Asterisk has been around for sometime already, and is an opensource telephony system.
What Asterisk can do, is link existing telephony systems to a digital platform where content can be stored or interfaced with your telephony service. For example;
- You could link you addressbook information with you telephony services.
- You could configure your system to record official conversations with government or corporate organisations.
- You can link your devices together, so that any call you recieve, can be sent to whatever device your able to use at that time.
- You can configure privacy settings. For example, when your driving perhaps you want your hands-free system to only allow some people to make a call to you while your driving.
Asterisk is traditionally a system that was focused on delivering solutions for business. However, with the introduction of the Semantic Web, your information systems will include cloud-based services, and these services can connect to your very own telephony system.
VOIP or SIP based systems are not only useful for deploying voice telephony services. Fundermentally, these are internet systems architectures that support real-time communications ("RTC"). RTC Applications need dedicated bandwidth for fixed periods of time, or calltimes. Other internet applications don't need so much data, on such a reliable basis. They can buffer, or burst data delivery so that you recieve packets of information when you click on new functions on webpages. VOIP or SIP provides the means to dedicate bandwidth for specific RTC Applications, whether it be for telephony, broadcast or webcast, TelePresence, TeleHealth or other RTC Application.
SIP Incorporates Security mechanisms that can be compatible with WebID.
Medooze MCU is an OpenSource Video Multiconference Server that integrates with SIP Compatible systems. When integrated with a SIP server (Such as asterisk) the MCU Allows a single stream of video to be transcoded in realtime, on the network, so that it can be supplied to different types of users, in different formats.
Different styles of devices use different codecs or media technologies used to display audio video content. The MCU translates these media technologies from formats that one device understands to another. Importantly, an MCU does this on the Cloud, which enables the end-points to use the maximum available bandwidth on one video stream, rather than several; increasing the quality made available to recipients of Real Time Communications - Media Streams.
RTC Connectivity & Display Technology Innovation
Real Time Communications from a network layer requires dedicated Bandwidth for the duration of call-periods. Networks in Australia are not provided in this way, and are billed for usage (GB's/MB's Upload / Download). Newer Networks have seperate 'traffic classes' to improve accessibility to the type of networking products required for clinical or otherwise reliable realtime communications infrastructure meeting the traditional experience of a plain old telepone, with the opportunities for immersive and interactive interpersonal communications brought about through internet. The type of bandwidth connection is often called Committed Information Rate ("CIR") or Committed Bit Rate ("CBR") which essentially provides dedicated bandwidth at a selected rate. One of the telecommunications challenges is defining methods to provide this bandwidth for the period of a call, rather than as a monthly subscribed service, which will improve accessibility.
Display Technologies are becoming far more advanced. In the longer-term, it seems likely that multi-view media encoding technologies will offer opportunities to revolutionise media production, post-production and interactive experiences. When applying these new media encoding techniques to image acquisition technologies such as light field optics devices, whilst the bandwidth needs dramatically increase; the capability when applied with related technologies can improve the realism of interpersonal communications, or the available camera angles for production and post-production environments.
The vast majority of evolutionary technologies made possible by interent are yet to be invented. We are still, as a global community, working on the basic framework that will ensure internet is ubiquitous, available, accessible and affordable to every person in every community.
At the core of the technology development is not in building the capacity for machines to improve their communications skills, knowledge, purpose or application; but rather the skills, opportunities and quality of life for the community using technologies as toolsets for socio-demographic improvement.
Realtime Communications has an enormous role to facilitate in the development, delivery and purpose of internet communications and will likely be amongst the most data-intensive applications being delivered, driving network deployment, development and growth in association to the economies surrounding those networks of people, places, faces and personalities.
Critically, Semantic internet provides means for identity. This means your communications can be associated to your identity, rather than gifted automatically to a provider without further consideration.