OwnPages Zero-Cost Phone and Mail System

The multi user dialer ordinarily scales to 10 users. You could of course take multiple dialers to go beyond 10, but that causes manageability issues. Leads will have to be divided amongst the servers and reports generated will pertain to just one server. Agents also have to be told to log into one of many servers and since the capacity of each is just 10, care must be taken that load is evenly distributed. To avoid this, our helpdesk can combine upto 6 servers into a single dialer on a request from you.

In this case your first server becomes the master with all your current settings and data intact . All agents log into the Master, and so does the administrator. The only thing the slave servers are used for is that their hostname should be used in the "domain" or "host" field of the SIP phones configured for your new agents. You need to distribute the SIP phones depending on how many servers you are taking according to the table at the end of this post. This needs to be done just once when configuring the phones for the first time.

Additionally, if you do not boot the slave servers, the main server capacity reverts to 10 as at present. This can be used on days there are less agents. All administration work can also be done with just the main server on. One exception is if recordings are to be downloaded, the slave servers must be on, even though the administrator has logged onto the main server.

There are some advantages of this "multi server" approach to scaling vs just putting up a single large server for all your agents:

1. Capacity grows in small steps, mirroring real world requirements at most call centers. For each additional server capacity increases by 9 agents. On the other hand putting up a single large server requires advance capacity planning and high expenses even when initially the team may be small.
2. Day to day manageability is comparable to a single large server, since the slave servers are only used to configure the SIP phones, which is a one time job. After that agents and administrators need to use only the master server.
3. On days there are less agents, or when doing just administration work, fewer servers or just the master can be booted, reducing hourly charges

All the servers can be started/stopped from your OwnPages console. The master server must be switched on first and then the slave servers after the master is functional. Each server will be separately charged at prevailing hourly rates. Also, we charge one time installation (USD90 at the time of this post) for each additional server (no installation charge for the Master server).

Table: Distribution of SIP phones amongst the servers of an OwnPages multi server dialer

Number of servers->	1	2	3	4	5	6
Master	10	8	6	4	2	0
Slave1	-	11	11	11	11	11
Slave2	-	-	11	11	11	11
Slave3	-	-	-	11	11	11
Slave4	-	-	-	-	11	11
Slave5	-	-	-	-	-	11
Total Capacity	10	19	28	37	46	55

Note: Just the phones need to be distributed amongst the servers; agents and administrators must log into the master server.