[Asterisk-Dev] 3rd party call control / CSTA , JTAPI orTAPIinterfaces

[alex at pilosoft.com]

On Mon, 20 Dec 2004, Schaefer, Mark wrote:

> 	The only reason I posted was due to the flippant response by Nick
> Bachmann to Shahed.  As a company, OnStar has no intention of evaluating
> Asterisk or Digium for a production environment.
So in other words, you aren't even planning of using Asterisk, don't need
a call control API but you are complaining Asterisk doesn't have one?

> 	The "Manager API" is a reasonable start to an API, but there are
> significant failures, that, in my opinion prevent it from being
> considered an API.  First of all, the API itself is the source code.  
> There is no independent interface that the API implements.  There is no
> failure moding.  You have no idea what state the system is in if there
> is a failure.  I'm not saying that it has to meet MY requirements to be
> an API.
a) If you want an independent interface to API - write one. Asterisk
Manager API is just that, interface to call control functions of Asterisk.  
If you want a generic API that would also control your nortel PBX and
toaster oven, write one. But it *exists*.

b) What kind of failure are you talking about anyway? Hardware failure? 
Call routing failure? What would you ever want to do if you have a call 
routing failure - route call again or something? That makes no sense.

> 	What I don't understand is why you first say that somehow OnStar
> has some sort of fraternal obligation to pony up money to develop
> Asterisk to meet our requirements, and then later when there is a
> requirement that Asterisk doesn't meet, you act as if I'm ridiculous to
> even consider that as a requirement.  What I was saying is that it is
> indeed ridiculous - ridiculous to pay money to fix a small problem when
> the entire switch is incapable of meeting our needs.
a) Why are you even on this list if you already decided Asterisk doesn't
meet your needs?

b) You can have any requirements you want, ridiculous or not. Just be 
prepared to put your money where your mouth is, with Free Software or not. 
If system doesn't do what you want it to do, you have options: 1) pay 
money to improve it or 2) not use it or 3) improve it yourself.

> 	Yes, vendors can and do sign up for liability.  An EULA (or
> warranty) is a end-user document.  If Avaya signs a legal document
> saying that they will pay OnStar for switch downtime, whatever warranty
> lingo you think we've missed doesn't hold any water in court.  This is
> all pretty standard - if a trucking company fails and shuts down a
> vehicle line, they pay our lost revenue.  Most of our legal agreements
> have clauses in them for back-charging.  It's a cost of doing business.
As much as you'd like to think that you get some compensation for switch 
downtime, it is very damn rarely anywhere close to the lost profits. I 
dare you to find EULA that allows damages based on lost profit or anything 
similar.

> 	I'm glad you don't speak for Digium.  I think Asterisk is a great
> product with very good momentum.  It's just too immature at this point
> to replace some of the production-level switches out there.  Maybe it's
> not my place (since I always get beaten down on this), but I have real
> trouble when people bash the newbies.
Some bashing is because you are talking on wrong list. This is the list
for people who develop asterisk. Most here work for (or own) companies
that heavily use Asterisk. We don't have any obligation to be nice to
newbies - asterisk-users is for them. If you want people who are nice to
you - pay money to $vendor (Digium/Nortel/Whatever), and they'll be nice.
Hell, wave money in front of me and I'll write you a 25 page proposal to
implement $CallManagerAPI in Asterisk :)

Nobody expects Asterisk to replace 5ESS switches anytime soon (or Telica 
or any other softswitch). Nor, I believe, it is intended anywhere close to 
that market. Now, when you are talking about "pbx" replacement, you are 
getting a good match. Or, if you are talking about feature server 
(voicemail, applications, etc) - that's a good match.