“Look Mom – No Hands” IP phone autoconfig with trixbox Pro 2.0

Fonality [1] has rolled out trixbox Pro 2.0, its open source IP PBX software specifically built for resellers. “A lot of the work we do is not very sexy, but it’s under the hood work to save resellers time,” said Fonality CEO Chris Lyman. “Resellers make a living on margin, how few hours they spend on site for a fixed price contract.”

The new trick for trixbox 2.0 is automated phone provisioning. “It’s our ‘Look Mom, No Hands’ feature,” Lyman said. “Everyone has been BSing about hands-free provisioning, so I’m calling them to the mat. You can take 100 brand new [IP] phones out of the box, stick them on people’s desks, plug them in, and walk away.”

Without auto-provisioning, it might take anywhere from 15 to 30 minutes per desk. Multiple that by 100 phones and there’s 20 hours of work. “Unless you’re making McDonald’s rates, you aren’t making money, especially if you’re changing a fixed rate for the installation… if we can keep chipping away at the time [resellers] spend on site, we have something they can make a living at on here.”

Fonality tested a number of other products claiming to have auto-configuration capabilities and ended up writing two separate protocol detection engines to support Aastra and Polycom phones. Each engine uses three different algorithms to identify a new phone plugged into the system. Once a new phone is detected and identified, the appropriate firmware and bootcode is downloaded on to the phone along with next available extension number, followed by a reboot of the phone so it comes up with the proper extension number. “Most of the time is spent waiting for the phone to reboot,” stated Lyman.

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