Asterisk on routers

Hi,

Anyone seen this

lestblood.imagodirt.net/archives … art-2.html

As most routers seem to run on linux, this seems like a perfectly possible idea and simplifies nat traversal for sip phones as we have less devices. I am assuming also that this is how the asterisk applicance that digium are bringing out will operate.

Has anyone tried installing asterisk on a commercial router and got it to work in a production environment - anyone know much about the implications of doing this?

Thanks

Robert

You can install asterisk on MANY MANY devices but the big question is WHY…

The router / nas boxes / toaster that you spend days at will only do two calls or so without any encoding and really be just a toy…

and it really is not a way a get around NAT (stun does that just fine)

Hello Robert,

I have … and it work very well on a Linksys WRTSL54GS.
Look at: teledata.qc.ca/MARS/MARS_en.html

It will easily handle 4 calls if no transcoding needed … which is good enough for many small offices / SOHO or even home use.

There are many advantage of using * in a router, the most obvious one beeing cost … Connect this to a broadband modem (ADSL/CABLE) and you get a LAN for 4 PC with a WI-FI access point plus a 4 X 2(+) hybrid PBX (using a 1 FXO / 1 FXS adapter) !

You can connect up to 4 systems together for direct inter-system calls. You can even use the lines of a remote system to place an outside call !

This could also be used as a “satellite” to a larger * system …

You will want a router which can run OpenWRT with 32 MB RAM and 8 MB Flash. Look here for the sources and docs :
downloads.openwrt.org/whiterussian/0.9/

Hanz Zandbelt has also ported * 1.4 and it works fine … (Check the forum for links …)

Noël

[quote=“robert.mcnaught”]Hi,

Has anyone tried installing asterisk on a commercial router and got it to work in a production environment - anyone know much about the implications of doing this?

Thanks

Robert[/quote]

Thanks for the reply.

I think for most small businesses, the opportunity in doing this is to remove one piece of equipment - less equipment is always better by combining the router and pbx. I spoke to a digium rep yesterday about the asterisk appliance and believe it is exactly that, a box that provides routing functionality with the pbx installed. I think the issue with using routers is the number of simultaneous calls it can process which will be the hanging point. I’m thinking that maybe some very small offices like 5 people can use a router/pbx together and larger offices may need separate router and pbx? Does this sound about right?

The link for the MARS device looks good and is half the price of an asterisk appliance, which could make it a serious competitor.

Thanks

RObert

Hello Robert,

I really think that such combined devices is one of the future trend of VoIP telephony … and it definitely has a place in the market for the small enterprises. This is definitly a most economical solution as you only need to connect to broadband modem to get a full working LAN / WAN (internet sharing) + an WI-FI access point + an asterisk PBX using one inexpensive hardware box …

Best of all, you can install the system on a single telephone line with ADSL and use that single line as one conventional trunk line for asterisk, the Internet access AND VoIP …

Also the WI-FI AP makes it a very interesting plattform to develop an asterisk PBX using WI-FI phones like this:
voipsupply.com/product_info. … ts_id=1525

One could create a service which offer VoIP telephony using these WI-FI phone as an alternative to (expensive) Cell. telephony.
Let say a Cafe with an outdoor terasse(?) …
Or put a few of these on a commercial street and offer cheap VoIP calls …
Can you imagine the possibilities …

Also more and more Cell phone has built in WI-FI / SIP clients and this seems to be a trend that will grow fast …

Thank you for your interest and good words…

Noël

[quote=“robert.mcnaught”]Thanks for the reply.

I think for most small businesses, the opportunity in doing this is to remove one piece of equipment - less equipment is always better by combining the router and pbx. I spoke to a digium rep yesterday about the asterisk appliance and believe it is exactly that, a box that provides routing functionality with the pbx installed. I think the issue with using routers is the number of simultaneous calls it can process which will be the hanging point. I’m thinking that maybe some very small offices like 5 people can use a router/pbx together and larger offices may need separate router and pbx? Does this sound about right?

The link for the MARS device looks good and is half the price of an asterisk appliance, which could make it a serious competitor.

Thanks

RObert[/quote]

Hello Bubba,

You comment reminded me of something i had heard previously

Listen to: teledata.qc.ca/audio/BellsInvention.wav
and
teledata.qc.ca/audio/ElectricalToy.wav

Best :wink:

Note that i don’t want to compare this with the greatest invention …

Noël

[quote=“bubba”]You can install asterisk on MANY MANY devices but the big question is WHY…

The router / nas boxes / toaster that you spend days at will only do two calls or so without any encoding and really be just a toy…

and it really is not a way a get around NAT (stun does that just fine)[/quote]

Like the .wav file - never heard it before

one of the things which I think is difficult to get across to customers to switch to VoIP and new technologies is familiarity - the WiFi using SIP has great possibilities and will no doubt grow - trouble I think is that a lot of customer really want something they are familiar with when they switch to newer technologies - ie something you can touch and feel and it looks like a real telephone - I am amazed how similar ip phones like the polycoms look to real telephones despite being software based

From what I hear of Wifi phones, it is a lot more difficult to ensure QoS, but I guess this is something which will reduce shortly

Robert

[quote=“robert.mcnaught”]Like the .wav file - never heard it before

Robert[/quote]

Hello again,

It’s an excerpt from one of the best radio program i have ever heard:
HELL’S BELLS: A Radio History of the Telephone
town.hall.org/Archives/radio/IMS/HellsBells/

It’s 8 X 30 mins. and very good !

BTW you can listen to it on the MARS system.
You call in and enter a 3 digits program code. The system dowload the .gsm file and plays it for you. That’s what i call WebAudio …

Tnx

Noël

Want to listen to Hell’s Bells on your * system …

add this to your dialplan … (this is for episode #1 … )

(Change *88 to any extension you wish …)

exten => *88,1,System(wget -O /tmp/sel${CALLERID(number)}.gsm town.hall.org/Archives/radio/IMS … ITR.au.gsm)
exten => *88,n,ControlPlayback(/tmp/sel${CALLERID(number)},60000,6,4,#,5,0)

Forward / rewind 1 min. by pressing 6 / 4 on playback
Pause with 5 and exit with # …

Should work with any Linux system with wget () …

:wink:

Noël