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Building a phone system? Use Freeswitch

6 points by nico 17y ago

I feel in love with this project ever since I learned about it while looking for Asterisk alternatives. If you are using Asterisk now, or are planning on building any kind of VoIP-related system, I recommend you try Freeswitch, it is a lot simpler to setup, configure and use in general, and has a great online community of users and developers.

viraptor 17y ago
It's a pretty old article. Asterisk has advanced to 1.6 with a more stable modules split, locking, etc. since the time this article was written. (It's still not very good though - IMHO) If you really want to build a phone system, check if you need a PBX at all. There's a lot of OS software that handles telephony. There's opensips or yxa if you don't need PBX features, only proxy. From PBXes there are asterisk, freeswitch, yate (some people say that headers from grand central indicate google uses it) and some other less popular ones. This article is mostly about - asterisk crashes, and fs doesn't ;) Don't go for the popular ones - check which features you need first and then decide.
jodrellblank 17y ago
Has anyone here used Freeswitch? Asterisk is impressive that it gives a customisable PBS of sorts, but peel away the hood and it's all duct tape and bubble gum, terrible documentation left in the hands of a run-down unmaintained wiki and extension libraries unmaintained since 2004 full of out of date warnings about which bits are and aren't working in various versions of Asterisk. It works, but it's not pleasant or fun. Is Freeswitch better?
- nico 17y ago
  I've been trying and experimenting with Freeswitch for a while now. I first tried it about a year ago and I can say it's come a long way since then, there's been a lot of improvement and everyday new people are coming on board (at least users). The development team is awesome and give great support on the mailing list or through IRC. At my company we are currently using Asterisk, but are in the process of switching to Freeswitch. Everything seems very well thought out, and in my opinion, it is way simpler than Asterisk. There are many modules for a lot of different functionality, there's support for javascript, lua, perl, java, C, C#, ruby, python, php, a skype gateway, and many more.
- viraptor 17y ago
  It's got a much worse learning curve... actually it was a vertical wall last time I tried. Even with good experience with other PBXes, it took me a long time to understand how does it route calls (and how to control it properly). If they improved documentation with some examples, it might be easier now. It is more stable and its routing does look more "sane" as far as SIP goes. If I was starting from scratch, I'd choose FS rather than Asterisk. Then again, I would choose some other systems before FS.
RobGR 17y ago
I have used Asterisk for many systems and even modified some of the C code in it. I would not say it is as horrible as it is portrayed here. I started to set up a FreeSWITCH system, figuring if it was a clean redesign I might as well get on board now. Then I discovered it used XML in config files, which made me question the developers credentials and I never looked at it again.
- nico 17y ago
  The XML thing has been questioned a lot, but once you understand how it works, you'll see it's no trouble or shortcoming at all. Usually you barely have to touch the XML config files, you can do everything with scripts in the language of your choice, or through the events socket, much like AGI/AMI in Asterisk, but a lot better.

6 points by nico 17y ago

viraptor 17y ago

It's a pretty old article. Asterisk has advanced to 1.6 with a more stable modules split, locking, etc. since the time this article was written. (It's still not very good though - IMHO) If you really want to build a phone system, check if you need a PBX at all. There's a lot of OS software that handles telephony. There's opensips or yxa if you don't need PBX features, only proxy. From PBXes there are asterisk, freeswitch, yate (some people say that headers from grand central indicate google uses it) and some other less popular ones. This article is mostly about - asterisk crashes, and fs doesn't ;) Don't go for the popular ones - check which features you need first and then decide.

jodrellblank 17y ago

Has anyone here used Freeswitch? Asterisk is impressive that it gives a customisable PBS of sorts, but peel away the hood and it's all duct tape and bubble gum, terrible documentation left in the hands of a run-down unmaintained wiki and extension libraries unmaintained since 2004 full of out of date warnings about which bits are and aren't working in various versions of Asterisk. It works, but it's not pleasant or fun. Is Freeswitch better?

nico 17y ago
I've been trying and experimenting with Freeswitch for a while now. I first tried it about a year ago and I can say it's come a long way since then, there's been a lot of improvement and everyday new people are coming on board (at least users). The development team is awesome and give great support on the mailing list or through IRC. At my company we are currently using Asterisk, but are in the process of switching to Freeswitch. Everything seems very well thought out, and in my opinion, it is way simpler than Asterisk. There are many modules for a lot of different functionality, there's support for javascript, lua, perl, java, C, C#, ruby, python, php, a skype gateway, and many more.
viraptor 17y ago
It's got a much worse learning curve... actually it was a vertical wall last time I tried. Even with good experience with other PBXes, it took me a long time to understand how does it route calls (and how to control it properly). If they improved documentation with some examples, it might be easier now. It is more stable and its routing does look more "sane" as far as SIP goes. If I was starting from scratch, I'd choose FS rather than Asterisk. Then again, I would choose some other systems before FS.

RobGR 17y ago

I have used Asterisk for many systems and even modified some of the C code in it. I would not say it is as horrible as it is portrayed here. I started to set up a FreeSWITCH system, figuring if it was a clean redesign I might as well get on board now. Then I discovered it used XML in config files, which made me question the developers credentials and I never looked at it again.

nico 17y ago
The XML thing has been questioned a lot, but once you understand how it works, you'll see it's no trouble or shortcoming at all. Usually you barely have to touch the XML config files, you can do everything with scripts in the language of your choice, or through the events socket, much like AGI/AMI in Asterisk, but a lot better.