Can you let me know whether a question would be on-topic here?
I want to ask a telephony theory question about fax hardware compatibility with the VOIP dialing protocol.
My understanding is that VOIP uses a different dialing protocol than landlines. This apparently causes problems with some fax hardware being unable to get a dial tone and make the connection. There are various workarounds, like setting line type to PBX and dial tone detection off (which doesn't always work).
I want to ask about any fundamental incompatibilities that would prevent some fax hardware from making the initial connection, and any specific hardware requirements that relate to the ability to do that (e.g., is there a spec I could check to know whether particular fax hardware would be expected to dial and connect with VOIP?). The question was originally triggered by some ancient hardware that doesn't work with VOIP, but my research indicates that it is an issue even with current hardware.
I see the site has a telephony tag with a small number of questions. I couldn't get a sense of whether this kind of question would be on-topic. I found what seem to be somewhat related questions previously discussed here:
- Should telephony questions relating to technologies like TDM be considered on-topic?. I have very limited knowledge of networking, so Chris Travers's answer went completely over my head.
- Are questions regarding “telephone networks” on-topic?. Seems to say in general, yes, but it depends. I don't have the background to parse what would and what wouldn't.
- Questions about Protocol. Same as the above bullet.
- Off-topic confusion. Same as the above bullet.
Perhaps a related consideration, I'm guessing this isn't a site for novices. So even if the question would be on-topic, would a novice be likely to understand the answer?
