[Asterisk-Users] chan_capi, chan_misdn and chan_modem

[Klaus-Peter Junghanns]

Hi,

time to clear some things up. :)

The new version of chan_capi (0.4.0) is still work in progress (no, I
have not dropped chan_capi in favour of BRIstuff). I harmonized the
dialstring syntax with chan_zap, so you can just use "CAPI/g1/..."
instead of those strange constructions with the outgoing msn. It also
contains fixes (contributed by Jan Stocke) to make it work on BSD.
Also it will then work properly with p2p BRIs in Austria. 
Chan_capi 0.4.0 will work with Asterisk stable and cvs head.

It does not distinguish between certain card types (CAPI means Common
isdn API), maybe you (or the Wiki) are mistaking this with BRIstuff.
In the beginning BRIstuff was only intended as a driver package for our
BRI hardware. But more and more enhancements (to asterisk and libpri)
were added and i merged and maintain patches and applications from other
people that were contributed under the GPL (and thus could not be
integrated into the asterisk cvs tree). We provide a version for 
Asterisk stable and for cvs head.

If you compare chan_capi, bristuff and chan_misdn then chan_capi and
chan_misdn would fall into the same category as they are just channel
drivers which do not touch the asterisk core at all. BRIstuff changes
some things in Asterisk to better support European users and contains
modificatiosn that we made for clients.

Regarding stability chan_capi and BRIstuff (for Asterisk stable) will
fall into the same category. They are used in hundreds of production
installations around the globe. I cannot comment on the stability of
chan_misdn because i have never used it (i have read the source though),
but i made the experience the authors of chan_misdn (Beronet) supply
patches for bristuff to their customers that enable them to use BRIstuff
with their hardware (instead of chan_misdn). They do not distinguish
between cards (so also our Junghanns.NET cards work with chan_misdn)
because chan_misdn does not talk directly to the card. This is done by
the mISDN kernel modules. The driver for the HFC-4S/8S based cards
(used in the Junghanns.NET amd Beronet cards) was not written 
by Beronet but by the author of PBX4Linux, Andreas Eversberg.

So, for your hfc-pci based isdn card you can use the zaphfc module
from BRIstuff and use it with chan_zap OR you can use it with the
mISDN driver and chan_misdn OR you can use it with the mISDN driver
plus the capi layer of mISDN and chan_capi. I also have a W6692
card laying on my desk (contributed by Michael Sandee) and will write
a zaptel driver for that card, but this is rather a longterm project. ;)

best regards

Klaus
--
Klaus-Peter Junghanns

Am Freitag, den 13.05.2005, 08:46 +0200 schrieb Jan Louw:
> Could someone please comment on the current state of chan_capi,
> chan_misdn and chan_modem channel drivers in terms of functionality
> (echo cancelation, fax, latency etc) and stability. Specifically, which
> channel driver would be best for a passive PCI HFC or W6692 ISDN card.
> The chan_misdn wiki claims that chan_capi distinguishes between
> junghanns and non-junghans cards, and that chan_misdn is better suited
> for general misdn compatibility.
> 
> A second point I'd like some clarification on is the purpose of
> Junghann's BRIStuff patch. Is this patch only necessary for chan_capi or
> also for chan_misdn? Does this patch add functionality to asterisk or is
> it only intended to smooth chan_capi integration into asterisk?
> 
> Thanks in advance!
> 
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