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<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8" /><title>The Asterisk Community</title><link rel="stylesheet" href="styles.css" type="text/css" /><meta name="generator" content="DocBook XSL Stylesheets V1.69.1" /><link rel="start" href="index.html" title="Asterisk™: The Future of Telephony" /><link rel="up" href="asterisk-CHP-1.html" title="Chapter 1. A Telephony Revolution" /><link rel="prev" href="asterisk-CHP-1-SECT-4.html" title="Asterisk: The Professional’s PBX" /><link rel="next" href="asterisk-CHP-1-SECT-6.html" title="The Business Case" /></head><body><div class="navheader"><table width="100%" summary="Navigation header"><tr><th colspan="3" align="center">The Asterisk Community</th></tr><tr><td width="20%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="asterisk-CHP-1-SECT-4.html">Prev</a> </td><th width="60%" align="center">Chapter 1. A Telephony Revolution</th><td width="20%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="asterisk-CHP-1-SECT-6.html">Next</a></td></tr></table><hr /></div><div class="sect1" lang="en" xml:lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a id="asterisk-CHP-1-SECT-5"></a>The Asterisk Community</h2></div></div></div><p>One of the<a id="I_indexterm1_tt21" class="indexterm"></a> compelling strengths of Asterisk is the passionate
community that developed and supports it. This community, led by Mark
Spencer<a id="I_indexterm1_tt22" class="indexterm"></a><a id="I_indexterm1_tt23" class="indexterm"></a> of Digium, is keenly aware of the cultural significance of
Asterisk, and is giddy about the future.</p><p>One of the more powerful side effects caused by the energy of the
Asterisk community is the cooperation it has spawned among the
telecommunications professionals, networking professionals, and
information technology professionals who share a love for this phenomenon.
While these professions have traditionally been at odds with each other,
in the Asterisk community they delight in each others’ skills. The
significance of this cooperation cannot be underestimated.</p><p>Still, if the dream of Asterisk is to be realized, the community
must grow—yet one of the key challenges that the community currently faces
is a rapid influx of new users. The members of the existing community,
having birthed this thing called Asterisk, are generally welcoming of new
users, but they’ve grown impatient with being asked the kinds of questions
whose answers can often be obtained independently, if one is willing to
put forth the time needed to research and experiment.</p><p>Obviously, new users do not fit any particular kind of mold. While
some will happily spend hours experimenting and reading various blogs
describing the trials and tribulations of others, many people who have
become enthusiastic about this technology are completely uninterested in
such pursuits. They want a simple, straightforward, step-by-step guide
that’ll get them up and running, followed by some sensible examples
describing the best methods of implementing common functionality (such as
voicemail, auto attendants, and the like).</p><p>To the members of the expert community, who (correctly) perceive
that Asterisk is like a web development language, this approach doesn’t
make any sense. To them, it’s clear that you have to immerse yourself in
Asterisk to appreciate its subtleties. Would one ask for a step-by-step
guide to programming and expect to learn from it all that a language has
to offer?</p><p>Clearly, there’s no one approach that’s right for everyone. Asterisk
is a different animal altogether, and it requires a totally different
mind-set. As you explore the community, though, be aware that there are
people with many different skill sets and attitudes here. Some of these
folks do not display much patience with new users, but that’s often due to
their passion for the subject, not because they don’t welcome your
participation.</p><div class="sect2" lang="en" xml:lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h3 class="title"><a id="asterisk-CHP-1-SECT-5.1"></a>The Asterisk Mailing Lists</h3></div></div></div><p>As with any<a id="I_indexterm1_tt24" class="indexterm"></a> community, there are places where members of the Asterisk
community meet to discuss matters of mutual interest. Of the mailing
lists you will find at <a href="http://lists.digium.com" target="_top">http://lists.digium.com</a>, these
four are currently the most important:</p><div class="variablelist"><dl><dt><span class="term">
<span class="emphasis"><em>Asterisk-Biz</em></span>
</span></dt><dd><p>Anything commercial<a id="I_indexterm1_tt25" class="indexterm"></a> with respect to Asterisk belongs in this list. If
you’re selling something Asterisk-related, sell it here. If you
want to buy an Asterisk service or product, post here.</p></dd><dt><span class="term">
<span class="emphasis"><em>Asterisk-Dev</em></span>
</span></dt><dd><p>The Asterisk developers hang out here. The purpose<a id="I_indexterm1_tt26" class="indexterm"></a> of this list is the discussion of the development
of the software that is Asterisk, and its participants vigorously
defend that purpose. Expect a lot of heat if you post anything to
this list not relating to programming or development of the
Asterisk code base specifically. General coding questions (such as
interfacing with AGI or AMI), should be directed to the
Asterisk-Users list.</p><div class="warning" style="margin-left: 0.5in; margin-right: 0.5in;"><h3 class="title">Warning</h3><p>The Asterisk-Dev list is not second-level support! If you
scroll through the mailing list archives, you’ll see this is a
strict rule. The Asterisk-Dev mailing list is about discussion
of core Asterisk development, and questions about interfacing
your external programs via AGI or AMI should be posted on the
Asterisk-Users list.</p></div></dd><dt><span class="term">
<span class="emphasis"><em>Asterisk-Users</em></span>
</span></dt><dd><p>This is<a id="I_indexterm1_tt27" class="indexterm"></a> where most Asterisk users hang out. This list
generates several hundred messages per day and has over ten
thousand subscribers. While you can go here for help, you are
expected to have done some reading on your own before you post a
