Telecom/1996-04-telecom-walnutcreek.iso/back.issues/1981-86.volumes.1-5/vol5.misc.msgs

Text File | 1991-01-20 | 72.5 KB | 1,704 lines

Subject: cheap modems
From: [e-mail] (Mark Hastings)
Path: clyde!burl!ulysses!ucbvax!brl.arpa!markus%fluke.uucp
Date: 15 Oct 85 17:59:00 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]

>Does  anyone  have any  information  on the  'cheap'  1200  baud  modems
>advertised  in BYTE or the  company  that sells them?  The ad is on page
>473 of the  Sept.  BYTE (and is also in the Oct.  issue).  It shows as a
>103/212 modem and claims Hayes  Compatability (the Sept issue says Hayes
>Compatable  and the Oct issue  says 99% Hayes  Compatable).  The  prices
>they show are $179  assembled,  $140 kit  (assembled PC board - 5 minute
>assembly  time), and $120 kit  (solder  it  yourself).  The  company  is
>Concord Technology out of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.

>It seems like a good deal, but my mother  always had a saying about good
>deals.

THIS DEAL IS TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE!!!!

I have delt with the company directly.  Over two months ago I was in
Vancover BC and decided to check out the company.  The manager (I
think) said that if I paid now, I would have a modem sent to me within
10 to 14 days.  I paid cash (I know what a sucker).  Well, two weeks
later, no modem.  I called them up, and I was told they would be in by
Friday and I would get it in one more week.  A week and a half went
by, I called them up again and got the same story.  This went on for
another three weeks.  After five weeks waiting and calling, I called
again.  I told the manager (I think) that he should send out a notice
after 30 days telling customers of the delay.  I asked him if I would
ever get my modem or if this would go on and on.  He got very angry at
this and said (and I quote) "WE DON'T NEED CUSTOMERS LIKE YOU".  I'm
not sure what he meant, but I think he meant, 'customers that expect
satisfaction and product for the money they (we) have spent'.  I have
since called twice asking for my money back, all I can get from them
is, and I quote "OH I THOUGHT SOMEONE SENT IT LAST WEEK.  I WILL SEND
IT TODAY".  You know the old saying "THE CHECK IS IN THE MAIL".

In my opinion, this would be a very poor company -->   CONCORD TECHNOLOGY LTD

        .
in which to spend your hard earned money!!!            47 W. Broadway
                                                       Vancover BC Canada

By the way, they have been advertising that 300/1200 baud modem for 3
months in Byte, and as a week ago have not shipped modems.

The comments that I have made are of my own and do not reflect that of
my employer.
----------kgd
Subject: Racal-Vadic VA4224 (2400 bps) modems (info wanted)
From: [e-mail]
Path: clyde!burl!ulysses!ucbvax!ucb-vax.arpa!decvax!ittatc!ittral!malloy
Date: 15 Oct 85 20:20:00 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]

Does anyone out there have Racal Vadic VA 4224 modems installed and
running?  We currently have 3 3481's modems (actually 6, but only 3
phone lines).  Our major USENET connection `ittatc' in CT has USR
Robotics 2400's.  However we'd like to stick to our rack mounts, thus
the 4224's.  Those of you with a bunch of normal modems stacked on top
of each other, can probably appreciate why we wish to stick with our
modem rack.  (easier to use, especially for debugging) It turned out
extremely useful while getting 4.2 to talk to our modems.  The
distributed Racal-Vadic code for 4.2 just plain doesn't work.

The 4224's are rack-mounted fitting in the Racal-Vadic modem rack
along with our VA3481 (triple VA 3400, 212, 103) modems and VA831
auto-dailer.  I would particularly like to know if someone knows if
the infamous "Rockwell chip set" problem has been fixed.  I'd also
like to know how easy they are to install if someone else has already
done it.  In particular the 4224 comes WITH an auto-dailer built-in.
Can we just ignore it and use the VA831?  If not, does anyone know how
to auto-dial them?  I.e. are they compatible with anything?

I'll send a summary of replies (if any) to anyone who's interested.
Also if we actually get to buy these modems, I'll let you know how the
installation goes.

=William P. Malloy

p.s. Interesting point.  These suckers talk (2400/1200/300) but the
protocols supported are (V.22/212/103).  Note: Vadic 3400 protocol is
not supported!

-- Address: William P. Malloy, ITT Telecom, B & CC Engineering Group,
Raleigh NC
         {ihnp4!mcnc, burl, ncsu, decvax!ittvax}!ittral!malloy
----------kgd
Subject: S.I.T.s (Special Information Tones)
From: [e-mail] (John Covert)
Path: clyde!burl!ulysses!ucbvax!castor.DEC!covert
Date: 19 Oct 85 05:20:00 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]


The first two tones can vary, but the last tone is always the same.
This provides a binary encoding indicating four different meanings.

        Tone 1          Tone 2          Tone 3
  Low:  913.8 Hz        1370.6 Hz
  High: 985.2 Hz        1428.5 Hz       1776.7 Hz

Low tone is always 274 ms, High is 380 ms

Category: Reorder       Low  High
          Vacant Code   High Low
          No Circuits   High High
          Intercept     Low  Low

/john
----------kgd
Subject: Active line indicator
From: [e-mail] (Ole Jorgen Jacobsen)
Path: clyde!burl!ulysses!ucbvax!sri-nic.arpa!OLE
Date: 19 Oct 85 06:57:46 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]

SRI International: [phone]  Home: [phone]
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
ReSent-Date: Sun 20 Oct 85 23:33:42-EDT
ReSent-From: The Moderator <[e-mail]>
ReSent-Sender: [e-mail]
ReSent-To: Telecom-Individual-Messages-List: ;
ReSent-Message-ID: <[e-mail]>


I'd like to build a simple circuit that will turn on an LED
when a phone line is active. The circuit should be powered
by the telco line, withstand ringing voltage and preferably
be small enough so as to be mounted behind the RJ11 modular
faceplate. The idea is to be able to see that a phone line
is in use without picking up another instrument to listen
(and cause havoc to a modem/computer). Any smart hardware
hackers out there?

<OLE>
<370>
-------
----------kgd
Subject: call hunting
From: [e-mail] (David M. Siegel)
Path: clyde!burl!ulysses!ucbvax!mit-hermes.arpa!dms
Date: 19 Oct 85 15:47:04 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]

Funny that you had problems getting call hunting going... I just want
through the same experience myself. I asked for another phone line to
be installed, with hunting going from my original number to the new
number. New England Telephone put in the new line fast enough, but
no call hunting. They told me it would turn on by 6pm the next day.
After a week of telephone calls to the business office, they finally
figured out that I'm on a crossbar switch, not an ESS, and that the
new number can only be 500 digits apart from the old number for
hunting to work. I had told them from the start that I wanted hunting
between the two lines, so I wonder why they didn't give me a number
that would work? Anyway, they changed the new number to something
closer to the original number, and told me hunting would be on by 6pm
the next day. Still no luck. After that, the business office told me
that it was no longer their problem, and I should call the repair
center. Well, to make a long story short, I called the repair center
twice a day for 2 weeks before they turned that damn hunting on. The
repair center blamed the delays on: hurrican Gloria, the Bell system
breakup, the business office, the Sept college telephone service
request crunch...

Oh well, at least I have hunting now.
----------kgd
Subject: Daa daa daa - the number...
From: [e-mail] (Joe Pistritto)
Path: clyde!burl!ulysses!ucbvax!brl.arpa!jcp
Date: 20 Oct 85 06:04:04 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]


        The three tone burst at the beginning of phone intercept
announcements appears to be international, by the way.  I recently dialed
a wrong number in Basel Switzerland (from the US), and got the three tone
burst associated with 'the number you have dialed is not in service, please
check the number and dial again', except that the announcement was in
German (!).  I recognized the tones however, and realized what had
happened.  I have only heard one set of tones however, does anyone know
what the different sequences mean?

