[Asterisk-Users] SIP Phones-Receptionist Setup

Thu Nov 25 12:24:28 MST 2004

Carmi Weinzweig wrote:

>
> On Nov 21, 2004, at 11:15 AM, Wayne Sheppard wrote:
>
>> Tracy R Reed wrote:
>>
>>> On Sat, Nov 20, 2004 at 06:55:56PM -0500, Noah Miller spake thusly:
>>>
>>>> This does seem to be a common request, but I haven't seen any great
>>>
>>>
>>> Yes, it is. I am surprised * still can't do it.
>>>
>>>
>> I'm not surprised. Asterisk is a PBX, not a key system or a hybrid 
>> system. The kind of functionality that is being described here is one 
>> or both of those 'other' beasts. Now I'm not saying that this 
>> wouldn't be nice, or even a long term requirement if you really want 
>> to open the entire SME market, but it's not typical PBX behavior.
>
>
> I would like you to name one PBX that does not support this behavior? 
> Every system from Avaya including their Definity, Merlin Legend, 
> Merlin Magix, Partner, and their new IP based PBXes support it, as do 
> those from Mitel, Nortel, InteCom and every other system that I have 
> ever used. A typical example is a manager/admin setup that works as 
> follows:
>
>     Sarah a manager has a phone on her desk with call appearances for 
> her main number (x-3123).
>     She also has a phone on her office conference table with its own 
> number (x-3302) but also with shared call appearances for her main 
> number (x-3123).
>     She shares a conference room with Ed, John, Steve, Susan and 
> Simon. All their phone numbers have shared call appearances that 
> conference room's phone.
>
>     Molly (Sarah's administrative assistant) has a phone with shared 
> call appearances for Sarah, Ed and Susan (two other Executive Team 
> members for whom she provides shared coverage with Wendy and Lisa).
>
> When a call comes in for Sarah on x-3123, Molly can answer it, and 
> just by looking at those little red and green lights on her phone she 
> can tell if Sarah is on a call or not. She can then place this call on 
> hold (not park it, just hit that red hold button) and call Sarah 
> announcing this call.
>
> Sarah can answer this call just by pressing that button next to the 
> flashing light (indicating a call on hold) and picking up her phone.  
> She does not have to use call pick up. She can also pick this call up 
> on her office conference table, or in the Executive Team's conference 
> room in exactly the same way, not needing to understand or know 
> anything else ("press the button with my name on it next to the 
> blinking green led").
>
> All of this was done using a PBX (an Avaya Definity), never using call 
> pickup, or an operator console (just a standard 28 button phone for 
> Molly, Wendy and the Executive Team conference room, and a standard 10 
> button phone for Sarah, Steve, Ed, John, and Simon). This is a real 
> example at a real company, not just something made up as a straw man.
>
> If you want to see examples of this, I would be happy to take you to 
> the Math Department at University of Illinois (Nortel), Sony Pictures 
> Imageworks (Avaya) or Argonne National Laboratory's Energy and 
> Environmental Systems group (InteCom).

Yes, well thank you for the kind offer, but I have actually seen a PBX 
before, even those new fangled ones with *proprietary phones with lots 
of buttons*. Plug a Nortel phone into an Avaya switch and see what 
happens. The same task for * is a bit  more challenging?

>
>
>>
>> In fact, if you start looking at *all* the differences in 
>> functionality, (i.e. call announce, hands free answer-back, 
>> hold/pickup scenarios, etc.) it *may* be easier to have a different 
>> product stream that is targeting this sort of thing. Of course that's 
>> easy to say, but hard to do given the number of developers that are 
>> actually working/contributing to * on a regular basis.
>
>
> I would still like to understand how adding any of these features 
> (even if they were not already available on almost every PBX system 
> sold today), would comprise Asterisk's "PBXness" in some way that 
> would hurt its adoption.

I think you misunderstood my message, so my bad for  not being more 
clear. I'll try to clarify, and these will be my last comments regarding 
this comparison to keep this thread from getting any larger than it 
already is without adding any additional value.

I'm not saying that it would compromise *'s 'PBXness'. But you are 
comparing products that have DECADES of development and maturity, 
building on basic features that * is just now getting stable, and that 
use proprietary hardware to accomplish these features.

It wasn't very long ago that all of the above vendors' solutions called 
for departmental key systems to provide the kind of functionality that's 
being discussed, and usually to get some other features that the PBX 
didn't provide, or didn't provide in a way that was easy to use.

