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Product Technical Overview
Technical Overview
Our system comes installed on two separate computers acting as
servers. We use one of the computers to run the core of the ProtCall application,
handle the database and information flow, and to provide the ASP.NET web interface.
The second server handles all the voice communication channels, inbound and outbound
calls.
First Server : ProtCall
The ProtCall server runs on Windows Server 2008 (see
installation requirements ). It stores your number databases, controls the PBX
and provides a web interface for your operators.
This server runs SQL2005 for database storage and IIS7 for the web interface.
Second Server: Software PBX
The PBX sever usually runs a Linux distribution and comes installed
with Asterisk , an open source PBX. This
provides PBX services for your location.
Operators can connect to this server using any kind of SIP phone, hardware or software.
We tend to prefer software SIP-phones (which happen to be free) such as CounterPath's
X-Lite or SJLabs's
SJ Phone.
Obviously, you can still use almost any PBX, software or hardware, if you already
have one installed. However, we do have a lot of experience with Asterisk and this
PBX will only cost you the hardware it runs on.
The Asterisk PBX can forward your voice communications to your telephony provider
either directly via VoIP (SIP) or through an ISDN line. If you opt for the ISDN
line, you usually need to buy a Digium Card
to convert your calls from VoIP to ISDN channels. If you opt for VoIP, if your telephony
provider supports it, there is no need for any additional hardware.
Operator's Desktop
The operator's desktop is a basic PC with a network connection,
a sound card and a headset.
You can run any kind of operating system (Windows, Linux, Mac) as long as it has
one of the supported internet browsers (IE7, FF3,Opera, Safari, etc).
If you are using software SIP phones, this is where you will have the SIP phone
installed. You can find a number of good (some free and some not) software SIP phone
for Windows, Linux or Mac.
Implementation diagram
Check the implementation diagram below to get an idea of how
the ProtCall system is deployed on a network.
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