                                                        -JCP-
----------kgd
Subject: Dear Mr. Phone company
From: [e-mail] ("Stephen C. Hill")
Path: clyde!burl!ulysses!ucbvax!mit-mc.arpa!STEVEH
Date: 20 Oct 85 11:30:45 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]

It will be interesting to see if you get billed for this 'service'.
----------kgd
Subject: Re: Dear Mr. Phone Company
From: [e-mail] (Louis Steinberg)
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!red.rutgers.edu!STEINBERG
Date: 21 Oct 85 13:04:32 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]

Have you tried sending a letter to your state Public Utilities
Commission (or whatever it is called in your state)?  With a copy,
of course to your phone company.  I was getting a royal runaround from
my power company for months, and finally sent a letter to the PUC with
a copy to the utility.  I got a letter from the utility almost
by return mail, "thanking" me for my letter (!) and things got straightened
out within days.

[I threatened to do so because after they connected my hunting service
finally, they forgot to connect the line to my pair so calls going
to me were falling on the floor. They fixed that in 2 hours, but
only because I had gotten the name of the supervisor I had spoken to
and threatened to call the PUC and the phone companies Executive
Complaint office (which I think is more effective in this case),
if it wasn't fixed in reasonable time (i.e. not 4 days like they
told me I would have to wait). --JSol]
----------kgd
Subject: "You must have a long distance..." and others
From: [e-mail] (Evan Kirshenbaum)
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!su-csli.arpa!evan
Date: 21 Oct 85 18:53:04 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]

Out of curiousity, if you don't have a default long distance carrier
(a story in itself), why does it take two rings to aprise you of this
fact (i.e., before you get that obnoxious message)?  This even happens
if you dial a number which is busy (like the one you're calling from).

Evan Kirshenbaum
ARPA: evan@SU-CSLI
UUCP: {ucbvax|decvax}!decwrl!glacier!evan
-------
----------kgd
Subject: High-speed modem query
From: [e-mail]
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!sandia-cad.arpa!pjatter
Date: 21 Oct 85 19:21:55 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]

We are currently evaluating high-speed (i.e., > 1200 baud) modems to
link our remote terminal users to our Vax.

There seem to be plenty of options in the 2400 baud arena, but now
we're getting greedy and are looking at some of the 9600 baud modems
which are beginning to become available. Does anyone have any
experience with 9600 baud modems (preferrably asynchronous)?  The only
companies I've seen advertise so far are:

 Electronic Vaults (Reston, VA): upta 96 (asynchronous)
 Universal Data Systems (Huntsville, AL): UDS 9600 A/B (synchronous)

(We just obtained a UDS modem for evaluation (using their EC-100
synchronous -> asynchronous converter) and had no trouble getting it
to work here in the office.  We haven't tried it over long distance
lines yet.)

It appears that there are some proposed standards for these modems
(CCITT V.29 & V.32).  I've seen some proposed CCITT standards (V.29 &
V.32) mentioned in the literature for these modems. Does anyone know
just what these standards standardize?

Paul Attermeier
Sandia National Labs
Div 5324
Albuquerque, NM
UUCP: ...{ucbvax | ihnp4!lanl | gatech}!unmvax!sandia!pjatter
ARPANET: rowe@sandia-cad
----------kgd
Subject: Voicemail info follow-up
From: [e-mail] (Martin Minow, DECtalk Engineering ML3-1/U47 223-9922)
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!rex.DEC!minow
Date: 21 Oct 85 20:56:28 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]

<<moderator: please don't reformat the following>>

Notes on early voice processing systems.


                               Disclaimer

        Patent 4,371,752, filed Nov.  26, 1979, issued Feb.   1,
        1983,  (the  VMX  patent)  claims  to  cover  voice-mail
        systems.  The reader should not assume that  information
        in this note disputes those claims.

There are two main early research efforts in the voice-processing field:
the Arpa real-time voice project and the IBM Voice Filing System.  There
are also a number of smaller efforts.



1  THE ARPA REAL-TIME VOICE PROJECT

The ARPAnet is a digital packet-switched network that connects a number
of computers doing government (Defense Department) sponsored work.

In a report "Evolution of the ARPAnet", published in 1981 by E.  J.
Feinler of SRI, The network voice protocol is described as follows:

    "The Network Voice Protocol (NVP) was implemented in 1973 and has
    been in use since then for realtime voice communication over the
    ARPANET [Cohen, D.  Specifications for the Network Voice Protocol
    (NVP), RFC 741, NIC 42444, Nov.  22, 1977, pp 43-88 IN:  ARPANET
    Protocol Handbook, NIC 7104, Network Information Center, SRI
    International, Menlo Park CA, rev.  Jan 1978.].  The protocol was
    developed by a group headed by the University of Southern
    California, Informatin Sciences Institute (ISI), as part of ARPA's
    Network Secure Communications (NSC) project.  The goal of this
    project was to demonstrate a digital, high-quality, low-bandwidth,
    secure voice handling capability across the ARPANET.  The protocol
    has been used successfully for experiments between ISI, BBN, SRI,
    MIT'S Lincoln Laboratory (MIT-LL), Culler-Harrison, Incl, and the
    Speech Communications Research Lab, Inc."

Packetized voice was first tranmitted in 1974 with point-to-point
connections, and in 1975 with conference connections.  A prototype voice
message system was implemented at ISI in 1978.  This was integrated into
the user's work environment, rather than "just" a computer-based
answering machine.  I do not know whether the ISI voice message system
was integrated into the public telephone network.

The ARPA voice project is discussed in two papers:

    Cohen, D., "A voice message system," in R.  P.  Uhlig (ed.),
    Computer Message Systems, pp.  17-27, North-Holland, 1981.

    Gold, Bernard (invited paper), "Digital Speech Networks", Proc.
    IEEE Vol.  65, No.  12, Dec.  1977.




2  THE IBM VOICE FILING SYSTEM

(These notes are from a collegue's trip-report, dated Sep.  12, 1978).

At COMPCON 78 (September, 1978), Steve Boise, Manager of the Voice
Filing System project at IBM, Yorktown Heights, gave a presentation.
There are six people on the project.  it was started five years ago
(i.e.  in 1973).  Three of them are psychologists, three computer types.
They considered this the first step toward an integrated office
information system.  The project is aimed toward providing direct
support to office principals (i.e., not secretaries or other support
people).  (Note:  the COMPCON proceedings do not appear to have an
abstract or paper on the IBM system.)

Boise's project is an audio correspondence system.  "Correspondence"
refers to non-interactive communications, those not requiring people to
get together at the same time.

IBM has had a system in use, at an experimental level, for 2 1/2 years
(i.e., since 1976).  it uses a System 7 for real-time control, and a
370/168 as a time-shared host.  The main purpose of the 168 is for mass
storage.  They use 2 hours of CPU time per month.  There is 1 Mbyte of
"on line" storage, and 800 Mbytes in "MSS" (archival storage?).  Users
access the system by dialing in from any touch-tone phone.

Boise gave a demo of the actual system.  All control for the system is
by touch-tone.  Audio input is used only for message content.  The user
can originate messages, transmit them (using touch-tone keys to specify
addresses), listen to his own mail, and several other functions.

The system automatically eliminates any long pauses from messages.  This
has had the unanticipated benifit of practically eliminating "mike
fright".  Users don't have to worry about pausing when deciding what to
say.  The system also uses some other tricks to speed up playback
without altering voice quality.  Typically, 50 wpm recording becomes 150
wpm on playback.  Another unintended result is that recordings sound
much more as if the person knows what he is talking about.

You can record a message, and specify it to be delivered at some future
time.  The computer will call up the addressee and tell him about the
message.  It can try several different numbers, and will call back later
if no answer.  If you go away, you can leave a forwarding number.

Users can file mail if they desire.  Retrieval can be by originator,
dates, and classification -- all under touch-tone control.  Messages are
automatically erased from the mailbox after two weeks, if they have been
read at least once.  Users like this feature as it frees them from
having to worry about disposing of old mail.

File protection concepts are built in.  Every message has an owner.
Several levels of access are possible:  read-only, read and forward,
read, append, and forward.

There are also several "classifications":  unclassified, personal, and
confidential.

You can check if someone has read the mail you sent him.  Other status
information is also available, such as whether he has logged in today,
etc.  You can also record a message to be read to anyone who asks about
you.  So, for example, if you are out of town for a week, you can leave
a message saying so.

The system provides extensive editing facilities which are mostly unused
as the users think they are too complex.

The system is heavily instrumented.  The implementors know which
features are used, and how much.  They know every command that has been
given on the system (but not message content).

