Asterisk VoIP News

Apple iPad:The Missing Features

2010-01-27T21:44:14Z

There’s no doubt that the upcoming Apple iPad will kick the asses of all netbooks, tablet PCs, and e-readers, but it’s by far the perfect unit that we had hoped for from Apple. But then again, neither was the original iPhone.

How could it have been better?

Here’s a list of things we felt strongly about. Post yours in the comments section below. Please keep the tampon jokes to a minimum.

]]> - No camera. Video conference calls over Skype or iChat with a front-facing hidden iSight camera would have been a killer feature. Apple did announce 30-pin connector accessories like an external keyboard, however there’s been no mention of an external video capture device. Hopefully something is in the works. I personally feel they should have held off the launch of this until a built-in camera was available. #1 feature, completely missed — and will keep many from not buying. As Spock would say, this is quite illogical.

- No phone. There’s 3G support, but no phone support? Perhaps VOIP is the answer.

- AT&T only? The love/hate relationship between Apple and AT&T continues. Why, man, why?

- Picture frame. What’s the deal with the humongo black frame? My guess is usability tests showed that it was necessary (the way users held the iPad), but it sure doesn’t look as slick as if the screen met up with the edge of the case.

- Mobile Safari still doesn’t support Flash. I suspect Apple’s mobile devices will be the death of Flash, and maybe that’s their intent? As a web developer myself, I avoid Flash or have to disable Flash for mobile devices for this very reason.

- Multitasking. There’s still no multi-tasking support with the iPhone operating system. Yikes!

- Storage. 64GB is the best they could do? What about support for network drives, memory expansion, or even tossing in a small hard drive?

- Battery. Like all Apple products these days, there’s no way to change the battery. A trend that nobody likes except for Apple.

And finally, I’m a bit bummed that there was no mention at all about an iPhone update, or at the very least — an iPhone OS update. I realize that an hour and a half on the iPad left little time to discuss anything else–but it’s been a long while since we’ve had an iPhone or iPod Touch OS update. Throw us a bone, Stevie-baby!

Apple iPad Specs

Source: AppModo

Digium launches 'app store' for the Asterisk PBX

2010-01-27T21:40:30Z

Ever since Apple adapted their wildly successfull iTunes music store to sell apps for the iPhone, technology vendors everywhere have been trying to find opportunities to replicate the innovation. Now Digium is launching AsteriskExchange--while not quite a true app store--it's a marketplace and reviews site for Asterisk's open source community.

]]> The website will serve as a hub for the Asterisk open-source VoIP community including a place for users to review applications and phones. Developers can get exposure for their Asterisk-based applications and users can get the purchase info right from the site.

At the moment it looks like AsteriskExchange is not actually doing any selling itself, but instead directs users to vendor sites who sell the products. The site has a number of tabs including a 'most popular' tab. Currently, the Bria softphone app is at the top of the list, but with no reviews or star ratings yet, I am not sure how they are determining the popularity. It will be interesting in the future to see what apps end up the top of the list when more users access the site.

Unlike other app stores, AsteriskExchange also includes some hardware that you can learn about, review, and connect to sellers to get your equipement. Clicking on the Snom 360 deskphone will bring to an info page and an offsite link to 'Buy Now.'

For more:
- read this article from Connected Planet

CounterPath Introduces Bria for Asterisk (SIP / VoIP Softphone Client)

2010-01-25T19:57:43Z

CounterPath and Digium recently launched Bria for Asterisk, a co-branded VoIP softphone solution that’s pre-integrated with the open source Asterisk platform. Todd Carothers, vice president of product management at CounterPath, says the idea was to start by simply bringing the Bria Professional enterprise-grade softphone to Asterisk in as straightforward a manner as possible. "We’ve done interoperability testing against the Asterisk platform, particularly from a Digium perspective—and we have IM, video and presence available for the solution," he says.

]]> For CounterPath, Carothers says, this is an excellent opportunity to work with the large and diverse Asterisk community. "They’re still very uniquely positioned in the market, where they bring that diversity… so we can bridge our feature-rich product that we have today to other areas of the market that we don’t reach with vertically integrated types of solutions," he says.

