In order to promote greater visibility as to the myriad of things that people can (and have) done with Asterisk, VoIP Supply has partnered with Digium, the creators of Asterisk, to launch the “101 Things You Can Do With Asterisk Contest”

Here are the contest details:

1. One contributor (at random) to the list of 101 things, will win a $1,500 VoIP Supply shopping spree sponsored by Digium and VoIP Supply.
2. To be eligible for the contest, one must simply post a use or application of Asterisk that they themselves (or someone they know) has actually done.
3. The contest is open until 101 unique uses or applications have been documented.

This is a pretty neat little contest, so if you are interested in writing about this or contributing, please stop head on over there!

The proliferation of open source, Asterisk-based, IP PBX software platforms has lead to demand for inexpensive, telco-grade hardware appliances. There are 12 or more manufacturers who offer dedicated server / app hardware, in a variety of forms, for use with popular platforms including Asterisk, Trixbox, Elastix and others. Many Asterisk users and integrators choose to run their PBX on off the shelf Intel or AMD-based servers from the likes of Dell and Supermicro, while neither of these manufacturers target the Asterisk marketplace per se. Here’s a quick overview of some of the hardware choices out there if you are looking to deploy open source telephony in your home or business.

Fonality released its Trixbox Appliance

California’s Fonality released its Trixbox Appliance last year. The Trixbox Appliance comes in a standard and enterprise version. Intel P4 CPU, 512MB RAM and 80GB hard drive, and integrated four-line LCD display round out the package in a 3U form factor.

Pika Technologies

Industry vet Pika Technologies tosses its hat in the ring with the release of Warp Appliance for Asterisk. It Features a compact form factor and the Warp Appliance packs a ton of features into a small footprint. Which you can then configure a variety of TDM hardware FXS/FXO combinations for PSTN and legacy analog hardware integration.

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Sangoma Technologies Corporation (TSXV: STC) a leading provider of connectivity hardware and software products for voice, WANs and Internet infrastructure, today released highlights of its unaudited results for the financial quarter ended March 31, 2007.

Both sales and net earnings represent new all time records for the company.

Q3 2006-2007 Financials

• Sales - $2.24 million (68% Increase)
• Net income before provision for income taxes - $0.89 million (69% Increase)
• Net earnings - $0.58 million (56% Increase)
• Net earnings per share - $0.021 (54% Increase)

The company finished the quarter ended March 31, 2007 with working capital of $4.72 million, compared to $2.83 million at June 30, 2006, an increase of 67%.

“Sangoma’s revenue grew 24% in Q3 relative to our previous record Q2 numbers as our new products gain traction in the marketplace,” says Sangoma Technologies President and CEO, David Mandelstam. “It is gratifying to see that we are increasingly meeting customer needs, resulting in our long-standing growth trend where we are growing faster than the market itself.”

The first step that you should make is for you to choose which version of Asterisk you want to install.

* Asterisk 1.2 - the stable version
* Asterisk 1.4 - the version that is currently in beta testing

When you know which version you want to install download the according packages.

Note that we will install also libpri and zaptel packages. They are optional for Asterisk but if you want to use Asterisk with MeetMe or to use MusicOnHold you’ll have to install zaptel. The TDMoE cards will also need the zaptel module in order to work correctly. If you will use PRI cards you’ll have to install libpri module.
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Fonality, a leading open source communications company, has announced the second Fonality trixbox Open Communications Certification (FtOCC) workshop to take place at the Hyatt Regency in Boston. The three day workshop, from June 3-6th, is a training and certification course designed around the Asterisk®-based trixbox platform, which has become synonymous with open source telephony and home to the largest Asterisk-based community. FtOCC workshops give trixbox and Asterisk resellers, as well as IT professionals, all of the tools and knowledge necessary to implement trixbox successfully in a business environment.
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Justin Beka of Ars Technica, highlighted a plug-in that I have known about for some time, the WiFi Hotspot finder for Asterisk. The Asterisk WiFi HotSpot Finder is designed to retrieve name and address information for commercial, free, or all Wi-Fi Hot Spots for any zip code in the United States. Simply call the phone number to your Asterisk system (with the WiFi Hotspot plugin enabled), dial 9434 (W-I-F-I) and key in a zip code using any touchtone phone connected to your Asterisk PBX, and the data will be retrieved from 4INFO.net’s WAP service and played back over your phone using the Flite text-to-speech engine.