The real issue is building a good "principal interface".  You must make
the entry cost to the principal very low.  The system uses lots of
(audio) prompting an dmultiple-choice responses.

To start using the system, there are only seven touch-tone commands to
learn.  Commands use the touch-tone letters as mnemonics, e.g., *R means
"record".  There is a "help" facility.  The " " key, followed by any
other key tells what that key will do.

References for the IBM system include the following:

    Gould, J.  D., and Boies, S.  J.  "Speech filing -- an office system
    for Principals." IBM Systems Journal, Vol 23, No.  1, 1984.  pp.
    65-81.  (Also IBM Res.  REp.  RC-9769, Dec.  1982).

    Gould, J.  D., and Boies, S.  J.  "Human factors challenges in
    creating a principal support office system -- The Speech Filing
    System Approach." ACM Trans.  on Office Info.  Systems, Vol.  1, No.
    4, October 1983, pp.  273-298.

The following were referenced by the above papers.  I haven't seen them
at this time.

    Boies, S.  J.  "A computer based audio communication system," AIIIE
    Conference on Automating Business Communications, (January 23-25,
    1978), pp.  369-372.  (Paper can be obtained from Management
    Education Corporation (MEC), Box 3727, Santa Monica, CA 90403.)

    Zeheb, D.  and Boies, S.  J.  "Speech filing migration system," in
    H.  Inose (Editor), Proceedings of the International Conference of
    Computer Communication (September 1978), pp.  571-574.

    IBM Audio Distribution System Subscriber's Guide, SC34-0400-1, IBM
    Corporation, 4111 Northside Parkway N.W., Box 2150, Atlanta, GA
    30056; also available from IBM branch offices.




3  OTHER WORK (NOT NECESSARILY VOICE-MAIL)

A number of companies produced systems for audio-response applications
where a customer could retreive information stored on a computer by
using a Touch-tone (tm) telephone.  Survey articles were published in
Datamation (1969) and by Datapro (September 1976).  These systems used
prerecorded human speech to produce messages with limited content.  The
misdial message "the number you have dialed, 555-1212, is not in
service..." is produced by a similar system.

Delphi Communications (part of Exxon information systems) was founded to
do voice messaging.

Computalker Consultants (Santa Monica, CA) developed hardware for speech
synthesis (connected to microcomputers using the S100 bus architecture).
The Computalker CT1) could not be directly connected to the public
telephone network.

    Rice, D.  L.  "Friends, humans, and countryrobots:  lend me your
    ears", Byte, Number 12, August 1976.

    Rice, D.  L.  "Speech Synthesis by a set of rules (or can a set of
    rules speak English?)", Proceedings of the First West Coast Computer
    Faire, San Francisco, 1977.

    Rice, D.  L.  "Hardware and software for speech synthesis", Dr.
    Dobbs Journal, April 1976.

Votrax (Troy Michigan) developed hardware for phonemic synthesis that
could be connected to any computer that supported Ascii text (RS232
asychronous port) and could connect to a Bell 407 -- and hence to the
public telephone system.

Systems using the Votrax and Bell 407 were developed at Bell Labs by M.
D.  McIlroy to do unrestricted text-to-speech conversion.  This allowed
directory-assistance applicications to be implemented on a Unix (version
6) system.  The software was available under license from Bell
Laboratories in 1978 (or earlier).  By connecting the text-to-speech
software to to standard Unix utilities using the "pipe" mechanism, voice
mail and computer-generated broadcast messages ("Time for lunch!") could
be easily implemented.

Using the same hardware, Lauren Weinstein implemented a "Touch-tone
Unix" interface at UCLA.

Using this hardware, and suggestions from Lauren Weinstein, I
implemented a Touch-tone RSTS/E system at the Dec Research and
Development group.  It was shown publicly at Canada Decus, February
26-29, 1980.


Posted: Mon 21-Oct-1985 16:53 Maynard Time.  Martin Minow MLO3-3/U8, DTN 223-

        9922
To:     RHEA::DECWRL::"[e-mail]",RHEA::DECWRL::"telecom@mit-xx

        .arpa"
----------kgd
Subject: Vadic 3400 protocol
From: [e-mail] ("Keith F. Lynch")
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!mit-mc.arpa!KFL
Date: 22 Oct 85 01:19:21 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]


    Date: Tuesday, 15 October 1985  14:20-MDT
    From: "William P. Malloy" <decvax!ittatc!ittral![e-mail]>

    Does anyone out there have Racal Vadic VA 4224 modems installed ...

    p.s. Interesting point.  These suckers talk (2400/1200/300) but the
    protocols supported are (V.22/212/103).  Note: Vadic 3400 protocol is
    not supported!

  A few years ago, Vadic 3400 and Bell 212 were equally popular.  For a
while it looked like Vadic 3400 was pulling ahead.  But now, it seems to
be one with the dinosaurs.
  This is unfortunate, since Vadic 3400 was a better protocol.  Does anyone
know why Bell 212 came out ahead?  Restrictive licensing by Vadic, perhaps?

                                                                ...Keith
----------kgd
Subject: May 1985 DC call-guide
From: [e-mail] (Carl Moore, VLD/VMB)
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!brl.arpa!cmoore
Date: 22 Oct 85 13:46:24 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]

List in May 1985 DC call-guide of Washington DC & suburban exchanges
has some noise:
950, 954 Alexandria/Arlington, Va.--but 954 is also listed in DC (and
is in DC on my 1982 tape), and wasn't 950 reserved for this "equal-
access" thing?
693--Dept. of Defense, Va.--but I checked with the operator (and my
1982 tape) and it's Washington.  It's one of those exchanges in the
Pentagon, which IS physically in Va., but must use areacode 202.
----------kgd
Subject: active-line indicator
From: [e-mail] (*Hobbit*)
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!red.rutgers.edu!AWalker
Date: 22 Oct 85 17:52:07 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]

Line ------------------------------------------------> to devices

                100 ohms
           +--/\/\/\/\/\/--+
           |               |
Line ------+------|<|------+-------------------------> to devices
           |               |
           +------|>|------+
                  LED

The thing in the middle is a regular diode pointing the other way.  If you
want to get fancy, you can use a green LED pointing one way and a red one
pointing the other [in place of the regular one], which will indicate line
polarity.  The 100 ohm resistor passes some of the line current and protects
the LEDs.  This will give you an almost indiscernible current drop at the
phone end...

_H*
-------
----------kgd
Subject: Racal-Vadic 4224 info
From: [e-mail]
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!sdcsvax.arpa!crash!scotto
Date: 22 Oct 85 18:44:24 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]

Date: Tue, 22 Oct 85 09:01:56 PDT
To:  ihnp4!mcnc!ittral!malloy
Subject: Racal-Vadic 4224 info
Cc:  sdcsvax!telecom@mit-xx

    I have 5 of the Racal-Vadic 4224 modems in my office.  I did
unfortunately get some of the first so there was the normal new
product troubleshooting.  I am basically only using one of them
for dial-out right now.  I have used them for auto-answer and put
them through a pretty lengthy test.  They do speed search, and seem
very clean at 1200.  2400 has more line hits, but I heard through
my vendor that they will be using the MNP protocal in the later
versions.

   I only problem that I was aware of with the "Rockwell chip set"
was the power consumption and availability.  Racal includes in the
documentation that if you don't have the 1681 chassis (the one with
the huge power supply) that you can only have 8 4224's per rack, even
though it is a 16 slot rack.  I have a 1680 chassis with redundant
power supplys, three 2440 (201C) two 1244 (202) and 5 4224's.  I have
not had any problems due to power yet. (knock on wood)

   Another thing I should mention is that Racal's has a regional service
center.  The people there are *very* helpfull and if you have any
questions they are more than willing to help.  They will also help you
if you are trying to install your modem in a strange application.  I
have talked with, and can recommend Richard Perez for 4224 support and
questions.  The number is 800/22V-ADIC or 800/228-2342.  If you need
a manual I have a couple extras.  Lemme know.


---Scott O'Connell              crash!scotto@ucsd  - or -  crash!scotto@nosc
                                {ihnp4, cbosgd, sdcsvax, noscvax}!crash!scott

        o

Data Systems of San Diego
----------kgd
Subject: DATA ACCESS LINE
From: [e-mail]
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!sdcsvax.arpa!crash!scotto
Date: 22 Oct 85 18:47:53 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]

Pacific Bell has a new service, thought I would relay it to Telecom.

