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The Softphone release project needs your advice (othomas)
I'd like to have a 15-minute conversation to solicit ideas on the best
way / options for the softphone release project to move forward.

Jonathan Hunt will be calling in for the meeting.

Jon called into the meeting.
1) Roundtable

Jana
- no hot items, quiet
- quiet for VoIP transition but will go up in January
- resource rates in Daptive - Anne will answer when roundtable gets to her.
- On vacation tomorrow - ski, NH
Kate
- Number of people migrating to Office '07 is increasing; EHS is converting soon, training soon
- Why slow adoption? Some suggested UI and file converter not available in early days, approximately 6 months after.
Anne
- Daptive resource rates/types - hourly rate estimates across IS&T driven by SAIS need for preliminary project budgets
  - Completed by Cecilia and Daptive/finance teams; analysis of titles/job types across IS&T, but not well documented by group about how they agreed to resource types; norms and salaries averaged to come up with rates; Wilson would like managers to determine teams' rates; finance team would rather keep Cecilia's work; Anne's check determined that the two are a close approximation; since it is across IS&T - good project resource comparison
  - a few more updates left for Rob to do; Mark gave Rob % per month for people
  - In the future → how report team's capacity and allocation? Use 40 hour week/ 52 weeks/year
  - These will be used primarily to determine relative project sizes
  - Jana's question - when to count people toward VoIP project → she should speak with Elliot
  - January 15th - Project resources into Daptive for project managers; Janaury 7th - Wilson gets CSS information
  - Managers who need changes to resource type and rate should send information to Rob.
Tim
- PGP/HIDP Project
  - Went to TAP last week - one minor glitch but OK to go; support issues now addressed; last step is a review with VP Staff in mid-January (16th?); not a tool for all - just targeted release
  - What about those who want it? But not in scope - Jon will talk to Tim
Mark
- not much people on vacation
- IT information server is no longer for stock answers, only front product page.
- It is down frequently, but we will live with it until Drupal is installed. There is no other solution without time and money
Jon
- Software billing communication breakdown - delayed billing since July. Jon thanked Anne who has been working hard to correct this.
Chris
- DITR will be working with the NextSource Vendor Management tool for hiring and tracking contractors. This is a pilot in conjunction with I&T-HR and Procurement. Potential to save time and money.
- All of the DITR consultants will be attending Richard Edelson's IAP training session for the domain container admins.
Oliver
- no major round table items
- only accounts person on this week, so go easy on him.

Agenda Item:
SoftPhone release

Stuart is leading
EyeBeam was the product in focus, but now more complicated now since started - multiple possible paths
- Client looks very non-standard
- Counterpath discontinues support in 8 months (EOL)
- Replaced by Bria - enterprise client.
  - More standard than EyeBeam
  - Next version not out yet
  - Mac Client not yet and current version not Mac compatible
  - Costs more → $30-60 difference per average seat.
  - Small company but largest of soft phone companies
  - No Academic pricing/site license
- Xlite = free client - personal SIP but not VOIP or Sylantro
- EyeBeam = fee based - personal SIP / Sylantro; but going away
- Bria = enterprise/fee - personal SIP/ Sylantro; but costs $
Regroup / Options:

EyeBean does not make sense, since EOL and $, but no clear alternative - no commercial cross platform
different clients for different platforms
No Macs and go with PC
Open source client - 2 available, but both early in development

- SIP communicator
- SJ phone
Softclient strategy piece versus software
- Recommend Skype versus softphone
  - VoIP forwards to Skype phone
  - advantages = Skype works well with phone and private networks v. SIP clients - not home friendly
  - disadvantages = new hopping and calls routed then random networks
  - Skype controls route and has MIT data = similar to BlackBerry issue and subpoenas for data
- gateway solution - bridge between Skype or similar commercial product and MIT VoIP - enterprise gateway product is fairly new
Pressure from users for Softphone: key users via Theresa and Elliot (not many, but some)
What is cost benefit of Softphone?
- Release team would like to do survey of frequent travelers to determine needs, uses, and behaviors
  - Jon and Chris like survey
  - Anne - high level of analysis can be done
  - Oliver - other universities with VoIP have not really officially rolled out soft phone
  - Mark - limited client desired; is this a service; products are still immature; survey will help determine level of need of service; may want bridge strategy for short term while long term in progress
  - Jon - used to think SoftPhone was answer, but now thinks Skype may be better; agrees with Mark
  - Mark - lessons learned - set expectations for short term
  - Jon - $ burden to users for ST to help control
  - Anne - business case never done for this
  - Oliver - Business case for VoIP was done because it focused only on campus infrastructure, but it did not include the Softphone.
- If users do it on their own it is problematic = it really cannot be done on their own due to SIP password/encryption.
Long term = consensus was to do the survey
- Send it to whom? List of potential people from MIT travel office, Andrew Yu (international phones), Jana's data from ipass and international phone rentals

Final non-softphone question from Mark → What are the Daptive project information expectations? Was the January 7th date communicated to managers? In an email from RobJonathan Hunt will be calling in for the meeting.

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