Asterisk and OpenPBX

The Asterisk community has changed considerably within the past week. Some key developers have become frustrated at the lack of leadership shown by Digium. Specifically, some claim that Digium is dragging its feet on accepting patches and new code. These developers have since gone on to fork the Asterisk code into a new project called OpenPBX.

I read through a long thread discussing the split, a thread which quickly devolved into a flamefest. Still unclear for the need for the new project, I surfed over to the blog of the main developer in the OpenPBX project, Brian West (bkw). Brian sums up his frustration with Digium in his blog post, basically saying how it seemed Digium’s focus is not on improving the code.

I don’t know whether its true or not, but I don’t think any harm will come from a separate project. I’ve had interactions with Brian on IRC and have always found him to be very helpful and knowledgable. While some Asterisk users are unhappy with the split, I am not betting against Brian and the OpenPBX crew. A little focus can go a long, long way.