                                DATA ACCESS LINE

DATA ACCESS LINE:

Provides a needed customer service, a "cleaner line", for faster,
more reliable communication over the switched network.


PRODUCT DESCRIPTION/TECHNICAL DESCRIPTION

Data Access Line is an analog local loop which is provisioned and
maintained to higher quality standards appropriate for data.

If necessary, electronic circuitry is added to the line which
improves frequency response and compensates for delay and loss.
Tests are performed to insure the assigned cable pair meets
tight limits for impulse and background noise.  If available, an
ESS number will be assigned, to help prevent noise caused by
electomechanical switches.  With an appropriate modem, a customer
could reasonably expect to attain 4800bps on most calls within
the Service Area.


PRICE:

The rates for establishing Data Access Line are -


        MONTHLY RATE                    SERVICE CHARGE

        $22.25 per line                 $175.00 per line

The FCC End User Common Line charges apply as well.

PRODUCT CONSIDERATIONS:

Customers may continue to transmit data over standard access
lines.  However, we will no longer upgrade these lines when
customers experience data problems.  A customer's modem will
determine what type of jack is required (rj45s, rj11 etc.).
A data jack does not improve line quality.

Data Access Line is available on a measured basis only, where
measuring capability exists.
----------kgd
Subject: (none)
From: [e-mail]
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!CLEMSON.BITNET!WGREGGS
Date: 22 Oct 85 21:44:48 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]

Active Line Detector Analysis

An active line dectector should not be to hard for someone to design.
The phone line has a potential of about 5 volts when off the hook. Its
on hook voltage is considerably higher.  All that need be designed is
a simple circut that detects the low voltage.  When the device sees
this lower voltage is draws a very small amount of current for the LED.
I am unfortunatly unable to take it beyond this stage.  I would
however be interested in the plans if someone can handle the next step.

                                           W. Gregg Stefancik
                                          Clemson University

BITNET: [e-mail]
ARPA  : [e-mail]
----------kgd
Subject: Rochester telephone service
From: [e-mail] (Tom Martin)
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!mit-multics.arpa!TJMartin
Date: 23 Oct 85 00:07:00 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]

I have been traveling a lot to Rochester, NY lately, and the most
aggravating part of it (or even, the only aggravating part) is the
terrible service provided by Rochester Telephone.  They have yet to
automate credit card service; it takes 5-6-7 attempts to get a
long-distance line; random information tones (sort of like busy signals)
are the result of a call in over half the attempts for a local
(intra-city) call.

How can the folks in Rochester take it?  Whenever I complain about the
service, people will counter with the ONE time they got a circuit busy
message in Boston.

Is the New York State PUC powerless?
----------kgd
Subject: More 1+
From: [e-mail] ("Peter G. Capek")
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!ibm-sj.CSNET!capek.yktvmv
Date: 23 Oct 85 00:24:00 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]

What with all this discussion about 1+, I couldn't resist telling
about this:

I work in the 914 (Westchester, New York) area.  Our PBX has automatic
route selection, and one of its possibilities is an FX line to 617.
One of my colleagues tried to call 617-460-xxxx and was told that he
had to dial a 1 when calling "beyond the local area".  I assume he was
supposed to dial 9-617-1-460-xxxx.

We were able to make the call by asking the operator for assistance.
I was later able also make the call by busying out the (single) FX
line from another phone, and thereby forcing a long distance call.

Whose fault is this?  Is our PBX expected to know when to insert a "1"
(and when not to, since the message clearly says I must include it
when it is required, and omit it when it is forbidden) at the
beginning of the number it dials?  It seems to be smart enough to know
not to dial the 617 when it has chosen that FX line.

Peter Capek
IBM Research -- Yorktown Heights, NY
----------kgd
Subject: (none)
From: [e-mail]
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!bbncca.arpa!ima!johnl
Date: 23 Oct 85 05:26:00 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]

From  "John R. Levine, P.O.Box 349, Cambridge MA 02238-0349 (617-494-1400)" <

        [e-mail]>
Subject: Why the Vadic 3400 protocol died
To: bbncca!telecom
ReSent-Date: Thu 24 Oct 85 16:25:48-EDT
ReSent-From: The Moderator <[e-mail]>
ReSent-Sender: [e-mail].#Internet
ReSent-To: Telecom-Individual-Messages-List: ;
ReSent-Message-ID: <[e-mail]>

There were several reasons.  The most important is that Bell cheaply
licensed their protocol to everybody in sight, while Vadic had only one
licensee, Anderson-Jacobson (as far as I could ever tell.)

There are also technical reasons.  It used to be important that you could
accoustically couple 3400 protocol and you can't couple 212 protocol.  Since
the advent of modular phone plugs, buy your own phone, and inexpensive
modems that can pick up the phone and place calls by themselves, it's
practically not an issue any more except for people who call in from their
hotel rooms.  Also, the 212 protocol was designed for easier LSI
implementation, which is why the frequencies are an octave apart.
Evidently, a 212 implementation, even before the Rockwell chip set, was
simpler and cheaper than a 3400.

Finally, I also gather that the 3400 protocol is not as much better than
the 212 protocol as people used to think.  That impression was gained from
triple modems which had lousy 212 performance.  Good 212 modems are about as
good as 3400 ones.

John Levine, ima!johnl, Levine@YALE
----------kgd
Subject: Re: High-speed modem query
From: [e-mail]
Path: clyde!burl!ulysses!ucbvax.berkeley.edu!vax135!petsd!pedsgd!bobh
Date: 24 Oct 85 12:16:30 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] writes:
>We are currently evaluating high-speed (i.e., > 1200 baud) modems
>to link our remote terminal users to our Vax.
>
>There seem to be plenty of options in the 2400 baud arena, but now
>we're getting greedy and are looking at some of the 9600 baud
>modems which are beginning to become available. Does anyone have
>any experience with 9600 baud modems (preferrably asynchronous)?
>The only companies I've seen advertise so far are:
>
> Electronic Vaults (Reston, VA): upta 96 (asynchronous)
> Universal Data Systems (Huntsville, AL): UDS 9600 A/B (synchronous)

Another option which just arrived is the Telebit modem, being marketed
by Digital Communications Associates (PC Irma coax interface board et
al).  This is a proprietary asynch scheme for 9600 b/s which
purportedly can adapt to changing line conditions on the fly in
increments of <100 b/s.  They do this by subdividing the bandwidth
into numerous subchannels to spread out the information.  I seem to
recall price for the stand-alone unit to be about $2400.  I mention
this since, as they are currently selling for the volume PC
marketplace, they are likely to become a de facto standard.  I believe
the information number is 1(800) TELEBIT.

                                                Bob Halloran
                                                Sr MTS, Perkin-Elmer DSG
=============================================================================


UUCP: {decvax, ucbvax, most Action Central}!vax135\
                         {topaz, pesnta, princeton}!petsd!pedsgd!bobh
USPS: 106 Apple St M/S 305, Tinton Falls NJ 07724
DDD: [phone]
----------kgd
Subject: Electronic Surveillance.
From: [e-mail] (the tty of Geoffrey S. Goodfellow)
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!sri-csl.arpa!Geoff
Date: 24 Oct 85 18:17:00 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]



