Asterisk Phone System

[Jeff Mincey]

I would like to know if anyone has any experience in the use of the open source Asterisk PBX phone system and VoIP.

Also, (and this is for Peter), would the use of Asterisk on an RH-hosted server be problematic or violate any terms of a license agreement? Do any RH customers now use Asterisk in any of your collocation centers? If so, with what results?

For those who are interested...

http://www.asterisk.org/

http://www.voip-info.org/

[tetech]

I use Asterisk.

I think its a bit memory hungry to install on a VPS. Having said that, I did successfully run an asterisk server on a Pentium 133 MHz with 64 MB of RAM for over a year with little problem.

A while ago I toyed with installing asterisk on my VPS to act as an IVR system (to screen my calls). Since asterisk is open source, there should not be any licensing reason why it can't be installed.

Does it violate the ToS? Prohibited uses "including but not limited to employing programs that consume excessive CPU time, network capacity, disk IO or storage space."

Well, disk access is negligible, network capacity is not significant unless you are dealing with many simultaneous calls... and I would not call CPU time significant (remember, I was running asterisk on a 133 MHz Pentium, handling a few simultaneous calls, and using G.729 encoding, without breaking a sweat - load rarely above 0.5).

Of course I cannot give you an official answer, but my guess is that no-one would have a problem with LIMITED use... if you were prepared to devote a big chunk of memory to it.

[Jeff Mincey]

Thanks for the reply. Interesting that you found a workable config with such modest cpu horsepower.

One thing I failed to mention in my first post on this topic is the question of station cards. Of course, I realize I should confine Asterisk questions to other forums which are dedicated for that, but as to the RH implications, I wonder if provision can be made for the installation of a specific station card for use with Asterisk. I'm assuming that those with dedicated servers would be able to do this, but I'm not sure many people would wish to have a collocated server for phone systems.

On the other hand, why not? We do it for e-mail and web and even IM. Voice is simply another kind of communication data.

[tetech]

The first and most obvious question is why the HECK would you need such hardware at a data center.

But really... there is no way this will be done for a virtual host or even dedicated host. Think of the logistical nightmare - qualify the hardware for compatibility and reliability when inter-operating with other components, what happens if it blows - how many spares do you keep, are the techs trained to replace the card, etc. Maybe a dedicated host charging huge fees might do it...

I think the only way this is done is colocation where you basically rent rack space and you maintain the hardware yourself.

Asterisk as a pure IP-based server though... that is pretty simple and many places offer it (which is another reason why I don't see it being a problem at RH).

[Jeff Mincey]

Thanks for the slap in the face with your opening question. Why the hell indeed. I can't imagine what I was thinking.

I'm just so accustomed to operating from the assumption that the internet makes "location" irrelevant and that the concept of local versus remote is moot that I neglected to realize there are still some areas where local DOES matter -- and this is one.

When after a night's sleep I awoke this morning and read your post, it actually gave me a laugh to put myself in your position and encounter my absurd post about a station card in a collocated server.

Thanks again for bringing me down to earth.

[tetech]

Thanks for the slap in the face

:D

You're welcome. Let me know if you're ever in a dunking booth.