Digium (News - Alert) today announced the release of the latest version of its AsteriskNOW software appliance.


AsteriskNOW 1.5, which was announced at the recent Astricon, incorporates the FreePBX graphical user interface (GUI),
and is designed to significantly simplify the process of installing, operating and managing an Asterisk (News - Alert)-based telephony system,

In addition to the FreePBX Web-based Asterisk management interface, the new release also includes an array of other open source components.

According to a blog authored by Digium’s Steve Sokol:
“…AsteriskNOW is a free Linux install image (.iso file) that reduces the process of building an Asterisk-based system to “burn, boot and run”. Simply download the .iso image, burn it to a CD, drop the CD into your soon-to-be Asterisk computer and boot. The integrated installation process will ask a few basic questions, install Linux, Asterisk, the FreePBX GUI and all the other bits and pieces necessary to transform an ordinary PC into an extraordinary communications platform.”


Mark Spencer (News - Alert), CTO of Digium and the creator of the Asterisk project, added, “Asterisk has always been a powerful platform for building telephony applications. The first version of AsteriskNOW made it really easy to get started. Now with the second release we\'re responding to our community and adding a wealth of additional features and functions.”


The latest version of AsteriskNOW was updated with lots of feedback from the community Said Sokol, “…the changes in 1.5 reflect the general consensus.”

AsteriskNOW 1.5 installs in 15 to 30 minutes and requires no in-depth knowledge of telephony or Linux to get started. By including the FreePBX administrative interface, Digium has made AsteriskNOW easier to configure and maintain.

The release also heralds a change in the delivery method, leveraging the freely available CentOS Linux distribution. The addition of FreePBX and the move to CentOS give open source telephony users a familiar, stable, community-driven platform for application development.

According to Philippe Lindheimer, leader of the FreePBX project, “We are delighted to extend our relationship with Digium and become part of this new AsteriskNOW distribution. We look forward to broadening our already excellent relationship with the Asterisk community as we expand the market for open telephony solutions.”

TMCnet’s Tom Keating (News - Alert) recently covered this news as part of his visit to Digium’s headquarters.

AsteriskNOW 1.5 can be downloaded from the AsteriskNOW Web site.


Edited by Greg Galitzine