Packet Island has introduced “PacketSmart for Asterisk (News - Alert),” a VoIP “lifecycle management” solution for companies deploying the open source Asterisk PBX (News - Alert). The Software as a Service (i.e. hosted) solution is a derivative of Packet Island’s (News - Alert) “PacketSmart” solution, which monitors VoIP network traffic and isolates and troubleshoots problems.

“PacketSmart for Asterisk” is based on Asterisk software agents and purpose-built micro-appliances that work with the PacketSmart platform. The solution includes the PacketSmart micro-appliances, the PacketSmart Platform and the PacketSmart GUI, all modified to work with Asterisk. One advantage of the 4 inch by 4 inch micro-appliances is that they can be easily moved around the network to isolate and troubleshoot issues affecting VoIP quality.

Praveen Kumar, president of Packet Island Inc., said in a press release that PacketSmart for Asterisk is the “industry’s first SaaS (News - Alert) solution that has been specifically created for the VoIP lifecycle management needs of the Asterisk market.” He pointed out that most of today’s VoIP monitoring and troubleshooting solutions cost thousands of dollars – very often exceeding the cost of a brand new IP PBX. With PacketSmart for Asterisk, he said, companies can pay an annual fee that works out to be “tens of dollars a month.”

The micro-appliances (which by the way do require a truck roll for installation) are used to simulate live VoIP traffic on the network, and to identify and fix problems prior to deployment. They are complementary to the platform. After deployment, the Packet Island software agent that is left installed on the Asterisk PBX continues to collect detailed metrics that can be used by the company and value-added reseller for service level agreement monitoring and to isolate and troubleshoot transient VoIP quality issues. For multi-site deployments with multiple PBXs, the software agents can be used to ensure that the inter-Asterisk connectivity continues to support good VoIP quality.

Using the PacketSmart solution, field technicians can monitor call traffic and troubleshoot problems from a central office. The micro-appliances analyze ongoing VoIP calls (or call attempts) from the customer network, enabling technicians to get real-time views on SIP/SCCP signalling data, call quality metrics, route performance metrics, traffic utilization metrics, protocol utilization metrics, and more. This “zero truck roll” method speeds up the troubleshooting process, particularly during the initial deployment stage. PacketSmart can also be used to determine if the service has been deployed to meet a company’s service delivery standards. It is also ideal for monitoring and troubleshooting during the period when a company is transitioning to, or adding, new services.

For more information about PacketSmart, and the new PacketSmart for Asterisk, visit www.packetisland.com.

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Patrick Barnard is Associate Editor for TMCnet and a columnist covering the telecom industry. To see more of his articles, please visit Patrick Barnard’s columnist page.

VoIP Quality of Service