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VoIP Going Wireless
imashoe writes "CNet's News.com reports on the wireless future of VoIP. Similarly BonaFideReviews.com has published an interesting article that attempts to predict what the future of voice communications will be like. The two editorals seem to agree that VoIP is going mobile and in a big way."
Hopefully encryption will make this a little more secure than regular cell communications.
"Made up/misattributed quote that makes me look smart. I am on
*ring*......*ring*...Hello?
"Hey, I have to tell you something importan....."*click*...Hey! Quit downloading pr0n, I'm trying to use the phone!
More proof that information wants to be free, barring going regulation and taxation.
Here's why we need to keep the ISP free of local, state and federal bondage. You can expect the legal monopoly telcos and cable companies to have more restrictions placed on third party ISPs. Phone calls are a cash cow still.
On the other hand, the cellular companies can probably find wireless VoIP profitable as they're better prepared to add WiFi to existing antenna structures.
This is going to open up cheaper communications, which will give us all more cash in our pockets and more services to make us more efficient in our work and play lives.
I can only hope those with legislative power can keep their dirty paws (and those of their friends) off.
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If you want, you can run a free VoIP quality test at http://testyourvoip.com/. So if you have wireless, or want to place a VoIP call over your Cell data link (for whatever perverse reason) you can check your quality before setting it all up if you have a web browser with Java enabled.
-ben
Okay, here's the thing that bothers me about VOIP going wireless: I already find cellular (wireless) unacceptable in quality. I already find VOIP unacceptable in quality (though I will concede under perfect conditions, it can be quite good). I may not be able to pick out different brands of beer on a bet (actually, I can), but I can smell a cellular call 12,000 miles away. And I can tell a VOIP call 5 "route" hops away.
I assume this development implies some marriage of the technologies (I wasn't able definitively to tell from the article). I can only shudder at the thought. Can you hear me w8erfjkldfa?...., Caeoa yow hear ewlrkj now? FSCK!
Maybe the most irritating thing in this is the stampede to not offer great technology for what I'll call "comfortable" conversation/communication, but instead: Get there first; Maximize throughput; and Make lots of money. The technology on the other hand is quite capable of delivering the high quality land line users are accustomed to... but, you're never going to see (hear) it in the competitive sleezy crappy quality and service world of wireless.
When was the last time you had to constantly repeat yourself on land line to land line phone conversations (not attribtutable to non-understandable help desk support)? Yeah, technology marches on, I just wish it would spiff up its uniform.
Got a Bluetooth headset hooked up to my iMac running Skype. I can call from anywhere in the world...as long as I'm about 20 feet away from my computer...
Knowing how weather is prone to interfere with cellular communications right now, how are they going to make wireless VoIP proof against mother nature?
And I can really imagine how much it's going to suck if lightning takes out a tower.
Really, we don't even have widespread wifi access across the country. What's the point of doing this now when the infrastructure doesn't fully exist in all areas?
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
I notice a quality difference between VoIP when I am directly plugged into my router and when I am using WIFI. And VoIP sound quality is already subpar to begin with. Eventually, wireless VoIP will be king. As it stands now, however, wired VoIP still needs some significant quality upgrades.
My parents got VoIP installed not to long ago. I immediately noticed a huge drop in connection stability.
:|
Not to mention whenever our Internet service goes out, so does our phone service.
VoIP phones should be hitting the market soon, within 2 years expect it to be standard on all phones.
Companies will only need one phone per employee, instaed of a mobile+desk phone, they'll just have the mobile. Saves those costly peak minutes while you're in the office as well.
I am no luddite, but this a solution to a problem that doesn't exist. Using existing *public* Internet carriers for low-latency and naturally real-time voice streams is asking for a trainwreck.
As an end user wishing to say, tie together two offices of my company with VOIP, there is a lot that is not under my control. Although I can use QoS/various traffic shaping facilties to ensure minimum latency and maximum bandwith for VOIP on *my* side of things, I have completely no control over what happens to the data when goes out of my DSL modem into the DSLAM and on forward (or T1 line, whatever).
QoS: A lot of ISPs dump all IP QoS flags, silently, because well... heh... they can provide that for mucho dinero. Even if they don't, who is to guarantee that my voice won't get congested someplace clogged by someone's pr0n torrents? No one.
Mobile VOIP is not new folks. Your Sprint phone uses SIP over IP. Your iDen phone uses TCP/IP to communicate to the servers. The mobile carriers, however, have their own private networks that are not part of the ``Intarweb''. The mobile carriers can control traffic on their network. The mobile carriers can ensure service. Combining mobile phone technology with VOIP over the public Internet is going to combine the worst of both worlds - get cut off because network congestion someplace upstream or lose the signal. I'll pass.
Btw, of course I didn't RTFA.
VOIP is really kicking ass in the callcenter world and wireless voip will undoubtably follow suit. Hopefully this doesn't mean that the dell service rep answering your call is in starbucks :)
Search your logs like the web: splunk!
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The only VoIP "solution" than really matters in the long run is SIP. It will eventually win out because it's an open standard, and already supported by the popular Gizmo Project (http://gizmoproject.com./ I'm currently using an analog telephone to SIP adapter, and calls to other SIP users directly over the net are clearer than PSTN-to-PSTN calls by a great margin. To handle dialing sip addresses like brokenladder@iptel.org, you just register with a free ENUM number at enum2go.com (uses the standard e164.arpa) or get one at e164.org for instance. Then you can go to brokenladder.com and look at the contact page to call me and test out your equipment ;)
3G wireless phone services ARE packet based data networks. The 3G voice protocols are more optimized for voice than layering on top of IP. The network exists and building a redundant network ONLY makes sense because of regulated competition. The problem isn't a technical one. It is a question of markets, taxes, monopolies, states rights, lobbying ... in other words, your government (and your phone company) in action.
