4 ms·

just want to point out: vast knowledge of telephony/VOIP is not something every sysadmin should be expected to know. If you don't have telephony expertise on st

by feld 10y ago

just want to point out: vast knowledge of telephony/VOIP is not something every sysadmin should be expected to know. If you don't have telephony expertise on staff I hesitate to suggest someone build out a VOIP infrastructure on their own. It can be extremely time consuming to learn and it is definitely painful to troubleshoot.

jessaustin 10y ago
Shouldn't it be possible for me to get some IP phones in my office and tunnel through my router to a competent online voice provider? If so, can you recommend such a provider?
- timlin 10y ago
  Yes, that is exactly what we do at work. We have ~20 IP phones in the office plus a few in remote locations. A few of us also use softphones (X-Lite or Zoiper) & USB headsets. Our pbx is hosted by http://sipworxx.com/ http://sipworxx.com/ and it works great.
- mgbmtl 10y ago
  http://voip.ms http://voip.ms is pretty decent and offers a few nice features that can avoid building an on-site PBX. I use this with good Polycom "HD voice" devices. I'm also rather picky about voice quality.
snuxoll 10y ago
Eh, I'd argue this varies a lot. In some cases you are more likely to run into issues setting up multiple SIP clients behind a NAT trying to connect to a server out on the public internet than you are to install your own PBX on-premises. Grandstream, Yealink, etc. all provide pretty easy to administer Asterisk-based PBX appliances that can be paired with a SIP trunk of your choice (shout out to Flowroute here, they're great). If you're feeling more adventurous sipXecs from sipfoundry is pretty easy to configure relative to the additional complexity it brings over the more simplified alternatives. I went from having 0 real world experience with SIP to managing a small installation for my aunts shop as well as one at home in a couple days. For proprietary offerings there's of course Skype for Business, etc. and I would argue they aren't terribly hard to configure or maintain either. Most of the work is just in network configuration once you have multiple sites and you need to ensure QOS going over your MPLS or whatever to ensure your voice packets take priority - that can be more difficult but that's something a competent network admin can help you with.

by feld 10y ago

jessaustin 10y ago

Shouldn't it be possible for me to get some IP phones in my office and tunnel through my router to a competent online voice provider? If so, can you recommend such a provider?

timlin 10y ago
Yes, that is exactly what we do at work. We have ~20 IP phones in the office plus a few in remote locations. A few of us also use softphones (X-Lite or Zoiper) & USB headsets. Our pbx is hosted by http://sipworxx.com/ http://sipworxx.com/ and it works great.
mgbmtl 10y ago
http://voip.ms http://voip.ms is pretty decent and offers a few nice features that can avoid building an on-site PBX. I use this with good Polycom "HD voice" devices. I'm also rather picky about voice quality.

snuxoll 10y ago

Eh, I'd argue this varies a lot. In some cases you are more likely to run into issues setting up multiple SIP clients behind a NAT trying to connect to a server out on the public internet than you are to install your own PBX on-premises. Grandstream, Yealink, etc. all provide pretty easy to administer Asterisk-based PBX appliances that can be paired with a SIP trunk of your choice (shout out to Flowroute here, they're great). If you're feeling more adventurous sipXecs from sipfoundry is pretty easy to configure relative to the additional complexity it brings over the more simplified alternatives. I went from having 0 real world experience with SIP to managing a small installation for my aunts shop as well as one at home in a couple days. For proprietary offerings there's of course Skype for Business, etc. and I would argue they aren't terribly hard to configure or maintain either. Most of the work is just in network configuration once you have multiple sites and you need to ensure QOS going over your MPLS or whatever to ensure your voice packets take priority - that can be more difficult but that's something a competent network admin can help you with.