PBX Features
First of all, the Vodia PBX is a private branch exchange (PBX). That means you can transfer calls, set up conference calls or queue incoming calls up. In a nutshell, the PBX connects trunks with extensions.
Extension. Extensions connect users to the PBX, through VoIP phones, soft phones, WebRTC or through mobile phones. More…
Trunk. The term "trunks" originates from the old times when PBX were connected to the outside world through telecom wires, called trunks. In the Vodia PBX, those trunks are done using the SIP protocol, thus called SIP trunks. More…
Auto Attendant. When a caller calls a company, the auto attendant takes care about connecting the call to the right destination. More...
Mailbox. When a user is not available, the mailbox takes a message and delivers it to the user by sending a message waiting notification or by sending and email to the users account. More...
ACD Group. For groups with a lot of callers, the automatic call distribution stacks callers up and sends them to agents when they become available. More...
Hunt Group. For not so busy groups, extensions can form a hunt group that distributes calls in a simple way to one of the extensions. More...
Conference. When more than two users need to talk, the conference room of the PBX can connect several callers into a audio conference. More...
Park Orbit. Instead of holding a call, users can also park a call until someone picks the call up from another extension. More...
Paging. Paging groups can send live or recorded messages to extensions. This is a very fast way of speading information around. More...
Unified Communications
The PBX is an integral part of most business information technology infrastructure today. There are several ways the PBX connects users.
SIP phones. There is a large range of SIP-compatible devices in the market. Depending on the requirements, users can pick the phone that best fits their requirements. The communication can be encrypted, with excellent quality, and as convenient as users expect it from a PBX extension.
Mobile Phone. Cell phones are widely available. They can be used in parallel with SIP phones, ringing both the phone in the office and on the mobile phone, depending on the time when the user wants that. Users can use smart phones or not so smart phones, just using the regular cell phone call without any apps installed. This makes sure that the voice quality is good when there is no wideband data connection available for a soft phone.
Email. When something happens, the PBX notifies the user in an email. Weather the user missed a call, has a new voicemail message or a technical problem occured, the PBX sends out an email to the user or to the administrator.
Text. In addition to email notifications, the PBX can also send out text messages (SMS). Those messages easily grab the attention of the user and even work when the user does not have a smart phone.
Web. The PBX comes with a built-in web server. The web server can notifiy the web client about changes, for example when a call comes in. It also supports the WebRTC API, so that users can use the browser as a soft phone for making phone calls. This makes it possible to use the PBX from a very large range of devices like PC, smart phone and tablets.
Recording. Calls can be recorded and made available on the web interface. 3rd party tools can be used to upload recordings into seperate recording archives.
Administration
The administration features of the PBX help companies to minimize the cost for running the PBX service in their network. The system was designed for minimizing downtime and providing useful information on important parameters.
Networking. The Vodia PBX supports modern network protocols like IPv4, IPv6 with multiple adapters. It respects the operating systems routing table, which makes it possible to use it with mixed LAN/WAN setups, VPN and VLAN configurations.
NAT Support. The system takes care about translating internal addresses to routable addresses, so that devices that are behind NAT work with the system. The PBX can also be run behind NAT itself, patching the messages to look like the PBX had a routable IP address.
Tenants. The system can handle more than one tenant (only for hosted PBX licenses).
Security. Calls can be encrypted using TLS, SRTP and ZRTP. An automatic intrusion detection help protecting the system from attacks.
Virtualization. The system can run in virtualized environments. Through the REST API it is possible to automate administrative tasks, such as creating or deleting tenant domains.
Logs. Logs on system and domain level help the administrator finding the needle in the haystack. The PBX is able to generate PCAP traces on a per-call bases, even when the calls are encrypted.
Reports. When something happens, the PBX sends email and text messages to the administrator. This helps detecting problems before the user becomes aware about it. Daily reports help documenting operations on a 24/7 level.