Americans' Privacy Exposed by New Technology, Congress Told

By LEE BYRD - Associated Press Writer

    WASHINGTON (AP) - The explosion in communications technology has so
outpaced privacy laws that Americans have little or no protection
against a plethora of new ways for government or private adversaries
to pry into their lives, a congressional agency reported today.
    The non-partisan Office of Technology Assessment found that 35 out
of 142 domestic federal agencies use or plan to use various
electronic surveillance methods, including modern devices not
governed by a landmark 1968 law that circumscribed the use of
wiretaps and bugs - concealed microphones.
    The agency said 36 agencies, not counting those in foreign
intelligence, already use a total of 85 computerized record systems
for investigative or intelligence purposes, and maintain 288 million
files on 114 million people. The report raised the ''technically
feasible'' specter of these being linked into a single data base
network that could track untold numbers of citizens without due
cause.
    The report, requested by House and Senate committees, noted that
many new and uncontrolled methods of surveillance are made possible
by the very technologies of which more and more Americans are
availing themselves - electronic mail, computer conferencing,
cellular and cordless telephones, beepers and electronic pagers.
Intercepting such devices is easy, and ''the law has not kept pace,''
the agency said.
    But other devices, such as miniature television cameras and pen
registers - which monitor the numbers called on a given telephone
line - have enabled new ways to spy on people even if their own
communications habits are more old-fashioned, the agency noted.
    Rep. Robert W. Kastenmeier, D-Wis., chairman of the House Judiciary
subcommittee on courts and civil liberties, said the study ''shows
how the law in this area has broken down; it is up to Congress to fix
it. If we fail to act, the personal and business communications of
Americans will not have the privacy protection they deserve.''
    Sen. Charles McC. Mathias, R-Md., said the report ''documents how
new and more intrusive forms of snooping have followed in the wake of
the exciting advances in communications technology,'' and agreed
Congress must ''bring federal privacy laws up to date.'
    Rep. Don Edwards, D-Calif., chairman of the House Judiciary
subcommittee on civil and constitutional rights, said, ''While the
attorney general of the United States is claiming that the civil
liberties granted by the Constitution should be limited to the
'original intentions' of the framers, the technological possibilities
for government surveillance have exploded. The framers knew nothing
of closed-circuit television, wiretapping and computer data banks.''
    The report noted that the Fourth Amendment, which protects ''the
right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers and
effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures,'' was written
''at a time when people conducted their affairs in a simple direct,
and personalized fashion.''
    Neither, said the report, has Title III of the Crime Control and
Safe Streets Act of 1968, which was designed to protect the privacy
of wire and oral communications, kept pace.
    ''At the time Congress passed this act,'' the report said,
''electronic surveillance was limited primarily to simple telephone
taps and concealed microphones. Since then, the basic communications
infrastructure in the United States has been in rapid technological
change.''
    The congressional agency said it could not estimate the extent of
electronic surveillance in the private sector, saying only ''it is
probable that many forms ... go undetected, and if detected, go
unreported.''
    But in its survey of the federal bureaucracy, OTA found 35 agencies,
mostly in the Justice, Treasury and Defense departments, used or
planned to use:
    -Closed circuit television, 29 agencies.
    -Night vision systems, 22.
    -Miniature transmitters, 21.
    -Electronic beepers and sensors, 15.
    -Telephone taps, recorders, and pen registers, 14.
    -Computer usage monitoring, 6.
    -Electronic mail monitoring, 6.
    -Cellular radio interception, 5.
    -Satellite interception, 4.
    As for the 85 computerized record systems that could be used for
surveillance purposes, none of the operators provided statistics
requested by the OTA on record completeness and accuracy.
    Under the 1968 law, wiretaps and bugs are prohibited without a court
order based on the affirmation of a high-ranking prosecutor that a
crime has occurred, that the target of the surveillance is involved,
and that other means of investigation would be ineffective.
    According to the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts, federal
and state judges approved 801 out of 802 requests last year for
electronic surveillance, primarily wiretaps and hidden microphones,
at an average cost of $45,000.
    The agency said that while there is some promise in emerging
techniques for low-cost data encryption or other means to protect
communication systems from eavesdropping, ''there is no immediate
technological answer ... against electronic surveillance.''
    Foreign intelligence cases are governed by a separate law, so the
CIA, National Security Agency and Defense Intelligence Agency were
not included in the survey.
----------kgd
Subject: what is an AML and how does it work?
From: [e-mail] (Richard Kane)
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!bbncc5.arpa!rkane
Date: 24 Oct 85 19:25:00 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]



I moved into a new apartment last month and had quite a bad experience
getting phone service.  Several weeks before I actually moved, I ordered my
new phone service with New England Telephone and was told that there would
be no problem in setting up my new service on time.  Since I was only
moving across the street from where I had been living, I wanted to keep my
existing phone number, but I also wanted to have a second line installed
with a new number for my home terminal (I didn't tell NET that that was
what it was for).

To make a very long story a bit shorter, when the installer came down on
the day that I moved, he discovered that they couldn't give me any phone
service at all since there were no more "facilities" (spare trunks)
available in my neighborhood.  (My apartment was wired up, but there were
no spare lines in the basement coming in from the street). After 2 weeks of
calling (from work) and badgering them almost every day, NET decided to
provide service to me by way of an AML.  An AML is apparently some sort of
multiplexor which is able to provide service for 2 (or more) phone numbers
over a single pair of wires.  The AML takes one number as input and gives
another number as output.  (There is apparently another AML or similar
device at the central office end of the circuit).  The configuration is
depicted below.


line in (main number)             |---|
__________________________________|AML|______________ second
                    |             |---|               phone
                    |                                 number
                 |------|
                 |filter|
                 |------|
                    |
                    |
                    |
                 main phone
                   number


Since I wanted two lines (numbers) coming into my apartment, and since it
was not convenient to run another set of wires up to my apartment from the
basement, the phone company came down and installed two AMLs in the
building.

One AML was installed in the basement.  This AML was used to provide
service to two residents of my building who had previously had dedicated
lines of their own.  These residents were not informed of this change, but
it all should have been transparent to them anyway.  This thus freed up a
dedicated pair of wires to connect to the wire going up to my apartment.

The second AML was installed in my apartment.  This AML now provides me
with the two lines which I had originally requested and everything works
fine.

One more interesting thing to report about this whole affair is its effect
on my telephone answering machine.  For some reason unknown to both me and
the phone company, my answering machine will not answer calls when it is
hooked up to the line which is output from the AML, but works fine on the
primary incoming line.  Anyone have any ideas?



----------kgd
Subject: RE: ACTIVE-LINE INDICATOR
From: [e-mail]
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!CLEMSON.BITNET!WGREGGS
Date: 24 Oct 85 20:45:19 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]

The device described by the Hobbit will work fine but it will only
display the status of the instruments connected after the device.
Therefore, if one wanted to show the staus of all the instruments
connected to a particular line it would have to be wired in before
the distribution box.  Unfortunately it can not be wired in at any
point and provide the status for all branches of the phone line.

                                       W. Gregg Stefancik
                                       Clemson University
                                       (803)-656-7896
BITNET: [e-mail]
ARPA  : [e-mail]
----------kgd
Subject: mobile phones
From: [e-mail]
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!sdcsvax.arpa!crash!scotto
Date: 24 Oct 85 22:57:55 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]

I had my first chance to use a mobile phone today and I must say I was
impressed.

I had never been close to one, but they seem so easy to use and the
reception was great.  I did notice one thing that I didn't understand
that seems annoying if nothing else.  While we were listening, (on a
speakerphone) it seemed that the persons voice would always be clear,
but would vary in volume.  I am sure we never left the "cell" we started
the call with because we were never more than 4 miles from the only
transmitter in the area.  Any ideas?

Also, I understand each area has it's own database.  The person I was
with is based out of Los Angeles, and had to "log on" in San Diego. He
was greeted with "Welcome to the San Diego cellular network". I tried
to call the Los Angeles number and was greeted with "I'm sorry, the
mobile number you have dialed is unavailable or in another area".  It
all seemed to work without a flaw.  Does anyone know if the prices for
air time will ever come down?

---Scott O'Connell              crash!scotto@ucsd  - or -  crash!scotto@nosc
                                {ihnp4, cbosgd, sdcsvax, noscvax}!crash!scott

        o
----------kgd
Subject: Rochester telephone service
From: [e-mail] (_Bob)
Path: clyde!burl!ulysses!ucbvax!red.rutgers.edu!Carter
Date: 24 Oct 85 23:01:00 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]


    From: Tom Martin <TJMartin at MIT-MULTICS.ARPA>

    I have been traveling a lot to Rochester, NY lately, and the most
    aggravating part of it (or even, the only aggravating part) is the
    terrible service provided by Rochester Telephone.

I make fairly frequent calls from northern N.J. (201) to Hamilton, N.Y.
(315)824-XXXX, and vice versa.  I very often get the tones and the "All lines


are busy, try again" msg.  Is Hamilton in the Rochester LATA?

One thing *I think* I've noticed.  It seems that if I punch in the
numbers slowly and very evenly (about 2 or 3/sec.) the success ratio
tends to be much higher.

