VoIP 101 (Telecom for Non-Engineers)

VoIP 101 is designed for the non-engineering professional needing an overview and update, and for those new to the business needing to get up to speed quickly.

VoIP 101 covers all major topics in Voice over IP – in plain English. From fundamentals to softswitches and SIP trunking, we’ll explain the jargon and the technologies, and more importantly, the underlying ideas.

Based on training courses developed, refined and tuned over many years, the selection of material, its order and emphasis in VoIP 101 is proven and field-tested to bring you the knowledge of Voice over IP you need.

Understanding what everything does and how it all works together allows you to be more accurate, eliminates frustration with buzzwords, and gives you confidence to make meaningful contributions.

You have the added advantage of knowing what someone is talking about, even if you’re not familiar with the exact details of the variation they’re discussing. Don't be the one person in the room who isn't up to speed!

Your employer (or prospective employer) will be interested to hear you have this solid foundation of knowledge that project- and product-specific knowledge can be built on, getting you up to speed quickly… then having the versatility to subsequently work on different projects.

VoIP 101 has six chapters covering all aspects of Voice over IP, including all the different ways VoIP is implemented, how calls are set up with softswitches and SIP, how voice is packetized, the factors affecting sound quality, connecting to carriers and SIP trunking, and network quality with MPLS, Service Level Agreements and Class of Service:

1 Fundamentals of Voice over IP
A complete introduction to everything Voice over IP. You'll learn the fundamental ideas and principles of a VoIP telephone system, the jargon and buzzwords, and how it all works together.

2 VoIP Architectures and Implementation Choices
Next is a comprehensive overview of the many flavors of VoIP, comparing and contrasting the various implementation and architecture choices.

3 Softswitches, SIP, Call Setup and SIP Trunking
This chapter is all about SIP, and how it is used to set up phone calls: what SIP is, how it works, jargon like proxy server and location server, how SIP fits in with softswitches and call managers, and trace the establishment of a VoIP phone call using SIP and DNS, step by step.

4 Voice Packetization, Codecs and Voice Quality
The "nuts and bolts" of Voice over IP: how the voice is digitized and coded, time stamps applied with the RTP protocol, and how the result is carried in UDP, IP packets and MAC frames.

5 SIP Trunking & Carrier Connections
This chapter is all about connecting to carriers to communicate VoIP phone calls, both carrier-to-carrier connections and business-to-carrier SIP trunking.

6 IP Network Quality: CoS, QoS, MPLS and SLAs
The last chapter in VoIP 101 focuses on the network service provided by carriers to move VoIP packets, and how network traffic is identified, managed and prioritized, resulting in Class of Service offerings to meet Service Level Agreements.

VoIP 101 is intended to be read sequentially, building ideas on top of ideas. The detailed Table of Contents makes it also useful as a day-to-day reference handbook.

Our goal is to explain the big picture, the jargon and buzzwords, and put in place a very solid base of VoIP knowledge spanning fundamentals to the latest technologies and how they are deployed – in plain English.

Let’s get started!