The next step, Carothers says, will be to see what else the market needs and wants from the product. "What we’re going to do is get more deeply involved in the Asterisk community to bring out… the very specific applications that the Asterisk community supports… so you’re going to see future releases from CounterPath that are going to leverage that community to get a best of breed product that that community will enjoy," he says.

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Apple Tablet "iSlate" Broadband Carrier Comparison

2010-01-25T19:46:22Z

With news that Apple's new tablet computer could be available on both Verizon and AT&T's networks, the question becomes which carrier will offer users more bang for their bucks. Let's start with overall 3G coverage, where Verizon uses a CDMA-based EV-DO Rev. A network and AT&T uses a GSM-based HSPA network. As you probably know through Verizon's gleeful pummeling of AT&T with its "There's a Map for That" ads, AT&T's 3G network covers far less area than Verizon's.

]]> But there are more factors to be taken into account than simple scope of coverage. When it comes to average data speeds, a recent Root Wireless study found that AT&T had higher average 3G data speeds than Verizon in Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, New York, Seattle, San Francisco and Washington, D.C. Overall, AT&T's average 3G data speeds ranged from a low of 246Kbps in New York and a high of 428Kbps in Dallas.

Verizon, meanwhile, had average 3G speeds ranging from 195Kbps in Seattle to 259Kbps in Chicago. The study also found that both carriers had comparably low rates of 3G connectivity failure, as each carrier's connection failure averaged between 1% and 3% for all seven cities.

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General Dynamics Receives NSA Certification for Sectera vIPer Phone with PSTN Support

2010-01-05T18:40:47Z

The National Security Agency (NSA) has certified the Sectera vIPer Universal Secure Phone enabled with Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) connectivity for voice communications classified at the Top Secret level and below.

The Sectera vIPer Phone with PSTN Connect allows U.S. military and government personnel to make both classified and unclassified calls using traditional telephone networks via one high-end office desktop phone. The Sectera vIPer Phone is a secure communication product manufactured by General Dynamics C4 Systems, a business unit of General Dynamics.

]]> "The certification makes the vIPer Phone with PSTN Connect a cost-effective solution as users will no longer have support and maintenance of their legacy Secure Telephone Units or STU-IIIs," said John Cole, vice president of Information Assurance for General Dynamics C4 Systems. "PSTN and VoIP network flexibility, combined with the vIPer Phone's interoperability with the government's Secure Terminal Equipment (STE), also enables customers to easily transition to the latest technology."

Introduced in 2006, the Sectera vIPer Phone remains the only Voice over IP Phone certified by the NSA to protect voice communications classified Top Secret and below over commercial, wired VoIP networks. As military and government organizations plan for evolving technology and the replacement of end-of-life STU-III phones, General Dynamics is offering a price discount of $200 for each vIPer Phone ordered to replace a deployed STU-III or STE phone.

General Dynamics C4 Systems is a leading integrator of secure communication and information systems and technology.

General Dynamics, headquartered in Falls Church, Va., employs approximately 92,300 people worldwide. The company is a market leader in business aviation; land and expeditionary combat systems, armaments and munitions; shipbuilding and marine systems; and information systems and technologies. More information about General Dynamics is available online at www.gd.com.

DataJack launches USB modem with $40/month unlimited 3G data plans

2010-01-05T18:35:49Z

If you want a USB modem that will provide mobile broadband access in the US, you’ll usually have to sign up for a 2 year contract and commit to paying $60 per month for up to 5GB of data transfers. Or, you can sign up for a new DataJack modem which costs about $100 up front and $40 per month thereafter for unlimited data. Oh yeah, and there’s no contract, so you could use the service for a month or two, cancel it, and then sign up again half a year later.

]]> On paper, DataJack has me second guessing my recent decision to pick up a CLEAR WiMAX modem. That’s especially true since while my mobile WiMAX modem works great, the home modem isn’t as fast as the DSL service I was hoping to replace, so I’m thinking of canceling the home service which means I’d end up paying as much as $45/month for WiMAX service that only works in a handful of cities when I could be paying $40/month for 3G data service that is available nationwide.