Would that be a crossbar trying to deal with the output from a DTMF
decoder or something of the like?

_B


Subject: What does "metallic" mean?
From: [e-mail] ("Theodore N. Vail")
Path: clyde!burl!ulysses!cbosgd!ucbvax!locus.ucla.edu!vail
Date: 16 Sep 85 19:08:12 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]
Reply-To: [e-mail]

Section 68.302 (d), of the FCC rules and regulations concerning
connection of terminal equipment to the telephone network an,d entitled
"Metallic voltage surge" requires that the equipment be subject to
"Two 800-volt peak surges of a metallic voltage (one of each polarity)
having a 10 microsecond rise time to crest and a 560-microsecond minimum
decay time to half crest applied between (1) tip and ring of a two wire
connection ..."

Other sections of these FCC rules refer to "voice band metallic signal
power" and "metallic surges".


Does anyone know what "metallic" means in this context?

ted
----------kgd
Subject: 700 numbers and charging
From: [e-mail] (Will Martin -- AMXAL-RI)
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!almsa-1.arpa!wmartin
Date: 17 Sep 85 14:33:10 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]
Reply-To: [e-mail]

Re the 700 numbers: are all calls to these numbers free to the
caller? That is, are they more like "800"s than "900"s?

On a more general charging topic: when you have message-unit service,
are there any costs charged back to the caller when you call 800 or
other toll-free numbers? (Like maybe the basic costs of making the call,
but no time charges?)

Will

ARPA/MILNET: [e-mail]     USENET: seismo!brl-bmd!wmartin
----------kgd
Subject: Further 700 numbers
From: [e-mail] (David Flory)
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!gvax.cs.cornell.edu!flory
Date: 18 Sep 85 19:12:59 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]
Reply-To: [e-mail]


In the last Telecom Digest the number for Alliance Teleconferencing was
mentioned.  Dialing 0-700-456-1000 will get you the closest Alliance site
available from where called from, but if the majority of your conferees
are from a distant city you may instead want to use the Alliance conference
bridge closer to them (to save on long distance charges.

I forget offhand (I have it around here somewhere) but calling Alliance
at their 800 number will find out what these dialups are.  They range from
0-700-456-1001 to -1004 at locations Los Angeles, Dallas, Chicago, and
White Plains NY (but not neccessarily in that order)  There are also
these same conference facilites (actually a different bridging machine
but same site) reachable at 0-700-456-200X, with the same location
selection for the last digit.  Audio/graphic capability exists at
0-700-456-3001 and -3002 (both in Chicago) although Alliance claims
that the -200X series does audio/graphics.

Another interesting number to check out is 0-700-456-150X and -250X. This
is extremely interesting as the recording answers as the service belonging
to "Bell" which if I recall correctly isnt allowed to offer conferencing
facilites (as per the breakup)  This only seems to work in Northern NJ (201)
though.  Does any one at any of the Bell Labs sites in Northern NJ know
what these numbers are for?

Also, does any one know of any other audio bridging or conferencing facilites


out there?  Whatever became of Quorum?

David Flory
[e-mail]
----------kgd
Subject: 8-pages of features; ROLM pbx poop
From: [e-mail]
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!lll-crg.arpa!l5!gnu
Date: 19 Sep 85 09:03:14 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]
Reply-To: [e-mail]

At Sun I worked with a brand new fancy ROLM phone system.  It had a
whole 60-page manual of features as well as a card that sits under the
plastic in the phone, next to the buttons.  I was the only person I
knew there who knew how to do a conference call.  Most people had
serious trouble transferring a call to someone else.  This was after
9 months of use!

I haven't yet seen a phone system "full of features" that wasn't harder
to use than a simple old fashioned phone system.  It reminds me of a
strange talk at Portland Usenix; an AT&T phone wizard (Brian Redman?)
got up and talked about how neat his home phone system was and how many
things you could do with it.  It didn't come with online help either,
and by the end of the talk I'd had far too many ##7*, #*65*#2, and
7*#88s to remember what good they were.  If any.

PS:  There's a serious bug in this ROLM pbx, which was their latest and
greatest as of about 9 months ago (3000?).  When you dial a busy
extension, it gives you a busy signal AND gives the extension a
beep-tone superimposed on the call in progress.  The usual effect is
that the caller hangs up, hearing busy, while the person on the line
flashes, trying to accept an incoming call.  The result is usually
confusion if not killing the conversation in progress.  I reported this
to our trouble desk, which reported it to ROLM, but it never got
fixed.

PPS:  Sun has a 3-pbx system that covers 5 buildings, interconnected
via fiber optic and microwave links.  It was the most complex
installation of this pbx at the time, and may still be.  We were led to
believe that it would all act like one big system.  They lied.  For
example, you can't forward your phone to a phone connected to another
physical PBX.

PPPS:  Their forwarding also leaves something to be desired.  You can
forward all-the-time or forward on busy-or-no-answer but you can't
forward "busy" separately from "no answer".  This means if you have an
office and spend a lot of time in a lab, you can't leave your phone
forwarded.  If you're in the lab, it's fine, but if you're in your
office making a call, it dumps incoming calls on the lab.  The ROLM
people I talked to didn't seem to see how this was a problem or why
other phone systems would do it differently.

I think IBM got a bum deal...
----------kgd
Subject: Equipment for sale
From: [e-mail] (Special Projects Group)
Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!bellcore!petrus!sabre!zeta!epsilon!gamma!ulysses!cbo
        sgd!ucbvax!csnet-relay.arpa!networks%dartmouth.csnet
Date: 19 Sep 85 18:49:55 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]
Reply-To: [e-mail]



The following equipment was salvaged (?) from an office renovation. Legally.
If anyone has any interest in the equipment, make an offer and it's
probably yours.

        2 Micom concentrator modems
        2 Micom data concentrators
        2 line terminators

There are no documents with the equipment and everything is 'as is'. It
was working perfectly before it was removed and was removed with care,
so things should still tick along.


David C. Kovar  -- Special Projects Group

            USNET:      {linus|decvax|cornell|astrovax}!dartvax!networks
            ARPA:       networks%dartmouth@csnet-relay
            CSNET:      networks@dartmouth

            US Mail:    Kiewit Computation Center
                        Dartmouth College
                        Hanover NH
                        03755

            Phone:      [phone]
----------kgd
Subject: Individual messages vs. digests - administrivia
From: [e-mail] (Jon Solomon)
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!mit-xx.arpa!JSOL
Date: 20 Sep 85 00:11:44 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]
Reply-To: [e-mail]

The mechanism for allowing users to receive individual messages
for TELECOM is now in place. If you are receiving this message separately,
then you are subscribing to the individual service. If you receive this
in the Digest, you are receiving Digest service.

Currently only the digests will be archived. I may at some later
time come up with a method of retrieving individual messages from
the archives (about the same time as we have automated -REQUEST service
for additions, deletions, and name changes -- Someone should submit
an RFC on this). If you have any ideas about this, send them to
[e-mail].

We anticipate no problems in getting TELECOM out to you folks, and have
taken steps to improve error recovery (I now save the input for about
a month in case something happens and I need to regenerate a digest),
so if you do notice sporadic service, please send mail to TELECOM-REQUEST
explaining the difficulty.

Enjoy,
--JSol
-------
----------kgd
Subject: administrivia
From: [e-mail] (Jon Solomon)
Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!bellcore!petrus!sabre!zeta!epsilon!gamma!ulysses!cbo
        sgd!ucbvax!mit-xx.arpa!JSOL
Date: 20 Sep 85 22:46:21 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]
Reply-To: [e-mail]

In the process of getting the new processing to work, I skipped
issue 37.

Sorry, guys.

-JSol
-------
----------kgd
Subject: equal access bugs
From: [e-mail] (*Hobbit*)
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!red.rutgers.edu!AWalker
Date: 24 Sep 85 05:17:40 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]
Reply-To: [e-mail]

By now many of us have experienced how a newly cut over equal access area
tends to "forget" to make special allowances for public phones.  While this
is fun in itself, my question is: By what mechanism does the long distance
carrier determine that the calling number is a public phone, so it can
arrange for different billing?  Does the LOC pass a special packet to it
saying "this is a pay phone, do whatever you have to do"?  Does the carrier
keep its own table of public phones for each area?  How is it that the bug
is present with some carriers and not others?  Why does it exist at all?
It seems to me that the sensible way to do things would be for the local
company to tell the carrier that simply billing the call to the originating
number will lose.

