- h323plus - lists.packetizer.com

Re: [h323plus] [Opalvoip-devel] [Openh323-devel] opalvoip vsh323plus
by Simon Horne 04 Nov '07

04 Nov '07

Peter I certainly don't know what the fuss is about. Opal has already really good H.323 support but you cannot *make* people or *conjole* people to migrate. H.323 is a very low priority these days with a lot of projects and many projects may just want to continue their existing code base then h323plus will do that (aka Asterisk (chan_h323),GnuGk etc), others like you are indicating might want to migrate to opal to include SIP or they might just go off and get any one of the dozens and dozens of quality SIP stacks out there. There are others who are using their own SIP stack who just want to add a H.323 stack which might be opal or h323plus or even ooh323. h323plus exists because there is a need of it, all the new work in h323plus is MPL 1.1 so you don't have to worry about licensing issues, want MPL ok, what GPL ok too, just go cherry pick what you want and leave whatever you don't, I'm not fussy. If you want a bit of support for it, then I'm willing to assist with direct enquiries. If you don't think any of it's relevent then forget it even exists and just use whatever you are using. But saying I should do this and that.... Sure everyone wants SIP so go use openser or the dozens of other quality SIP stacks, if you also need H.323 support use Asterisk or FreeSwitch or YATE or this little great project called Opal. Opal is a tiny small fish in a huge ocean. How is me moving to Opal going to change anything except cut off H.323 support for some of the bigger open source projects which relied on OpenH323 for there support, sure they can move to opal but honestly they'll probably just let (like they have been doing) their H.323 support stagnate. Just as with Asterisk and GnuGK I'm happy in assisting updating existing codebases from openh323 to h323plus. Easy, we went though the process last week with both projects. H323plus is meant to be project neutral (anyone can use it), it's a drop in replacement for openh323 and I still intend (where possible) to be highly compatible with opal so if your not ready to migrate then h323plus or cannot see a business case to do it, then it is there until you decide to (if ever) to migrate. You can pull out any of the new code and drop it straight into opal, I certainly will not be standing in anybodies way. With respect to any other projects that may occur they will be the same format so they too will be a neutral stand alone project library which probably be more suited to the asterisk channel type model rather than the more integrated Opal model. I really want to bring this whole discussion to an end. For the majority of people it has little relevence. For the rest, it is as it is. let's move on. Simon -----Original Message----- From: opalvoip-devel-bounces(a)lists.sourceforge.net [mailto:opalvoip-devel-bounces@lists.sourceforge.net]On Behalf Of Peter Nixon Sent: Saturday, 3 November 2007 11:13 PM To: opalvoip-devel(a)lists.sourceforge.net Cc: h323plus(a)lists.packetizer.com; GNU Gatekeeper Developer; Discussion on enhancements and development issues with the OpenH323 library Subject: Re: [Opalvoip-devel] [Openh323-devel] [h323plus] opalvoip vsh323plus On Sat 03 Nov 2007, Peter Robinson wrote: > Hi All, > > I've been a user of openh323/opal and on the mailings lists since very > early on when gnomemeeting was in the early 0.x releases and have > watched it all evolve, even contributing minor patches and testing on > ocasion. > > There are a number of things that disurb me about this whole "we've > been orphaned" deal. > > OPAL as it stands has been in development for years, it was > essentially openh323 version 2. Just like gnomemeeting was renamed to > ekiga to reflect the fact that it wasn't just aimed solely at gnome, > openh323's name was changed to reflect the fact that it didn't just > support h323, and as a result was essentially version 2. It was > advertised as such for years. > > Simon there is certainly currently more development of the SIP side of > opal at the moment but I see that is the case for 2 reasons. firstly > the H323 support was very stable and established, and secondly the > people doing the H323 development was being done one openh323. The > OPAL H323 side of things wouldn't stagnate as long as there's > developers. And if you and everyone else were to develop on openh323 > version 2 (OPAL) there wouldn't be missing features because you'd only > have to do the work once. And the only reason the H323 features would > stagnate is if the devs working on it and the maintainers of the H323 > portion of the code (you and others) moved