Presented by Grant Broomhall at The Asterisk Community Conference Africa 2016.

1. Introduction
&
Product
Overview

2. Introduction &
historical perspective
● Who are we?
● Where are we?
● Value / Vision / Brand?
● What is the Value Proposition?
● The evolution of mature, open source products
● Phase 1: Asterisk telephony peripherals
● Phase 2: Telephony appliances
● Phase 3: The Web, enter HTML5!

3. WHO are WE?
● OEM/Vendor of IP communications products
● Privately owned, Pty Ltd registered 2008
● South African design & manufacture (Proudly SA)
● HQ: Cape Town, South Africa
● Strong partnerships:
●Channel: Distribution, Resellers
●Manufacturing: South African partners
●Technology: Intel, Yealink, SNOM, Voipex, Polycom,
Inmarsat, Connection Telecom

4. WHERE are We?
● To date: 6000 units shipped in to Southern African region
● Some use cases:
●Gated Communities: Smart Village
●Hotels: Tintswalo Atlantic
●Emergency services: ER24, WP Blood Transfusion Service
● Call Centers: SABC Call Center, Trafficc
●Multi-branch: CMH, Tiger Wheel & Tire, Ellerines
●Ecommerce: Yuppiechef
●Financial Services: Rand Trust, Currencies Direct, Argon
Asset Management
●Security: Stallion Security

5. Vision & Brand
● Vision:
●Bring cost effective, enterprise grade UC to the SMME
● Brand:
●Changing the Communications Landscape for Good
●Access to the new world of feature rich, connected
anywhere telephony at low cost and low risk

6. Value Proposition
● World leading tech
● Flexible offering
●Seamless integration
● Easy upgrades
● Rugged productisation for harsh environments
● Brilliant, hands-on training
● High caliber support

7. Evolution of mature, open
source products
Phase 1: since 2008
“Generic” Asterisk telephony peripheral

8. Phase 1: Comma iTA
● Vision: Build a robust and scalable alternative to PCI and USB
based telco cards for Asterisk
● Where:
● Comma = “ , ” as word play on “*” and “Comms”
● iTA = Intelligent Telephony Adapter

9. Comma iTA Architecture
● 32-bit softcore µP with dedicated hardware EC, implemented in
an FPGA
● Native Asterisk TDMSpan protocol: Ethernet based “TDM over
Packet” using DAHDI
● Utilities on host machine: Auto-detect and Boot iTA
Benefits:
● Scalable, distributed architectures
● Abstracted from hardware
Case history:
● Vodacom Gated Services (now Smart Village)

10. Comma iTA Architecture
FXO FXS
ISDN
PRA
ISDN
BRA
EthernetEthernet
Commodity Server
Comma iTAs (Scalable to many)
TDM/Packet Engine
Hardware Echo Canceller
CAS
TDMoE
ISDNoIP
UDP
IP
Comma Manager
Agent
Ethernet
Linux Network Stack
mISDN
DAHDI
Analog/PRI
Asterisk
Dynamic
Multispan
ISDNoIP
VoIP
FreePBX
Comma GUI
Comma Manager
PSTN Option Modules
TDMoE Chipset
Drivers
ISDNoIP
LAN

11. Comma iTA:
Com.X line card in a box
● Features:
● 1U rack-mount unit supports high density installations
● HW based Echo Cancellation (EC)
● Timing synchronization of multiple units over Ethernet
● 10/100Base-T Ethernet connection to host server
● Build options:
● 1 to 4 PRI
● BRI: 4 or 8
● 8 to 32 Analogue (FXS and FXO)

12. Evolution of mature, open
source products
Phase 2: since 2010
Telephony Appliances

13. Phase 2: Telephony Appliance
● Vision:
● Build a robust, all-in-1, Asterisk appliance
● Productisation of Asterisk!
● We wanted to offer:
● A feature rich, cost effective alternative to incumbent
product vendors (closed eco-systems)
● Remove need for skilled Linux / Asterisk personnel

14. Com.X Appliance Architecture
● Hardware:
● Integrated telephony server
● Ethernet or PCIe -> iTA hardware
● Software
● Ubuntu base
● Debian packaging for Asterisk
● FreePBX
● Java GUI (GWT)
Ubuntu Linux 12.04 LTS
mISDN
DAHDI
Analog/PRI
Asterisk
Dynamic
Multispan
ISDNoIP
FreePBX
Comma GUI
(Java)
Comma Manager
APIs

