5.7 EL MÉDICO RESIDENTE COMO DOCENTE

When we discuss the future of AVVID, it is useful to examine where we are and how we got here. Over the past few years, this technology has grown by leaps and bounds. Advances have been made in every area, with new offerings coming out almost every day.

An area that will definitely be enhanced further will be the CallManager platform. In version 2.x organizations were limited to 200 IP telephones per server.When 3.0 debuted, this number went up to 2500 with support for 10,000 IP phones within a cluster.With the latest release, 3.1, we can now support up to 1,000,000 IP telephones. I would expect that this number will continue to rise with the later revisions of the software. As this technology gains further accep- tance, we can also probably expect to see several enhancements to the

CallManager feature offering, such as a voice-recording system. I would also expect to see support specifically for call centers. IOS-based versions of the CallManager platform are already available; although these currently provide a very limited feature set, future revisions will most likely contain more features and open IP telephony solutions up for branch offices.

Aside from CallManager, I would also expect that we will see further software developments and new packages from both Cisco and other vendors. A good example would be the Intelligent Contact Management (ICM) suite, due to be released in the first part of 2002. It is a software solution used for the direction and relay of customer contact information between resources.This system will utilize a set of user-defined roles in order to route voice,WWW, and e-mail cor- respondence to the appropriate system or resource.This and other systems of its kind will further enhance and augment the IP telephony and AVVID solutions.

Another area we will likely see growth is with the offering of pizza box

solutions.These products derive their colorful name from their small form-factor,

which is about the size of a pizza box.These are integrated all-in-one access solu- tions that provide capabilities such as routing, switching, and voice-gateway ser- vices. A good example of this type of solution would be the IAD1101 integrated

SONET, or Gigabit Ethernet. Products found at this layer are typically high-end routers such as the 7500, or Layer 3

switching devices like the 12000 Gigabit Switch Router (GSR). Concerning IP telephony, we would probably not see much here, as it should be implemented at the lower levels.

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access device.This solution offers two T1 ports, a v.35 port, a 10bastT Ethernet port and an RS-232 port. Eight analog ports are also available via an expansion slot.This type of solution offers several capabilities of the larger scale platforms at a fraction of the cost.

At the client end, I would expect to see a third generation of IP telephones offering wider support for the SIP protocol as well as other features, and maybe eventually integrating with a video endpoint device, although Cisco has not made any indication of this.

Without our standard-issue crystal ball, we cannot be certain as to what the future holds, but if past performance is any indication, I would expect we will continue to see rapid development of exciting products and services. Perhaps IP telephony will one day replace our existing telephone infrastructure. Only time will tell.

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Summary

Internet Protocol (IP) telephony and IP-based video conferencing solutions pre- sent many opportunities to your organization, and at the same time introduce an entirely new set of challenges to overcome. IP telephony benefits your organiza- tion by providing simplified administration, toll bypass, and a unified messaging platform. All of these benefits have the potential to save your organization a great deal both administratively and monetarily when implemented correctly.

Several new IP telephony-specific enhancements need to be made to your infrastructure in order to make IP telephony a reality.The CallManager system replaces the traditional Private Branch Exchange (PBX) system for call pro- cessing; currently in release 3.1, it has the potential to support up to 2500 IP tele- phones per server and 10,000 per cluster. IP telephone handsets provide the user interface to the IP telephony infrastructure. Currently in their second-generation, Cisco offers four IP telephone handsets: the 7910/7910+SW, 7940, 7960, and 7935. Gateways provide the interface to the public switched telephone network (PSTN). Cisco products currently support three protocols: the Skinny Station Protocol (SSP), H.323, and Media Gateway Control Protocol (MGCP).The Cisco Unity product suite offers a unified messaging solution, integrating voice, video and fax communication into one medium.