onto other things. That > would give everyone better features on all three protocols currently > supported... and any others that come along. > > I'm sure if the opal project had remained named openh323 and called v2 > with new apis when they added sip support and later renamed there > wouldn't be this disparate uncessary separation and code divergence > and H323 would get nice features like the latest codecs developed by > craig, robert and co and SIP would get some of the great features you > and others develop for openh323 with very little effort. > > This community is too small for all the in fighting that I'm seen > between all the various developers over the years. Way more than a lot > of the other projects I follow, I was just reading through this thread over my Saturday morning coffee and thought I should write a reply. Then I got this this email which very nicely sumarises almost everything I wanted to say. I do have one thing to add however. I have known both Simon and Craig (and the gnugk and ekiga people) for several years now and have had the pleasure of being involved in some spirited face to face discussions over that time. I respect you all and consider you all friends. Simon, with that caveat, I would like to say that I think it is a good thing for h323plus to exist given the state of the openh323 "project" but I heartily wish that its goal was more of a "maintenence mode" project than an actively developed alternative to OPAL. I have heard your reasons for continuing development on openh323/h323plus instead of OPAL several times before and I have to say that I was never fully convinced, however recent events have made me ever less sure. Three months, I made the transition from owner of my own company, to a new position as RnD Director for a VoIP CPE vendor. This has given me a different perspective on things, given that I had always been involved in the "large" side of VoIP deployments where you have gigabytes of disk space and ram and a very different development environment, time to market requirements and market realities. The fact is, despite incompatibilities, functionality gaps and all wisdom to the contrary, SIP is the current market standard for VoIP CPEs. If I told my CEO that I wanted to build a H.323 only CPE he would tell me to reconsider, or reconsider my position at the company. On the other hand, if I can build a SIP device, then deliver H.323 functionality practically for "free" by using OPAL then I can build either an "advanced" model with both SIP and H.323 support (It would cost more due to the required flash and ram increase), or an alternate H.323 firmware for the "standard" device. This, as H.323 proponent, is good for you, and this is a major reason for me to pick OPAL as the stack to develop on, otherwise I would just as likely pick one of the many other very good open source SIP stacks available, and I would never even consider doing the work to develop completely independent H.323 support using h323plus. Please spend a moment to consider "new" users like my company, and not only the temporary difficulties that some old users (like gnugk for example) would face porting from openh323 to opal. The VoIP industry is far from done, and as you know, there are new protocols coming out like AMS and others which I hope one day will also be available as part of OPAL also. I think the decision to do new development in h323plus is a little short sighted, because it makes using your wonderfull new features (and I really mean that) difficult for new VoIP developers due to the hurdle of learning and using another library for H.323 in addition to whatever library they already use for SIP (Or IAX or AMS or whatever), and the even bigger hurdle of deciding to add H.323 support in the first place! Consider also, what you will do when AMS is released.. You will at some point outgrow the existing openh323 design and API and be forced to refactor things at which point you will likely end up with something a lot like OPAL :-) Please, consider doing your future h323 development on OPAL! I really believe that you will end up with a lot more people using your code (and H.323) in the long term. -- Peter Nixon http://peternixon.net/ ------------------------------------------------------------------------- This SF.net email is sponsored by: Splunk Inc. Still grepping through log files to find problems? Stop. Now Search log events and configuration files using AJAX and a browser. Download your FREE copy of Splunk now >> http://get.splunk.com/ _______________________________________________ Opalvoip-devel mailing list Opalvoip-devel(a)lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/opalvoip-devel

