[Asterisk-Dev] G729 in non-realtime mode - way forward for Asterisk?

[Dorn Hetzel]

A "batch" to/from G.729 converter offered as a "service" available over
the internet could, in theory, convert 14,400 minutes of audio per day,
with a single channel at realtime.  If operating in batch mode on a 
sufficiently fast system, could it operate faster than realtime per
channel?  It seems like a server somewhere on the net with a relatively
modest number of licenses could provide an awful lot of conversion
capability for batch users.  Voicemail originally left in G.729 could
be shipped to this server for conversion to some other format, and so
on in the reverse...

Would this make any sense at all?

-Dorn

On Tue, Oct 26, 2004 at 12:21:19AM +0900, Benjamin on Asterisk Mailing Lists wrote:
> On Mon, 25 Oct 2004 15:10:19 +0300, joachim <zoachien at securax.org> wrote:
> > 
> > 
> > With the time spent on this thread, i think you could all have bought some
> > licenses. (& The development cost to create something to convert those
> > messages will buy you some more).
> 
> If it was only for myself, I wouldn't even bother with G729. I am very
> happy with ILBC, thank you very much. For our own purposes, G729 is
> totally and utterly obsolete.
> 
> Howver, I have customers who would like to know how to work around the
> considerable cost of G729 licensing when used for anything other than
> a hobby or SOHO system where a G729 caller leaving a voice message
> will probably only happen once or twice before the patents expire.
> 
> > I don't think 10$ a license is that much, and you could do all your prompts
> > with that too.
> 
> I have already stated this at least twice before, so let me make this
> very clear one more time:
> 
> Nobody cares about prompts.
> 
> > Its not 10$ a call, its 10$ / license.
> 
> No, it's 15.000 USD initial contract fee just for the privilege to be
> able to purchase licenses and then it is 63.000 USD for the minimum
> package of 50.000 channels (for Annex A and B). Further a contract
> renewal fee of 7.500 USD every year.
> 
> Digium doesn't sell any G729 binaries for BSD, none for LinuxPPC, none
> for Darwin and none for Solaris. Even going with the x86 platform, it
> is 10$ per channel and if you run a redundant voicemail server where
> you want to have -say- 50 concurrent voicemail channels capacity, then
> that will cost you 2x50x10$ = 1000 USD for only 50 people being able
> to leave voicemail just to cater for the possibility that they all
> come in using G729. And of top of that, the licensing means extra
> hassle, extra work, limitations managing your systems. All that extra
> nonsense that you wouldn't need if it wasn't for the side effects of
> the license management will cost the customer who wants to deploy such
> a system several times more than the actual license fees. I know
> because I had a few projects where we have run the numbers and in the
> end the customer opted out of G729 altogether, which is what I always
> recommend anyway.
> 
> However, if a batch conversion system or a batch conversion service
> could be set up, such customers would have a reasonable and affordable
> option to support G729 on their voicemail systems.
> 
> Besides, efforts to work around software patents is something we will
> have to get used to if the open source movement is to have a future.
> So, the exercise alone is well worth the effort.
> 
> rgds
> benjk
> 
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