Just announced at Astricon a few hours ago Skype and Asterisk have decided to roll out a beta application for a special 'Asterisk-Skype client'.
http://www.digium.com/en/mediacenter/viewpress/Digium-and-Skype-Collaborate-to-Bring-Skype-to-Business-Phone-Systems
Basically what this means is that there will be a special 'Skype client' that can only install on to an Asterisk server.
This means that you will be able to receive 'Skype calls' directly on your Asterisk server, this is pretty cool because you can route these calls the same way you would an ordinary telephone call eg, drop it into an IVR, conference room, voicemail etc
The best part is I could set up a Skype user account for my business and when someone calls this number it will ring all of the Polycom IP phones in the office or if no one is here to answer will divert the calls to my voicemail or out another line to my cell phone - the person at the other end (eg the Skype user) wont even know that they are being redirected to a desk phone for answering.
Or of course I can just 'log in' to my regular Skype account from my SIP desktop phone handset but not sure how this would work when I'm roaming remotely on my laptop and want to receive calls there instead.
Pretty neat huh.
Also in case you are wondering this special Skype client wont be used for handling 3rd party Skype routing traffic, eg your Asterisk server will only be carrying your own Skype traffic.
Oh and you can also use Skype channel for your outbound call routing but as Asterisk users get their voip so cheap that's not really going to make that big a deal.
Beta sign ups being accepted now at http://www.astricon.net/skype .
Cheers,
Dean
PS in case you are an Asterisk newbie without a clue go spend 60's here www.Cognation.net/Asterisk
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