Google Wave is now available, and on your domain too!

Yes, that’s right, if you’re using Google Apps for your Domain, you can now enable Wave domain-wide! Best part is it’s totally free, and very easy to dive right in!

Google Wave has been in private-beta status since Google I/O 2009, and one year later it’s being opened to the public.

Google Wave is a realtime multi-user combination of both Instant Messaging, Email and Document collaboration service. Basically it means that as you write, the other people who are in the Wave with you (Think of it like a chat conversation) see what is being typed as it happens.

So, how do we get started?

If you already have Google Apps for your Domain, you can easily enable this feature for all of your accounts.

Well done Google, we know you care about the future of the web with your WebM Project (VP8)

Yes, it’s been announced as predicted:

http://webmproject.blogspot.com/2010/05/introducing-webm-open-web-media-project.html

All I can say is well done Google, they’ve truly done the right thing and could have single-handedly helped to preserve the future of video on the web! They’ve also hit the ground running with a very impressive list of people backing the format, such as:

nVidia
Intel
ARM
Qualcom
Adobe Flash platform
Opera
Mozilla / Firefox
CORE Codec
AMD
Logitech and more!

Why is this all so important?

FTTH (Fibre-to-the-Home) and ADSL2+ in NZ

Having explained this now 5x in the last 24 hours, I decided it was time to blog about it.

This post summarizes why NZ broad band doesn’t “suck”, why FTTH isn’t going to solve what your problems are, and what you can do about it in the mean time.

It’ll also explain to you how “The Internet” works, here in New Zealand, as well as giving you some figures to compare us against the rest of the world.

Installing ADA (Asterisk Desktop Assistant) on Elastix

Formerly SnapANumber, ADA is now offered by Digium. However, the first thing that you’ll notice is that it was written for their Asterisk Business Edition.

That’s great if you have ABE, but not so good if you’re one of the millions of installs out there that uses vanilla Asterisk.

This guide presumes you already have ADA downloaded and installed. If not, you can get the latest (At the time of writing) version 1.1 from here:

http://dl1.digium.com/ADA1.1/ADAInstall.exe

Now you’re going to ignore any instructions you’re previously read, and we’ll start from scratch. Don’t worry, you’ll be up and running in a matter of moments!

Why VP8 matters

This post was made prior to the Google IO conference which is May 19 -> 20th, and as such things may change after this date.

VP8 is potentially a game-changer in the realm of both streaming, High-Definition, and mobile video devices. It also has the potential to help in the killing of Adobe Flash, and solve the HTML5 Video format war.

Currently there are two formats that are used in HTML5 Video by differing browsers: Ogg Theora and h.264

Both have support from different browsers, both have different camps fighting for their success, and both have their pros and cons.

Migrating a windows user profile directory

Many times I’ve found myself wanting to do this, and only just recently learned how to.

If you’ve disconnected from a Domain for example and are now part of a workgroup but want to retain your existing “setup”, or perhaps you’ve got yourself something like an EeePC 900 and your C: Drive is running out of space, this can be a great way to free up additional space, and it’s a better all-round solution that purely moving the “My Documents” folder.

The whole process should take only 2-3 minutes!

Using the Patton SN4554 for ISDN with Elastix

For any business migrating to SIP, the Patton SN4554 is a brilliant way to bring two ISDN lines (4-channels) in to their new PBX system, especially considering you don’t have to break open your PBX Server to install a PCI card.

This basic How-To shows you how to set it up to work with your Elastix system:

DIY FreeSWITCH & FreePBXv3 from LiveCD

This is a bit of a follow on from my previous post: http://chillingsilence.wordpress.com/2010/01/14/initial-thoughts-on-freepbxv3-and-freeswitch-vs-asterisk/

Everybody is starting to talk about FreeSWITCH as the next big PBX software (Amongst other things), and FreePBXv3 is shaping up to be a damn fine GUI.

The more I use it, the more I start to like FreeSWITCH as a progression from Asterisk. One will likely never completely kill the other, I can see a world where they both live happily, but for me I struggle knowing that Asterisk doesn’t 100% accurately do all CDR stuff, and it bugs me recommending that to a client.

I’ve blogged before on FreePBXv3, and the dev guys are still as friendly as ever (Granted they seem to be a truckload busier lately, but who can blame them).

What follows is a guide on booting a LiveCD (Debian!) and running FreeSWITCH & FreePBXv3 from this live system. From there, it’s up to you if you want to simply reboot and forget it ever happened, or potentially install it to a HDD. The choice is yours, I’m just going to give you a quick How-To on getting FreeSWITCH & FreePBXv3 up and running nicely, and in a flash! In fact, on a decent machine (C2D 2Ghz+) and a decent internet connection, you could be up n running from scratch, in less than 20 minutes

How-To: Hotel Management System for Elastix

Two blog posts in 24 hours? We’re on a roll here!
Based off PIAF’s Hotel Management System, we’re going to make some minor adjustments to have this work with Elastix. This is a brilliant Hotel Room Management system with the ability to restrict the calls from Ext’s when they are not checked in, per-second billing, and more!

Contents:

1. Installing the base system
2. Updating the config
3. Fixing up HTTPS
4. Updating dial-plan
5. Closing words

Linking systems via OpenVPN (No port-forwards needed on client-side)

Yes, this is the ultimate in remote access for your PBX systems! It’s also quite possibly the longest blog post ever!

Imagine a client of yours happens to move their PBX, perhaps they are shifting premises (Without notifying you — Their prerogative I suppose). Now, with the change of ISP’s they’ve changed router and network settings, new public IP Address etc, so until you fix the sip_nat.conf settings calls are dead quiet. What do you do?

Well, you could ring them up and get them to port-forward their router and let you in. Or, you can do everything yourself via your shiny remote-control VPN!

Not only does it not matter where your customer plugs in the box, provided DHCP gives it an IP Address and they don’t have some silly proxy in the way, it will tunnel out NAT, past their routers firewalls, and let you in! It’s a service-operators dream! Used in conjunction with the SSH Tunnelling blog article, you’ll find this gives you total control of their local endpoints as well, just as if you were right there sitting on their LAN. You can even access your clients ADSL Router WebGUI and make the required port-forward changes yourself, provided they give you the admin password of course.