VoIP stands for Voice over the Internet Protocol.
Internet Protocol, or IP for short, is a set of rules which describes how data should flow between the computers.
And when the rules of IP, i.e. the rules for data flow are used to flow voice between the computers, it is called Voice over IP, or VoIP for short.
The above is I think the simplest possible explanation of VoIP in total layman terms.
The rules of IP are not for humans, they are for the computers and other electronic devices which make data communication between the computers possible. This communication infrastructure makes something which is called computer networks. And when there exist many different computer networks, they make a network of computer networks called internet (with a small i). When this network of networks starts growing even further, and we have networks of networks of networks of networks…, what we get is “the Internet” (with a capital I), which we use on daily bases to google, email, and visit websites like this.
Now the Internet, to which we all are slave today, was originally made to be able to do simple data transfer between the computers. The voice part was a monopoly of the telecom giants, who were earning jumbo size profits out of it (and still do) thanks to their highly overinflated calling costs, and they never wanted people to be able to start sending voice over any type of computer network. They knew if people will start sending voice successfully over the networks of computers, and will start talking to each other over the computer networks, their profits will heavily suffer. They resisted for a long time, and are still resisting it, but VoIP slowly and surely is overcoming this resistance. This is also thanks to the regulations made by the governments of various countries, which has allowed voice to go main stream over the Internet.
VoIP is still a relatively new technology. For most of the people it heavily depends upon the quality and speed of their Internet connections, unless the VoIP is provided by a local cable service provider, or by a dedicated network, in which case the Internet is not involved at all.
There are still very few professionals who truly know how VoIP works, what challenges it faces, what are VoIP related security issues, how to successfully implement it, how to make VoIP work successfully on the same computer networks which were originally designed and installed for data only, and so on. There is a lot to learn in this field, but at the same time it is real fun, much more fun than plain and silent data networks.
Here in these blogs, which consist of both technical and non-technical posts, I am trying to share my knowledge and experience in this field. I hope it’ll benefit you in getting better understanding of this technoogy whether you are a technical person or not.
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