There have been many recent and interesting developments with GNU Bayonne, some of which directly relate to the practical aspects of it's use within GNU Enterprise.
First, we have recently introduced Bayonne web services. This is a lightweight XML service which allows other application servers (and end user applications) to invoke Bayonne features and functions over HTTP. There is an initial reference implementation of a Perl module to use Bayonne web services in CPAN, and a partially completed Python module.
The obvious use of such services would be to enable telephone related operations in gnue. The most basic example that comes to my mind is enabling pop-up dialing requests using contact information (phone numbers, etc) that may be found in various forms. Other possibilities could include scheduling automated calls, etc.
Second, recent releases of GNU Bayonne2 have re-introduced XML form parsing. This allows Bayonne to request a XML document from a web server, and then offer documents using speech synthesis and telephone keypad navigation. This suggests the possibility of Bayonne operating as a GNUE telephone form "client", an idea once advocated within GNU Enterprise.
Third, we are introducing features over the next 6 months to support the use of GNU Bayonne as a complete stand-alone office phone system. To support this, GNU Bayonne 2 makes use of a feature known as service bindings, and these can be used to integrate meta data for users, extensions, etc, which could be managed from a GNUE hosted database and forms clients as part of a complete integrated business solution.
Each of these areas of development suggest new and interesting ways in which GNU Bayonne can come closer to serving an originally intended role as a communications server within GNU Enterprise framework as a whole. Most news and up to date information about GNU Bayonne can be found on the GNU Telephony wiki, found at http://wiki.gnutelephony.org .