Why You Need SIP Protocol for Voice Over IP
SIP (Session Initiation Protocol) is the transmission protocol for person-to-person voice traffic over the Web. Its technical specifications come from the SIP working group of the Internet Engineering Task Force. SIP provides access to the public switched telephone network for voice data at 3 kHz bandwidth and common number dialing using Voice over IP (VoIP). It can also be expanded to deal with IP telephony combined with video and instant messaging. Future enhancements will allow SIP applications such as video conference calls, application sharing, home monitoring, and interactive gaming for companies in Medical Lake.
SIP is typically thought of as a means to emulate the operation of typical telephony over an IP network. It is replacing the older, less adaptable protocols used in the old days such as H.323 and MGCP. These earlier protocols worked at a very low level to link IP phones to the public telephone network. SIP, on the other hand, provides a sophisticated and well-defined way to network the enterprise. For instance, SIP uses email addresses as the SIP address instead of a telephone number over the regular phone network.
Before setting up a SIP solution in your company, you should think about the proper configuration of your corporate firewall to accept SIP. Many of the typical firewalls already deployed in business offices are not developed to support the SIP protocol. First, SIP media streams are transferred over dynamically assigned UDP ports that are typically blocked on firewalls. Second, SIP clients within a firewall can not be accessed using IP addresses since these addresses are local and unique to the LAN. Third, you need to ensure that either your T1 line broadband carrier or Metro fiber carrier is able to support the SIP protocol from your internal network to the outside world. Your IT administrator will need to evaluate how to properly support SIP to get around these technical problems. By adding a SIP proxy and registrar for controlling the firewall, it is feasible to handle complicated SIP scenarios for reliable and confidential communications.
