As far as I know, trixbox target audience/market is for home / small business and not the enterprise or commercial market. That being said, there's nothing stopping you from using I just have some fears and concerns about using the trixbox product.
I did a quick google search for trixbox vs asterisk and [EMAIL PROTECTED] (its previous name) vs asterisk and couldn't find much substance. Due to the amount of posts I see weekly about trixbox on this list, I think we should put together some of the pros and cons of using it. This could be a good wiki article later. Security: I like building boxes from scratch/minimal installs and install each individual package I need as I go. That way, I have nothing installed but packages I consider absolutely necessary to have on my asterisk box. The main dial plan I believe is stored in mysql and asterisk grabs what it needs via realtime. This sounds great but unless I specifically need realtime for something, I prefer storing my settings in configuration files. Running mysql is an additional headache and security risk. Yes, mysql could be locked down and not even exposed to the Internet but somehow that would make me feel as if I'm moving backwards. I prefer to start from the ground up, fix the leaks in my roof while I'm doing the roof instead of leaving it for after I am done the kitchen. Stability: I question the stability / reliability of the trixbox product. Even if we say the product is perfect, it's still fair to say each additional package I install has the possibility to decrease stability. Product Lifetime: What is the product release cycle like? Every 4 months? Is my asterisk installation critically vulnerable because I am waiting for a new trixbox release to come out? Meanwhile, anyone running asterisk can do a cvs update and install. What about when trixbox lacks a specific feature needed in dialplan. I have read a few threads on this mailing list that cite you can use a extensions-custom.conf and, of course, the other option is to edit the php interface. When I did look at some code for one of the php interfaces a while back when it was [EMAIL PROTECTED], the code lacked meaningful comments and some things could have been coded better (a problem common in the open source community). Community: Where do you go for help with this product? As soon as I hear [EMAIL PROTECTED] or trixbox I quickly excuse myself from the conversation because I cannot help you. #asterisk on freenode sends everyone with [EMAIL PROTECTED] / trixbox questions to #freepbx. Most of the posts on this mailing list about trixbox go either unanswered, or somewhat answered, but not too in depth. The fact is that people who know asterisk really know nothing about trixbox because it's another beast of its own. I just can't apply my knowledge of asterisk to your trixbox installation. It would be fair to say that the 'regular' asterisk community has more 'hardcore' nerds let's call them and a much larger community. (ignorant assumption warning light) The trixbox community would be mainly composed of people who like GUIs and are generally expect their answers to be solved by said GUI. When their answers are not solved by the GUI, they come running for help from others who, like them, are mostly unaware of what's going on in the background and how to solve the issue at hand. I am sure that is not all of the community again ignorant assumption warning light is on but for the most part the idea is that the developers of trixbox know what's going on and the consumer or the person using the product does not. Let the (constructive) flame wars begin. For good measure, let's throw Windows vs Linux in there as well :) This mailing list will also be biased towards trixbox so someone feel free to play devil's advocate. I have done little research on trixbox/[EMAIL PROTECTED], its community, or even installed it. Blaine Aldridge
