is no such environment variable no value will be returned.

Meaning of the parameters is as follows:

• environment_variable (string) - environent variable name. Can also be specified as a pseudo-variable
• avp - an AVP to store the result in

WARNING: any OpenSIPS pseudo-vars which may contain special bash characters should be placed inside quotes, e.g. exec_getenv(”‘$ct’”);

This function can be used from REQUEST_ROUTE, FAILURE_ROUTE, LOCAL_ROUTE, STARTUP_ROUTE, TIMER_ROUTE, EVENT_ROUTE, ONREPLY_ROUTE.

exec_getenv usage

...
exec_getenv("HOSTNAME");
exec_getenv("HOSTNAME", "$avp(localhost)");
...

Exported Asynchronous Functions

exec(command[,input[,output[,error[,env]]]])

Executes an external command. This function does exactly the same as exec sync exec (in terms of input, output and processing), but in an asynchronous way. The script execution is suspended until the external script provided all its output. OpenSIPS waits for the external script to close its output stream, not necessarily to terminate (so the script may still be running when OpenSIPS resumes the script execution on “seeing” EOF on the the output stream).

Note

This function ignore the “error” parameter for now - the asynchronous waiting is done only on the output stream !! This may be fixed in the following versions.

To read and understand more on the asynchronous functions, how to use them and what are their advantages, please refer to the OpenSIPS online Manual.

async exec usage

{
...
async( exec("ruri-changer.sh","$ru","$ru"), resume );
}

route[resume] {
...
}

Known Issues

When imposing an execution timeout using time to kill, make sure your “/bin/sh” is a shell which does not fork when executed, case in which the job itself will not be killed, but rather its parent shell, while the job is silently inherited by “init” and will continue to run. “/bin/dash” is one of these troublesome shell environments.

doc copyrights:

Contributors

By Commit Statistics

Top contributors by DevScore⁽¹⁾, authored commits⁽²⁾ and lines added/removed⁽³⁾

#	Name	DevScore	Commits	Lines++	Lines—
1.	Bogdan-Andrei Iancu (@bogdan-iancu)	46	28	744	637
2.	Jiri Kuthan (@jiriatipteldotorg)	28	11	1579	152
3.	Daniel-Constantin Mierla (@miconda)	26	19	445	136
4.	Liviu Chircu (@liviuchircu)	23	14	346	333
5.	Jan Janak (@janakj)	18	10	494	142
6.	Razvan Crainea (@razvancrainea)	17	13	309	51
7.	Ionut Ionita (@ionutrazvanionita)	16	7	633	138
8.	Stefan Darius (@dariusstefan)	12	4	512	122
9.	Andrei Pelinescu-Onciul	11	8	33	109
10.	Walter Doekes (@wdoekes)	4	2	8	8

All remaining contributors: Henning Westerholt (@henningw), Anca Vamanu, Dan Pascu (@danpascu), Elena-Ramona Modroiu, Vlad Paiu (@vladpaiu), Konstantin Bokarius, Octavian Cerna, Julián Moreno Patiño, Andreas Granig, Edson Gellert Schubert, Dror Wald.

(1) DevScore = author_commits + author_lines_added / (project_lines_added / project_commits) + author_lines_deleted / (project_lines_deleted / project_commits)

(2) including any documentation-related commits, excluding merge commits

(3) ignoring whitespace edits, renamed files and auto-generated files

By Commit Activity

#	Name	Commit Activity
1.	Stefan Darius (@dariusstefan)	Jun 2026 - Jul 2026
2.	Razvan Crainea (@razvancrainea)	Jun 2011 - Jun 2026
3.	Bogdan-Andrei Iancu (@bogdan-iancu)	Jul 2004 - Jun 2018
4.	Liviu Chircu (@liviuchircu)	Feb 2014 - Jun 2018
5.	Ionut Ionita (@ionutrazvanionita)	Oct 2014 - Feb 2017
6.	Octavian Cerna	Oct 2016 - Oct 2016
7.	Julián Moreno Patiño	Feb 2016 - Feb 2016
8.	Walter Doekes (@wdoekes)	Mar 2014 - Sep 2015
9.	Vlad Paiu (@vladpaiu)	Mar 2015 - Mar 2015
10.	Anca Vamanu	Jan 2011 - Jan 2011

All remaining contributors: Dror Wald, Dan Pascu (@danpascu), Daniel-Constantin Mierla (@miconda), Konstantin Bokarius, Edson Gellert Schubert, Henning Westerholt (@henningw), Elena-Ramona Modroiu, Andreas Granig, Jan Janak (@janakj), Andrei Pelinescu-Onciul, Jiri Kuthan (@jiriatipteldotorg).

(1) including any documentation-related commits, excluding merge commits

Documentation

Contributors

Last edited by: Razvan Crainea (@razvancrainea), Bogdan-Andrei Iancu (@bogdan-iancu), Liviu Chircu (@liviuchircu), Walter Doekes (@wdoekes), Ionut Ionita (@ionutrazvanionita), Anca Vamanu, Dror Wald, Dan Pascu (@danpascu), Daniel-Constantin Mierla (@miconda), Konstantin Bokarius, Edson Gellert Schubert, Elena-Ramona Modroiu, Jan Janak (@janakj).

License

All documentation files (i.e. .md extension) are licensed under the Creative Common License 4.0