Re: DUNDi

[Dave Siegel <dave@siegelie.com>]

Yes, it is what ENUM is supposed to be, but unlike ENUM, it is completely 
decentralized.


On Tue, Oct 19, 2004 at 03:56:27PM -0400, Irwin Lazar reportedly typed:
> FYI (Any thoughts? - isn't this what ENUM was supposed to do?)
> 
> ----
> http://voxilla.com/voxstory107-nested-order0-threshold0.html
> 
> Asterisk Guru May Have Solved Interconnection Dilemna
> 
> By DAVID HOLUB
> for VOXILLA.COM
> 
> What has been a longtime complaint of many VoIP users ? the limited ability
> of users on separate IP networks to call each other over a direct IP-to-IP
> connection ? may well be addressed through a new number discovery protocol
> developed by Mark Spencer, the lead architect behind the highly regarded
> open source PBX system, Asterisk.
> 
> The Distributed Universal Number Discovery, or DUNDI, says Spencer, "solves
> one of the holy grails of Voice over IP, direct IP connectivity."
> 
> DUNDI, says Spencer, is a "true peer-to-peer" system that allows users of
> disparate telephone networks to find each other at a regular phone number
> simply by querying tables maintained on each network's server.
> 
> Already, said Spencer, a number of commercial and free service providers
> have agreed to the standard, including a General Peering Agreement ("GPA")
> that is available on a new web sited Spencer developed for the project,
> www.dundi.com.
> 
> Among the service providers Spencer lists as supporting DUNDI are
> VoicePulse, SIPPhone, Free World Dialup, Telesthetics, Nufone and SpeakUp.
> 
> Once the providers put up complete tables of their users, including phone
> number, device MAC addresses and URL identifiers, a user on one service
> participating dialing a user on a separate participating service will be
> able to make a voice connection while bypassing the PSTN system.
> 
> Currently, for example, a call between a Nufone customer and a VoicePulse
> customer, travels over the traditional PSTN between the Nufone and
> VoicePulse servers.
> 
> Using DUNDI, the PSTN portion of the call is unnecessary as the caller would
> be able to find the recipient's phone directly via IP using peering tables.
> 
> "This is what VoIP was supposed to be about," said Spencer.
> 
> DUNDI, said Spencer, is designed to work with or apart from the DNS-based
> ENUM system, which maintains a centralized table of participants on a single
> database. "DUNDI doesn't need a central repository, such as ENUM," said
> Spencer. "But it can supplement ENUM by interconnecting ENUM repositories."
> 
> Spencer says the difference between ENUM and DUNDI is similar to the
> difference between looking up a number in a phone book and asking a friend
> for the right number to call.
> 
>  Spencer says it will take a while before DUNDI's effectiveness can be
> measured. "We don't have proof that it will work, but we don't have proof
> that it won't work," he said. "Time will tell but I have high hopes."
> 
> Service providers have been reluctant to enter into interconnection
> agreements with other providers, even though such agreements would lead to
> lower operating costs and higher quality voice communications by bypassing
> the PSTN system. Interconnection agreements would require some sort of
> sharing of customer information, not something parties in the highly
> competitive VoIP environment were willing to do.
> 
> By allowing participants to store there own database of users, and not
> requiring the information in the database to be shared, DUNDI helps overcome
> the main objection.
> 
> Jeff Pulver, of Free World Dialup, was quick to embrace DUNDI. "No matter
> how established you get, you must be aware that disruption will happen,"
> Pulver said. "DUNDI is disruptive and we support it."
> 
>  
> 
> -- 
> Irwin Lazar, CISSP
> Senior Analyst, Burton Group
> ilazar@burtongroup.com
> Phone: 703-742-9659
> AIM/iChat: imlazar
> Skype: imlazar
> sip:452401@fwd.pulver.com
> 
> 
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-- 
Dave Siegel                     http://www.siegelie.com/people/dsiegel/
Oro Valley, AZ

Cleaning your house while your kids are still growing is like
shoveling the walk before it stops snowing.
                -- Phyllis Diller

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