But this time I think I’ll try not to be the early adopter and wait to see how well the service works for others before signing up.

Source: Chip Chick

Cisco Files to Patent to Enter the Search Engine Business

2009-12-30T23:06:26Z

Editor's Note: Here's a novel idea, maybe there are websites that people want to be private and if they wanted the search engines to know about them then they would let them know. I think Cisco is making a pretty big assumption here. I would rather see the search engines themselves deploy this gear in their datacenters and use it for people doing searches on their indexes and use that data to do inclusions if at all. But I would not like to see this as a new standard deployed everywhere.

One of the limitations of search engines such as Google (GOOG) or Microsoft’s (MSFT) Bing that crawl the web looking for links is that they can only tell you about what they’ve finally come upon. That still leaves vast amounts of material as yet to be “discovered.” A patent application from Cisco (CSCO) suggests a clever way to help update the engines — and to make a manufacturer of network equipment an important part of yet another industry.

]]> In June 2008, Cisco filed a patent application yet to be granted but published by the US Patent and Trademark Office on December 17, 2009. The title is Seeding search engine crawlers using intercepted network traffic. As the application notes, a web-crawling search engine has a basic limitation: it cannot index sites of which it doesn’t yet know. Furthermore, it may never be able to reach pages that have not been introduced, either by direct input or by being connected to its existing structure of web pages, known as a web-graph.

And yet, people still use these pages. Cisco’s claimed invention is to have network equipment such as “routers, multilayer switches or any other suitable device” examine data packets for HTTP requests that appear when a network user is looking to reach a resource on the web. The devices would strip out the URLs and pass them to the search engine, which would now know about the page and be able to add the new-to-it site to the web-graph.

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VoIP racket busted and equipment seized

2009-12-29T20:08:43Z

KATHMANDU: An investigation team dispatched from Metropolitan Police Crime Division raided a well-equipped underground call centre in Ravibhawan and arrested a racketeer for his involvement in flouting telecommunication laws recently.

The accused Anwar Hussein (24), who hails from Kolkata-24 Porguna, India, and his two accomplices were found to be operating VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) from a rented three-storey building, illegally blocking Nepal Telecom’s gateway, thus inflicting a loss of millions. While, the other accused, Bharat Lal Shrestha (27), hailing from Chaugada-3, Nuwakot, and another named Raju are at large. Raju’s details were still sketchy.

]]> SSP Rana Bahadur Chand, in-charge, MPCD, revealed that the threesome had been using the SIM cards bearing numbers — 9807020501, 9803811605 and 9841467386 — registered in the name of Raju, who goes by his single name.

The police also recovered an eight-lined CDMA wireless adaptor, a Euro Tech Communication’s 32-lined capacity GSM VoIP, a GSM VoIP Gateway equipment, a UPS, a wireless broadband internet antenna, extension codes, a requester, 300 recharge cards, a laptop, a desktop, mobile phone sets and 209 Mero Mobile SIM cards, among others.

The seized properties are said to be worth over Rs 10 million. Anwar has been handed over to Metropolitan Police Range, Hanumandhoka.

What is VOIP Gateway?

Call by-passers make use of VoIP GSM Gateway to divert international rings from the official gateway. The call is then transferred to the telecom subscribers through a GSM SIM card. The ISD then displays a personal caller ID on the receiver’s gadget. VoIP has always been a headache for telecom service providers in the country. As per the Telecommunications Act, 2053, any person convicted of posing threat to telecommunications systems and service can face a fine equal to the principal amount of loss caused or sentence up to five years in prison or both.

VoIP uses broadband Internet for routing phone calls, unlike conventional switching and fibre-optic alternatives.

Source: Himalayan Times

Asterisk PBX 1.6.1.12 Now Available

2009-12-18T23:08:23Z

The Asterisk Development Team has announced the release of Asterisk PBX 1.6.1.12.

This release is available for immediate download at
http://downloads.asterisk.org/pub/telephony/asterisk/

The release of Asterisk 1.6.1.12 resolved several issues reported by the community, and would have not been possible without your participation. Thank you!