IP telephony applications are used to enhance the IP telephony product offering. Cisco has developed several IP telephony applications to work within the AVVID product offering.WebAttendant is a software-based attendant console used to replace the traditional PBX attendant console. It provides call monitoring and management functions and can be used to monitor up to 26 conversations concurrently. IP SoftPhone is a software-based version of an IP telephone, pro- viding a viable alternative for traveling users or others who do not have access to an IP telephone. Internet Communications Software (ICS) is a grouping of five tools: Automatic Call Distribution (ACD), Cisco IP Contact Center (IPCC), Intelligent Contact Management (ICM), the Customer Interaction Suite, and Network Applications Manager (NAM), for service and application providers. Interactive voice response (IVR) and AutoAttendant are used for menu-based telephone systems. Other vendors have also developed applications to work with Cisco’s IP telephony solutions, which includes Interactive Intelligence, Latitude, and Intelligent Telemanagement Solutions (ISI). Interactive Intelligence offers the Interaction Center platform, installed on the ICS 7750. Latitude offers the MeetingPlace IP software for video-conferencing, and ISI offers an accounting and billing application that utilizes the call detail record (CDR) of each call.

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Video over IP (VoIP) is made possible through the use of several devices including gateways, gatekeepers, multi-point control units (MCU), video terminal adapters (VTA), and endpoints. Gateways provide access to the outside world from your internal network. Gatekeepers are used to permit or deny requests for video conferences. MCUs serve as a center for video-conferencing communica- tions and infrastructure.The VTA’s role in video conferencing is to provide an interface to legacy video-conferencing systems. Endpoints are the end-user devices that subscribe to and receive services from video-conferencing. Cisco offers the IPVC family of products to meet the video-conferencing needs of organizations. Cisco also offers the IP/TV family of products for one-way video broadcasting.

Additional infrastructure, including switches and routers, will also need to be adapted in order to meet the needs of AVVID. Cisco’s voice-ready routers include the 1750 Series, 2600 Series, 3600 Series, and 7200 Series. All of Cisco’s switches support IP telephony, but the 3524XL-PWR, 4000 Series, and 6000 Series sup- port inline power. Inline power can come in the form of inline power modules for the Catalyst switches or external power-patch panels.

Queuing and class of service (COS) measures must also be taken on your LAN/WAN in order to ensure real-time delivery of voice and video traffic. 802.1Q provides a Layer 2 queuing solution for your LAN environment.

Solutions Fast Track

Introduction to IP Telephony

; Simplified administration is achieved by converging three separate networks into one, allowing one resource pool to administer the entire network.

; Toll bypass allows organizations to avoid costly telecommunications expenses by utilizing the data infrastructure.

; Unified messaging combines voice-mail, e-mail, and faxes into one easy- to-use interface.

IP Telephony Components

; CallManager provides the IP telephony network with a software-based

PBX system.

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; IP telephones provide the user interface to the IP telephony network.

; Gateways provide the interface between the IP telephony network and

the public switched telephone network (PSTN) or a legacy PBX device.

Exploring IP Telephony Applications

; WebAttendant replaces the traditional PBX attendant console.

; IP SoftPhone provides a software-based IP telephone handset.

; Third-party applications include software from Interactive Intelligence, Latitude, and ISI.

Introduction to Video

; Traditional video-conferencing utilizes ISDN lines in a point-to-point infrastructure.

; IP-based video-conferencing utilizes the H.323 specification allowing for video-conferencing over a variety of mediums.

; IP-based video-conferencing is much more efficient than traditional video-conferencing because the existing data infrastructure is utilized opposed to a separate infrastructure.

; Gateways provide access to the outside world from your internal network.

; Gatekeepers are used to permit or deny requests for video conferences.

; Multi-point control units (MCU) serve as a center for video- conferencing communications and infrastructure.

Enhancing Network Infrastructure

; Routers provide gateway services and voice aggregation for IP telephony by use of analog ports, FXO, FXS, E&M as well as digital trunking cards.

; Routers that support IP telephony include the 1751, 2600 Series, 3600

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; Switches that support inline power modules include the 3524XL-PWR,

6000 Series, and 4000 Series.

; Inline power is also provided by using the Catalyst inline power patch panel.