My point was to 'sell what you have' today. Asterisk is not yet suitable 
(IMO) as a direct Nortel, Avaya, Toshiba, etc. replacement for *every* 
possible customer application. But having said that, it's absolutely 
beautiful for *many* applications. Nothing will injure a great product 
in the market faster than trying to 'pound to fit and paint to match' 
into customer requirements that are not a good fit. I completely agree 
that these features would be nice, and are indeed, for certain markets, 
requirements.
But  (you knew there was one, right?)-
It seems to me that this yelping/almostflaming for additional features 
needs some cheese to go with the whine. So I was trying to throw the 
developers some slack while they make truly fundamental features rock 
solid is all. I am sure that these features will eventually emerge, but 
as others on the list have indicated it may very well take some hardware 
to accomplish the task (depending on how you describe the requirements) 
and that's not really entirely an * issue, is it?

>
>>
>> This isn't unique to *, it's the battle that every PBX vendor fights 
>> at least internally with product management.
>
>
> Yes, but every other PBX vendor has adopted this functionality, while 
> Asterisk has not.

I guess I would add 'yet' to that sentence. I haven't seen anyone say 
that these are 'bad' ideas, but perhaps I just missed it.

>
>> How to be all things to all people and still have some level of 
>> control over the product development and support streams. I guess 
>> what I'm ultimately pointing to is the need to pre-qualify a prospect 
>> before one makes a sales proposal.
>
>
> This "religious" argument ("We cannot do that because it is 
> unPBX-like.") seems to also miss another important factor. While large 
> and small organizations use this functionality, a system is almost 
> unusable for a small office without it (see how it is used in every 
> small store or company with a Merlin Legend or Magix system for 
> example). I am fairly convinced that smaller offices are better 
> candidates to adopt Asterisk than are fortune 500 companies. Not 
> having these features makes Asterisk much less likely to be deployed 
> in those environments. While Pingtel's open source sipXchange is not 
> quite ready (still a month or two off from what I have seen), it is 
> getting quite close. I think seeding this whole market segment to them 
> is not the best plan.

I certainly didn't say or mean 'We cannot do that because it is 
unPBX-like'. In fact I take great pains to try not to be directive on 
the subject in any way. Oh well, written language is always hard because 
one can't share the nuances very well. At least this one can't/ :)

Well, it takes a certain kind of customer and application to make use of 
Asterisk, no doubt. It's more work to build an ROI, and will require 
some retraining, etc. But the reason they use a Merlin (or whatever) the 
way they do is because that's how they were trained to do it! And I'd 
bet dollars to doughnuts that most of those users couldn't create a 
conference call if their life depended on it. Why? Bad design? Mostly 
it's a training issue, and a lack of need to do it very often. Does that 
mean that those are 'bad' or 'inadequately featured' products? Probably 
not. There are lots of systems installed in that same customer base that 
don't use the fancy multi-button phones. 

As far as the view that fortune 500 companies are not good prospects, I 
would suggest that they are indeed good prospects, but for specific 
applications mostly targeted at the departmental level, etc. It might be 
tough nut to crack for a newbie that's never sold in that space before, 
and just wakes up one day and decides to, but for an experienced rep 
with a Rolodex it's much easier to get their attention. Depends on the 
sales/marketing/application/business case more than the product.

Anyway, one thing that's nice about Open Source -. If it's that bloody 
important, life and death, and the market demand is great enough, then  
someone will pony up with either the $$$ or the resources to make it 
happen. But without one or the other, it takes the time it takes. I 
don't think that * will die immediately upon the release of sipXchange, 
with or without these features.

>>  If there are certain aspects of PBX vs. Key System that they can't 
>> metabolize, or aren't willing to make the user training investment, 
>> then sell them what they will can rather than try to pound a square 
>> peg into their round hole. Does this limit the market for *? Sure 
>> does. But hen no matter how bad a salesman wants to sell me a 
>> minivan, I'm just not interested.
>>
>>
>
> Given how many times this request has come up, I would like to know if 
> there is a technical explanation as to why this is hard?
>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Asterisk-Users mailing list
>> Asterisk-Users at lists.digium.com
>> http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
>> To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit:
>>   http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Asterisk-Users mailing list
> Asterisk-Users at lists.digium.com
> http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
> To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit:
>   http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
>
>
>