Best PBX Software?
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@Dashrender said:
@JaredBusch said:
Because I have used zero legacy systems that let you conference more than 3 people at once. Users always get around it by joining in multiple conference calls together from various extensions.
Our Mitel system allows us to conference 4 additional besides the one who's phone it is. a total of 5 people.
So one more than what I said I have experienced with legacy systems.
Either way, yes conference bridges are the correct solution and always should have been, but it was an add on feature that legacy PBX providers charged outrageous prices to get.
So it sounds like Mitel tweaked their PBX to alleviate the issue to some degree instead of just opening up conference bridges.
With Asterisk, you can have a completely open conference bridge no need to dial special codes or require name announcements. So if you want external people on it just transfer them into it and then call in yourself.
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I guess I misread your 3 to mean 3 including the caller in your office.
In any regards, why the need to force people to a conference bridge? Does it somehow make the system more secure? use less resources?
Why offer less than what anyone else offers?
Often I'll agree with a specific work flow change - but this is one place where I just see the technology forcing us to something someone has decided to dictate as the "Proper Way." But isn't the real end goal of our technology to provide solutions for the way people do or want to work?
Oh and Mitel didn't charge us extra for the ability to conference 4 or 5 people using the endpoint, that's just part of the base package.
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@Dashrender said:
I guess I misread your 3 to mean 3 including the caller in your office.
In any regards, why the need to force people to a conference bridge? Does it somehow make the system more secure? use less resources?
Why offer less than what anyone else offers?
Often I'll agree with a specific work flow change - but this is one place where I just see the technology forcing us to something someone has decided to dictate as the "Proper Way." But isn't the real end goal of our technology to provide solutions for the way people do or want to work?
Oh and Mitel didn't charge us extra for the ability to conference 4 or 5 people using the endpoint, that's just part of the base package.
How much do they charge for conference bridges?
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@Dashrender said:
In any regards, why the need to force people to a conference bridge? Does it somehow make the system more secure? use less resources?
Conference bridges definitely use fewer resources. They use the least possible number of trunks to do the job.
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@Dashrender said:
But isn't the real end goal of our technology to provide solutions for the way people do or want to work?
Is it? Or is it to do things the best way possible? Why enable things that are less than ideal if you can give them ideal instead?
I'm not stating an opinion, just offering an alternative way to look at it. Remember most vendors have been burned giving people "what they want", it is generally wiser to give them "the right solution."
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@Dashrender said:
Oh and Mitel didn't charge us extra for the ability to conference 4 or 5 people using the endpoint, that's just part of the base package.
The nice thing about FreePBX or Elastix or whatever... unlimited conference bridges with unlimited callers into each.
At NTG, everyone gets their own private conference bridge plus we have the main ones that are accessible directly from the main IVR. So much more flexible.
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@coliver said:
@Dashrender said:
I guess I misread your 3 to mean 3 including the caller in your office.
In any regards, why the need to force people to a conference bridge? Does it somehow make the system more secure? use less resources?
Why offer less than what anyone else offers?
Often I'll agree with a specific work flow change - but this is one place where I just see the technology forcing us to something someone has decided to dictate as the "Proper Way." But isn't the real end goal of our technology to provide solutions for the way people do or want to work?
Oh and Mitel didn't charge us extra for the ability to conference 4 or 5 people using the endpoint, that's just part of the base package.
How much do they charge for conference bridges?
I'm pretty sure the system came with at least two built in. It's not a function that we use often, if at all. The ability for an endpoint to conference 4 additional people has almost always been more than enough for our needs.
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@Dashrender said:
I guess I misread your 3 to mean 3 including the caller in your office.
In any regards, why the need to force people to a conference bridge? Does it somehow make the system more secure? use less resources?
Why offer less than what anyone else offers?
Often I'll agree with a specific work flow change - but this is one place where I just see the technology forcing us to something someone has decided to dictate as the "Proper Way." But isn't the real end goal of our technology to provide solutions for the way people do or want to work?