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Re: [h323plus] [Opalvoip-devel] [Openh323-devel] opalvoip vsh323plus
by Robert Jongbloed 04 Nov '07

04 Nov '07

> -----Original Message----- > From: opalvoip-devel-bounces(a)lists.sourceforge.net [mailto:opalvoip- > devel-bounces(a)lists.sourceforge.net] On Behalf Of Michel Stempin .... > split to > a different site as a general purpose library:) We actually did discuss this! :-) In the end we decided that making OPAL any more complicated to get and build than it already is (it's hard enough now) was less desirable than having a separate SF project for PTLib. We did stop short of actually integrating the two libraries completely, for precisely the reason that there are people using PTLib on its own. So, having it as a sub-project of opalvoip was the compromise ... Robert Jongbloed OPAL/OpenH323 Architect and Co-founder.

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Re: [h323plus] [Opalvoip-devel] [Openh323-devel] opalvoip vs h323plus
by Simon Horne 03 Nov '07

03 Nov '07

Hannes I completely understand your point and from our offlist discussions I have been very supportive of getting some of these ideas like the a common H.460 framework base and H.239 into Opal. It would be good to have these kind of H.460 features like NAT and also the myriad of other H.460 extensions like text messaging (h460.tm), follow me, click to call, presence (h460.presence in development with PacPhone and GnuGk) which are available in h323plus into Opal. I very much look forward to that close working relationship into the future. Simon -----Original Message----- From: opalvoip-devel-bounces(a)lists.sourceforge.net [mailto:opalvoip-devel-bounces@lists.sourceforge.net]On Behalf Of Hannes Friederich Sent: Saturday, 3 November 2007 7:30 PM To: Discussion on enhancements and development issues with the OpenH323 library Cc: h323plus(a)lists.packetizer.com; Opalvoip-devel(a)lists.sourceforge.net Subject: Re: [Opalvoip-devel] [Openh323-devel] opalvoip vs h323plus Simon, On 03.11.2007, at 10:26, Simon Horne wrote: > > Robert > > I hate to be blunt but I would like to point out a few facts. > > The decision to fork Opal to OpalVoIP was purely yours and craigs. > Nobody > forced you to make the fork and you guys did it very much with your > eyes > wide open. You knew very well what new work I was doing in openH323 > as well > as the numerous projects such as Asterisk,Yate,GnuGk, PacPhone etc > rely on > OpenH323 for their H.323 support and that support would be > disrupted if not > lost with the abrupt move to OpalVoIP. There was a flurry of > "concerned" > private emails on the topic and was actively discussed on the days > leading > up to your public announcement. The fact that all those features aren't ported to Opal (yet) is not lack of interest but mainly lack of time. I think Craig and others pointed this out as well. I myself am very interested to have a full- featured H.323 stack in Opal, and I am willing to do some of the porting work myself, but right now I am struggling to find even time to work on my main project, XMeeting. I have to admit I never really worked with the OpenH323 stack, but as much as I can tell, Opal not only offers multiple protocol stacks but also a better software architecture design. This itself should make it a reason to port the applications above to Opal. However, as long as most H.323-related work is done in OpenH323/H323Plus, the two projects continue to diverge, making it harder to switch to Opal later on. I think that the developers of Opal / OpenH323 should put more pressure on the projects mentioned above to migrate to Opal. I know it is hard to convince someone to fund such porting work, as there is no direct financial benefit for the funder, but at some point the cost of maintaining "backwards" compatibility by far exceeds the benefits of having this backwards compatibility. One should not only focus the projects one is interested in, but also consider the OpenH323 community and what's best for that community as a whole. However, I will by no means criticize your project split-off, as I can fully understand your motivation for doing this. ...deleted... Hannes ------------------------------------------------------------------------- This SF.net email is sponsored by: Splunk Inc. Still grepping through log files to find problems? Stop. Now Search log events and configuration files using AJAX and a browser. Download your FREE copy of Splunk now >> http://get.splunk.com/ _______________________________________________ Opalvoip-devel mailing list Opalvoip-devel(a)lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/opalvoip-devel

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Re: [h323plus] [Openh323-devel] opalvoip vs h323plus
by Simon Horne 03 Nov '07

