The SNOM 360 is a linux based hardphone, the linux kernel comes in a seperate file from the root filesystem and the software application for the phone is in its own file. I’m no expert but this seems to be a perfect platform for hacking and firmware mods. Sounds like it would be as easy as hacking the linksys wrt54g. MORE TO COME!
Reply from IronHelix:
I question how much this phone can be hacked. I haven’t looked at any SNOM GPL repositories but I don’t think there’d need to be much there. As per the GPL they have to release source code they distribute, which means the Linux kernel/tools/etc they use for the phone’s OS, filesystem, and possibly bootloader. However the rest I’d assume is a custom application written on top of linux, the application that speaks SIP, interfaces with the keypad/display/audio/etc, and if this is a custom app then it may not be GPL and thus no source would be required. I could of course be wrong, I haven’t looked at any SNOM licensing agreements lately.
What can almost definately be done- rewrite the app that runs on the phone. This may be tricky though…
–iH
Reply from the 0cpm project:
The problem of rewriting an app is a general one. Have a look at http://devel.0cpm.org/firmerware/ for our project (in progress) that implements firmware for SIP phones. It is “left as an exercise to the reader” to crack any particular phone other than initial/demo models, but once in, there is an app to put on it. This firmerware has a large, generic “top half” application that relies on a simple API implemented by drivers in a “bottom half”. Although it is possible, the firmware is not built to run on Linux but instead it runs as a single app. Phones are not that complicated, and the cheaper / energy efficient models have very little memory available, it would be a shame to forget about such phones.
Linux and uClinux are GPL — that means that any device based on them (and that’s quite a few nowadays) must provide a toolchain to go from source code to a firmware image. Also, such phones must make firmware upgrades openly accessible to any user. If not, use the information on http://gpl-violations.org/
The problem that remains is that most phone manufacturers think of their chips as so innovative (yeah, even though it is just a phone!) that datasheets cannot be openly shared with application developers. They may require an NDA to be signed, and may not release all code for linkage into an open source application, thereby making it impossible to distribute a solution under a GPL license — except when making it a process on something like a uClinux system.
-Rick
June 27, 2013
Phone System 