[Asterisk-Users] Bridged line appearance

Sat Feb 18 16:23:51 MST 2006

Man, I am all for shared line appearances.  I have asterisk systems in
several small businesses and they all cry for it.  But there are ways
around it as well, after a week all the bussinesses have gotten used to
asterisk w/o bla.  Plus, past 4 lines, its hard to implement cause lots
of phones only have 4 lines.  Trust me though arguing on this list wont
get you the feature quicker, I have read tons of e-mails on here and
have seen a pattern :)

Now, I don't code C, but would like the feature for some customers.  If
you would be interested in forming a bounty with me, I would be possibly
willing to donate some money to the bounty with you. But if you just
want to complain then good luck getting this implemented quicker.

Mike

-----Original Message-----
From: asterisk-users-bounces at lists.digium.com
[mailto:asterisk-users-bounces at lists.digium.com] On Behalf Of
mustardman29
Sent: Saturday, February 18, 2006 12:59 PM
To: 'Asterisk Users Mailing List - Non-Commercial Discussion'
Subject: RE: [Asterisk-Users] Bridged line appearance

>  1) Yes. There are "plans for it".
GREAT!  What is the current status and expected timeline?
> 
>  2) No. It won't be easy as Asterisk is a multi-protocol PBX and 
> usually when we consider introducing a feature like this, its intent 
> is for it to function across all of the protocols that Asterisk 
> supports, VoIP or not. Everyone else you've mentioned needs only worry

> about their own device supporting a standard or their own system only 
> supporting devices that they manufacture to support the feature. That 
> makes things somewhat easier for implementation and Asterisk has no 
> such luxury given it's completely open nature which most of us see as 
> an advantage.
Thanks for explaining the details of why it will be difficult
> 
>  3) The other solutions you've mentioned above all have 
> salaried engineering staffs whose job it is to implement 
> features as decided by product management folks also employed 
> by that company who are driven by the comments and feedback 
> of users such as yourself who fork over large sums of money 
> compared to what you pay for your Asterisk to have such 
> solutions. Had you sent such an email to one of these 
> companies at the time you did on a Friday night in the 
> states, my bet is on the fact that it wouldn't have even 
> solicited an initial response from a product management 
> resource until Monday morning.
Ummm.....ok.  Asterisk=open source community.  That just goes without
saying.  Other than that I don't know what your point is.  So there are
no
salaried software engineers at Digium working on Asterisk?
> 
>  4) The SPA-9000 is devoid of features like, Voicemail, which 
> Asterisk already has. If a system without BLA is a 
> "non-starter" for you and these small business you have 
> cited, why not consider a combined solution where Asterisk 
> provides features (call queues/ACD, voicemail,
> etc) that the SPA-9000 does not have and then you use the 
> SPA-9000 for what it is good for (an IP key system - which is 
> not what Asterisk is)? Asterisk can be whatever and play 
> whatever part you want it to play in your solution. It 
> doesn't have to be the entire solution.
> Because of its open nature, it usually integrates and 
> interoperates well with many existing products/solutions. The 
> SPA-9000 is no exception.
Thanks for pointing out the differences.  Yes, I have thought about
creating
a Frankenstein system which takes advantage of the strengths of both the
SPA-9000 and Asterisk.  Perhaps using Asterisk as a POT's gateway and
voicemail server.  The cost starts to creep up though.  This is a
concept I
have been mulling over for awhile now.  It remains to be seen what the
best
direction is.  When in doubt the best strategy is KISS.  The simplest,
cheapest, and presumably most robust solution is to have everything in
one
box.
> 
>  5) There are thousands of small businesses already, my own 
> being one of them, that would disagree that Asterisk is a 
> "non starter" for them. Asterisk is what you make of it, and 
> for us, it's a criticial communications tool for our business.
At the end of the day it is what the user thinks, not the Linux people.
For
you, me and most others on this board I think we can all agree that
Asterisk
works just fine for us.  For some companies used to PBX like
functionality
it will probably work just fine as well which I have already pointed
out.
For many many other companies used to key system like functionality it
is a
non-starter mostly because of the lack of BLA IMHO. If you don't believe
me
that it is a VERY important feature then ask yourself why a LOT of IP
phones
and VoIP systems support it or are starting to support it.  If Asterisk
wants to be a main stream phone system then I feel it should support it.
Has nothing to do with open source vs proprietary.  Just giving my
opinion
based on user feedback. 
> 
>  These things being said, what was your original intent for 
> writing such an email? Is there something you'd like to 
> contribute to help get this feature implemented? You don't 
> need to be a developer to contribute. There's testing, 
> documentation, bounties to be set for features one "must 
> have", and all sorts of other areas that could use the 
> assistance of folks like yourself that aren't software developers.
Sure, what is the development schedule?  I get your point.  No need to
beat
me over the head with it.  I read these sorts of comments about how it's
"your fault for not being a software coder" and "if you don't like it
too
bad, it's your fault for not getting more involved" and frankly I am
sick of
it.  We all know this is open source, we mostly all know the advantages
and
disadvantages of it and we would not be here if we didn't want it to
work.
Let's just move on.  I am sorry for not being able to code.  I am sorry
I am
not contributing as much as I should.  It's my fault this feature is not
getting off the ground.  There are you happy?  Can we move on now?

> 
>  Thanks for your initial feedback and we look forward to your 
> continued contributions to the Asterisk community.
> 
> --
> Bird's The Word Technologies, Inc.
> http://www.btwtech.com/
> 
> 
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