03 Nov '07

Robert I hate to be blunt but I would like to point out a few facts. The decision to fork Opal to OpalVoIP was purely yours and craigs. Nobody forced you to make the fork and you guys did it very much with your eyes wide open. You knew very well what new work I was doing in openH323 as well as the numerous projects such as Asterisk,Yate,GnuGk, PacPhone etc rely on OpenH323 for their H.323 support and that support would be disrupted if not lost with the abrupt move to OpalVoIP. There was a flurry of "concerned" private emails on the topic and was actively discussed on the days leading up to your public announcement. The decision to start h323plus was made in part in response to your decision and to ensure continuation of support for these "orphaned" projects and also to ensure the new work I was doing in OpenH323 saw the light of day. It became impossible to do in openh323, although I had made several public gestures to taking over the OpenH323 project, I never received any response from anybody on the topic so I was forced to take the action I did. Facts remain there has been little new H.323 work in Opal aside from the video plugin work with majority of that focus been on the SIP side which is completely understandable as this has been your prime focus. For instance, the new H.264 and MPEG4 codecs in the Opal repository didn't even have H.323 support. (Well not completely true, I'm testing H.264 code and will get to the MPEG4 shortly) To be honest, the H.323 support in Opal is currently at the level of about openH323 v1.18 meanwhile over the last 12 months I have been diligently adding H.230,H.239,H.249,H.341,H.350,H.460.x etc to the openH323 plugins branch (abit with Roberts paid (from somebody) support for the video plugins :) ) with the an aim to have that work ported to Opal when you guys were ready, nobody has EVER contacted me on doing this to date (aside from Hannes) and the offer is still there and I certainly welcome you to do so. Nothing at all changes that. As you are aware I still commit changes to ptlib and the opal plugins in OpalVoIP SVN and you are very much welcomed to take any of the new H323plus work and add it to OpalVoIP. I don't understand, Although the desire to make a smaller ASN.1 footprint is a completely fantastic idea but why do you want to effectively exclude such a large number of projects which currently rely on OpenH323 (now h323plus) or basically force these projects to recode to Opal. In many respects there is no compelling business case (or benefit) for these projects to move to Opal but more importantly, politics may be the deciding factor as unlike openH323, Opal may be seen as a competitor especially on the SIP side and with the current demand for H.323 very low they might just abandon any new H.323 work altogether. This is my greatest fear. The purpose of h323plus is to continue on from your (and craig's) fantastic work on OpenH323 and the unique neutral place OpenH323 had in the marketplace and develop it further with app sharing, conference controls etc,(hence the + in h323plus) and make that available to the widest audience possible, continuing the history of being the one really good advanced open source H.323 stack which everyone has relied on for so many years. Simon -----Original Message----- From: openh323-devel-bounces(a)lists.sourceforge.net [mailto:openh323-devel-bounces@lists.sourceforge.net]On Behalf Of Robert Jongbloed Sent: Saturday, 3 November 2007 11:33 AM To: 'Discussion on enhancements and development issues with the OpenH323 library'; h323plus(a)lists.packetizer.com; Opalvoip-devel(a)lists.sourceforge.net Subject: Re: [Openh323-devel] opalvoip vs h323plus Sigh, I know I should not do this but .... > -----Original Message----- > From: openh323-devel-bounces(a)lists.sourceforge.net [mailto:openh323- > devel-bounces(a)lists.sourceforge.net] On Behalf Of Simon Horne > Sent: Sunday, 28 October 2007 3:19 PM ... > There are dozens of very popular open source stacks like asterisk and > Yate > that rely on openH323 for their H.323 support. With the migration to > Opal > this support is hampered as openH323 was seen as a component where as > OpalVoIP may be viewed a little differently. My greatest fear is that > H.323 > support in these projects would stagnate or be dropped entirely which > would > be a major loss. Hence the maintaining of that support in H323plus. And this is my greatest fear as well. Unfortunately when the primary champions of the H.323 protocol decide NOT to use the OPAL environment, they are going a long way to ensuring that this WILL be the case. > H323plus has a completely different focus