A related question:  Why is it that some areas insist that you dial
10nnn 1+??  Here in Jersey, if you dial 10nnn and the number you want, you
get a recording that you must "first dial a 1".  I thought that 1+ was
implicit in 10nnn+.  Down in DC, where I was last weekend, 10nnn+number
works just fine in some areas, but others want the redundant 1.

And a comment:  For some carriers, 10nnn# will simply connect you to the
carrier switch, as if you dialed the 950 number.  Sprint does this, some
of the others might.  It's not universal, though, and the *LOC* handles
such a call, giving you a local recording if you can't do it.  Weird!!

Now, if only they gave you better *audio*.

_H*
-------
----------kgd
Subject: Social Impacts of Computing: Graduate Study at UC-Irvine
From: [e-mail] (Rob-Kling)
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!uci-icsa.arpa!Kling%UCI-20B
Date: 26 Sep 85 16:11:00 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]
Reply-To: [e-mail]


                                CORPS

                               -------

                        Graduate Education in

            Computing, Organizations, Policy, and Society

               at the University of California, Irvine


     This graduate concentration at the University of California,
Irvine provides an opportunity for scholars and students to
investigate the social dimensions of computerization in a setting
which supports reflective and sustained inquiry.

     The primary educational opportunities are PhD concentrations in
the Department of Information and Computer Science (ICS) and MS and
PhD concentrations in the Graduate School of Management (GSM).
Students in each concentration can specialize in studying the social
dimensions of computing.

     The faculty at Irvine have been active in this area, with many
interdisciplinary projects, since the early 1970's.  The faculty and
students in the CORPS have approached them with methods drawn from the
social sciences.

     The CORPS concentration focuses upon four related areas of
inquiry:

 1.  Examining the social consequences of different kinds of
     computerization on social life in organizations and in the larger
     society.

 2.  Examining the social dimensions of the work and organizational
     worlds in which computer technologies are developed, marketed,
     disseminated, deployed, and sustained.

 3.  Evaluating the effectiveness of strategies for managing the
     deployment and use of computer-based technologies.

 4.  Evaluating and proposing public policies which facilitate the
     development and use of computing in pro-social ways.


     Studies of these questions have focussed on complex information
systems, computer-based modelling, decision-support systems, the
myriad forms of office automation, electronic funds transfer systems,
expert systems, instructional computing, personal computers, automated
command and control systems, and computing at home.  The questions
vary from study to study.  They have included questions about the
effectiveness of these technologies, effective ways to manage them,
the social choices that they open or close off, the kind of social and
cultural life that develops around them, their political consequences,
and their social carrying costs.

     CORPS studies at Irvine have a distinctive orientation -

(i) in focussing on both public and private sectors,

(ii) in examining computerization in public life as well as within
      organizations,

(iii) by examining advanced and common computer-based technologies "in
      vivo" in ordinary settings, and

(iv) by employing analytical methods drawn from the social sciences.



         Organizational Arrangements and Admissions for CORPS


     The CORPS concentration is a special track within the normal
graduate degree programs of ICS and GSM.  Admission requirements for
this concentration are the same as for students who apply for a PhD in
ICS or an MS or PhD in GSM.  Students with varying backgrounds are
encouraged to apply for the PhD programs if they show strong research
promise.

     The seven primary faculty in the CORPS concentration hold
appointments in the Department of Information and Computer Science and
the Graduate School of Management.  Additional faculty in the School
of Social Sciences, and the program on Social Ecology, have
collaborated in research or have taught key courses for CORPS
students.  Our research is administered through an interdisciplinary
research institute at UCI which is part of the Graduate Division, the
Public Policy Research Organization.

Students who wish additional information about the CORPS concentration
should write to:

          Professor Rob Kling (Kling@uci-icsa)
          Department of Information and Computer Science
          University of California, Irvine
          Irvine, Ca. 92717
          714-856-5955 or 856-7548

                                or to:

          Professor Kenneth Kraemer (Kraemer@uci-icsa)
          Graduate School of Management
          University of California, Irvine
          Irvine, Ca. 92717
          714-856-5246
----------kgd
Subject: Okay, buckaroos, here it is
From: [e-mail] (*Hobbit*)
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!red.rutgers.edu!AWalker
Date: 27 Sep 85 23:18:56 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]
Reply-To: [e-mail]

Here, taken from a flyer sent out by the Teleconsumer Hotline people, is an
expanded carrier list.  They are pretty good people; it's a splinter group
of something called the Telecommunications Research and Action center, locate
        d
in Washington DC.  Call them at 800 332 1124 to get a similar list for your
own local area.  There will be a lot of overlap, so you may find this helpful.
[Equal access codes are prefixed with 10, of course..]

EA      Company                 Cust. svc       [serving area,
code    name                    number           defaults to "most"]
---------------------------------------------------------------
tba     Garden State Telemktg.  201 539 6900    [Northern Jersey]
007     Telemarketing           202 783 7213    [DC, Philly, parts of VA]
054     Eastern Telephone       [phone]    [Philly]
066     Lexitel                 800 631 4835
211     RCI                     800 458 7000    [phy pbg +]
220     WU                      ???             [to be announced]
221     Telesaver               201 488 4417, 202 982 1169 [eastern cities]
222     MCI                     800 624 6240
235     Inteleplex              609 348 0050    [Southern NJ]
288     AT&T                    800 222 0300
333     US Telecom              800 531 1985
444     Allnet                  800 982 8888
488     ITT                     800 526 3000
777     GTE Sprint              800 521 4949
850     Tollkall                800 646 1676    [Northern NJ]
855     Network plus            703 352 1171    [DC metro area]
888     SBS Skyline             800 368 6900,235 2001 [no auto EA, need acct]



Many of these allow what's called "casual callers", which is simply a person
who picks a given carrier for a given call, without actually having an
account with them.  The carrier codes may vary, but the larger ones seem to
have the same number everywhere [how did they arrange this, I wonder??].

_H*
-------
----------kgd
Subject: Using Sprint within a LATA
From: [e-mail]
Path: clyde!burl!ulysses!ucbvax!UCB-VAX.BERKELEY!dual!qantel!stv
Date: 28 Sep 85 03:52:27 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]
Reply-To: [e-mail]

Okay, I got my Sprint bill, so I can report on the difference between
using Pacific Bell and an Alternate Long Distance Service to call from
one point in my Pacific Bell Service Area to another.

It says in many places (like the front pages of my phone book and on the
back of my Pacific Bell phone bill) that calls within the boundaries of
these Service Areas can only be placed thru Pacific Bell.  This is part
of the divestiture agreement that broke up AT&T.  However, I have never
had any trouble using Sprint or SBS to make such calls--they aren't
blocked or anything.  Nobody answered my previous posting asking why this
is so.  I hypothesized that Sprint might route such calls thru some
Location X--outside my service area--to get around the regulation, but I
really have no idea.

My reason for wanting to use Sprint is that I sometimes want to make
personal toll calls from where I work, and don't want them charged to my
company.  I could use my Pacific Bell Calling Card, or Sprint.  Here is
how these compare for the 5 Sprint calls I made last month:

         call                     PacBell    PacBell with
         type  mins    Sprint   direct dial   40c CC fee
          DE    26      4.98       5.51         5.91
          DN     1       .21        .15          .55
          DD     2       .68        .65         1.05
          DD     1       .43        .36          .76
          DD     8      2.17       2.39         2.79

This is not a systematic study.  These were calls I just happened to be
making.  I called the Operator to get the comperable Pacific Bell rates.
When using my Calling Card, there would be a 40-cent service charge.

Conclusion:  I will continue to use Sprint under these circumstances.  I
continue to think that 40c per call is a bit steep for using my Calling
Card on those calls where I enter it myself, with no operator involved.
----------kgd
Subject: Voice Mail info request
From: [e-mail] (Martin Minow, DECtalk Engineering ML3-1/U47 223-9922)
Path: clyde!burl!ulysses!ucbvax!rex.DEC!minow
Date: 29 Sep 85 23:32:57 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]
Reply-To: [e-mail]

I'm trying to write a paper tracing the history of "voice mail"
systems and vaguely recall some work done in the '70's on ARPAnet
(ARPA Speech Project?) but can't seem to track down any references
(except for a few semi-annual reports from Lincoln Labs complaining
about memory errors on the TX-2.)

