[Asterisk-Users] IVR only system with scalibility with asterisk???
Hello all: Thank you for taking the time to read this post. Background: I am a new user to IVR systems and asterisk. I have been tasked with helping to set up a system that will only handle IVR (eg no PBX functions) incomming calls for 45 or so people that will call in 3 or 4 time each day during (approx) normal business hours. We have started to look at the Ivrs perl module from http://search.cpan.org/author/MUKUND/. We are having limited success. I found the asterisk software and have trugded through the last several months looking for IVR specific comments with minimal success. Issues: 1. We need to have a working system by "yesterday" (since we were told yesterday ;) my problem not yours). Realy, how easy is asterisk to develop for in a IVR message -> response -> authorize/validate -> contiune scenario? We will need to do database lookups. 2. We expect that we will end up greater than 100 users that will call in 3 or 4 time each day during (approx) normal business hours in the next couple of months. We also have the possibility that the next step may involve several hundred users. How can I provide something now and scale UP from a "commidity" PC (running GNU/Linux of course)? The Wildcard X100P only has 1 port. Are there other higher density options that "just work"? I've seen mentioned an Intel/Dialogic card that looks high density and expensive and interesting. I don't mind having a farm of these things on commidity hardware... within reason. Again, I'm a newbe trying to get myself up to speed on this topic. 3. I need to provide a working model very soon. What is cheapest way to put together a system with AVAILIBLE parts? There seems to be a shortage of some of the cards on the yahoo store front. So, looking for everything... Thank you very much. ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
Re: [Asterisk-Users] IVR only system with scalibility with asterisk???
On Thu, 4 Sep 2003, PJ Welsh wrote: > Thank you for taking the time to read this post. you're very welcome, welcome to the community, its extremely helpful > Background: > I am a new user to IVR systems and asterisk. I have been tasked with > helping to set up a system that will only handle IVR (eg no PBX > functions) incomming calls for 45 or so people that will call in 3 or 4 > time each day during (approx) normal business hours. We have started to > look at the Ivrs perl module from http://search.cpan.org/author/MUKUND/. > We are having limited success. I found the asterisk software and have > trugded through the last several months looking for IVR specific > comments with minimal success. you've found "a" right solution... > Issues: > 1. We need to have a working system by "yesterday" (since we were told > yesterday ;) my problem not yours). Realy, how easy is asterisk to > develop for in a IVR message -> response -> authorize/validate -> > contiune scenario? We will need to do database lookups. i'd go as far as to say that developing IVR through * is a dream. simple to a fault almost at times... db integration, hell, any type of integration is as simple as it can get, with a little help (get on #asterisk) you'll have your IVR up "yesterday" > 2. We expect that we will end up greater than 100 users that will call > in 3 or 4 time each day during (approx) normal business hours in the > next couple of months. We also have the possibility that the next step > may involve several hundred users. How can I provide something now and > scale UP from a "commidity" PC (running GNU/Linux of course)? The > Wildcard X100P only has 1 port. Are there other higher density options > that "just work"? I've seen mentioned an Intel/Dialogic card that looks > high density and expensive and interesting. I don't mind having a farm > of these things on commidity hardware... within reason. Again, I'm a > newbe trying to get myself up to speed on this topic. digium makes single and quad port E/T1 cards too, very economical, and scale wonderfully well.. > 3. I need to provide a working model very soon. What is cheapest way to > put together a system with AVAILIBLE parts? There seems to be a shortage > of some of the cards on the yahoo store front. depends on the number of lines, you can setup all the IVR functionality and test it though VoIP while youre waiting for the cards, and as soon as they arrive, go live on tdm circuits as well... -- Mirza Wasim Baig | Principal Consultant | Convergence Business Systems PK #48, St 32, Sector F-6/1, Islamabad, Pakistan 44000 | US: +1(800)460-1446 VOX: +92(51)282-0628 | FAX: +92(51)282-0621 | GSM: +92(300)850-8070 This mail is confidential & intended solely for the use of the addressee. ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
Re: [Asterisk-Users] IVR only system with scalibility with asterisk???