to that of OpalVoIP and is > designed to undertake advanced H.323 development (hence the plus) and > unleach the full potential of what H.323 is capable of where are > OpalVoIP is > more of a generalist which to date has focused a lot of their > attention (of > late) on SIP. True, because much as I hate SIP as a protocol, we can't ignore it. Many consumers of OpenH323 (YATE, Asterisk, etc) have SIP as well, they just use someone else's stack. > Now saying that, it does not mean the work in H323plus > cannot > be ported across to OpalVoIP or visa versa. Case in point the Video > Plugins > from Opal (which Robert did a lot of work on) and the plan to port > the app > sharing H.239 to Opal (which I authored). The H323plus stack is built > off > ptlib and uses the same audio/video plugins which I still actively > assist in > maintaining. Yes, but as time goes on and the stacks continue to diverge, this gets harder and harder. For example, one idea Craig and I have toyed with is changing the ASN.1 PER system to use the iii compiler. This reduces the code footprint by a staggering amount. Literally an order of magnitude, a 3 megabyte executable being reduced to less than 300 kilobytes. This involves changing (in a semi-automatic way) thousands of lines of code. However, once that is done any porting between the two is ten times harder as diff's can no longer be used on files that used to be 95% identical. We don't know if we would do this or not, but maintaining the ability to port between OpenH323 and OPAL becomes a factor against in the decision making process. > The real question is not which is better but which better suits your > needs. > If you are starting a new project and need to support SIP with > quality H.323 > support then use OpalVoIP. If you have an existing project or don't > require > SIP but need advanced H.323 features such as app sharing, HD Video, > conference controls, LDAP, SNMP then you should consider H323plus. And therein lies the problem. What if someone wants both? They shouldn't need to choose. There is really no technical reason for it. If you use OPAL and just use H.323 (i.e. only create an H323EndPoint and not a SIPEndPoint), that should be IDENTICAL to using OpenH323. Once upon a time it was! The "generalist"/"specialist" argument not a good one IMHO. OPAL is a LIBRARY, as with any library you use as much or as little as you need and ignore the rest. .... > I certainly wish them all the best. However the move does have its > downside > as projects such as GnuGk, YATE, Asterisk are forced to migrate their > H.323 > support or let it stagnate (which is my greatest fear) which was the > prime > motivating force for h323plus. As I said before, if you were working on OPAL, then the H.323 within it would never stagnate. It is to my everlasting regret that I never could get around to producing a "porting guide" from OpenH323 to OPAL. A nice, detailed recipe on the API changes that need to be tweaked. There are already examples of dual mode applications in the contrib directory now and not THAT much changes. If I had managed to produce such a document then I do not think this would have been an issue. I say this because I believe the REAL reason applications such as GnuGk etc have not moved to OPAL is that the authors did not know, nor want to expend valuable time figuring out, how to change their applications to use the new API. I do not blame these people in the slightest for that decision. The fault is mine in not producing sufficient information to make it easy. However, that fundamental mistake several year ago has caused a juggernaut to move on. It is probably now impossible for OPAL to ever have the same functionality as OpenH323 as the likelihood of us having time to port the code is small (we need to earn a living), and the likelihood of someone paying for it is even smaller. I know if I was an application writer with requirements for H.323 with the extras and needed SIP too, I would be using OpenH323 and some other SIP stack such as oSIP/Vocal/reSIProcate etc. So, I believe the divergence will continue and this makes me profoundly sad. Robert Jongbloed OPAL/OpenH323 Architect and Co-founder. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- This SF.net email is sponsored by: Splunk Inc. Still grepping through log files to find problems? Stop. Now Search log events and configuration files using AJAX and a browser. Download your FREE copy of Splunk now >> http://get.splunk.com/ _______________________________________________ Openh323-devel mailing list Openh323-devel(a)lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/openh323-devel