Oh and Mitel didn't charge us extra for the ability to conference 4 or 5 people using the endpoint, that's just part of the base package.
You read that wrong. I said the vendors charge stupid prices for conference bridging and the Mitel obviously tweaked their PBX to allow a phone to make more calls than any other vendor instead of just opening up conference bridging.
Just because you think it is right base don your experience, does not mean the it is the right solution.
The correct solution has always been conference bridges. Every single place I have worked or consulted for either accepted limited extension based calling or purchased conference bridging in the PBX (prior to Asterisk based solutions obviously).
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@scottalanmiller said:
@Dashrender said:
But isn't the real end goal of our technology to provide solutions for the way people do or want to work?
Is it? Or is it to do things the best way possible? Why enable things that are less than ideal if you can give them ideal instead?
I'm not stating an opinion, just offering an alternative way to look at it. Remember most vendors have been burned giving people "what they want", it is generally wiser to give them "the right solution."
You're right - people think they want something, and You're right, we/they need to be led to the best solutions sometimes. So my earlier statement needs to be amended.
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@scottalanmiller said:
@Dashrender said:
In any regards, why the need to force people to a conference bridge? Does it somehow make the system more secure? use less resources?
Conference bridges definitely use fewer resources. They use the least possible number of trunks to do the job.
How does it use fewer trunks? the endpoint opens a trunk to the PBX, the PBX opens 4 trunks to outside callers. so 5 total trunks are open.
If we use a bridge, the employee has a trunk to the bridge, and the bridge has 4 more trunks to the outside callers.
Where's the savings? I'm not asking to be snide, I'd really like to know what I'm missing.
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@Dashrender said:
@scottalanmiller said:
@Dashrender said:
In any regards, why the need to force people to a conference bridge? Does it somehow make the system more secure? use less resources?
Conference bridges definitely use fewer resources. They use the least possible number of trunks to do the job.
How does it use fewer trunks? the endpoint opens a trunk to the PBX, the PBX opens 4 trunks to outside callers. so 5 total trunks are open.
If we use a bridge, the employee has a trunk to the bridge, and the bridge has 4 more trunks to the outside callers.
Where's the savings? I'm not asking to be snide, I'd really like to know what I'm missing.
Conference Bridge for five users... every user uses one trunk, no matter where they are calling from. So the total trunks is always five.
On phone conference behind a PBX... each internal caller goes to and from the PBX for two trunks. Each outside caller goes to the PBX then to the phone, for two trunks. So a five person call uses ten trunks.
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@JaredBusch said:
The correct solution has always been conference bridges.
So what makes your chosen solution the correct solution? Just because it's always been the way you've used/sold it doesn't make it right
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@Dashrender said:
@JaredBusch said:
The correct solution has always been conference bridges.
So what makes your chosen solution the correct solution? Just because it's always been the way you've used/sold it doesn't make it right
Because I said so. Obviously.
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@scottalanmiller said:
@Dashrender said:
@scottalanmiller said:
@Dashrender said:
In any regards, why the need to force people to a conference bridge? Does it somehow make the system more secure? use less resources?
Conference bridges definitely use fewer resources. They use the least possible number of trunks to do the job.
How does it use fewer trunks? the endpoint opens a trunk to the PBX, the PBX opens 4 trunks to outside callers. so 5 total trunks are open.
If we use a bridge, the employee has a trunk to the bridge, and the bridge has 4 more trunks to the outside callers.
Where's the savings? I'm not asking to be snide, I'd really like to know what I'm missing.
Conference Bridge for five users... every user uses one trunk, no matter where they are calling from. So the total trunks is always five.
On phone conference behind a PBX... each internal caller goes to and from the PBX for two trunks. Each outside caller goes to the PBX then to the phone, for two trunks. So a five person call uses ten trunks.
Eh? explain why behind the PBX doubles everything?
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@Dashrender said:
So what makes your chosen solution the correct solution? Just because it's always been the way you've used/sold it doesn't make it right
Most power and flexibility, lowest overhead, universally accepted as the right answer, no known downsides, all upsides
What makes anything else a consideration? While you can "make do" with lesser solutions, what's their upside?
