I'm quite interested in getting into the business of switching local small businesses from proprietary PBX systems to open VoIP hardware. Anyone got some tips for getting into the field? I'm a competent programmer and system admin but my but I have little knowledge of telephony.
BTW, my impression of Asterisk vs Freeswitch matches the article. Asterisk is pretty ugly in terms of implementation and configuration. However, at this point Asterisk has much more (still small) traction in the marketplace.
If you want real integration possibilities, look at Yate too. It's got a bit steeper learning curve, but seeing the whole PBX as lots of completely independent modules and the core as a message synchronisation engine only is very refreshing. After having fun with all three solutions, Yate is my favourite (even if it has a much smaller development group and community currently - these guys are serious about what they do).
You can also integrate with everything, because the external module interface is a simple text protocol (no - a sane one - not sip kind of simple). Use php, perl, bash, python, java, etc. as you want - helper libraries are provided.
BTW, my impression of Asterisk vs Freeswitch matches the article. Asterisk is pretty ugly in terms of implementation and configuration. However, at this point Asterisk has much more (still small) traction in the marketplace.