> > Issues: > 1. We need to have a working system by "yesterday" (since we were told yesterday ;) > my problem not yours). Realy, how easy is asterisk to develop for in a IVR message > -> response -> authorize/validate -> contiune scenario? We will need to do database > lookups. > An AGI application should be able to do this for you.. > > 2. We expect that we will end up greater than 100 users that will call in 3 or 4 > time each day during (approx) normal business hours in the next couple of months. We > also have the possibility that the next step may involve several hundred users. How > can I provide something now and scale UP from a "commidity" PC (running GNU/Linux of > course)? The Wildcard X100P only has 1 port. Are there other higher density options > that "just work"? I've seen mentioned an Intel/Dialogic card that looks high density > and expensive and interesting. I don't mind having a farm of these things on > commidity hardware... within reason. Again, I'm a newbe trying to get myself up to > speed on this topic. > The digium hardware is your best bet (as opposed to intel/dialogic), you can get a single quad port card that will handle either 96 channels of T1 or 120 channels of E1 depending on which part of the world you live in.. > > 3. I need to provide a working model very soon. What is cheapest way to put together > a system with AVAILIBLE parts? There seems to be a shortage of some of the cards on > the yahoo store front. > An X100P will give you a working model with a simgle channel, If you want to use a BRI ISDN line you could use an AVM or EICON ISDN card.. -- __ http://www.linuxmail.org/ Now with e-mail forwarding for only US$5.95/yr Powered by Outblaze ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
RE: [Asterisk-Users] IVR only system with scalibility with asterisk???
> i'd go as far as to say that developing IVR through * is a > dream. simple to a fault almost at times... db integration, > hell, any type of integration is as simple as it can get, > with a little help (get on #asterisk) you'll have your IVR > up "yesterday" That's really good to hear - my background is in IVR and I've been developing with Intel's CT-ADE (formerly VOS from Parity Software) for quite a while now. I'm starting to play with Asterisk and liking everything I see so far, so to hear you say that is really encouraging. One thing I do find a bit lacking is documentation, but being a developer I know how we all hate writing docs ;-) I've seen the AGI HTML dump, think it makes sense, I guess I just need to do a bit more playing and looking at the examples. > digium makes single and quad port E/T1 cards too, very > economical, and scale wonderfully well.. Yes, I love the pricing compared to Dialogic cards! When you say they scale well, how many cards are we talking about in a single chassis? Regards Paul ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
Re: [Asterisk-Users] IVR only system with scalibility with asterisk???
On Thu, 2003-09-04 at 12:43, PJ Welsh wrote: > Hello all: > > Thank you for taking the time to read this post. > > Background: > I am a new user to IVR systems and asterisk. I have been tasked with > helping to set up a system that will only handle IVR (eg no PBX > functions) incomming calls for 45 or so people that will call in 3 or > 4 time each day during (approx) normal business hours. We have started > to look at the Ivrs perl module from > http://search.cpan.org/author/MUKUND/. We are having limited success. > I found the asterisk software and have trugded through the last > several months looking for IVR specific comments with minimal success. > > Issues: > 1. We need to have a working system by "yesterday" (since we were > told yesterday ;) my problem not yours). Realy, how easy is asterisk > to develop for in a IVR message -> response -> authorize/validate -> > contiune scenario? We will need to do database lookups. > > 2. We expect that we will end up greater than 100 users that will call > in 3 or 4 time each day during (approx) normal business hours in the > next couple of months. We also have the possibility that the next step > may involve several hundred users. How can I provide something now and > scale UP from a "commidity" PC (running GNU/Linux of course)? The > Wildcard X100P only has 1 port. Are there other higher density options > that "just work"? I've seen mentioned an Intel/Dialogic card that > looks high density and expensive and interesting. I don't mind having > a farm of these things on commidity hardware... within reason. Again, > I'm a newbe trying to get myself up to speed on this topic. > > 3. I need to provide a working model very soon. What is cheapest way > to put together a system with AVAILIBLE parts? There seems to be a > shortage of some of the cards on the yahoo store front. First you need to decide on how many ports you will need, how important ease of scalability is. For the number of ports, you need to decide how much tolerance you have for the people remotely to deal with a busy signal. So far you mentioned 45 people making 3-4 calls a day over a ~8 hour day. The quick math says that 45 people with 4 calls is 180 calls a day. In a 8 hour day you have 480 minutes. From 480 minutes 1 port could handle the load if the call was under 2.5 minutes long and everyone waited till it became available. My guess is you don't want people on redial that often and waiting for the port to come open. Next, you move on to what is the acceptable idle amount of service available. If you scaled up to say 5 lines, and the call length is short, then you will have your service mostly idle, but it can handle peak times better. I'll let you continue this line of questioning internally. Next to decide on hardware, if you think you may need more than 10 lines, you need to move to digital trunks. You can start with a T100P and a channel bank until your costs justify switching over to a T1. The benefit is already having the hardware in hand and used to it while on spending a little more short term to get the FXO channel bank that you will either sell off later, or convert to FXS for internal extensions if you want to switch services. If you already have a PBX in house and can drop a T1 interface to you asterisk box, that is good too. As for your application. You mention looking into perl modules, so I assume you have some perl familiarity. From AGI you can script up any database access and prompting you so wish to undertake. Essentially it will come out to be something like. stream file(prompt) while (not enough digits) wait for digits collect dialed digits validate(digits) # in this sub is where your database stuff works continue? # whatever here you planned on letting happen. all this is easy and cheap. For your quick demonstration, I suggest setting up asterisk with a dummy interface, downloading the iaxclient and showing that your AGI app would be easy enough to write. You are then only into the project for time, but not any parts. Once you have that down, you would then purchase the parts needed to complete the project from Digium and deploy. If you stick with a T100P interface then you should be able to handle 500 people with 5 minute calls mainly around the business work time and have a small window of safety to not overload the circuits to the point you will have busy signals often. If it is likely you could grow beyond 500 people soon, you may want to buy the T400P card and be able to deploy more digital trunks without taking the system down for more than an asterisk restart. -- Steven Critchfield <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
RE: [Asterisk-Users] IVR only system with scalibility with asterisk???
