*Asterisk



The world's leading open source software available for free! and worth looking into for your TAS Application





The world of technology such as the Internet, fiber optics, broadband and VoIP are being called the "invisible infrastructure", but the digital highways of today are critical to the economy. So critical in fact, that President Obama will appoint the nation's first-ever "chief technology officer."

That being said, there is now a buzzword in our industry called "*Asterisk" that enables you to offer robust features using only standard off the shelf Dell (i.e.) computers/servers. *Asterisk is an open source software telephony engine and is available for download free of charge. This telephony platform has been adopted by call centers and now telephone answering services (TAS) because of its robust fullness, flexibility and price. It provides all current capabilities (free of charge) of current TAS systems with features like remote operator, barging or coaching, IVR, advanced skill-based ACD routing, automated custom attendant, conference bridge, Voice Logging, Voice Mail, predictive and bulk dialing, Unified Messaging and can even be the telephony interface for your web site.  

Its telephony operates with traditional telephony equipment using relatively inexpensive hardware or Voice over IP systems. It can be configured as the core of an IP or hybrid PBX, switching calls, managing least cost routes, enabling features, and connecting callers with the outside world over IP, analog (POTS), and digital (T1/E1) connections.  

Internet Service Providers, Call Centers, Telephone Answering Services, Local Exchange Carriers (CLECS) and even first-tier incumbents are using this open source *Asterisk software. Feature servers, hosted services, voicemail systems, pre-paid calling solutions, all based on *Asterisk have helped reduce costs and enabled flexibility for these as well as numbers of other businesses.  

If service is a concern, the hardware used to power this system is right off the shelf at your local Dell dealer or computer store saving you money by not having to pay service and maintenance fees to a vendor located out of state.  In addition, "hot-swappable" servers are also available allowing immediate "on the fly" cutovers during an equipment failure. Now smaller TAS's can be brought under the "tech" umbrella with the affordability of *Asterisk while larger TAS's can continue grow without the hindering cost of expensive platforms.

In a few words, what does this all mean?

One of the reasons we developed our own TAS software years ago was myself and some "techies" researched the market and realized how antiquated the software and hardware was provided by all the vendors, not to mention how expensive it was. Consistently, the vendors did not market their features but marketed fear and this is unique to our wonderful TAS industry. Why ? We are a very small niche industry that is shrinking every day and the disparity between larger and smaller centers grow due to the cost of these systems. Smaller TAS's do not have the ability to buy newer systems. Now they do with TASterix. Why is it that our industry is the only industry that costs more for technological advancements than any other in the world ? We see our telco costs diminish and many other facets of our business but the core software keeps increasing, this is nothing short of a monopolized industry specific to 5 vendors fighting over maybe 2000 services nationwide.

The reason for such expense is not the software development but the hardware it resides on and the development required to integrate the hardware and software, software development is nothing more than data management in our industry.

We refuse to provide fear marketing, we will provide 100% transparency and educate all of our clients as best we can since ultimately education of Asterisk is the best path for tech support and business continuity.

Our application is unique since we are able to "hook" into any PBX or SWITCH out there as long as it is open to us. If you research and look at every major PBX or Call Center Application available outside the TAS world, they are all open architecture which allows anyone to "hook" into the system. Hence, Pinnacle chose EON, open architecture. All of the other TAS vendors tell potential customers that their systems can handle such calls, and this is untrue and part of the fear marketing.

We originally hooked into a system called TeleVantage which had more installs in the world than all TAS vendors combined and it was a cheaper solution for the TAS world, however, at the first go of selling our software, the owners felt it was inferior since we were cutting most price structure in half, no joke ! It was like beating our heads against the wall. In addition there were a few sale people from other vendors who chose to say our application was smoke and mirrors and there was no way a small company like ours could have developed the features we have. We still have features that no other vendor has.

Now, Asterisk comes along, and because it is a world wide phenomenon it is gaining traction within the TAS world and now allows us to sell our product even cheaper than before with more TAS features. This is why we ventured with TAS Marketing and why our venture fits so well. We have also ventured with a preferred vendor of Digium who is the parent of Asterisk. So we have a goliath behind us if we ever need to stand chin to chin with another vendor. In addition, there are hundreds if not thousands of call centers much larger than most TAS centers currently using Asterisk worldwide.