A beginners' guide to Portland, OR?
Although the tech for seemless network handoff is tricky, I think the main issue to adoption is resistance from the cellular networks who stand to lose a fortune.
One of these days I'm moving to Theory - everything works there
Not sure how many VOIP providers offer this .. but VOIP voice mail should be sent as an attachment in an email. And when a person makes a VOIP call .. they should have the option of sending a text message or listening to a custom message .. or .. when you make a VOIP call .. you may be able to get IM'd back (text to speech if the caller isn't logged into IM?) or an IM that reads "I'm not here, leave an IM".
.. am I on my desktop? Or am I out with my cell phone while my desktop happens to be logged in? Or is my desktop and laptop off? AIM solves some of this by enabling multiple simultaneous logons .. which is great because I never have to be signed off .. I can sign in to AIM from work and then sign off from work ..all the while my home desktop stays logged on.
.. callers would have to prove their identity before a call gets through (for example if i only want certain people or people from a certain group/company to get through). If I am on vacation I only want friends to be able to contact me, not people from work ,,they can get forwarded to email or IM depending what I choose.
.. then I'm in. Seems like google, msn, or yahoo would be able to deliver on these needs.
Calls to reach me should not have to know which device I am currently on. That is
But on the top of my feature list is encryption end to end encryption. Along with this notion of encryption is the call blocking/receiving capability
If a VOIP service can offer me these services and cell phone integration
Rule #2: Mods are jerks; if you say something funny they just might be inclined to remind you.
I'm with you, man. Why must we moderate to death something that is only slightly off-topic. It has been said before here that the "Meta" category is the smartest thing about kuro5hin. Maybe Slashdot needs to (finally) follow suit? Rather than waste tons of effort trying to smack down people who criticize slashdot on slashdot, it would give Taco and company some reasonable suggestions.... From time to time... On full moons... When a goat has been sacrificed at dawn the preceding Sunday... A goat purchased the preceding Wednesday from a one-eyed monk...
But, in all seriousness, it would also give witty, funny posts that are meant as both loving criticism and humor an appropriate place to be "on-topic." Everybody wins. Introspection is good for any community, and slashdot is no exception.
Who did what now?
Voip over Wifi is a fact. You could be doing it right now using a SIP based program and your PDA. Good? No, of course its going to have to improve. But whats *is* important about it is right now I carry two devices in my pocket at any given time, a cellphone and a wifi enabled PDA. Both basically do the same thing, only the PDA does more and does some of the same things only better (contacts, calandering, etc).
Which do you think I rather carry?
Data communication isn't going to be going away, why should I have a device that can do the bare minimum but makes phone calls when I could in the not-to-distant future have both?
FTR, I'm not exactly a gadget guy, I legitmately need these for work. I'm a systems admin and bad things have a way of happening at inopportune times.
Quack, quack.
(b) Yes and yes. Most VOIP providers like Vonage will give you an adapter that can directly connect to the internet, which means you don't need the computer. But to use Skype you need to go through the computer.
tm
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In the First World, we live in hyper-wired environments. I have over 30 wired IP telephones in sight of me right now, as well as a choice of cellphone providers and technologies (CDMA or GSM). I also have a choice of wired and wireless IP providers - again over a variety of technologies including dialup, cable, xDSL, ATM, or even Ethernet, as well as WiFi, WiMax, and 1xEvDO.
In the Third World - and probably in two-thirds of the world besides - it just costs too damned much to roll out and maintain cabling. Cellphone technologies like GSM and CDMA are really only useful for a voice service (unless the end user has cash to burn).
IP technologies make so much sense, since you roll out voice AND data all in the one roll-out, and don't have to worry about tracking down the badly soldered joins, or the waterlogged junctions. It also gets the equation around the right way - instead of trying to run data over a voice service, you're running voice over a data service. Brilliant!
Get the technology right in the world where we've already got so many choices, and the rest of the world will be so much better off.
With each breath in, a flower somewhere opens; with each breath out, a flower withers away. In between lies beauty.
Several Months ago I made the switch to primus-talkbroad band voip. (34$Can tax in per month) Unlimited local and north american calling. Voice mail, email relay of voice mail, 5 way calling, local numbers you can dial to access free long distance services, private web porthole with phone book, log and settings ( I wish they had a cell navigable version ) and more. I have a cell for if or when my internet dies. I have to have one any way it pays for itself in gained work. Anyway quality is for all intensive purposes as good as a land line and not nearly as bad as a cell phone. Computers are proving to be the ultimate in communication tools.
I'm a CS student and a network technician at Radford University, we've already employed VOIP Wireless in our department. We're using the Cisco 7920 IP phones, they work great as long as you're well, standing still. We have about 2-300 Cisco Aironets and hopping from one AP to another doesn't work too well right now. Most of the time that the 7920s work well you're standing next to a working 7960.
The technology is not new, and if I recall correctly there is a cell phone (PDA style) that supports VOIP over 802.11.
VOIP is nice and wireless could be handy ;)
However, what I don't understand is... "VOIP over wireless IP".. shouldn't IP be IP? wireless or not? and VOIP over wireless should be non-issue since it is designed to work over IP network, and the focus should be to make wireless IP networks good enough to be able to carry VOIP?
I mean, the original article here is about VOIP going wireless.. but VOIP doesn't need to go nowhere.. its already VOIP and working over wireless IP network should not be an isssue here.
"From the moment I could talk, I was ordered to listen" - Cat Stevens