15. Bespoke Appliance Server
● MPX: Media Processor eXtreme
● Intel Atom E6xx
● Built in PCIe based iTA hardware
● Solid State (SD, SSD)

16. Com.X overview
Model Gateway
(G.729a)
PBX
(users)
Interfaces
Com.X5 (Lite) 4 20 BRI, Analog (FXS/FXO)
ADSL, X.21, 3G/LTE, GbECom.X5 (MC ) 8 50
Com.X5 (MB) 16 100
Com.X10 30 150 PRI, BRI, Analog (FXS/FXO)
X.21, 3G/LTE, GbECom.X10-T (turbo) 60 250
Com.X20 360 1000 Utilise iTA expansion

17. Platform Software Feature
set
Router / Firewall:
Provisioning, Protocols (IPv4, PPPoE, HDLC, CLAN, VPN), Networking (HDCP, DDNS, DNS
proxy), Routing (Static, NAT/traversal, port forwarding), Security (Firewall policy & ACL,
filter, DMZ), Packet inspection (SIP ALG), QoS (ViBE)
Gateway:
Back-to-Back User Agent (Multi-CODEC support, UDP & TCP), FaxoIP (T.38), Security
(Fail2Ban), Monitoring (Nagios), Apps (Call Recording, Budget routing, ...)
PBX
User support: Bulk auto-provisioning IP endpoints (Yealink, snom, Polycom) & POTS
Routing: Multi-route priorities, DDI, Day/Night, Ring Groups, Voice mail, IVR,...
Features: MoH, Conferencing, VM-to-Email, Call Recording, Camp-on, Call Back, Ring
Back, Host Desk, CoS, Multi-tenanting, Immediate Dialing, Call blocking, Parking lots, Pin
sets, Queues, Ring groups, VM blasting, Call barging, Internal and Ext Phone book,
Announcements, Remote users (VPN)

18. Creating solution eco-
systems
Value Added Applications:
●IP endpoint bulk auto-provisioning
●TMS
●Operator Panel & User HUD
●Call Center Analyser
●Voice Logger
●Licenced Upgrades

19. Web based GUI: Log-in!
Web Application
Entry points:
● Administrator log-in
● Call Centre Analyser
● Atmos Voice Logger
● Operator Panel & User HUD
● Monitor & Status
● User

20. IP Endpoint Bulk Auto-
Provisioning
Device discovery & network scan
Import extension config via Spreadsheet “database”
Interop maintained with following vendors:
●Yealink
●snom
●Polycom

21. Telephone Management
Systems
Com.X stores all call detail records (CDR’s) for
all calls
Supporting many 3rd party TMS’s:
● MAN3000 with Budget Controller feature
● TNG
● Aspivia – Unison

22. Operator Panel &
User HUD
Basic:
● HUD: Real time view of extensions,
trunks, PBX service status
● Presence: Set user status
● Call Control: Answer, transfer, end,...
Advanced: Additional…
● Directory, with click-to-dia
● Incoming call “pop-up
● Instant Messaging
● Voice Mail & Call Recordings explorer

23. Call Center Analyser
Feature set summary
● Administrator, Agent & User
access and permissions
● Real-time “Wall boarding”: Agent
and queue activity reporting
● Reporting: Multiple, scheduled
email reports
● Predefined and custom report
tool
● Listen and Whisper

24. Atmos Voice Logger
Integration from Call Cabinet
Registration (Customer / Site ID’s)
Feature set brief:
●Compliant: FICA, FAIS, POPPI, CPA
●256 bit AES encryption
●SSL security
●Cloud storage, redundant and
backed up
●100% available
●Access and playback via web
browser

25. Extensibility
Open Interfaces:
● TAPI
● HTTPs “CDR & Call Recording”
● HTTPs “Click to Dial”
● AMI
● RESTful / HTML5

26. Com.X PBX demonstration
GUI review: “Show and Tell”
iTA & Asterisk CLI
●Analogue interfaces:
●Dial tone (DHADI-1/1, start simple switch…)
●Dial number & call traces (call logs …)
PBX Call flow scenarios:
●Outbound calling
●Inbound calling:
●IVR
●Operator Panel (Queues, Users,...)
●Call Center
●Voice Logger