We will not fear market and want to educate owners like yourself on tech issues, like the SMTP issue, since it will provide independence from a software standpoint and increase profitability never seen in the TAS industry before.

From my understanding, the fear marketing has already begun with vendors stating that Asterisk is a toy and does not compare to their switch but then why are some of them offering a software based solution using Asterisk? The Free Downloaded version may be not as feature rich as required but TASterix has developed features allowing Asterisk to work as the telephony application with our TAS product.

The world of telephone answering is Changing…

Here is what a complete package utilizing TASterix® can do for you:

By applying *Asterisk software in your telephone answering service, there are no more:

Call (800) 369-6126 to set up your demo today...

*Asterisk + TASterix® = Total TAS Solution

More about *Asterisk

*Asterisk is the world's leading open source telephony engine and tool kit. Offering flexibility unheard of in the world of proprietary communications, *Asterisk empowers developers and integrators to create advanced communication solutions...for free.

Asterisk® is released as open source under the GNU General Public License (GPL), and it is available for download free of charge. *Asterisk® is the most popular open source software available, with the *Asterisk Community being the top influencer in VoIP.

*Asterisk as a switch (PBX)

*Asterisk can be configured as the core of an IP or hybrid PBX, switching calls, managing routes, enabling features, and connecting callers with the outside world over IP, analog (POTS), and digital (T1/E1) connections.

*Asterisk runs on a wide variety of operating systems including Linux, Mac OS X, OpenBSD, FreeBSD and Sun Solaris and provides all of the features you would expect from a PBX including many advanced features that are often associated with high end (and high cost) proprietary PBXs. *Asterisk's architecture is designed for maximum flexibility and supports Voice over IP in many protocols, and can interoperate with almost all standards-based telephony equipment using relatively inexpensive hardware.

*Asterisk as a gateway

It can also be built out as the heart of a media gateway, bridging the legacy PSTN to the expanding world of IP telephony. *Asterisk's modular architecture allows it to convert between a wide range of communications protocols and media codecs.

*Asterisk as a feature/media server

Need an IVR? *Asterisk's got you covered. How about a conference bridge? Yep. It's in there. What about an automated attendant? *Asterisk does that too. How about a replacement for your aging legacy voicemail system? Can do. Unified messaging? No problem. Need telephony interface for your web site? Ok.

*Asterisk in the call center

*Asterisk has been adopted by call centers around the world based on its flexibility. Call center and contact center developers have built complete ACD systems based on *Asterisk. *Asterisk has also added new life to existing call center solutions by adding remote IP agent capabilities, advanced skills-based routing, predictive and bulk dialing, and more.

*Asterisk in the network

Internet Telephony Service Providers (ITSPs), competitive local exchange carriers (CLECS) and even first-tier incumbents have discovered the power of open source communications with *Asterisk. Feature servers, hosted services clusters, voicemail systems, pre-paid calling solutions, all based on *Asterisk have helped reduce costs and enabled flexibility.

Supported platforms

*Asterisk® is primarily developed on GNU/Linux for x/86 and runs on GNU/Linux for PPC along with OpenBSD, FreeBSD, and Mac OS X. Other platforms and standards-based UNIX-like operating systems should be reasonably easy to port for anyone with the time and requisite skill to do so. *Asterisk® is available in Debian Stable and is maintained by the Debian VoIP Team.

Supported hardware

*Asterisk® needs no additional hardware for Voice over IP. For interconnection with digital and analog telephony equipment, *Asterisk® supports a number of hardware devices, most notably all of the hardware manufactured by Digium®, the creator of *Asterisk®.

Supported protocols

*Asterisk® supports a wide range of protocols for the handling and transmission of voice over traditional telephony interfaces including H.323, Session Initiation Protocol (SIP), Media Gateway Control Protocol (MGCP), and Skinny Client Control Protocol (SCCP).

Using the Inter-Asterisk eXchange (IAX™) Voice over IP protocol *Asterisk® merges voice and data traffic seamlessly across disparate networks. The use of Packet Voice allows *Asterisk® to send data such as URL information and images in-line with voice traffic, allowing advanced integration of information.

*Asterisk® provides a central switching core, with four APIs for modular loading of telephony applications, hardware interfaces, file format handling, and codecs. It allows for transparent switching between all supported interfaces, allowing it to tie together a diverse mixture of telephony systems into a single switching network.

© 2009 by Tas Marketing - All rights reseverd.