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H.239 support in h323plus
by Simon Horne 02 Nov '07

02 Nov '07

H.239 support is now available in h323plus. I have updated simple in the application directory of the CVS to provide a sample application. You can place a call and press 'S' to start a fake application video window and 'E' to end it. You will need the latest CVS version of the H.263 video plugin to for it to work. You can get it from the opalVoIP repository or there is a mirror in the extensions/plugins directory in the h323plus CVS. Simon ----------------------- Simon Horne Principal Maintainer h323plus library www.h323plus.org h323:s.horne@packetizer.com

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h323plus v1.19.6 (Linux) Release
by Simon Horne 02 Nov '07

02 Nov '07

Guys An update has been release to fix a few issues with GnuGk http://www.h323plus.org/source/download/h323plus-v1_19_6-src.tar.gz The main download page should be updated shortly with the new link. Thanks to Jan Willamowius (GnuGk) is assisting resolving the issues and getting the release out. Simon ----------------------- Simon Horne Principal Maintainer h323plus library www.h323plus.org h323:s.horne@packetizer.com

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Socket aggregation not yet implemented on Unix?
by Vlasis Hatzistavrou (KTI) 02 Nov '07

02 Nov '07

Hello, I have tried to compile H323Plus with Signaling and RTP aggregation, so I assumed that I needed to compile PTLib with socket aggregation first using "./configure --enable-sockagg" However, during the PTLib compilation I receive the message: "aggregation not yet implemented on Unix" Is there any ETA about this feature? Also, is this feature fully available on Windows? -- Best regards, Vlasis Hatzistavrou.

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Re: [h323plus] [Openh323-devel] help in creating WhiteBoard application using Opal
by Simon Horne 30 Oct '07

30 Oct '07

FYI opal is now opalVoIP and openH323 is continuing on as H323plus. OpenH323 (the project "in general" is no longer being actively developed. T.120 support in Opal is at the same level it as it is in OpenH323 very very basic. There is a project on sourceforge which has been abandoned for many many years based on OpenH323. http://sourceforge.net/projects/opent120/ T.120 development in general has pretty much stopped for various reasons including NAT issues. It uses TCP and you cannot easily use STUN, H.460.18/19 or emerging NAT technologies like P2Pnat to traverse NATs. That does not mean T.120 development has ceased. In h323plus www.h323plus.org we have added H.239 support or extended video to perform the same operation as T.120 app/whiteboarding would perform except over UDP so it can traverse NATs. It utilises the existing video plugin codecs to create a secondary video channel for the purpose of App Sharing. This work is continuing with the addition of app sharing controls such as H.249 collaberaton controls (remote userinputs, mouse movements and keystrokes). T.124 or Generic conference controls has also been resurrected and is being tunnelled through H.245 to perform "next generation" remote MCU control functionality such as Inviting and ejecting participants, Floor and chair controls and eventually the ability to introduce H.239 apps directly into conferences as presentations. If anyone would like to participate and/or contribute to this work then please let me know. Simon -----Original Message----- From: openh323-devel-bounces(a)lists.sourceforge.net [mailto:openh323-devel-bounces@lists.sourceforge.net]On Behalf Of Vishak V. Kurup Sent: Monday, 29 October 2007 3:08 PM To: openh323-devel(a)lists.sourceforge.net Subject: [Openh323-devel] help in creating WhiteBoard application using Opal Hi, I am Vishak. I want to develop a white board application for linux using gtk. I heard that whiteboard applications use T.120 protocol. T.120 protocol is in the stack of Opal. So can any one please tell me how create a whiteboard application. Regards

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Re: [h323plus] [Openh323-devel] opalvoip vs h323plus
by Hugo Pereira 28 Oct '07

28 Oct '07

Greetings, I have just read the history post about OPAL. I was already very impressed about the work of Craig and Robert. now i am even more! :) Spite In that text OPAL seens to be the successor of openh323, now this last has reemerged in the form of h323plus. - Does this new and enhanced protocol stack is is better? - What are the advantages/disadvantages of using one or another? - Are now these projects competing with each other? These are a few questions that question the existence of both projects simultaneously.

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opalvoip vs h323plus
by Hugo Pereira 27 Oct '07

27 Oct '07

Greetings, OpenH323 has branched into two distinct projects: opalvoip and h323plus. However each of these projects are best? Both of their based protocols (H323 and SIP) is well known in he videoconference worldwide. Because opalvoip supports both SIP and H323 i could point this project better than h323plus. Am i right? Best regards, Hugo Pereira

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