[Asterisk-Users] New Asterisk bounty: SIP simultaneous

Chris A. Icide chris at netgeeks.net
Mon Jul 12 20:13:29 MST 2004 

There is also something known as feature bloat.

feature bloat occurs when you take a system that is fully functional and 
operation and start to add features to it that don't inherently fit the 
model the system was designed under, so what you end up with si a bloated 
system with extra features that have been forced to work in an inefficient 
manner (thus adding the bloat to the feature).

The thing I noticed about what Olle said was something to the effect that 
Asterisk doesn't inherently have the structure to support this feature, and 
a good bit of asterisk would need to recoded to support it.

Considering you can reproduce this capability by using the dial plan or by 
putting ser in front of it, do we really need to ask the asterisk dev team 
to stop what they are working on and move down the path of rewriting a good 
portion of asterisk to allow it to be a proxy as well as a pbx?  Can we 
toss in making it a h323 gatekeeper as well, I kinda get tired of having to 
run gnugk when I want a nat'd or registered h323 endpoints to work with 
asterisk.

I guess my point is, mark has said in the past that asterisk is a PBX, NOT 
a proxy, and apparently that is something that is deep down inside the code 
and not a "simple fix" as Olle has said.

I agree wholeheartedly with you, it would be wonderful if asterisk were a 
proxy as well as a pbx (and a gatekeeper too!), but at this time, it's not 
an easy fix.

-Chris

On 03:30 PM 7/12/2004, Kannaiyan Natesan wrote:
 >I hope you clearly understand that everyone here **KNOWS** to use
 >alternative software such as SER, what is needed here is the same facility
 >in asterisk.
 >
 >When I see beauty, I want to see all the things in a same figure rather than
 >splitted. If you see with splitted face doen't mean there is no beauty but
 >it cause inconvinience.
 >
 >What everyone here want to see the same beauty in asterisk and when this can
 >be done in another softwares why not in asterisk.
 >
 >As Olle says, nothing is impossible. There is a possible solution, but takes
 >time.
 >
 >-Kannaiyan.
 >
 >
 >----- Original Message -----
 >From: "Sunrise Ltd" <stsltdtyo at yahoo.co.jp>
 >To: <asterisk-users at lists.digium.com>
 >Sent: Monday, July 12, 2004 5:20 PM
 >Subject: Re: [Asterisk-Users] New Asterisk bounty: SIP simultaneous
 >
 >
 >> in response to Olle's excellent post, ...
 >>
 >> in particular ...
 >>
 >> >Asterisk is *not* a SIP proxy. It's a SIP registrar and
 >> location server.
 >> >It's a very clever SIP UA. It wants to be in the middle
 >> of the call
 >> >and wants to be in control of each device. This
 >> device-slave view >doesn't match the SIP architecture.
 >>
 >> and ...
 >>
 >> >I've spent a considerable amount of time investigating
 >> support for
 >> >multiple registrations on one Asterisk sip [peer] account
 >> and after
 >> >learning about Asterisk's architecture come to the
 >> conclusion that
 >> >it is not an easy or even a desirable feature to
 >> implement.
 >>
 >> and ...
 >>
 >> >It may be possible, but will probably lead to a lot of
 >> changes to
 >> >Asterisk, both core and applications, that no other
 >> channel will
 >> >benefit from. A quick hack to support it may lead to a
 >> lot of
 >> >confusion on how to handle other apps. And it's a lot
 >> more work
 >> >than the bounty will cover. I suggest that you use a
 >> forking SIP
 >> >proxy in conjunction with Asterisk to get this
 >> functionality.
 >>
 >> Precisely! A fairly simple and elegant solution.
 >>
 >> For those rare occasions where one would really need
 >> multiple concurrent SIP registrations I'd say one should
 >> consider running Asterisk in combination with a SIP proxy.
 >> Since SER is a free download, this wouldn't seem to be
 >> such a big deal IF IT WASNT for the fact that one will
 >> then need to run two boxes.
 >>
 >> It would make a lot of sense to provide support for an
 >> easy-to-configure set up where Asterisk can live together
 >> with another SIP speaking piece of software on the same
 >> box.
 >>
 >> Something along the lines of ...
 >>
 >> (ip1:5060)---[*]---[portswapper]---(ip1:5061)---[SER]---(ip2:5060)
 >>
 >> Something like this should allow you to run Asterisk on
 >> one address (ie LAN side) and SER on another (ie WAN
 >> side), so you get the best of both Asterisk and a SIP
 >> proxy all in one box.
 >>
 >> This would also make it possible to run a SIP softphone
 >> alongside Asterisk on a notebook, so it would solve two
 >> birds with one stone.
 >>
 >> I'd like to emphasise however, that most of the problems
 >> described in this thread are NOT good reasons for multiple
 >> concurrent SIP registrations. Those problems have other
 >> solutions. Let's take a look at them.
 >>
 >> 1) Call centre scenario
 >>
 >> Problem: multiple agents should receive calls on the same
 >> phone number
 >>
 >> Solution: assign a number to a call queue and let the call
 >> queue distribute incoming calls to the agents on different
 >> SIP phones, each of which should have unique logins for
 >> reasons of accounting and quality assurance.
 >>
 >> multiple concurrent registrations on the same SIP account
 >> in call centres is a BAD IDEA.
 >>
 >> 2) Overworked admin scenario
 >>
 >> Problem: asterisk admin doesn't want to deal with support
 >> calls for adding additional SIP phones
 >>
 >> Solution: a simple self provisioning system, either web
 >> based or even IVR based.
 >>
 >> 3) Dual line desk phone scenario
 >>
 >> Problem: dual line desk phone requires multiple
 >> registrations, one per line
 >>
 >> Solution: let the phone register on two different SIP
 >> accounts, which is how any conventional PBX handles dual
 >> line phones: one extension per line.
 >>
 >> 4) Call group scenario
 >>
 >> Problem: multiple phones to ring on the same extension
 >>
 >> Solution: use the call group feature or use the dial
 >> command with multiple SIP peers
 >>
 >>
 >> For the avoidance of doubt, I am not saying there is no
 >> situation for which multiple concurrent SIP registrations
 >> may be the right solution, but the problems described so
 >> far are *not*.
 >>
 >> But if anybody has a problem that truly warrants parallel
 >> forking, then I propose you look into sponsoring somebody
 >> to work on the little port swapping trick to run SER
 >> concurrently on your Asterisk box.
 >>
 >> rgds
 >> benjk
 >>
 >>
 >> __________________________________________________
 >> Do You Yahoo!?
 >> http://bb.yahoo.co.jp/
 >>
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