Merging Old and New Telephony with Asterisk Greg Vance Digium, Inc. gvance@digium.com
Asterisk a Global Phenomenon Digium Confidential
Digium Confidential What is Asterisk? platform The world s from which most Unified popular Communications Open Source and for VoIP cloud applications or premises-based can be constructed operation
Open Source de facto Standards Function/Application Solution Open Source Operating System Linux Web Server Apache Browser Firefox Telephony/Communications Asterisk Database MySQL Customer Relationship SugarCRM Management Backup Zmanda Productivity Suite Open Office Collaboration Suite Zimbra The Apache Software Foundation http://www.apache.org/ Digium Confidential
Digium Customers
What is Asterisk? Why do I care? The world s most popular open source toolkit from which telephony/communications solutions can be built. Advantages of Asterisk - Cost Effective - Feature-rich - Scalability - Flexibility/Integration - Integration/Customization - Huge community of developers - Standards-based
Digium Confidential Asterisk Statistics 2M+ 83,000+ downloads registered for asterisk.org 2014 68,000+ users members 34,000+ 109,000+ forum forum topics 900+ active contributors posts 9800+ Worldwide developers Asterisk over deployment the lifetime in 170+ of the countries project Dedicated AstriCon Industry for Events: - Asterisk World Asterisk for Business Developers usersand Users Asterconference The Asterisk Community
GPL License Asterisk is license under GPL Version 2 Digium owns Asterisk and we have exclusive right to do what we wish including: Special licenses outside the GPL Create application such as Switchvox Digium Gateways GPL Requires basically: In applications make aware using Asterisk Open Source software Make Source code available to the end user Please consider contributing back to the community your enhancements
Economic Opportunities The global economic situation has opened new doors for Asterisk development Cost savings are at the forefront of most business Asterisk downloads are steadily increasing The number of hits to our web site and people who are registering for more information is increasing Asterisk is still the giant among open source telephony projects
Necessary Skills set Linux knowledge Install, Edit, Manager systems configuration TCP/IP Networking as VoIP requires a network ready set up VoIP and Telephony knowledge Basic understanding of a phone system Networking Script Programming Asterisk using Dial Plan It s own language If you know PHP or Pearl you ll get Dial Plan Dial Plan tell Asterisk what to do with a call Learn Asterisk Management language AMI Allows management from external applications Receives commands, generates responses AGI Allows Asterisk to run external scripts Similar to CGI for web servers, allows programs to be written in any language
Where Asterisk Fits
Most Popular applications SMB IPPBX Call Center Applications Many custom made call centers developed under various names Asterisk does well, auto-attendant and IVR functions ACD, Asterisk does great call routing 3rd party applicants exist for Call Accounting 3rd party applications for predictive Dialer 3rd party applications for Carrier applications Media Servers IVR applications, Meet me Conference, Voicemail Gateways Hosted PBX solutions Call card application
So Flexible you can create anything New York University created a application when the plants need water they dial out and leave a message to the graduate students Peer to Peer phones systems in disaster recovery Low Cost call solutions for off site oil rigs In Africa use Asterisk on bicycle powered server to communicate via wireless network to other villages So much more to mention
Options Asterisk Opens Source from Scratch www.asterisk.org AsteriskNow www.asterisknow.org Linux distribution with Asterisk and an open source GUI (FreePBX). Makes it easy to get started Locate a packaged PBX or other application Switchvox Elastix FreePBX (www. Schmoozecom.com) PBX In A Flash Many others in the market Where can I find these apps??
Asterisk 12 Standard (release Oct.) Asterisk 13 Long Term Release (2014) Open Source Asterisk 11 Long Term Asterisk 1.6.x.x. Standard Asterisk 1.8.x.x Long Term Asterisk 10.x.x Standard Feat ures Fe at ur es Asterisk 1.4 Long Term Started Feature Freezes Only Bug fixes Asterisk 1.2 Asterisk Trunk First Release 0.1.0 Was December 5, 1999 Asterisk 1.0 was released in 2004 At the First Astricon event
Release Cycle Alternating between Standard and LTS releases Long Term Support (LTS) release will be fully supported for 4 years, with one additional year of maintenance for security fixes Standard Release : Standard releases are supported for a short period of time, which will be at least one year of full support and an additional year of maintenance for security fixes. What should I use: If you're not sure which one to use, choose either the latest release for the most up to date features, or the latest LTS release for a platform that may have less features, but will usually be around longer.
