jana1972 at centrum.cz
2010-Oct-20 07:22 UTC
[asterisk-users] Is Asterix right tool for me?
Hi , I am a newbie with Asterix and not sure if Asterix is a right tool for my needs. Let's suppose this scenario : I have a telephone line in one office( all calls are paid to telephone operator). In other offices I have only internet connections. Is it possible to use Asterix so that I can make telephone calls from ALL offices( without direct telecom connection) ? if so, what telephone equipment would they have to use (VoIP telephones?) Thanks Jane
In short terms: 1)broadband internet connection 2) Voip phone like a Cisco 7960 3) Sip Trunks from a SIP Trunk provider Thats a short list of what you will need, but you could ditch your local Telcom operator completely, and run VOIP. There are much more knowledgable people about the subject matter than me, but this should at least get you started! Good luck and Welcome to Asterisk! James "I see blindness, not as a disability, but more of an ability. And Sight actually, more of a disability because some people with sight tend to judge others by what they see on the outside, whereas I don't see that. I just see that which is in a person." Patrick Henry Hughes, Louisville Kentucky,2008 On Wed, Oct 20, 2010 at 03:22, <jana1972 at centrum.cz> wrote:> Hi , > I am a newbie with Asterix and not sure if Asterix is a right tool for my > needs. > > Let's suppose this scenario : > I have a telephone line in one office( all calls are paid to telephone > operator). > In other offices I have only internet connections. > Is it possible to use Asterix so that I can make telephone calls from ALL > offices( without > direct telecom connection) ? if so, what telephone equipment would they > have to use (VoIP > telephones?) > > Thanks > Jane > > > -- > _____________________________________________________________________ > -- Bandwidth and Colocation Provided by http://www.api-digital.com -- > New to Asterisk? Join us for a live introductory webinar every Thurs: > http://www.asterisk.org/hello > > asterisk-users mailing list > To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users >-------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.digium.com/pipermail/asterisk-users/attachments/20101020/a700c1de/attachment.htm
> Hi , > I am a newbie with Asterix and not sure if Asterix is a right tool for my needs. > > Let's suppose this scenario : > I have a telephone line in one office( all calls are paid to telephone operator). > In other offices I have only internet connections. > Is it possible to use Asterix so that I can make telephone calls from ALL offices( without > direct telecom connection) ? if so, what telephone equipment would they have to use (VoIP > telephones?)Yes, indeed, Asterisk can give you this capability. There are several different approaches which can be used - which one you choose will depend on your needs. You'll need to equip your office users with VoIP telephones. These can be either dedicated IP-capable phones (usually running the "SIP" voice protocols), or "softphone" software packages running on their PCs (again, implementing SIP). Dedicated "hard" IP phones can be had for anywhere from $50 on up. Softphone programs range from completely free to significant amount of money, depending on what capabilities you want. Simple ones will emulate a one-line phone (often with a built-in contact list and autodialer) while more complex ones can emulate a multi-line business phone. You would probably want to equip each PC with a handset or headset of some sort rather than depending on the built- in microphone and speaker. USB-connected handsets are widely available; they're usually marketed as being for Skype, but most of them simply register as USB audio devices and will thus work with almost any soft-phone. You'll want at least one system running Asterisk, to act as the "hub" for your offices. If you have a large number of users in a particular office, and if they will wish to phone one another within the office or working region, it may make sense to place an Asterisk server in that office so that phone-to-phone traffic stays within the office and doesn't have to travel over the public Internet... this will reduce voice latency (delay) and perhaps reduce your Internet bandwidth costs. Each "hard" or "soft" IP phone will register with one of the Asterisk servers, so that it can receive calls through that server. Urgent advice: assign each such phone a unique, difficult-to-guess username (*not* just the extension number you are planning to assign to it) and assign it a *very* difficult- to-guess "secret" (password). Long, randomly-generated strings of letters, digits, and symbols make the best secrets. You *really* do not want somebody from outside your system to be able to guess a phone's username and password, or they'll be able to make calls overseas for which *you* will be financially responsible (this can be a *very* expensive problem if you don't take care!) As to getting back onto the PSTN (public switched telephone network), there are several different approaches you can take. As others have suggested, the best is probably to purchase a SIP account from one of the many different VoIP providers available. Prices, services, and quality vary. You'll probably be best off picking one which is known to provide good service in your area, and has an Internet-to-PSTN interchange switch close to you (network-wise). This SIP provider can do two things for you: - They can accept outbound SIP calls from your Asterisk server (and/or directly from your IP phones) and route these calls onto the PSTN. This is what you'll want to do, in order to allow your offices that have only Internet connections to make phone calls. - They can provide you with any number of PSTN phone numbers, (in your own country or elsewhere) and route calls to these numbers to your Asterisk server. Phones in your Internet-connected offices could make calls out to the PSTN via any of several methods: - They could place calls directly to the SIP provider's servers. This would have the least latency and overhead, but the worst security problems (every phone would have to have an authorized account with the provider, or share a single outbound account and secret... not a good idea). - They could register with, and then place calls through your organization's main (or only) Asterisk server. The server can restrict call destinations on a per-phone basis if necessary, provide centralized logging, etc. - Offices which have their own Asterisk server, could place calls through that server and out to the SIP provider, rather than going through the main company server. This would provide somewhat better delay and call quality in many cases, and still give you a limited number of somewhat-centralized servers which would manage call security and authorization.