Digium claims to have logged “tens of thousands of hours of Skype-to-Asterisk communication”. They’ve also learned a lot about “the art of connecting Asterisk to with the Skype global network”. The post then goes on to provide more details of the forthcoming offering:

The SFA product will be the only solution that integrates Asterisk directly with Skype. This is not a “proxy” solution and the call quality will be superior to anything else on the market. Customers will have the ability to make, receive and transfer Skype calls from within Asterisk phone systems, using existing hardware and existing Asterisk configurations: Skype calls become just another Asterisk call.

Some of the features that will be supported in the market release are:

1. SkypeIn: Receive calls from the public telephone network using standard phone numbers

2. SkypeOut: Make calls to landline and mobile numbers at incredibly low rates

3. Standard phone features: Incoming/outgoing digits (DTMF), Caller ID

4. Smart call routing based on called Skype Name, Caller ID, country of the caller, language they have chosen in their Skype client and etc.

5. Retrieve Skype credit balance information

6. Store and call PSTN and Skype contacts

7. Retrieve and set Skype user presence information

8. Support for G.711 and G.729 voice codecs

9. Each Skype channel license includes a Digium G.729 codec license

 

Click Here to Continue Reading

Posted by Dal at 12:03 PM | Direct Link | TrackBacks (0) Posted to Asterisk News

The Asterisk.org development team is proud to announce the release of Asterisk 1.6.0.6. This release is available for download from http://downloads.digium.com/.

This release is a significant bug fix update for the 1.6.0 release series.

In addition, this release is recommended for all users of the Asterisk GUI. Two issues with the manager interface have been resolved. The first being with the manager interface improperly handling async. requests from the GUI (see issue #14364). It resulted in manager session file descriptors being improperly destroyed and overwritten. The other being an issue with the Originate action that would cause issues with the GUI. They have both been resolved in this release.

The following list of bugs were resolved with the participation of the community, and this release would not have been possible without your help!

* Set the initiator attribute to lowercase in our replies when receiving calls. This attribute contains a JID that identifies the initiator of the GoogleTalk voice session. The GoogleTalk client discards Asterisk's replies if the
initiator attribute contains uppercase characters.
- Closes issue #13984. Submitted and tested by: jcovert

* Fix odd "thank you" sound playing behavior in app_queue.c
- Closes issue #14227. Reported and tested by: caspy

* Don't do an SRV lookup if a port is specified RFC 3263 says to do A record lookups on a hostname if a port has been specified, so that's what we're going to do. See section 4.2.
- Closes issue #14419. Reported and patched by: klaus3000

* Properly set "seen" and "unseen" flags when moving messages from the new to the old folder when using IMAP for voicemail storage.
- Closes issue #13905. Reported and patched by: jaroth

* Fix devicestate problems for "always-on" agent channels.
- Closes issue #14173. Reported by: nathan. Tested by: nathan, aramirez

For a full list of changes, see the ChangeLog:

http://svn.digium.com/svn-view/asterisk/tags/1.6.0.6/ChangeLog?view=co

Thank you for your support of Asterisk!

Posted by Dal at 12:00 PM | Direct Link | TrackBacks (0) Posted to Asterisk Releases

As a last important change, we now support the Oreka recording solution as an audio storage medium. This will be loved by those of you running the largest Asterisk deployments, who will be able to factor out call recordings from the main Asterisk server.

There is also a long list of new features and bugs fixed that should make this release interesting for most of you.  This release works with the same activation keys you used on your current version of QueueMetrics.  As always, we value your feedback on how to improve QueueMetrics to make it a better fit to your needs.

Enjoy the update

New features:
- #498: QueueMetrics is now able to track lost outbound calls and will show outbound calls correctly as they are being placed in the Realtime page.
- #586: Qloaderd tool lets you do partial upload of older queue_log data
- #632: It is now possible to use Oreka for audio recordings.
- #605: Now officially using the PolyVox translator's portal
- #612: QM supports AMI version 1.1 for Asterisk 1.6
- #633: New XML-RPC call to export audio files for a given call.
- #575: Broadcast messages are now shown on the Agent's page.
- #576: AGAW information (if present) will now be displayed on the Agent's page
- #577: URLs can be launched automatically from the Agent's page
- #582: Agents can have a visibility key - useful to fully partition QM for multi-tenant systems
- #619: On the Agent's page it is now possible to do logins to all queues at once using ADDMEMBER. Useful for Asterisk 1.6.
- #620: Assisted outbound dialing on the Agent's page
- #621: Custom buttons that can lanch extenal URLs or trigger dialplan functions added to the Agent's page.
- #600: All dialplan hooks of QM now receive the login of the user performing the call - useful for auditing

Click Here for Information

Posted by Dal at 11:03 AM | Direct Link | TrackBacks (0) Posted to Asterisk Software

Marymount High School in Los Angeles has recently deployed Xirrus 802.11n WiFi arrays campus-wide as it prepares to roll out a new 1:1 computer initiative.

The independent, all-girls Catholic high school will utilize the new wireless network throughout its 6.5-acre campus to support a rage of wireless educational tools. The deployment is aimed at giving the school increased flexibility without diminishing the overall power of the network.

