CodeIgnitor needs to be updated if this project wants to remain relevant. In addition to drastically improving security, speed, and compatibility with non-EOL PHP versions, there is a long list of other benefits.
I tried seeing how far I could get on my own fork; It wasn’t that bad. Just working on my own, and with the help of ChatGPT, I could probably have a working beta in about a month or two. With several people working on it I think we could make quick work of it. I don’t want to maintain my own fork so it would be nice if the people who currently maintain this project could get behind it.
I could immediately merge a bunch of changes I already made. Enough to get the UI partially working on CodeIgnitor 4. I would say that is maybe 10-20% of the work already done.
After taking another look at the code I wrote, the changes I made were to get PHP v7.4+ working, which is the first step to updating to CodeIgnitor 4. It required a change to the cipher encoding/decoding routines and authentication, so that I could get basic login to the UI working. I think it’s just 3 or 4 functions I had to change.
If they were to start a development branch on github specifically for this purpose, I could submit the changes to update ASTPP for use with PHP v7.4+.
If you look at their Pull Requests, they are not even bothering with them. But when a bug appears, they have told told people “it is open source, you are welcome to contribute.”
They are still using the first version of CodeIgnitor v2, even though it would have been relatively easy to update to newer minor releases of that version. I could help with updating the core code but I would need to see some indication they are willing to be an active participant.
The fact they have not been participating much in the forum in the past few days is a bit telling.
For their upcoming version 7, they asked for suggestions. I made a slew of suggestions. The only one they accepted was one for which open source code is already available on GitHub so all they had to do is copy and paste.
Also, a while back while testing version 5, I had an issue with one of the modules not installing. After they looked it over, their “solution” was to ‘chmod 777’ a directory.
I think with version 3, and before, the modules were sold separately as add-ons. For example, the WHMCS module sold for $129. Then all of a sudden that was gone and returned with a community and enterprise version.
Last I checked, they wanted around $1300 per year on the enterprise version. Too steep with how the community version is not doing too well.
I have looked into OV500. It’s a one-man operation. I had contacted him before about setting up a forum so there could be more community involvement, and others could help. He said would look into it. That was 3-4 years ago.
Open source BillRun is an option, but it does not act as an SBC.
Another option is 2600Hz’s open source Kazoo, but their version 4 only supports CentOS 7, documentation not the best, they seem to be most helpful only when you are waving money at them, and their version 5 of Kazoo is about four years overdue. You would have to do your own billing integration. On a positive note, there is very good OneBill integration with Kazoo, but at a cost of $350 a month, and nobody seems to want to answer how to integrate it into Kazoo, unless you want to pay for their hosted Kazoo.
There is another called Magus Billing which is open source, but based on Asterisk. Problem with that, again a one-man operation, but he does keep up with active development. He does run a Telegram group for help, but problem is the dude will not lift a finger to help at all unless you wave money at him, and expects others to help instead.
Another is a now abandoned open source project called FreeSide. Real jerks there. From the mail list seems even abandoned paying clients with support contracts.