AsteriskNOW AsteriskNOW makes it easy to create custom telephony solutions It's a complete Linux distribution with Asterisk, the DAHDI driver framework Who Supports AsteriskNOW There is an active community of AsteriskNOW users, integrators and developers who provide community support on the AsteriskNOW Administrative GUI support is provided by FreePBX. Digium offers commercial support for the Asterisk and DAHDI components of AsteriskNOW.
FreePBX by Smoozecom
AsteriskNOW.com
VoIP Opportunities are on the Future
Traditional vs. VoIP Voice Over Internet Protocol Traditional Voice Uses a dedicated link between callers Constant link is required even when there is no sound Voice Over IP (VoIP) Technology that turns voice signals into data Already used by carriers Only requires link to send actual sound
IP Telephony Adoption Leading analysts predict VoIP adoption among businesses will continue to increase rapidly over the next few years, reaching 52% growth between 2010-2014, IP PBX market will reach $9.05B by 2015 Businesses expect to increase their phone extensions at a slightly higher-than-normal growth rate over the next 2 years (15%), which can be attributed to hiring and growing following the recession Virtually all future growth in phone extensions will come from IP platforms, whether hosted or customer-owned 2. Gartner Group 3. TEQConsult Group
Current Analysis 2011
Digium Custom Telephony Solution Products Software and Hardware to create a telephony solution or application
Points of Interest Digium is market share leader with over 6 million ports shipped First analog card shipped was the, 1 port FX0 X100P Designed and shipped the first Asterisk Interface cards in 2001: Tormenta 2 T400P Writing drivers was a
In the Beginning, The Big Bang Creators and primary developer of Asterisk Open Source Software. Product line is developed and optimized to work with Asterisk and it s open source drivers No need to obtain and maintain third party drivers as needed with other cards. Before we release changes to DAHDI drivers we test our cards first. Other vendors have to catch up to our modifications
DAHDI Drivers DAHDI (Digium/Asterisk Hardware Device Interface) DAHDI Linux is the open source device driver Interfaces Asterisk with telephony hardware. DAHDI Tools is a package of utilities for managing and monitoring DAHDI devices Digium developed the analog signaling and digital line-signaling library used by the Digium cards (as well as competitive cards). If there is a problem between the cards and the protocol stack or signaling then Digium is uniquely capable to resolve it. Digium fixes the bugs in DAHDI so other card manufactures depend on us.
Testing Digium cards have been heavily tested in all the major server hardware platforms, such as Dell, HP, and IBM. Digium cards also work in a variety of hardware platforms with chipsets including AMD, Intel, VIA, Nvidia, etc Digium cards have
Asterisk Telephony Cards E1 Digital Cards 1,2,4 and 8 Ports Analog Cards 4,8,24 port
Echo Cancellation Modules Echo Cancellation in Hardware takes the load off the PC to accomplish other tasks Echo Cancellation Module for any Digium card From 32-256 channels Analog T1/E1 PRI 128ms (1024 taps) of Echo Cancellation G.168 Compliant Digium Confidential
Fake Cards Digium Confidential
Gateways
E1 Gateways Designed and built by Digium No moving parts Asterisk based Easy to use GUI Interface No Additional Licenses Support: G.729, G.711 (Coding Support for A-law and μ-law) G.722, G.729,GSM-FR, G.726 Digium Gateways 1,2,4,and 8 port E1 GW
VoIP Provider (SIP) to Legacy PBX (T1/PRI) T1/E1 (up to 8) SIP
Legacy PBX to IP PBX Migration SIP
Seeing is Believing Gateway On Line Demo Here: http://gatewaytestdrive.digium.com/login/
Asterisk Phones for Easy Deployment and Robust Features
Digium Phones D70 D50 D45 D40
Digium Phones Easy Setup & Provisioning Voicemail App Smart BLFs Call Queues App with Voicemail Screening Contacts App Phone App Engine Status App
Switchvox Demo End-User Experience Admin Interface Admin Interface Switchboard Productivity Tool Mobility Digium Phones User Interface Manage Extensions Phone Apps Reporting
Let s Partner for Success Partner for success Apply here: www.digium.com/en/partners/ap plication