a common feature of a traditional phone system is music on hold. while asterisk (and other media servers) can certainly play music on hold, the audio source is usually a wav or mp3 that is invoked when a call is put on hold. it is my understanding that if 5 callers were put on hold, there would be 5 separate streams of “on-hold” audio and each stream would start at the beginning of that audio file.
traditional phone systems often have an analog input for an on-hold loop tape or a live feed (ie, radio station via 1/8" audio jack). let’s say someone has a 5 minute loop for on-hold. at any time, a caller can hear a different segment of that loop and if 5 callers were put on hold, they would all hear the same exact thing. further, if the on-hold was a live audio feed from an analog source, they could be listening to something like a local radio station.
i guess i’m looking for a more dynamic way to serve the on-hold media so that people on hold won’t always get the beginning of an audio file. if it’s a 5 minute message and people only hear the first minute, the other 4 minutes will never be heard.
any ideas? even using a sound card would be acceptable, although i’d like to keep the media digital if possible.
thanks in advance.