It may be a while before Internet telephony with
VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) reaches critical mass, but
there's already tremendous movement in that direction. A lot of
organizations are not only attracted to VoIP's promise of cost
savings, but its ability to move data, images, and voice traffic
over the same connection. Think of it: a single Internet phone call
can take information sharing to a whole new level.
That's why many IT administrators and developers are actively
looking to set up VoIP-based private telephone switching systems
within the enterprise. The efficiency that network users can reach
with it is almost mind-boggling. And cheap, if the system is built
with open source software like Asterisk. There are commercial VoIP
options out there, but many are expensive systems running old,
complicated code on obsolete hardware. Asterisk runs on Linux and
can interoperate with almost all standards-based telephony
equipment. And you can program it to your liking.
Asterisk's flexibility comes at a price, however: it's not a simple
system to learn, and the documentation is lacking. Asterisk: The Future of Telephony solves that
problem by offering a complete roadmap for installing, configuring,
and integrating Asterisk with existing phone systems. Our guide
walks you through a basic dial plan step by step, and gives you
enough working knowledge to set up a simple but complete
system.
What you end up with is largely up to you. Asterisk embraces the
concept of standards-compliance, but also gives you freedom to
choose how to implement your system. Asterisk: The Future of Telephony outlines all
the options, and shows you how to set up voicemail services, call
conferencing, interactive voice response, call waiting, caller ID,
and more. You'll also learn how Asterisk merges voice and data
traffic seamlessly across disparate networks. And you won't need
additional hardware. For interconnection with digital and analog
telephone equipment, Asterisk supports a number of hardware
devices.
Ready for the future of telephony? We'll help you hook it up.
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