Technology
Gizmo5 was based on the Session Initiation Protocol and could interoperate with other SIP-based networks directly, including the public switched telephone network. The latter required the Gizmo5 service features CallOut and CallIn. CallOut was available at a fee, whereas CallIn and calls to other VoIP users were generally free of cost. Gizmo5 also used encryption (Secure Real-time Transport Protocol) for network calls and worked well with Phil Zimmermann's Zfone security features.
Gizmo5 supported the following Codecs:
- GSM — fixed bit rate, not loss tolerant, narrow band (8khz sampling rate)
- PCMA — fixed bit rate (8 kHz sampling rate)
- PCMU — fixed bit rate (8 kHz sampling rate, high band width)
- EG711 (Enhanced G.711) — fixed bit rate, loss tolerant, narrowband
- iSAC — variable bit rate, loss tolerant, narrow and wideband (8 to 16khz)
- iLBC — variable bit rate, loss tolerant, narrow
- iPCMwb — 16 kHz sampling rate
- iPCM — fixed bit rate, loss tolerant, wideband
Version 4.0 of the Gizmo5 softphone offered video calls. Gizmo5 also offered smartphone version.
As of July 20, 2009, Gizmo5 was the only SIP service that could be used with Google Voice directly (without requiring a U.S. based phone number).
The text chat function of Gizmo5 utilized the Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol (XMPP) protocol. Users were addressed by an identification string in the format of username@chat.gizmoproject.com.
An earlier incarnation of the service was PhoneGaim, a free software VoIP system based on the Pidgin instant messaging software and the SIP protocol handling of the Linphone VoIP software, but restricted to using (only) the SIPphone service. It is available under the GNU General Public License and sponsored by Linspire.
Read more about this topic: Gizmo5
Famous quotes containing the word technology:
“The real accomplishment of modern science and technology consists in taking ordinary men, informing them narrowly and deeply and then, through appropriate organization, arranging to have their knowledge combined with that of other specialized but equally ordinary men. This dispenses with the need for genius. The resulting performance, though less inspiring, is far more predictable.”
—John Kenneth Galbraith (b. 1908)
“If we had a reliable way to label our toys good and bad, it would be easy to regulate technology wisely. But we can rarely see far enough ahead to know which road leads to damnation. Whoever concerns himself with big technology, either to push it forward or to stop it, is gambling in human lives.”
—Freeman Dyson (b. 1923)
“Radio put technology into storytelling and made it sick. TV killed it. Then you were locked into somebody else’s sighting of that story. You no longer had the benefit of making that picture for yourself, using your imagination. Storytelling brings back that humanness that we have lost with TV. You talk to children and they don’t hear you. They are television addicts. Mamas bring them home from the hospital and drag them up in front of the set and the great stare-out begins.”
—Jackie Torrence (b. 1944)