On Thu, 4 Sep 2003, Paul C wrote: > One thing I do find a bit lacking is documentation, but being a > developer I know how we all hate writing docs ;-) I've seen the AGI HTML > dump, think it makes sense, I guess I just need to do a bit more playing > and looking at the examples. use the source, luke, if you know perl, get citats asterisk-perl modules, asterisk.gnuinter.net, they make life really easy > > digium makes single and quad port E/T1 cards too, very > > economical, and scale wonderfully well.. > Yes, I love the pricing compared to Dialogic cards! When you say they scale > well, how many cards are we talking about in a single chassis? well, 2 of the quad-e1 is about as high as i'd go, so 240 tdm channels (and this question has been asked a number of times before , see the varying discourses on the mailing list archives) - wasim ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
Re: [Asterisk-Users] IVR only system with scalibility with asterisk???
Top posting only: This is great info. A couple of you have already replied with very helpfull and usefull information. Thank you very much!! I am very excited to hear that I can test without purchasing the hardware. I googled and found a IAXClient at http://iaxclient.sourceforge.net/. Is that the program you mean? It looks like * is a very good sofware to pursue and very powerfull (and fairly inexpensive) when hooked up with the Digium cards. I will download and begin trying *. I will likely just place an order for a single analog card just to get the ball rolling very soon. I still would like to hear more about how people are integrating * with external scripts. It was mentioned that the docs may be a little sparse... examples would be GREAT (said in the voice of Tony Tiger). On Thu, Sep 04, 2003 at 01:15:11PM -0500, Steven Critchfield wrote: > ...my original post deleted > First you need to decide on how many ports you will need, how important > ease of scalability is. For the number of ports, you need to decide how > much tolerance you have for the people remotely to deal with a busy > signal. So far you mentioned 45 people making 3-4 calls a day over a ~8 > hour day. The quick math says that 45 people with 4 calls is 180 calls a > day. In a 8 hour day you have 480 minutes. From 480 minutes 1 port could > handle the load if the call was under 2.5 minutes long and everyone > waited till it became available. My guess is you don't want people on > redial that often and waiting for the port to come open. Next, you move > on to what is the acceptable idle amount of service available. If you > scaled up to say 5 lines, and the call length is short, then you will > have your service mostly idle, but it can handle peak times better. I'll > let you continue this line of questioning internally. > > Next to decide on hardware, if you think you may need more than 10 > lines, you need to move to digital trunks. You can start with a T100P > and a channel bank until your costs justify switching over to a T1. The > benefit is already having the hardware in hand and used to it while on > spending a little more short term to get the FXO channel bank that you > will either sell off later, or convert to FXS for internal extensions if > you want to switch services. If you already have a PBX in house and can > drop a T1 interface to you asterisk box, that is good too. > > As for your application. You mention looking into perl modules, so I > assume you have some perl familiarity. From AGI you can script up any > database access and prompting you so wish to undertake. Essentially it > will come out to be something like. > > stream file(prompt) > while (not enough digits) > wait for digits > collect dialed digits > validate(digits) # in this sub is where your database stuff works > continue? # whatever here you planned on letting happen. > > > all this is easy and cheap. For your quick demonstration, I suggest > setting up asterisk with a dummy interface, downloading the iaxclient > and showing that your AGI app would be easy enough to write. You are > then only into the project for time, but not any parts. Once you have > that down, you would then purchase the parts needed to complete the > project from Digium and deploy. > > If you stick with a T100P interface then you should be able to handle > 500 people with 5 minute calls mainly around the business work time and > have a small window of safety to not overload the circuits to the point > you will have busy signals often. If it is likely you could grow beyond > 500 people soon, you may want to buy the T400P card and be able to > deploy more digital trunks without taking the system down for more than > an asterisk restart. > > -- > Steven Critchfield <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > ___ > Asterisk-Users mailing list > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
Re: [Asterisk-Users] IVR only system with scalibility with asterisk???