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@JaredBusch said:
@Dashrender said:
@JaredBusch said:
The correct solution has always been conference bridges.
So what makes your chosen solution the correct solution? Just because it's always been the way you've used/sold it doesn't make it right
Because I said so. Obviously.
Of course, what was I thinking...
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@Dashrender said:
@JaredBusch said:
@Dashrender said:
@JaredBusch said:
The correct solution has always been conference bridges.
So what makes your chosen solution the correct solution? Just because it's always been the way you've used/sold it doesn't make it right
Because I said so. Obviously.
Of course, what was I thinking...
Heaven only knows.
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@Dashrender said:
@scottalanmiller said:
@Dashrender said:
@scottalanmiller said:
@Dashrender said:
In any regards, why the need to force people to a conference bridge? Does it somehow make the system more secure? use less resources?
Conference bridges definitely use fewer resources. They use the least possible number of trunks to do the job.
How does it use fewer trunks? the endpoint opens a trunk to the PBX, the PBX opens 4 trunks to outside callers. so 5 total trunks are open.
If we use a bridge, the employee has a trunk to the bridge, and the bridge has 4 more trunks to the outside callers.
Where's the savings? I'm not asking to be snide, I'd really like to know what I'm missing.
Conference Bridge for five users... every user uses one trunk, no matter where they are calling from. So the total trunks is always five.
On phone conference behind a PBX... each internal caller goes to and from the PBX for two trunks. Each outside caller goes to the PBX then to the phone, for two trunks. So a five person call uses ten trunks.
Eh? explain why behind the PBX doubles everything?
I know this is how it works, I've watched it on FOP2 working this way, I just can't tell you why it works this way.
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@scottalanmiller said:
@Dashrender said:
So what makes your chosen solution the correct solution? Just because it's always been the way you've used/sold it doesn't make it right
Most power and flexibility, lowest overhead, universally accepted as the right answer, no known downsides, all upsides
What makes anything else a consideration? While you can "make do" with lesser solutions, what's their upside?
The upside is that when someone is sitting at their desk, they don't have to call someone then transfer them to a conference bridge, then call the next person and do the same, etc.. and finally join the bridge themselves.
While I will admit that I'm probably in a more rare situation, our schedulers make conference calls randomly all day long. They can be on with a patient, a hospital, and two dr's offices.
With these calls happening randomly, it's not reasonable to call those places and say - hey here's the conference bridge, hang up and dial in for me, would ya? and doing the above stated.. call patient, transfer them to bridge, call hospital transfer, call dr 1 transfer, call dr 2 transfer, finally join conference bridge... damn what a huge PITA.I'm sure it's just that this particular situation doesn't happen much outside of medical - who knows.
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@coliver said:
@Dashrender said:
@scottalanmiller said:
@Dashrender said:
@scottalanmiller said:
@Dashrender said:
In any regards, why the need to force people to a conference bridge? Does it somehow make the system more secure? use less resources?
Conference bridges definitely use fewer resources. They use the least possible number of trunks to do the job.
How does it use fewer trunks? the endpoint opens a trunk to the PBX, the PBX opens 4 trunks to outside callers. so 5 total trunks are open.
If we use a bridge, the employee has a trunk to the bridge, and the bridge has 4 more trunks to the outside callers.
Where's the savings? I'm not asking to be snide, I'd really like to know what I'm missing.
Conference Bridge for five users... every user uses one trunk, no matter where they are calling from. So the total trunks is always five.
On phone conference behind a PBX... each internal caller goes to and from the PBX for two trunks. Each outside caller goes to the PBX then to the phone, for two trunks. So a five person call uses ten trunks.
Eh? explain why behind the PBX doubles everything?
I know this is how it works, I've watched it on FOP2 working this way, I just can't tell you why it works this way.
WOW, that's pretty inefficient! though the next question is, does it matter? It's still not using more than 4 connections on your SIP trunk, and as long as resources internally aren't an issue, is it worth trying to make this particular situation more efficient?