Any pointers to the literature would be appreciated.  Please mail
to me and I'll summarize for TELECOM if there's any interest.

Thanks.

Martin Minow
ARPA: [e-mail]
UUCP: decvax!minow
----------kgd
Subject: phone-from-car; 215-453
From: [e-mail] (Carl Moore, VLD/VMB)
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!brl.arpa!cmoore
Date: 30 Sep 85 15:54:25 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]
Reply-To: [e-mail]

Along U.S. 22 in northeastern New Jersey (between I-287 and Newark
Int'l Airport) are several outdoor public phones where the overhead
sign says "Phone from car" instead of just plain "Phone".

I have learned of 215-453 prefix at Perkasie, Pa. (north of Phila.
and beyond "suburban Phila.").  This is significant because it
duplicates a prefix at Newark, Del. (302 area); the only previous
such duplication involved the oldest Newark, Del. prefix duplicated
at Lansdale (also north of Phila. beyond "Phila. suburbs"): 368,
which had been ENdicott 8 at Newark, Del.
----------kgd
Subject: Rolm, Sprint, etc.
From: [e-mail] (Fred R. Goldstein)
Path: clyde!burl!ulysses!ucbvax!donjon.DEC!goldstein
Date: 30 Sep 85 17:25:04 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]
Reply-To: [e-mail]


A few replies to subject in recent issues:

PC Pursuit does not "save" GTE money vs. people who run data on Sprint.
If you run a 300 bps modem on Sprint, you pay the full "voice" rate,
even though you're using up a 64 kbps channel on digitized sections of
the backbone (which is probably analog anyway, in most areas).  It's
more "efficient" of bits to use Telenet, but GTE charges you for the
voice call on Sprint and they don't care if YOU are being wasteful,
since they're going to make their money anyway.  PC Pursuit is more
efficient of the transmission, but it requires more switching hardware
(packet switches).

Telenet is not very efficient for "host echo" applications, though many
or most people use it that way.  It eats a full packet for every echo,
so if the timer is set below 200 ms., then every character typed will
create a full packet header.  The charges are computed in packets, so
you're usage rate will skyrocket, versus using a slower response time.
Tymnet charges by the character, since it uses "shared" packets (their
internal protocol is less like ARPA's).  That's probably why your Telenet
PADs won't go below a setting of 200 ms. -- it flunks the manufacturer's
"sanity test", and probably overloads its processing capacity.

Re: Rolm; It's amazing how many people complain about the Rolm to this
day.  Rolm's response is to have fancy featurephones with extra buttons
for features, and guess what -- they cost you!  Rolm's features are
designed to give the station user the maximum in flexibility, which they
trade off for a minimum of friendliness.  Sorta like comparing Un*x to
a Macintosh -- a Un*x guru can do more with it, but "the rest of us"
do more with the Mac.

Rolm's call forwarding consists of two features.  Call Forward All Calls
("Station forwarding") is set from the phone; Call Forward Busy/Don't
Answer ("System forwarding") is set from the system administrator's
terminal and has one destination extension.  The destination must be
internal.  (This restriction does not apply on the high-end 9000/VLCBX.)
It does, however, have four "flags":  Busy Internal, Busy External, No
Answer Internal, No Answer External.  You pick a combination.

Re: Mexico; What I've heard is that the building housing the
international gateway switch for Mexico City collapsed.  It took out the
switches, frames, etc.  Restoration of service will presumably be done
by splicing in mobile switching units.  It'll take years to rebuild
the building; this makes the 1972 New York fire look trivial.
----------kgd
Subject: 1+ usage
From: [e-mail] (Doug Hirsch)
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!bbncc2.arpa!dhirsch
Date: 2 Oct 85 04:07:45 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]
Reply-To: [e-mail]

>   From: ima!johnl@bbncca
>   Date: Thu Sep 26 22:32:00 1985
>   Subject: Re: TELECOM Digest V5 #40 (why you have to dial 10xxx + 1 + )
>
>   You might ask "why not assume a 1+ after the 10xxx if the
>   next digit is not a 1 or 0?" It appears that's because
>   they're planning ahead for once.  I gather that the plan is
>   that eventually you'll dial 1 first iff you are dialing
>   outside your area code, as is currently the case in New York
>   and Los Angeles.  Since there are some area codes that span
>   more than one LATA, such as 609 in southern New Jersey, you
>   will eventually need the 1+ after the 10xxx to make it clear
>   whether you're dialing an inter-LATA call in your own area
>   code or outside it.

John,

Along the lines of New York and Los Angeles usage, the use of 1
as a switch flagging the following three digits as area code
provides a couple of handy by-products, which I think you imply
in your next paragraph: area codes can then be almost any three
digits, since they would always be flagged with the 1.  Exchanges
can include numbers now reserved for use as area codes.  For
example, in dialing from 212, one would use 1+ to differentiate
between 617/617-nnnn and 212/617-617n.

I'm afraid I don't understand your comment on inter-LATA calls
within an area code.  Within 609, what's the difference between
1+nnn-nnnn and nnn-nnnn?  Why should I ever have to dial 1+
within my own area code?  Aren't LATAs just an artifact of tariff
and jurisdiction?  If the number I'm trying to reach is
unambiguous, then why should I worry whether I am crossing a LATA
boundary or not?  Is there some technical need for me to point
out to a machine (that knows LATA boundaries better than I do)
when I think I'm crossing a LATA boundary?

Similarly, why is it that New England Telephone can now parse my
dialing sufficiently to play me a tape when I need to dial a 1,
but not infer into my dialing the 1 they insist I need?

Doug Hirsch <dhirsch@bbn-unix> or <decvax!bbncca!dhirsch>,
1617/497-2608 or 617/497-2608 or 1497-2608 or 497-2608,
asking the question, "Who's in charge, man or machine?"
----------kgd
Subject: When the area codes run out....
From: [e-mail]
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!rand-unix.arpa!vortex!lauren
Date: 2 Oct 85 04:36:43 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]
Reply-To: [e-mail]

When the N0/1X area codes run out, we will indeed see NNX (prefix)
codes assigned as area codes.  In fact, the ordering list for
picking NNX codes for such use has been around for MANY years, just
waiting for the day it might have to be used....

--Lauren--
----------kgd
Subject: 10XXX + 1 +
From: [e-mail]
Path: clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!UCB-VAX.BERKELEY!ihnp4!mcb
Date: 2 Oct 85 12:34:00 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]
Reply-To: [e-mail]

> A related question:  Why is it that some areas insist that you dial
> 10nnn 1+??  Here in Jersey, if you dial 10nnn and the number you want, you
> get a recording that you must "first dial a 1".  I thought that 1+ was
> implicit in 10nnn+.  Down in DC, where I was last weekend, 10nnn+number
> works just fine in some areas, but others want the redundant 1.

In some areas (areas referring to area codes) all calls outside the area
code require 1+ 10 digits.  All calls within the area code require 7
digits only.  In other areas, all local calls are 7 digits, all TOLL
calls (inter- or intra-lata) are 1+ 7 or 10 digits.  In the latter case
the central office knows if you are going to dial 7 or 10 digits based
on the second digit.  Area codes have a 0 or 1 as their second digit.
Office codes have 2-9 as their second digit.  So much for the past...

In the last two years areas have run out of office codes, e.g. 312,
Chicago.  In these areas, 3 digit numbers formerly reserved as area codes
are being used as office codes.  The central office still needs to know
whether or not you are going to dial 7 or 10 digits.  The alternative
is that the CO has to wait 4-5 seconds after you dial the 7th digits
just in case you were going to dial 10 digits.  This would upset many
people.  The way the CO predetermines if you are going to dial 7 or
10 digits is by the existance of the 1+ prefix.  This has to apply
to 10XXX calls also, since they can be 7 or 10 digits.  And that is why
some areas require 10XXX + 1+ and some do not.

-- Mark

P.S.  MY work phone number is 312-510-xxxx.  510 used to be reserved
for future a area code.
----------kgd