* Fix multiple issues with musiconhold, which led to classes not getting
   destroyed properly.
   (closes issues #16279, #16207), reported by: parisioa, dcabot, patched by:
   tilghman, tested by: parisioa, tilghman

* Fix compatibility with valgrind 3.3 and older.
   (noticed in issue #16388), reported by: parisioa, patched by: atis, tested
   by: atis, parisioa

* Prevent double closing of FDs by EIVR
   (closes issue #16305), reported by: diLLec, patched, tested by: thedavidfactor

* Send ack (response/message) after receiving manager action userevent
   (closes issue #16264), reported, patched by: dimas

* Make manager response to "Action: events" finish with empty line
   (closes issue #16275), reported, patched by: vnovy

This release also contains significant improvements to T.38 support. Anyone who has tried T.38 faxing in the past should try again as most problems should now be resolved.

A summary of changes in this release can be found in the release summary:
http://downloads.asterisk.org/pub/telephony/asterisk/asterisk-1.6.1.12-summary.txt

For a full list of changes in this releases, please see the ChangeLog:
http://downloads.asterisk.org/pub/telephony/asterisk/ChangeLog-1.6.1.12

Thank you for your continued support of Asterisk!

Asterisk PBX 1.4.28 Now Available

2009-12-18T23:04:43Z

The Asterisk Development Team has announced the release of Asterisk PBX 1.4.28. This release is available for immediate download at
http://downloads.asterisk.org/pub/telephony/asterisk/

The release of Asterisk 1.4.28 resolved several issues reported by the community, and would have not been possible without your participation. Thank you!

* Send ack (response/message) after receiving manager action userevent
   (closes issue #16264), reported, patched by: dimas

* Do not modify the gain settings on data calls in chan_dahdi.
   (closes issue #15972), reported by: udosw, patched, tested by: alecdavis

* fixes solaris segfault on dial with verbosity >= 3
   (closes issue #16193), reported by: asgaroth, patched by: snuffy, tested by:
   snuffy, asgaroth

* fixes conditional jump or move depending on uninitialised STACK value
   (closes issue #16261), reported, patched by: edguy3

* Copy the peer CDR's userfield to the bridge CDR if it exists.
   (closes issue #14590), reported by: msetim, patched by Laureano, tested by:
   Laureano, mnicholson

A summary of changes in this release can be found in the release summary:
http://downloads.asterisk.org/pub/telephony/asterisk/asterisk-1.4.28-summary.txt

For a full list of changes in this releases, please see the ChangeLog:
http://downloads.asterisk.org/pub/telephony/asterisk/ChangeLog-1.4.28

Thank you for your continued support of Asterisk!

Intel has no plans to bid for Wimax spectrum

2009-12-14T22:45:55Z

Chip maker Intel, a key player in the wireless broadband technology (Wimax), today said it has no plans to bid for Wimax spectrum auction, which is due to happen later next month.

"We have no such plans (to bid for Wimax spectrum auction) it is for the operator to go for this. We will do what we are best at... to make platform and get the devices up there," Intel South Asia Managing Director (Sales and Marketing) R Sivakumar said here.

Sivakumar was replying to a query if Intel being a pioneer in deploying wireless technology in the world would be interested to bid for Wimax spectrum auction scheduled to happen in January.

Yesterday, Intel and BSNL launched wireless broadband services in Jaipur.

Source: PTI

FCC plans to formalize Internet rules on net neutrality draw fire

2009-12-10T21:47:52Z

The Internet has long adhered to one basic principle: Nobody's in charge. That hallmark owes to the Internet's grand design. It's basically a global confederation of unrelated computers, making it impervious to hurricanes, earthquakes and other disasters. Hackers regularly attack, but can't shut it down. Governments, try as they might, also can't control it. That doesn't mean the Internet is meddle-proof.

]]> Its Achilles' heel: Internet service providers, or ISPs. They control the on-off ramps used by millions to enter and exit the World Wide Web each day. Access is typically provided by phone and cable TV companies, via upgraded phone lines and high-speed cable-TV modems.

