Commetrex and Sangoma Team Up!
Interfacing HMP media servers to the PSTN just got
a whole lot less expensive. Commetrex'
BladeWare now supports the Sangoma line of
PSTN PCI and PCI Express interface boards. The
boards will be marketed as the MSP product line,
which includes 2-24-port analog with mix-and-
match support for both station and office trunks,
single, dual, and quad E1/T1/J1 with PRI support.
BRI support provides 2-24 ports on Linux.
For years, Commetrex has shipped a limited range
of PCI telephony boards, including the DSP-based
MSP-320, so this announcement marks a major
shift in the company's strategy. We have landed
some significant design wins in the IP enterprise-
fax market with BladeWare's high function and
performance with an unbeatable price. But every
one of these OEMs would like to enjoy similar
competitive advantage when a TDM interface is
required. They have a worldwide customer base;
systems range from two to hundreds of ports. This
means not just analog and E1/T1 boards, but ISDN
PRI and BRI for the EU market. And then, there's
worldwide homologations.
Now, we're venturing into T.38 Phase II.
With SIP trunking obviating the need for the
enterprise gateway, users and vendors are
looking for end-to-end T.38 transport from
deep within the enterprise to the access
service provider, through the backbone
IP provider to the IP-PSTN gateway. This
presents the system integrator with a lot of
moving parts that, since we are still at the
front end of Phase II, have never been
tested. Users, OEMs, and service providers
need T.38 pioneer, such as Commetrex,
to help them put the pieces together.
As we received IP design wins, we knew we had to
get there, and get there fast to meet our FoIP
customer's PSTN-interface requirements. Then,
the Sangoma folks told us that not only did they
already have the products our customers need, but
that they could sell them to us for less than we
could produce them ourselves. We were sold.
Another consideration was Sangoma's support for
Windows. There are multiple vendors for PCM-
interface boards, but many only support Linux.
Sangoma's support for Linux and Windows, their
simplified APIs, and strong tech support made the
decision even easier.
Over three dozen boards are available in a variety
of configurations. Example board prices are
$272.00 for a two-line analog; 12-line analog is
$993.00; single-span MSP E/T is $497.00; quad-
span is $1410.00. A beta release will be available
in August.
For more information or to sign up for the beta test
(with discounts),contact
Sales or Tom Ray at 770-407-6025.
Voice Is Coming to BladeWare!
We are adding voice to BladeWare to support your
IVR and messaging applications, and some fax
applications need voice prompts. Look for a beta
release in Q3 that supports the Sangoma boards
described above. We'll also be adding voice
support to the SIP RSM in Q4. So you should have
PSTN voice in BladeWare 2.0 towards the end of
Q3 and SIP support for it in Q4. Playback will be
full-featured with pause-resume, jump ahead-back,
loader-softer, and faster-slower.
For more information contact
Sales or Bruce Adams at 770-407-6020.
BladeWare 1.5
he biggest new feature in BladeWare 1.5, scheduled
for mid-Q3, will be V.34 support for G.711 pass-
through fax and terminating T.38 (what we call Multi-
Modal Terminating Fax or MMTF). This means
BladeWare's TerminatingT38 supports T.38 V3. SIP
registration and authentication will be there, support
for fax footers as well as headers, and a better
logger, which will allow you to use it in a production
environment, will be included.
There will also be a new feature that has significant
maintainability ramifications. A BladeWare user's
application will be able to continue running even if
BladeWare, or a service within BladeWare, is taken
down for maintenance. (Remember, BladeWare is a
distributed system, so your applications have their
own process space or even their own machine(s).)
For example you will be able to take media resources
in and out of service without shutting down your
application or the balance of the system. And if the
application implements your proprietary admin
console, it can run independently of the balance of
the system.
Over the next several months, BladeWare's
administrative and maintainability features will
improve. The keystone event will be release 2.0,
planned for late Q3, which will have a powerful
browser-based control console. From it, you will be
able to move BladeWare between its operational
levels:
Level 0 - Not Running: (The initial and final state)
OTF is not running. The only thing that can be done
is to start BladeWare.
Level 1 - Configurable: Here, BladeWare supports
configuration and administration.
Level 2 - Mandatory Services Running: In this state,
the Mandatory Services, such as the Authentication
Server, are started.
Level 3 - Optional Services Running: Here, optional
services, such as the SIP RSM are started.
Level 4 - Clients Enabled: This state is functionally
equivalent to Level 3 except that now BladeWare can
handle client-application connections.
Level 5 - Calls Enabled: At Level 5, client applications
can place and accept calls.
Want to learn more about BladeWare, contact Sales
or Mike Coffee at 770-407-6021.
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What is PowerFax for BladeWare?
PowerFax for BladeWare is the product that adds
Commetrex' industry-leading fax technology to the
BladeWare platform.
Perhaps we shouldn't assume you know what
BladeWare, is. It's our HMP telephony middleware.
Today, it is shipping with support for IP fax, both
TerminatingT38 and G.711 pass through, which
uses our fax modems, now including V.34. In early
Q3 we will begin shipping support for several
Sangoma boards, as explained above, giving the
BladeWare user PSTN analog and digital access,
as well as voice play-record.
But it gets even better as the differences between
these network-interface resources are transparent
to your BladeWare, application. Moreover, SIP and
PSTN support run on the same system and at the
same time. Routing rules, maintained
independently of your application for inbound and
outbound calls, are used to determine which
application receives a call and which resource
handles an outbound call.
PowerFax for BladeWare is the integrated fax
resource for BladeWare that makes all this happen.
And it's all the access your application needs to
support IP networks and the PSTN.
For more information on PowerFax for BladeWare,
send an e-mail to Sales and we'll
send you a comprehensive product bulletin.
The SIP Forum's (www.sipforum.org) FoIP Task Group
If any of you have tried to deploy T.38-based fax in
multi-network environments, you've probably
encountered more than one obstacle. To address
these problems and offer solutions, the SIP Forum
has chartered the FoIP Task Group (TG). From the
SIP Forum Website:
The proposed charter of the SIP Forum FoIP task
group is to investigate ongoing issues with the
deployment of fax services, specifically ITU T.38, in
SIP networks. SIP networks cannot adequately
replace analog PSTN in enterprises unless
essential services, such as fax, are
accommodated.
Many real-time IP-fax problems are occurring with
increasing frequency due to the evolution and
maturation of enterprise and carrier networks.
Today, capex by both is largely confined to IP
infrastructure, creating demand for SIP trunking,
which reduces the need for gateways. The
absence of gateways and substitution of SIP
trunking and peering, then, boosts demand for
effective support of fax in access-provider and
backbone IP networks. This move to a more
seamless interconnection of the enterprise and
wide-area networks creates new interoperability
requirements and challenges.
Previously, when IP stopped at the enterprise edge,
T.38 interoperability was relatively simple, as it was
only required between the ATA or fax server and
the enterprise gateway. But with direct SIP
connections, T.38 interoperability is required
between the enterprise and access provider, and
between the access and long-haul providers. And
all of the links in this chain must provide effective
T.38 support. It's the addition of all these "moving
parts" that present today's challenges.
If you are interested in SIP, you should be a
member of the SIP Forum. So join up! And if you'd
like to see more effective support of real-time fax in
IP networks, monitor the work of the FoIP Task
Group. Better yet, volunteer to participate. We
need you.
Want to learn more about the SIP Forum?
Contact Marketing
or Mike Coffee at 770-407-6021.
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