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Funny seeing this on HN the day I start building a PBX system that supports SIP and WebRTC in node. There's really nothing open source out there, that isn't 10

Funny seeing this on HN the day I start building a PBX system that supports SIP and WebRTC in node. There's really nothing open source out there, that isn't 10 years old and horrible. Hopefully I can knock down some marketshare that the enterprise solutions have by making it super easy to build your own servers for this.

PenguinCoder 9y ago
Would love to have more details/information on this project, or possibly help. *Just a SIP/Asterisk enthusiast, not an actual SIP dev.
- zackify 9y ago
  just starting on it now. https://github.com/encryption/pbx https://github.com/encryption/pbx. See my reply above :) Thanks
mc_ 9y ago
Just curious how you evaluated projects like FreeSWITCH and Kamailio and what you found lacking/horrible? We have been building on them for 8+ years now with no major issues. We've found both communities and core teams to be helpful and responsive with bug reports, feature requests, and pull requests.
- otto_ortega 9y ago
  Hey! You seem to have a lot of experience on the VoIP field, any suggestion for my situation? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15690623 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15690623 Thanks
  - zackify 9y ago
    Every suggestion will be Asterisk / FreeSwitch (have fun learning how to configure it all and good luck coming back to it in a year) or a hosted solution, this is what I want to solve :) I will admit I am new to this field but that is my impression so far.
- zackify 9y ago
  For me, I want something that immediately works with local phones and local calling, built in admin panel that shows active calls, transfer calls, build out prompts for conferencing, 1st class iOS / Android support. Web app integration to accept calls there. Database driven. I know these things are possible but it's a ton of work and messing with configs and lacking documentation. My goal is to make express.js but for voip. code it however you want, offer a preset with admin panel, mobile apps, and default middleware for conferencing, whispering, etc. Keeping all setup as code.
  - cweagans 9y ago
    FWIW, I went down this road a few years ago. If I were you, I'd seriously consider rescoping your project. Asterisk is a beast, but it is capable of doing everything you want. If the problem you're trying to solve is that Asterisk is a pain to install, configure, and administer, why not solve that problem? An easy way to install Asterisk + a nice control panel on top of it would be really appealing to a lot of people.
    - zackify 9y ago
      Because that wouldn't solve half the problems and some things just aren't possible. Building off existing open source phone solutions is like asking a team to continue building on top of garbage code, have you looked at the FreePBX repos on github? I don't understand how you could ever extend it
      - cweagans 9y ago
        FreePBX is not great, but I'm not saying that you should use it. I'm saying that you should use Asterisk, which is what FreePBX is built on top of. Asterisk is really, really solid, and will handle a lot of things for you that you shouldn't have to care about handling - lower level stuff. Check this out: http://www.igorescobar.com/blog/2014/08/13/working-with-asterisk-and-node-js/ http://www.igorescobar.com/blog/2014/08/13/working-with-aste... If you're going through the SIP RFCs for what you want, you're attacking the problem at the wrong layer of the stack. It's just not necessary to write your own SIP stack. It'd be like writing SSL negotiation logic for a web app: totally pointless. Just use what already works and extend it with the fancy UI and dev experience that you want. It's totally possible.

PenguinCoder 9y ago

Would love to have more details/information on this project, or possibly help. *Just a SIP/Asterisk enthusiast, not an actual SIP dev.

zackify 9y ago
just starting on it now. https://github.com/encryption/pbx https://github.com/encryption/pbx. See my reply above :) Thanks

mc_ 9y ago

Just curious how you evaluated projects like FreeSWITCH and Kamailio and what you found lacking/horrible? We have been building on them for 8+ years now with no major issues. We've found both communities and core teams to be helpful and responsive with bug reports, feature requests, and pull requests.

otto_ortega 9y ago
Hey! You seem to have a lot of experience on the VoIP field, any suggestion for my situation? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15690623 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15690623 Thanks
- zackify 9y ago
  Every suggestion will be Asterisk / FreeSwitch (have fun learning how to configure it all and good luck coming back to it in a year) or a hosted solution, this is what I want to solve :) I will admit I am new to this field but that is my impression so far.
zackify 9y ago
For me, I want something that immediately works with local phones and local calling, built in admin panel that shows active calls, transfer calls, build out prompts for conferencing, 1st class iOS / Android support. Web app integration to accept calls there. Database driven. I know these things are possible but it's a ton of work and messing with configs and lacking documentation. My goal is to make express.js but for voip. code it however you want, offer a preset with admin panel, mobile apps, and default middleware for conferencing, whispering, etc. Keeping all setup as code.
- cweagans 9y ago
  FWIW, I went down this road a few years ago. If I were you, I'd seriously consider rescoping your project. Asterisk is a beast, but it is capable of doing everything you want. If the problem you're trying to solve is that Asterisk is a pain to install, configure, and administer, why not solve that problem? An easy way to install Asterisk + a nice control panel on top of it would be really appealing to a lot of people.
  - zackify 9y ago
    Because that wouldn't solve half the problems and some things just aren't possible. Building off existing open source phone solutions is like asking a team to continue building on top of garbage code, have you looked at the FreePBX repos on github? I don't understand how you could ever extend it
    - cweagans 9y ago
      FreePBX is not great, but I'm not saying that you should use it. I'm saying that you should use Asterisk, which is what FreePBX is built on top of. Asterisk is really, really solid, and will handle a lot of things for you that you shouldn't have to care about handling - lower level stuff. Check this out: http://www.igorescobar.com/blog/2014/08/13/working-with-asterisk-and-node-js/ http://www.igorescobar.com/blog/2014/08/13/working-with-aste... If you're going through the SIP RFCs for what you want, you're attacking the problem at the wrong layer of the stack. It's just not necessary to write your own SIP stack. It'd be like writing SSL negotiation logic for a web app: totally pointless. Just use what already works and extend it with the fancy UI and dev experience that you want. It's totally possible.