Currently, the only thing stopping ISPs from abusing their control are four "Internet principles" – voluntary guidelines, which are subject to interpretation.

Now, the Federal Communications Commission wants to turn those guidelines into hard rules and extend them to wireless, and that's creating a heated debate across the USA about "net neutrality" – the idea that all Internet service providers should treat all traffic on their networks the same.

The goal: to preserve the Internet as a free and open communications platform that's open to all but controlled by none. That was the original goal of the Internet's creators more than 40 years ago.

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Asterisk PBX 1.2.37, 1.4.27.1, 1.6.0.19, and 1.6.1.11 Available

2009-11-30T22:06:28Z

The Asterisk Development Team has announced the release of Asterisk 1.2.37, 1.4.27.1, 1.6.0.19, and 1.6.1.11. These releases are available for immediate download at http://downloads.asterisk.org/pub/telephony/asterisk/

These releases have been created in response to a SIP remote crash vulnerability.

Additionally, Asterisk versions 1.4.27.1, 1.6.0.19, and 1.6.1.11 also contain an SDP regression fix as described in issue #16268.

Asterisk 1.6.0.19, and 1.6.1.11 contain an additional SDP regression fix as described by issue #16238.

Information about the SDP issues can be found at:
https://issues.asterisk.org/view.php?id=16268
https://issues.asterisk.org/view.php?id=16238

For more information about the details of this vulnerability, please read the security advisory AST-2009-010, which was released at the same time as this announcement.

The security advisory is available at
http://downloads.asterisk.org/pub/security/AST-2009-010.pdf

For a full list of changes in the current releases, please see the ChangeLogs:
http://downloads.asterisk.org/pub/telephony/asterisk/ChangeLog-1.2.37
http://downloads.asterisk.org/pub/telephony/asterisk/ChangeLog-1.4.27.1
http://downloads.asterisk.org/pub/telephony/asterisk/ChangeLog-1.6.0.19
http://downloads.asterisk.org/pub/telephony/asterisk/ChangeLog-1.6.1.11

Thank you for your continued support of Asterisk!

Skype courting traditional wireless carriers

2009-11-30T19:50:23Z

After years of stealing telecom service share from traditional providers, Skype is looking to cozy up with carriers. The company recently broke free of legal entanglements between its former parent, eBay, and its founders. Its chief operating officer resigned, heading to the U.S. to "pursue career interests within the global Fortune 500 technology, telecommunications and media industry."

]]> And under its new owners (an investor group that includes Silver Lake Partners and Andreessen Horowitz), it is focusing in the near term on carrier partners. Its CEO, Josh Silverman, has hinted at possible deals in the works with Chinese mobile operators in particular but is more explicit about the timing.

"You should expect to see [more carrier deals] in 2010," Silverman told Dow Jones Newswires. "The attitude of carriers has shifted a lot in 18 months, and we think that is a trend that is going to continue."

Not only have carrier attitudes shifted a lot — toward third-party voice services on their networks — the entire landscape has as well. Skype competitors come in all shapes and sizes now, from little-known mashups and features on existing services to the big kahuna, Google, whose acquisition of VoIP start-up Gizmo5 this month seems aimed at taking advantage of Skype's long-lived corporate distractions.

Source: Telephony Online

British Telecom and Polycom sign three-year deal for videoconferencing partnership

2009-11-30T19:45:32Z

Polycom and BT have announced a worldwide three-year agreement designed to accelerate the growth of audio and video conferencing within the corporate and public sector industries. Under this global agreement, the companies will combine Polycom's voice, video and telepresence products with BT's managed services and global MPLS network.

]]> The products will include jointly developed systems to enable business-to-business collaboration for multinational companies, large organisations, and SMEs.

BT and Polycom have collaborated on software development that brings BT's Bridge Connect services to the scalable Polycom RMX conference infrastructure. This joint development on the Polycom RMX also allows BT to deliver VNOC services and intercompany B2B services, through BT's Global Video Exchange, in support of Polycom telepresence systems. Additionally, Polycom RMX has been chosen by BT in the company's initiative to upgrade existing video bridging infrastructure.

Source: AV Interactive