[K12OSN] phone system

[Gentgeen]

On Thu, 10 Aug 2006 08:18:03 -0500
"Paul Lemke" <lists at paulandmichelle.net> wrote:

> Hi all,
> 	This is not closely related to the list. but I don't know who
> 	else
> to ask. The school I'm currently helping has about 10 rooms. They want
> to put some kind of phone system in place to have a phone in each
> room. (why they didn't do this when they built the school boggles my
> mind) We already have cat5e ran to each room where the phone would go.
> 
> 
> 	The question is. are there any open source implementations of a
> commercial phone system? Let's just say the bid we got to do the phone
> system was a little high for our low budget. So I'd figure I'd ask
> some other school's what they do. I was thinking of a VOIP setup
> utilizing our totally underutilized Fedora server. 
> 
> 	Here are the basic requirements:
> 1. Use phones (not software phones)
> 2. Voicemail
> 3. Some kind of "Public Announcement" system
> 
> Thoughts? Or can someone point me in the right direction? 
> 
> Thanks!
> Paul 
> 


For a "simple approach"

>From my understanding you can use the Cat5e cables for more then just
networking.  Depending on where the other end of the lines come out (and
assuming the lines are not already being used for your network), you
could just use the Cat5e lines like regular phone lines.  You would have
to make your own patch cables, but the tools (and the caps) are pretty
cheap.

Just my own $0.02 - and it might do the trick.  







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