Voice Over Internet Protocol

A SEMINAR REPORT (IN 5TH SEMESTER)

Submitted by Sagar Shukla (090570107014) For the partial fulfillment of the subject Seminar Of Computer Engineering Under the Esteemed guidance of Mr. Chirag K Gohel (Assistant Professor)

Abstract
This particular project is a solution developed to communicate between the users across worldwide through Internet. A message or information can be sent via many medias such as it can be telephonic, telegrams, fax etc to the recipient. Each such information requires a high level of security. To maintain such security and smooth completion of any communication it requires more time and human effort in manual systems. The entire process has been automated using JAVA technology to smoothen the flow of information in a highly secure environment across the network. We can send both the text based and voice based messages so we can do teleconferencing using this. While designing the system, care has been taken in efficiency, maintenance and reusability of the software for the present and future changes in the system. In future we can upgrade this by adding the features of making the video conference environment, sending picture messages and giving userid, password facility for added security.

INDEX
Abstract . 1) Introduction .. 2) What is VoIP? .. 3) How it works 4) Impact of VoIP on Networks 5) PSTN Call vs. VoIP .......... 6) VoIP Protocols .......... 7) Advantages Of VoIP . i 1 2 2 4 4 5 6

8) Services & Applications 7 9) Conclusion . 8

Introduction:
Since the telephone was invented in the late 1800s, telephone communication has not changed substantially. Of course, new technologies like digital circuits, DTMF (or, "to uch tone"), and caller ID have improved on this invention, but the basic functionality is still the same. Over the years, service provides made a number of changes "behind the scenes" to improve on the kinds and types of services offered to subscribers, including toll-free numbers, call-return, call forwarding, etc. By and large, users do not know how those services work, but they did know two things: the same old telephone is used and the service provider charges for each and every little incremental service addition introduced. In the 1990s, a number of individuals in research environments, both in educational and corporate institutions, took a serious interest in carrying voice and video over IP networks, especially corporate intranets and the Internet. This technology is commonly referred to today as VoIP and is, in simple terms, the process of breaking up audio or video into small chunks, transmitting those chunks over an IP network, and reassembling those chunks at the far end so that two people can communicate using audio and video. This idea of VoIP is certainly not new, as there are research papers and patents dating back several decades and demonstrations of the concept given at various times over the years. VoIP took center stage with the "information super highway" (or, the Internet) concept that was popularized by former Vice President Al Gore in the 1990s, as the Internet would make it possible to interconnect every home and every business with a packet-switched data network. Before Al Gore's effort to grow the Internet, the Internet was generally limited to use in academic environments, but the possibility of mass deployment of the Internet sparked this renewed interest in VoIP.

Technical Overview
What is VoIP? VoIP [Voice over Internet Protocol] is family of communication protocols and transmission technique which is used in delivery of voice communication or multimedia sessions over internet. VoIP stands for Voice over Internet Protocol. It is also referred to as IP Telephony or Internet Telephony. It is another way of making phone calls, with the difference of making the calls cheaper or completely free. The phone part is not always present anymore, as you can communicate without a telephone set. VoIP has a lot of advantages over the traditional phone system. The main reason for which people are so massively turning to VoIP technology is the cost. VoIP is said to be cheap, but most people use it for free. Yes, if you have a computer with a microphone and speakers, and a good Internet connection, you can communicate using VoIP for free. This can also be possible with your mobile and home phone. There are many ways of using VoIP technology. It all depends on where and how you will be making the calls. It could be at home, at work, in your corporate network, during a travel and even on the beach. The way you make calls varies with the VoIP service you use.

How It Works:
VoIP converts the voice signal from your telephone into a digital signal that can travel over the Internet. If you are calling a regular telephone number, the signal is then converted back at the other end. Depending on the type of VoIP service, you can make a VoIP call from a computer, a special VoIP phone, or a traditional phone with or without an adapter. In addition, new wireless "hot spots" in public locations such as airports, parks and cafes allow you to connect to the Internet, and may enable you to use VoIP service wirelessly. If your VoIP service provider assigns you a regular telephone number, then you can receive calls from regular telephones that dont need special equipment, and most likely youll be able to dial just as you always have.

Fig: 1 VoIP Communication Diagram

Impact of VoIP on Networks

Although VoIP is based on packet switching technology and should be a more efficient transport format, in actual fact, it is more inefficient. This is so due to the pervasive use of SIP and Skype protocols, which are bandwidth hungry. VoIP adds significant traffic load and latency to the network, especially if the network was not planned with that application in mind. Network management is also more time consuming. For example, it becomes necessary to differentiate the different user groups. Increased quality of service monitoring is also needed to ensure service level agreements to subscribed customers.