The plugin was created by Ward Mundy of NerdVittles, who has some of the best tips, tricks, hacks, and plugins for Asterisk based phone systems. Check them all out here.

CRN recently released a list of 15 Key VoIP Players that attempted to give solution providers an idea of who the top dogs and market leaders are in the VoIP space. The list which includes names such as Cisco, Nortel, Avaya, and 3-Com, was disappoint to read, not just because it “went with” large incumbants, but because it was a gross mis-representation of what is truly out there.

Of the 15 players listed, only three had anything to do with open source telephony; Digium, Pingtel, and Fonality. What strikes me as odd about the list, is that when it comes to providing solutions to businesses, open source based products can be one of the most cost-effective avenues for a business, but also one of the most profitable niches. But it is not just open source, there are numerous smaller VoIP hardware and service provider doing a much better job not just supporting their reseller/solution provider channel, but also delivering better solutions, service, and supports to the end customer.

Here is my list of the key VoIP players, that should have made the list.

Missing Key VoIP Players

• Skype - Skype is making a huge push into the SMB and Entreprise space. If you are walking into a business and you do not know about the world largest VoIP service provider, you might want to do some homework. While they do not have a formal reseller channel, there is money to be made in consultation and integration of the solution with existing business processes and new telephony systems. And whatever you do do not forget about skype hardware and of course you need a skype phone
  Talkswitch’s recent release of the Talkswitch 244VS, 280VS, 284VS, 480VS and 484VS, has given the company natively based IP solutions for resellers/integrators in the small to medium sized business marketplace. Value priced, superbly supported, and excellently engineered, Talkswitch definitely has products, tools, and resources to assist any solution provider in selling and supporting their product.
• SwitchVox - The San Deigo, CA based phone system vendor has created one of the easiest to install and manageable phone system softwares. Based on Asterisk, the SwitchVox system can be sold under the SwitchVox name, or can be privately labeled for the reseller/solution provider. Currently servicing over 800 resellers worldwide, SwitchVox channel focused strategy, backed by crisp operations, and excellent technical support makes them a company to consider when looking for a phone system solution to resell.
• Bandwith.com - Bandwidth.com is a complete communications provider offering advanced VoIP, internet and network services in all 50 states and around the world. Bandwidth.com can enable a reseller or solution provider to sell anything from a data pipe to SIP trunking, and everything in between. Recently named to the Inc. 500 list, Bandwidth.com can assist any solution provider in getting into the services game, on many levels, in a quick and easy manner.

In the first of moves by Digium’s new executive management staff, the company has signed a licensing deal with Japanese Telco NTT. Under the terms of the deal, NTT Software Corp. will develop its own version of Asterisk Business Edition for use in its ProgOffice PBX product for Japanese small and medium-sized businesses. According to Jim Webster, Digium’s Director of Software Technologies the deal,

“…will help raise the knowledge and awareness of Asterisk in Japan in that Asterisk will now be seen as something that’s ready for mainstream use…”

It will be interesting to see how deals like this further shape the go to market strategy for Digium. This deal, on the surface is much more of an OEM type agreement than a channel agreement. I, for one, had always felt strongly that Digium’s only way to grow was through a formal channel of resellers and integrators who had the ability to sell a “canned” or appliance based device. With moves like this one with NTT, you have to wonder if Digium is also looking towards OEM licensing deals with major telco’s as another way to grow their business.

• Increases productivity
• Reduces Costs
• Is easy to install and use
• Can be used in any sized call center
• Is available at highly competitive prices

SineDialer uses the most advanced predictive algorithms in the industry to make sure that you have as many staff active on the phone at any given time.
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Rhino Equipment has announced the release of their plug-in PCI analog telephony card product line with on-board echo cancellation as a standard offering. The Rhino FXO and FXS analog telephony product line consists of fixed and modular offerings to fill the need of any analog requirement for Asterisk-based PBX systems.

What’s New With The Rhino Analog PCI Cards?

For their new analog telephony cards, Rhino has partnered with Texas Instruments and Adaptive Digital Technologies to help create the lowest priced analog PCI card echo cancellation solution available for Asterisk. All Rhino PCI analog cards offer standard features such as carrier-class ITU G.168 compliant echo cancellation with 1,024 taps, 128ms tail, complete with a fast converging non-linear processor with automatic comfort noise generation.
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