Voice Over Internet VoIP

Ekiga is a SIP and H.323 compatible VoIP, IP Telephony, and Video Conferencing application that allows you to make audio and video calls to remote users with SIP or H.323 hardware and software. It supports all modern VoIP features for both SIP and H.323.

Ekiga is the first Open Source application to support both H.323 and SIP, as well as audio and video. Ekiga was formerly known as GnomeMeeting.

After more than one year of work, Ekiga 2.00 is finally available. Ekiga is now the first Open Source software to support both SIP and H.323 in the same application. GnomeMeeting was already a pioneer among the Open Source Voice over IP softphones, and we hope that Ekiga will continue in this path.
Among the features, you can find:

* Full SIP Support
* Full H.323 Support
* Audio and Video Support
* Call Transfer (SIP and H.323)
* Call Forwarding on Busy, No Answer, Always
* Call Hold
* DTMFs Support
* Basic Instant Messaging
* Ability to Register to Several SIP Accounts Simultaneously
* Possibility to Use an Outbound Proxy (SIP) or a Gateway (H.323)
* Message Waiting Indications (SIP)

Among the new features:

* Better Audio Quality
* Support for Wideband Codecs (16 kHz)
* Echo Cancellation
* Easier NAT traversal
* Improved camera Support
* Improved Video4Linux2 Support
* DBUS Support

Click Here for more Information

VoIP technology proved its worth during and after Hurricane Katrina, said users and the VoiceCon and Computerworld Premier 100 conferences last week.

Note: This is a little off-topic for Asterisk but I felt you still needed to read this if you have not heard because it could affect us in the future.

Consumer IP telephony service Vonage has filed a complaint to Canadian regulators over plans by local telco, Shaw Cable, to charge a C$10 ($8.60) a month premium to customers of VoIP service. The charge ostensibly covers to cost of providing a higher quality connection to VOIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) users. Vonage describes the levy as a "thinly veiled" VoIP tax.

By using internet connections to make long-distance calls instead of conventional voice circuits users have the potential to make far cheaper calls. Vonage argues Shaw's fee undermines the healthy development of the market.

Click Here for the Full Article

Release notes of: ruby-agi-1.1.2
March 07, 2006

In this release bug # 3722 has been fixed
Details of this can be found Here

Feedback, suggestion, feature request, bug report is always appreciated.

For more information, please visit projects homepage:
http://rubyforge.org/projects/ruby-agi/

To install ruby-agi,
% gem install ruby-agi
and to update exiting ruby-agi
% gem update ruby-agi


Thanks,
Mohammad Khan
info beeplove com

SPONSORED THIS MONTH BY: SOUND CHOICE COMMUNICATIONS LLC
"Keep in touch with the World"

The next Asterisk Users Group meeting has been scheduled for this Saturday March 11th at 11:30am.

Meetings are held monthly on the second Saturday of each month, excluding July and December.

Meetings are held at Sound Choice Communications LLC:
Google Map Directions

Sound Choice Communications is located in Bloomington Minnesota, just 1/2 mile west of the Mall of America. The address is: 7839 12th Ave S, Bloomington Minnesota 55425. We are just south of Hwy494 on 12th Ave. 12th Avenue is one exit west of Hwy 77 (Ceder Ave).


This month we'll hear from Shane Young and Dave Walters as they discuss integrating Asterisk with Tivo, Home security, Home Audio, and possibly X-10.

If you're having a problem with Asterisk, bring your questions to a meeting for free help. We love helping new users!

Come to a meeting to meet other asterisk users, see asterisk solutions, win a door prize, eat food, or for the good company, to look for work, if your looking for employees, to go out for a drive, to get out of your house, whatever, JUST COME TO THE MEETING!

Last month we gave away two licenses for the Cepstral Text to Speech software voices. Thank's Cepstral for your support!

In November we gave away an autographed copy of the O'Reilly book "Asterisk - The Future of Telephony". All three authors, plus Mark Spencer personally signed the book.

New visitors can help themselves to FREE FXO Interface cards (So you can connect your phone line, and have a timing source for meetme and IAX protocols). Some members have been known to swap hardware at the meetings. Have extra VoIP gear, looking for VoIP gear? There's plenty of hardware to see. Have you been to a meeting recently?

Please come and share your own ideas and learn from others. As always, free food.


We are always looking for help with meeting topics. If you feel like taking the lead, please do and simply let me know if you need anything.

Meeting starts at 11:30am and parking is available in the rear of the building. Runs about 2 hours or less, and we'll order Pizza to the meeting for lunch.

Look forward to seeing you there.

VoIP Info Link



If you have a product or service you'd like to introduce to our members, send a private message to ejo1(at)soundchoicecomm.com and we'll see if we can't get you listed as next month's sponsor.

The White House report “Hurricane Katrina: Lessons Learned” indicates that preparations for the nation’s next crisis will take more than technology improvements. Communications experts who met recently to discuss disaster response issues agree.

March 3, 2006 In the most competitive market the North American manufacturing industry has ever known, Canadian manufacturer Wescast Industries Inc. is an early proponent of converging voice, data and even video onto a single Internet Protocol (IP) network. Wescast’s approach allows them to thwart communication issues likely to arise from successfully pursuing a global expansion and diversification strategy. A recent upgrade of Cisco’s IP telephony and IP Video solutions is proving …

starface is a professional Voice-over-IP solution, which can reproduce the complete voice-communication of companies on a software basis.

Characteristic for starface Softswitch PBX is the innovative, process-oriented usage concept, which uses the advantages of the software basis, to reproduce the process of voice-communication ergonomically and intuitively.

The browser-based concept makes sure, that starface can be used on every client with a standard-browser - without any need to install additional software. By this means, starface potentiates the access on centralized resources - out on business or through mobile clients.

Click Here for more Information

Fonality, the leader in affordable IP-PBX systems for small businesses and the world's largest distributed deployment of Asterisk, today announced that Business 2.0 has named Fonality one of "The Next Net 25." According to the magazine, Business 2.0 editors selected Fonality as one of 25 companies "in the vanguard" of the "new Web revolution."

Editors selected companies "whose approaches help illuminate where the Web is headed and where the opportunities lie." "The Next Net 25" includes five categories. Fonality was selected as one of five companies within the category titled "The New Phone."

Click Here for the Full Release

Excerpt: "Ever wished you could screen incoming calls and route them to another person, or to an autoattendant, or to voicemail without the caller knowing what you're up to? Need a free Automatic Call Distribution (ACD) System for your business (with Elevator Music no less) that will balance incoming call workload among your employees? Ever wanted to prioritize incoming calls from different groups of callers? How about a simple way to access hidden features on your Asterisk system when you're away from your home or office?

Well, the latest Asterisk (1.2.x) now can do all of this without breaking a sweat... with Call Queues. And, with Asterisk@Home 2.5 and its included Asterisk Management Portal, you can build a complete Call Queue System in about half an hour."

Click Here for the Full Nerd