Traditional PSTN Call vs. VoIP

Traditional telephony uses circuit switching technology while VoIP uses packet switching. In circuit-switched networks, network resources are dedicated to the circuit during the entire message, and the entire message follows the same path. In packetswitched networks, the message is broken into packets, each of which can take a different route to the destination, where the packets are recompiled into the original message. As such, packet switching is supposed to be a much more efficient and cost effective way of sending voice messages. VoIP calls have different routing arrangements, such as peer to peer and those set up and maintained by proxy servers. Proxy servers are logical intermediary entities that control 3 and process call requests on behalf of its group of user clients e.g. users on a LAN or within a company. A peer to peer VoIP call is a direct connection between two users. Party A calls party B, party B accepts the call and a VoIP session is established between the two users. Calls via proxy severs are established in two ways. In one scenario, Party A sends a call request for B to the proxy server, the proxy server sends As information to B and Bs information to A, and maintains the connection for the duration of the call.

VoIP Protocols
VoIP uses different protocols to setup a call, route packets, and create a conversation over the internet. For call setup, the two most used protocols are H323 and SIP. H323 is based on an ITU standard and has commonality with traditional PSTN. H.323 is the more mature of the two and covers a wider range of services. SIP, which was developed by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), has no commonality with the PSTN format. Though SIP is less defined, it is more flexible, more scalable, and more easily integrated into the internet application; for example, it has better traversal network address translations (NAT) and firewalls. SIP is an application layer control protocol that can establish, modify and terminate media sessions such as internet telephony calls and multimedia connections. It works independently of underlying transport protocols and without dependency on the type of session that is being established. As a result of these advantages, the usage of SIP has surpassed that of H323. However in terms of traditional networks, H323 is more efficient, as its message encoding format is binary while SIP is text based and therefore bulky for networks. Proprietary protocols such as Skype are now widely used. Skype is an encrypted peer to peer protocol. Because of the way it functions, connecting using a randomly generated port and is always on, it is very inefficient in the network and uses a lot of bandwidth. For routing packets across the network, codecs are used to encode and decode both ends of the conversation, so that it can be sent and received across the network. Different codecs have characteristics and bandwidth requirements that can impact network performance. Codecs that employ no compression technology require more bandwidth. Those that use compression, require less bandwidth, but can impact voice quality. For the transfer of voice conversations VoIP uses mainly Real-time Transfer Protocol (RTP). This is with the exception of Skype, which uses proprietary protocols. RTP was originally designed for unidirectional real-time applications, but voice is a bidirectional real-time application. To facilitate the bidirectional nature of the VoIP application, RTP uses transmission header fields, containing data instructions for routing the voice packet. This adds to the packet size, and hence to the bandwidth requirements.

Advantages Of VoIP
In the current market climate IT & Telecoms investments are exposed to a greater degree of scrutiny than ever before and the business case justification must clearly identify the total life cost as well as the business benefits & business risks. Many key drivers exist that speed up the introduction of VoIP solutions which when implemented can realize many benefits such as: Carrier & leased circuit charges can be reduced using national & international toll bypass, by running voice & video traffic over the LAN / WAN / Virtual Private Networks (VPN). Enhanced business communication brought about by IP PBXs, multimedia collaborative applications, unified messaging & videoconferencing can improve employee productivity. IT department productivity can be improved with centralised network administration, and the simplified moves, adds & changes that IP provides. Common building wiring for both voice and data traffic can provide for rapid office expansion and the introduction of new office locations. Remote offices can take advantage of centralised IP PBX architectures with distributed IP phones providing consistent user experience for all regardless of size or location.

Services & Applications

VoIP by its nature is primarily concerned with the provision of voice and telephony services on IP networks. Traditional telephony services on VoIP networks today include Long Distance Toll bypass, Voice Conferencing, Call Centres, and PBX networking. In addition to traditional voice services VoIP provides an environment that allows voice to be integrated with other media types both at the transport layer and at the service layer. New integrated applications are in their infancy and already new service opportunities such as powerful unified messaging, IP video conferencing & other IP video applications, IP Phone & PC Softphone features, multimedia contact centres, collaboration applications, and mobility enabled presence services, can all help to greatly enhance an organisations communication capabilities. The extent and pace at which more converged services will emerge is not yet totally clear. What is clear however is the quantum leap convergence has brought to voice service creation and data integration compared to the past history of ISDN and Intelligent Networking.

Conclusion
Voice over IP is quickly becoming readily available across much of the world, however many problems still remain. For the time being transmission networks involve too much latency or drop too many packets, this effects quality of service sometimes severely deteriorating the quality of the call. Also VOIP contains many security risks, sending out packets that any person may intercept. Although VOIP may offer cheaper solutions for many the PSTN offers a high QoS and greater security that makes up for its higher prices. It is my belief that the telephone market will continue to be dominated by the PSTN until quality of service and security issues can be addressed.

References
1) http://transition.fcc.gov/cgb/consumerfacts/voip.pdf 2) http://voip.about.com/od/voipbasics/a/whatisvoip.htm 3) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voice_over_Internet_Protocol 4) http://www.l1associates.com/Introduction%20to%20VoIP 5) http://www.canto.org/document_center/canto_reports/report-on-voip 6) http://www.voip-info.org/wiki/view/Open+Source+VOIP+Software 7) http://thejo.in/2005/08/a-list-of-voip-applications