Fonality (News - Alert) today announced a new point release of their PBXtra phone system. Version 4.0 of PBXtra offers a series of new features including advances in mobility. The new system features FindMe with Boomerang Mobile Integration, a unique feature that uses presence detection to find users on their mobile devices, allowing them to answer the call or forward it to another extension.

The built-in presence detection enables the system to keep track of an employee’s keyboard and mouse activity and can then route calls to their cell phone based on inactivity on their computer.

The feature can also be managed by rules and personal scheduling parameters set by the user.

The Boomerang Mobile Integration enables calls sent to mobile phones to be boomeranged back to any extension by pressing a few keys on the mobile phone. In addition, a person can dial *1 to start a recording of the mobile phone call and have it automatically stored on the PBXtra server back at headquarters. This feature can be especially useful for workers in industries that make use of verbal contracts, such as real estate, mortgage, legal, etc…Workers in these fields are frequently on the go, so if the call reaches them at lunch or during the commute, they can enable a recording with a simple series of key commands and then can pick up the recording later, at the switch.

Another new feature included in version 4.0 is a PBXtra plug-in for the Firefox Web browser, which turns any phone number on any site into a link. By clicking the link, PBXtra automatically takes the desk set off hook and dials out to the number hands-free. PBXtra 4.0 also enhances branch office integration by merging spell-by-name directories allowing callers to dial into one branch and find an employee at any other branch.

Yet another significant feature is targeted specifically at the reseller community. A brand-new consolidated interface allows resellers to manage all of their PBXtra customers from a single Web-based administration interface, with hot switching between installations, so for resellers who have multiple systems deployed across a number of geographies, it becomes much easier to manage the multiple systems.

Furthermore, a new network card configuration option allows for custom configuration of analyst and PRI and T1 cards. New alerts are available so resellers can receive e-mail to text messages when issues arise with a PRI, RAID disk, analog line voltage, and a host of other indicators. Country support has also been added so administrators can set a server to the host country it is located in, and PBXtra will automatically configure the relevant telecom settings.

Resellers will also find upgrades that include the addition of such features as busy lamp field, night mode, and calendar-based scheduling.

The new version of PBXtra is available immediately.

Chris Lyman (News - Alert), CEO of Fonality, told TMCnet that he’s excited by the new version of PBXtra. "This is a big release for us," Lyman said. "It’s been over a year since we had a new release."

And as for what’s next, Lyman looked ahead to a new version of HUD, the company’s heads-up display.

"In the next 3 months we’ll be coming out with the biggest upgrade we’ve ever had of HUD. HUD 3.0 will have a variety of new features, including SMS texting so you can contact people through their SMS. It’s slated to have Bluetooth presence detection so instead of reading mouse and keyboard activity we’re trying to read the Bluetooth phone on your hip to know if you’re within 30 feet of your phone on your desk. HUD 3 will also have Google (News - Alert) chat integration and we’re starting to federate with other chat clients," Lyman concluded.

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