[lug] What would you like to know about Asterisk?

[dio2002 at indra.com]

i'd like a basic rundown on setup for a home office with one "real" 
external phone number / line that routes if possible to a number of 
internal "virtual numbers / lines / vboxes".

in that scenario, are the internal virtual lines / boxes only accessible 
from a computer with mic & headset or can they be routed to actual 
physical "internal" phones with "local dummy numbers" behind the 
asterisk pbx?  any hints on related configuration would be helpful.

can windows clients access the vboxes on the asterisk server?

based upon your experience, any notes on gotchas related to 
configuration and regular operation of the system?

how does one handle a failure on the asterisk server?  at a bare 
minimum, i'm assuming you unplug the server and plug in a physical phone 
into the wall jack to get a single working line, foregoing all of the 
extra virtual lines and vboxes until you can bring the asterisk server 
back up.

hope that isn't too basic for you?
thanks


Sean Reifschneider wrote:
> Next month I'm going to be talking at BLUG about Asterisk.  In order to
> tune the talk to the audience, I'd like to hear what kinds of things the
> list members would like to hear about.
> 
> Asterisk is a full service PBX phone system which runs on Linux and other
> OSes.  A PBX is kind of the telephone equivalent of a network router or NAT
> gateway, in that it allows different servers to communicate amongst
> themselves and the outside world, and get access to services.
> 
> For example, I helped a friend set up an Asterisk system at his home which
> has a whitelist of phone numbers that will ring right through to his
> internal extensions, but other numbers get a message saying "If you are a
> telemarketer, please put this number on your do not call list and hang up,
> otherwise press 1 to complete the call", and if he's not at home the call
> goes into an answering machine that in addition to having an call-in
> interface will also e-mail voice messages...  This system connects to his
> external phone line and also to internal phones, acting kind of like a
> NAT with DMZ and iptables, to make an imperfect analogy.  :-)
> 
> A previous presentation on Asterisk I gave is at the following URL if you
> would like to see what I previously talked about on this topic:
> 
>    http://www.tummy.com/Community/Presentations/asterisk-20070213/asterisk.html
> 
> More information on what Asterisk is is at:
> 
>    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asterisk_(PBX)
> 
> and general information on a PBX is at:
> 
>    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_branch_exchange
> 
> So, what can I tell you about Asterisk?
> 
> Thanks,
> Sean