query.</p></dd><dt><span class="term">Asterisk-BSD</span></dt><dd><p>This is <a id="I_indexterm1_tt28" class="indexterm"></a>where users who are implementing Asterisk
on<a id="I_indexterm1_tt29" class="indexterm"></a> FreeBSD (and other BSD dialects) hang out.</p></dd></dl></div></div><div class="sect2" lang="en" xml:lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h3 class="title"><a id="asterisk-CHP-1-SECT-5.2"></a>The Asterisk Wiki</h3></div></div></div><p>The<a id="I_indexterm1_tt30" class="indexterm"></a> Asterisk Wiki (which exists in large part due to the
tireless efforts of James Thompson—<span class="emphasis"><em>thanks James!</em></span>)
<a id="I_indexterm1_tt31" class="indexterm"></a>is a source of much enlightenment and confusion. A
community-maintained repository of <a id="I_indexterm1_tt32" class="indexterm"></a>VoIP knowledge (<a href="http://www.voip-info.org" target="_top">http://www.voip-info.org</a>)
contains a truly inspiring cornucopia of fascinating, informative, and
frequently contradictory information about many subjects, just one of
which is Asterisk.</p><p>Since Asterisk documentation forms by far the bulk of the
information on this web site,<sup>[<a id="id4102774" href="#ftn.id4102774">11</a>]</sup> and it probably contains more Asterisk knowledge than all
other sources put <span class="keep-together">together</span> (with
the exception of the mailing-list archives), it is commonly referred to
as <span class="emphasis"><em>the</em></span> place to go for Asterisk knowledge.</p></div><div class="sect2" lang="en" xml:lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h3 class="title"><a id="asterisk-CHP-1-SECT-5.3"></a>The IRC Channels</h3></div></div></div><p>The Asterisk community maintains<a id="I_indexterm1_tt33" class="indexterm"></a><a id="I_indexterm1_tt34" class="indexterm"></a> Internet Relay Chat (IRC) channels on
<span class="emphasis"><em>irc.freenode.net</em></span>. The two most active channels are
<span class="emphasis"><em>#asterisk</em></span> and<a id="I_indexterm1_tt35" class="indexterm"></a> <span class="emphasis"><em>#asterisk-dev.</em></span><sup>[<a id="id4102851" href="#ftn.id4102851">12</a>]</sup> To cut down on spam-bot intrusions, both of these channels
now require registration to join.<sup>[<a id="id4102866" href="#ftn.id4102866">13</a>]</sup></p></div><div class="sect2" lang="en" xml:lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h3 class="title"><a id="asterisk-CHP-1-SECT-5.4"></a>Asterisk User Groups</h3></div></div></div><p>In many cites around the world, lonely Asterisk users began to
realize that there were other like-minded people in their towns.
<a id="I_indexterm1_tt36" class="indexterm"></a><a id="I_indexterm1_tt37" class="indexterm"></a>Asterisk User Groups (AUGs) began to spring up all over
the place. While these groups don’t have any official affiliation with
each other, they generally link to each others’ web sites and welcome
members from anywhere. Type “Asterisk User Group” into Google to track
down one in your area.</p></div><div class="sect2" lang="en" xml:lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h3 class="title"><a id="asterisk-CHP-1-SECT-5.5"></a>The Asterisk Documentation Project</h3></div></div></div><p>The Asterisk Documentation Project<a id="I_indexterm1_tt38" class="indexterm"></a><a id="I_indexterm1_tt39" class="indexterm"></a><a id="I_indexterm1_tt40" class="indexterm"></a> was started by Leif Madsen and Jared Smith, but several
people in the community have contributed.</p><p>The goal of the documentation project is to provide a structured
repository of written work on Asterisk. In contrast with the flexible
and ad hoc nature of the Wiki, the Docs project is passionate about
building a more focused approach to various <span class="keep-together">Asterisk-related</span> subjects.</p><p>As part of the efforts of the Asterisk Docs project to make
documentation available online, this book is available at the <a href="http://www.asteriskdocs.org" target="_top">http://www.asteriskdocs.org</a>
web site, under a Creative Commons license.</p></div><div class="footnotes"><br /><hr width="100" align="left" /><div class="footnote"><p><sup>[<a id="ftn.id4102774" href="#id4102774">11</a>] </sup>More than 30 percent, at last count.</p></div><div class="footnote"><p><sup>[<a id="ftn.id4102851" href="#id4102851">12</a>] </sup>The <span class="emphasis"><em>#asterisk-dev</em></span> channel is for the
discussion of changes to the underlying code base of Asterisk and is
also not second-tier support. Discussions related to programming
external applications that interface with Asterisk via AGI or AMI
are meant to be in <span class="emphasis"><em>#asterisk</em></span>.</p></div><div class="footnote"><p><sup>[<a id="ftn.id4102866" href="#id4102866">13</a>] </sup><code class="literal">/msg nickserv help</code> when you connect to the
service via your favorite IRC client.</p></div></div></div><div class="navfooter"><hr /><table width="100%" summary="Navigation footer"><tr><td width="40%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="asterisk-CHP-1-SECT-4.html">Prev</a> </td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="u" href="asterisk-CHP-1.html">Up</a></td><td width="40%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="asterisk-CHP-1-SECT-6.html">Next</a></td></tr><tr><td width="40%" align="left" valign="top">Asterisk: The Professional’s PBX </td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="h" href="index.html">Home</a></td><td width="40%" align="right" valign="top"> The Business Case</td></tr></table></div><div xmlns="" id="svn-footer"><hr /><p>You are reading <em>Asterisk: The Future of Telephony</em> (2nd Edition for Asterisk 1.4), by Jim van Meggelen, Jared Smith, and Leif Madsen.<br />
This work is licensed under the <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/">Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works License v3.0</a>.<br />
To submit comments, corrections, or other contributions to the text, please visit <a href="http://oreilly.com/catalog/9780596510480/">http://www.oreilly.com/</a>.</p></div></body></html>
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