[Asterisk-Users] IAXy - anyone using them yet?

[Benjamin on Asterisk Mailing Lists]

On Tue, 05 Oct 2004 14:51:07 -0500, Kristian Kielhofner <kris at krisk.org> wrote:
>         I understand that, but if Digium (and us) are ever going to see IAX
> (and IAX devices) become a success, they have to at least be on par
> (feature wise) with the SIP devices.

I disagree with that.

I do believe that IAX will continue to become more and more widespread
and go mainstream, perhaps even become a serious contender for the
No.1 spot.

However, the IAXy is only a small part of the IAX ecosystem, that is
to say, it is not on its own going to decide the success of IAX.

I totally agree that incompatibilities with any major networking
equipment, Cisco or otherwise, is a problem that needs to be fixed and
I am confident that Digium share this view and that they are working
on resolving this problem.

I also agree that not having DNS is a disadvantage serious enough to
warrant looking for ways how it could be added in future releases. It
is however understandable that Digium won't jump on such a commitment
right away because it will most likely require a hardware redesign.
Implementing a DNS resolver within the constraint of the device as it
is would seem somewhat impossible.

As for any other features mentioned, I disagree that they are
necessary to successfully compete against other ATAs.

I would see the bulky power supply as a far bigger stumbling block
because it neutralises the otherwise advantageous small size of the
IAXy, especially when targeting users who would like to use it as a
VoIP travel adaptor, a target group that will most appreciate IAX' NAT
friendliness and against-all-odds-robustness especially if they
venture outside of the US.

> "little guys" usually have to blow away the competition just to make it.

IAX does blow away the competition by a margin very rarely seen in
technology, perhaps once in a decade or so: It ranks amongst the first
transistor, the first integrated circuit, the first micro-processor,
the GUI, the Newton PDA, Tim Berners Lee's HTTP.

And that precisely was my point. The IAXy competes on IAX alone and it
is targeting the market segment which is buying it for IAX alone.

That doesn't mean that there shouldn't be other ATAs following in
IAXy's footsteps which introduce more feaures such as multiple ports
and low bandwidth codecs. Farfon are now taking orders for their IAX
ATA and that has most if not all the features on your list. It is
scheduled to ship mid October.

>   Did I mention that it was more expensive?

This is probably the most vulnerable point when targeting a wider
market outside of the Asterisk community.

I think I speak for the majority if I say that we are generally
prepared to pay a little premium for Digium products simply because we
know Digium is giving us Asterisk and will put the revenue to use in a
way that benefits Asterisk in one way or another.

This is of course not the case with customer outside of the Asterisk
community. Since the IAXy's design is a triumph of simplicity, I would
think that the cost of producing it in large volume should be lower
than most other ATAs, but then again, Digium won't have the volumes
that Grandstream or Sipura produce. So it will also come down to
missing economies of scale.

>         When I ask which one they would like me to implement for them, can you
> guess what their reaction usually is?

It depends on how you explain the situation to them and how much of an
impact security, firewalls and NAT will have. SIP used outside of a
LAN is a security hazard and there is no proper solution to traverse
NAT, only workarounds, many of which are problematic in terms of
security and most of which are support intensive. SIP is a very
expensive protocol unless you want to restrict your choice of
equipment and give up flexibility or security. If you are prepared to
do that, then it is still an expensive protocol. Most certainly it is
an inconvenient protocol.

rgds
benjk

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