> I'm a complete newbie to Asterisk and have been reading through > documentation and sites for the last couple of hours trying to understand > what to do to start my learning curve with Asterisk, and am very confused.
It's a big world, so take a deep breath and don't worry about being overwhelmed at first. > > For starters, what is the difference btwn the 1.2 and 1.4 branches of > Asterisk? I can't seem to find a document that describes the changes. > > Secondly, what is the best way to start off with Asterisk? Should I > install > a Linux distro from scratch and then install Asterisk on top of that, > start > with AsteriskNOW and go from there, or start with Tribox? What advantage > do > I get installing Linux/Asterisk vs. installing AsteriskNow or Tribox and > starting my learning curve from there? It would seem as the most > reasonable > to start with a prepackaged "appliance" installation - no? One advantage to using the prepackage method is that you get straight into what Asterisk can do while skipping most of the how-do-I-set-it-up drama. I personally like the Trixbox distro for getting a quick setup into operation. It is relatively easy to get started with and let's you play with the system. Once you get your feet wet then it's a good exercise to learn the steps of doing a manual install. > > Can someone please explain the difference between AsteriskNow and Tribox? > They seem to be filling the same need - a one-step easy installation of > Asterisk on a brand new PC. Am I missing something? Both have GUIs, but > TriBox seems to be more complete with more features. Is this not correct? > Trixbox is, essentially, Asterisk + Asterisk 3rd party add-ons + decent preconfiguration. I'm not sure about AsteriskNOW. Just remember that Asterisk has an ecosystem, so there are lots of different things you can plug into it and lots of different apps that can interface with it. Just take it slow and steady and you'll do very well. > Thanks so much for any information to help set me on the right path. As > you > can see, I am extermely confused and lost in the maze of Asterisk docs and > struggling to find a little headway here. > Someone already mentioned it, but get the O'Reilly book - "Asterisk - The Future Of Telephony." (Abbreviated TFOT in many places.) Be sure to get the 2nd edition if you're going to buy it off the shelf. It should be out any time if it isn't already available. -MC _______________________________________________ Sign up now for AstriCon 2007! September 25-28th. http://www.astricon.net/ --Bandwidth and Colocation Provided by http://www.api-digital.com-- asterisk-users mailing list To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