On Thu, 2003-09-04 at 14:10, PJ Welsh wrote: > Top posting only: > > This is great info. A couple of you have already replied with very > helpfull and usefull information. Thank you very much!! > > I am very excited to hear that I can test without purchasing the > hardware. I googled and found a IAXClient at > http://iaxclient.sourceforge.net/. Is that the program you mean? yes. While it isn't ready for prime time use, it is a easy way to start it up from a windows or OSX system. It works much easier than a SIP or H323 soft phone. > It looks like * is a very good sofware to pursue and very powerfull > (and fairly inexpensive) when hooked up with the Digium cards. I will > download and begin trying *. I will likely just place an order for a > single analog card just to get the ball rolling very soon. If you read through the archive you will find that an analog card is prone to signaling problems. Basically it is not something you would want to depend upon for a business. Not to mention that is is 1/5th of the cost of a T100P card that you will probably need to move up to in the short term to handle the load you will generate during parts of your day. > I still would like to hear more about how people are integrating * > with external scripts. It was mentioned that the docs may be a little > sparse... examples would be GREAT (said in the voice of Tony Tiger). There is quite a bit available via the archive. Not to mention there are a few people on this list that are selling services based on asterisk and may for a small fee give you a great jump start on hardware and/or software setup/creation. If you ask directly for this help, I'm sure someone will contact you shortly to offer assistance. > On Thu, Sep 04, 2003 at 01:15:11PM -0500, Steven Critchfield wrote: > > > ...my original post deleted > > First you need to decide on how many ports you will need, how important > > ease of scalability is. For the number of ports, you need to decide how > > much tolerance you have for the people remotely to deal with a busy > > signal. So far you mentioned 45 people making 3-4 calls a day over a ~8 > > hour day. The quick math says that 45 people with 4 calls is 180 calls a > > day. In a 8 hour day you have 480 minutes. From 480 minutes 1 port could > > handle the load if the call was under 2.5 minutes long and everyone > > waited till it became available. My guess is you don't want people on > > redial that often and waiting for the port to come open. Next, you move > > on to what is the acceptable idle amount of service available. If you > > scaled up to say 5 lines, and the call length is short, then you will > > have your service mostly idle, but it can handle peak times better. I'll > > let you continue this line of questioning internally. > > > > Next to decide on hardware, if you think you may need more than 10 > > lines, you need to move to digital trunks. You can start with a T100P > > and a channel bank until your costs justify switching over to a T1. The > > benefit is already having the hardware in hand and used to it while on > > spending a little more short term to get the FXO channel bank that you > > will either sell off later, or convert to FXS for internal extensions if > > you want to switch services. If you already have a PBX in house and can > > drop a T1 interface to you asterisk box, that is good too. > > > > As for your application. You mention looking into perl modules, so I > > assume you have some perl familiarity. From AGI you can script up any > > database access and prompting you so wish to undertake. Essentially it > > will come out to be something like. > > > > stream file(prompt) > > while (not enough digits) > > wait for digits > > collect dialed digits > > validate(digits) # in this sub is where your database stuff works > > continue? # whatever here you planned on letting happen. > > > > > > all this is easy and cheap. For your quick demonstration, I suggest > > setting up asterisk with a dummy interface, downloading the iaxclient > > and showing that your AGI app would be easy enough to write. You are > > then only into the project for time, but not any parts. Once you have > > that down, you would then purchase the parts needed to complete the > > project from Digium and deploy. > > > > If you stick with a T100P interface then you should be able to handle > > 500 people with 5 minute calls mainly around the business work time and > > have a small window of safety to not overload the circuits to the point > > you will have busy signals often. If it is likely you could grow beyond > > 500 people soon, you may want to buy the T400P card and be able to > > deploy more digital trunks without taking the system down for more than > > an asterisk restart. > > > > -- > > Steven Critchfield <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > > > ___ > > Asterisk-Users mailing list > > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listin