Posted by Dal at 10:55 AM | Direct Link | TrackBacks (0) Posted to WiFi / Wireless

According to Polycom, its HDX 4000 and associated infrastructure solutions support a more efficient decision-making process without the need for extensive travel.

Daimler Trucks selected Polycom to cut cost and improve efficiency. With many of the board members and directors being geographically dispersed at different locations worldwide, the systems are expected to pay quickly for themselves when executives choose to avoid international trips and elect to use video instead.

Robert Hagerty, president, CEO and chairman of Polycom, said: "Polycom is delighted to see our important customer Daimler embrace visual communication for its ability to reduce operating costs and improve productivity, efficiency and effectiveness of its executives." 

Source:  Automotive Business Review

Posted by Dal at 10:51 AM | Direct Link | TrackBacks (0) Posted to Polycom

Posted by Dal at 10:39 AM | Direct Link | TrackBacks (0) Posted to WiMax Hardware

Posted by Dal at 12:33 PM | Direct Link | TrackBacks (0) Posted to Asterisk Help

The spybiz exec, who preferred to remain anonymous, confirmed that Skype continues to be a major problem for government listening agencies, spooks and police. This was already thought to be the case, following requests from German authorities for special intercept/bugging powers to help them deal with Skype-loving malefactors. Britain's GCHQ has also stated that it has severe problems intercepting VoIP and internet communication in general.

Skype in particular is a serious problem for spooks and cops. Being P2P, the network can't be accessed by the company providing it and the authorities can't gain access by that route. The company won't disclose details of its encryption, either, and isn't required to as it is Europe based. This lack of openness prompts many security pros to rubbish Skype on "security through obscurity" grounds: but nonetheless it remains a popular choice with those who think they might find themselves under surveillance. Rumour suggests that America's NSA may be able to break Skype encryption - assuming they have access to a given call or message - but nobody else.

The NSA may be able to do that: but it seems that if so, this uses up too much of the agency's resources at present.

"They are saying to the industry, you get us into Skype and we will make you a very rich company," said the industry source, adding that the obscure encryption used by the P2Pware is believed to change frequently as part of software updates.

The spyware kingpin suggested that Skype is deliberately seeking to frustrate national listening agencies, which seems an odd thing to do - Skype has difficulties enough getting revenues out of its vast user base at any time, and a paid secure-voice system for subversives doesn't seem like a money-spinner.

But corporate parent eBay, having had to write down $1.4bn already following its $2.6bn purchase of Skype back in the bubble-2.0 days of 2005, might see an opportunity here. A billion or two from the NSA for a backdoor into Skype might make the acquisition seem like a sensible idea.

We asked the NSA for comment, particularly on the idea of simply buying a way into Skype, but hadn't yet received a response as of publication.

Source: The Register 

Posted by Dal at 03:22 PM | Direct Link | TrackBacks (0) Posted to Skype

Of these notes, $2 billion will mature in February 2019 and will bear interest at an annual rate of 4.95 percent, and $2 billion will mature in February 2039 and will bear interest at an annual rate of 5.90 percent.

Cisco said it will use the proceeds from this offering for general corporate purposes and to repay $500 million worth of floating rate notes due this year.

Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, Citigroup, Morgan Stanley and Wachovia acted as bookrunning managers on the transaction.

Copyright 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Source: AP

Posted by Dal at 03:16 PM | Direct Link | TrackBacks (0) Posted to Cisco

Editor Note:   I found this interesting.  According to this source, a satellite communications satellite collided in orbit with a non-functioning Russian satellite.  Ouch.

February 10th , Iridium lost an operational satellite. According to information shared with the company by various U.S. government organizations that monitor satellites and other space objects (such as debris), it appears that the satellite loss is the result of a collision with a non-operational Russian satellite. Although this event has relatively limited impact on Iridium’s service, the company is taking immediate action to address the loss. The Iridium constellation is healthy, and this event is not the result of a failure on the part of Iridium or its technology.

Click Here for More

Link:

Satellite Phone Rental

Posted by Dal at 12:57 PM | Direct Link | TrackBacks (0) Posted to Blogsphere News

  Polycom is introducing a videoconferencing package for small businesses that have low-bandwidth WAN connections. The QDX 6000 system includes a codec, two microphones, a 4CIF standard definition camera, remote control and cables. The gear does not support telepresence, the immersive audio/video technology that creates the illusion participants are sitting across the table from each other.

Posted by Dal at 11:38 AM | Direct Link | TrackBacks (0) Posted to Polycom

Nortel is saying good-bye to its mobile WiMAX business and jumping head-first on the LTE train.  The company is working with Alvarion to transition its joint mobile WiMAX customers to Alvarion. Nortel is not exiting the fixed WiMAX space.

Nortel employs about 500 people to support mobile WiMAX, according to spokesman Ryan Hill, and it’s not clear how many of them might end up at Alvarion. The two companies combined efforts last year to integrate Alvarion’s radio access technology with Nortel’s core network and backhaul solutions.

Posted by Dal at 10:59 AM | Direct Link | TrackBacks (0) Posted to WiMax