So I’m starting to get more and more annoyed with this stupid pop-up that comes along every day or so that wants to “update” my Apple software. All because I installed the Quicktime viewer, which is practically required to do anything video related on the internet. If it were just trying to update Quicktime, I’d be ok with it, but it isn’t.
The updater has checked BY DEFAULT to install itunes and Safari, as well as updating Quicktime!
Bad Apple! BAD!
I don’t want Safari. I have no interest in Safari. I don’t want iTunes either. Installing one product of yours DOES NOT mean I want the whole rest of your catalog installed with a single click. Get rid of it.
]]>Table of contents for Quest for an IP-PBX
- The Quest for an IP-PBX, Part the First
- The Quest for an IP-PBX, Part the Second
Having laid out my needs and wants in a IP-PBX here, let’s take a look at the platforms themselves, shall we? For the sake of convenience, I’ll divide them into No-Cost and Cost sections.
In the No-Cost section we have basic Asterisk, trixbox CE, trixbox Pro Standard, and PBX-In-A-Flash. By “No-Cost” I mean that the IP-PBX software won’t cost you anything. You still have to provide server hardware to run the system and buy all the phones and such, but you won’t incur any software costs. Digium (who owns the Asterisk brand now) distributes an official Asterisk package for free.
While you can certainly install Asterisk on your favorite Linux distro, and there’s nothing wrong with that at all, I was looking for more of an all-in-one install. I wanted to download an ISO, burn it to CD, drop it in the drive and go. AsteriskNOW is the basically that, using rPath linux and vanilla Asterisk. It’s as close to a basic Linux+Asterisk as anything and that’s probably why I felt the least comfortable with it. I think it’s a great platform, and hugely extensible. Someone with more familiarity with both Linux and Asterisk could probably make better use of it than me. Sadly, my Nix-Fu is weak.
My second freebie that I tested was trixbox CE. Formerly called Asterisk@Home, trixbox CE is owned by Fonality (makers of trixbox pro, reviewed later here). While I have concerns with the tone taken by Fonality’s devs and officers on various forums and blogs, I cannot fault the product itself. Installation is a breeze, and the admin interface is well laid out. I had no problems provisioning my test phones (Aastra 9133i’s). It even auto-provisioned them after I set one DHCP parameter. There are a few weird items of mention. The package manager cannot be accessed without logging into the trixbox forums. This necessitates creating a user on the trixbox forums as well. Not a huge deal, but an odd choice to be sure. I really liked HUDlite, the desktop control application. Really really slick. While ended up choosing another option for my business needs, this is the one I have installed at home now, because it was the easiest to configure and expand for other uses at home (SMB file server).
Next up was trixbox Pro. trixbox Pro (yes, trixbox is always all smallcase) is a weird bird, compared with all the other options. Fonality pitches it as a “Hybrid-hosted” system. Without getting into the details of hosted systems vs. on-site systems, lets just say that “hybrid-hosted” is very accurate and that, like many hybrids, trixbox Pro has most of the benefits and disadvantages of both parents. before installing you create an account with trixbox.com. After the install is done, the server connects via VPN to Fonality’s datacenter. While the server functions as a local server (call handling, trunk connections, etc. etc.), all administration is done through a web control panel at cp.trixbox.com. There are obvious security concerns with this type of setup (my biggest being the possiblility of a rogue trixbox employee nuking things), there are some very real strengths to it as well. Backups of configuration are automatic. Restores are also nearly automatic. Being a remote tech/admin for trixbox Pro is a cinch, since all admin is done remotely anyway. In case of a blowed-up server, simply replace the hardware, drop in the trixbox pro CD, type in your username and password at the prompt (post-install) and watch the config synchronize. Remote extensions are also a breeze, due to the built-in VPN. While I eventually chose a fully on-premise solution, I could see this as a strong contender for a consultant or reseller. FYI, if your site’s internet connection is down, the tbPro server continues to function as normal. you just cannot make config changes until the Internet comes back up. In the case of network topography changes (IP range change, gateway address change or some other local change in Internet access) there is a limited command-line interface to change these settings.
Last on the list was supposed to be PBX-In-A-Flash. I picked this up after reading a few things at nerdvittles.com. It looks pretty cool, but sadly I could never get it past the install. I couldn’t figure out how to administer the thing, so I moved on.
That’s all for the No-Cost options that I tried. Next up are the Costly options.
]]>Table of contents for Quest for an IP-PBX
- The Quest for an IP-PBX, Part the First
- The Quest for an IP-PBX, Part the Second
I’ve been working for the past couple of months on putting together an Asterisk IP-PBX for the purpose of replacing my company’s aging traditional PBX system. Briefly, for those unfamiliar with the concept, an IP-PBX does everything a normal PBX system does, but it talks to the phones over your data network using TCP/IP. There are IP-PBX systems made by Cisco and Shoretel and a few others that are quite impressive but they tend to be either expensive or extremely expensive.
So I’ve turned to Asterisk. Asterisk is an Open Source IP-PBX built on top of Linux. Like most platforms built on Linux, you have a wealth of options to choose from when putting together your own system, to the point that I am lost most of the time. So far, I’ve looked at trixbox (CE and Pro), PBX-in-a-Flash, AsteriskNOW, Druid ECS, and Thirdlane Advantage.
My ultimate plan for this is to replace all our PBX’s for all 5 sites with a comprehensive system with some key features. Least Cost Routing is a must. I have to be able to route calls from any extension at any site out of the most efficient (cheapest) trunk. I have one site in remote Northern California and the call rates out of there are killing me. Line Failover is another must-have. The copper going into one of my sites is TERRIBLE. We have regular outages on either the voice PRI or the data T-1, though neither at the same time. Auto-provisioning Phones is nearly a must, I don’t want to be hand-configuring phones. Reliable Support is the last. Whether it’s paid support from the vendor or an active community of Open Source people, I need to know I can go to someone to ask questions when I get lost.
I have a couple of desired-but-not-needed features in mind too. 4-digit dial between sites, Outlook integration for dial-by-name, telecommuter extensions, fax support. Those are just icing though.
This has gotten too long, so I’ll break it up into a few pieces. Stay tuned…..
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What is perhaps not obvious are the zip-ties suspending the switch from the bottom of the box. *sigh* I’ll get it mounted, eventually.
I promise.
]]>That Number is One.
]]>I can’t believe I never posted this before, but I went to reference it and couldn’t find it. So, if you’ve heard this before, I’m sorry for being repetitious.
Sometime a number of years back, about the time we were getting ITDiscuss kicked off, a few of us were sitting around a table talking about network monitoring (bandwidth issues) and what tools we used. There was a lot of silence. Then somebody (may have been me) sheepishly admitted “I watch the blinkey lights.” Kind of similar to the Roundtable discussion on network monitoring regarding “a lot of calls tells you things are really bad,” we sort of all came to the same conclusion — we look at our switches and use a highly scientific method of determining network traffic:
- If the lights are all off, that’s bad
- If the lights are on solid, that’s also bad
- If the lights are blinking, not too fast, not too slow, then that’s good
Do you use the “blinkey light” method of monitoring your network utilization?
http://tonydye.typepad.com/main/2006/10/blinking_lights.html
To sum up:
-
If the lights are all off, that’s bad
- If the lights are on solid, that’s also bad
- If the lights are blinking, not too fast, not too slow, then that’s good