FW: Production Server

[R P Herrold]

On Thu, 28 Sep 2006, Kevin wrote:

> My questions are: Do you know if this is a good open source 
> solution?  Is there a better one? We use 4 lines (2 incoming 
> and and 2 outgoing) and send about 500 faxes a day. For a 
> production server, is CentOS or Fedora better?

I've built and supported such a system, together with call 
list import from spreadsheet, image conversion from PDF, 
logging, retries, bad number detection and lockout, anti-911/ 
restricted AC abuse, and the rest; with 4 outbound lines, we 
are able to reliably deliver about 30k faxes a week on a 
sustained basis without issue.

I first delivered that solution pre-Centos, but the underlying 
code was what has now become Centos, and as the hardware (an 
ancient 6RU Dell PE-6450 box running the 4 modems) has aged, I 
have dropped in a Centos based replacement.  We experimented 
with a multiport RocketModem card, but found that discrete PCI 
single line units met our code's needs better.

The underlying customer was in the medical device/Pharma 
field, and needed to reliably and traceable deliver FDA 
mandated 'recall' notices.

The Fedora 'non-objectives', item 2, expressly states, and has 
stated from the first day Red hat took it over that it was not 
designed for applications neeeding commercial grade, SLA's and 
long term support, and I take them at their word.

The initial link was at:
 	http://fedora.redhat.com/about/objectives.html
but I do not get a response from that server tonight; I have 
an archival backup copy 'local PDF' snapshotted of it, at:
 	http://www.owlriver.com/support/wings/#fedora

Please, please be aware of the Federal anti-unsolicited fax 
laws.  The penalties are quite harsh.

> Do you know of anyone able to setup a server of our own like 
> this and willing to reliably support it (for a fee of 
> course) if we had a problem I couldn't solve?

*cough*  We sell such support.  Our website has contact 
details.

-- Russ Herrold