Network FAX solution?

[Jay R. Ashworth]

On Wed, Mar 24, 2004 at 03:10:57PM -0500, Harwyn Berens wrote:
> We have a network of 7 machines running Windows 98, Windows 2000 and 
> Windows XP on  LAN network with a DSL internet connection.  We don't use 
> UNIX.  We're looking to join the modern world and add a fax server.  To 
> date we've walked over to our hardwired fax machine, dialed the number, 
> stuck the paper in and hit "SEND".
> 	We have a filePro application and we're looking to integrate some 
> e-mailing and automated faxing from the filePro application if and where 
> possible.  We have some extra PCs that are currently not being used.  Would 
> it be possible or wise to consider using one of these PCs for a fax 
> server.  What does the fP list recommend for a fax solution??

HylaFax 4.2 (which should be production in a couple weeks) on Linux on
a separate box from your Windoze stuff.  It will run comfortably on
anything down to a 486/66, with a single modem; multiple modem systems
will run quite happily on any Pentium.  Fair amount of memory's a good
thing, though.

Faxing from filePro isn't too hard, as long as you can live without
printcodes -- the standard text-to-Postscript (HylaFax's native
submission format is PostScript) converter is kind of dumb, and while
there are some PCL-to-PS converters around, I can't speak for them at
this time.

I also recommend MultiTech 5634 modems, usually the ZDX or ZBA, usuallt
externals.

There are several Windows clients which will interoperate with it, as
well as Mac and KDE clients.  About the only weak spot is that there's
no convenient way to send pages in one job from different apps.

But it's rugged, and reliable, and did I mention free?

Cheers,
-- jra
-- 
Jay R. Ashworth                                                jra at baylink.com
Member of the Technical Staff     Baylink                             RFC 2100
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        "They had engineers in my day, too."  -- Perry Vance Nelson