Carl Moore (VLD/VMB) <cmoore@brl.mil> (10/17/90)
Would it be possible for a baseball dugout to have phones connecting only to, say, the bullpen? (That is, take the phone off the hook and it automatically rings that other location, such as you might see in an airport for a car-rental company.) [Moderator's Note: Yes, it would be possible. I see a lot of ring-down lines in offices. Amoco Sales Authorization in Des Moines, IA has such a phone which when taken off hook rings on a desk at Diner's Sales Authorization in Denver, CO. and vice-versa. They use it to verify Torch Club cardholder charges at Diner's establishments and Diner's card holder charges at Amoco stations. But a ring-down line, like an FX line, is an overkill unless you keep it loaded at all times and can justify the savings over DDD, which is hard these days. From a dugout to a bullpen would be such an overkill when the already-in-place PBX connects them anyway with three digit dialing, no? PAT]
riddle@hoss.unl.edu (Michael H. Riddle) (10/19/90)
In <13758@accuvax.nwu.edu> Carl Moore (VLD/VMB) <cmoore@brl.mil> writes: >Would it be possible for a baseball dugout to have phones connecting >only to, say, the bullpen? (That is, take the phone off the hook and >it automatically rings that other location, such as you might see in >an airport for a car-rental company.) >[Moderator's Note: Yes, it would be possible. I see a lot of ring-down >lines in offices ... But a ring-down line, like an >FX line, is an overkill unless you keep it loaded at all times and can >justify the savings over DDD, which is hard these days. From a dugout >to a bullpen would be such an overkill when the already-in-place PBX >connects them anyway with three digit dialing, no? PAT] Isn't there an "in-between" alternative, where the instrument appears to be dedicated ring-down service, but in reality places the call when the customer goes off-hook? I remember this in the Autovon world of several years ago. The call went out with a preprogrammed precedence levl high enough to guarantee success in well over 90% of the situations, yet avoided tying up the circuits during the idle time. The advantage to the user was that, in the heat of the momenet, there was no need to misdial any numbers. What I'm not sure about is whether such a service is tariffed anywhere today, or why one wouldn't use a "smart phone" to dial on its own. Particularly if the stadium had a reasonably modern PBX with an executive override function, there would be no problem with busy signals. Any comments? riddle@hoss.unl.edu riddle@crchpux.unl.edu mike.riddle@f27.n285.z1.fidonet.org Sysop on 1:285/27 @ Fidonet [Moderator's Note: Bell used to offer something called a 'one number dialer' which was a phone without a dial on the front of it, and a special box on the wall where the phone plugged in. The box had something in it which when the phone went off hook would dial the desired number as programmed in the box. PAT]
roy@phri.nyu.edu (Roy Smith) (10/19/90)
> a ring-down line, like an FX line, is an overkill unless you keep it > loaded at all times and can justify the savings over DDD When I was a kid growing up in New York (1960's) there were green boxes on lamp posts containg phones with which you could call the police. You didn't have to dial, just lift the handset. Anybody know exactly what these were? Leased ring-down lines from NYTel or private wires actually owned by the police department? And where did they ring-down to? The nearest precinct house, or some pre-911 central location? On another topic, I notice everbody using the term "slamming" to refer to unauthorized changing of default long distance carrier. Is that a standard term, or is it just TELECOM Digest vernacular? Roy Smith, Public Health Research Institute 455 First Avenue, New York, NY 10016 roy@alanine.phri.nyu.edu -OR- {att,cmcl2,rutgers,hombre}!phri!roy [Moderator's Note: We had some of those here also, along with the non-speaking kind where you simply pulled down on a little lever inside the box. You'd hear it start 'whirring' inside as it sent a pre-programmed code to the nearest police/fire station. They were supplied by the local telco. PAT]
slr@tybalt.caltech.edu (Steve Rhoades) (10/20/90)
In article <13758@accuvax.nwu.edu> cmoore@brl.mil (VLD/VMB) writes: >Would it be possible for a baseball dugout to have phones connecting >only to, say, the bullpen? (That is, take the phone off the hook and >it automatically rings that other location, such as you might see in >an airport for a car-rental company.) I work for the Los Angeles Coliseum on weekends and we have a phone in the video control center labeled "Raider Hotline". Basically, it's a ringdown from Raider management to us. It has a strange ring - It's one, long, continuous ring until we answer. It rarely ever rings but when it does, we jump :-). On a related note, Pac*Bell here in California offers a service called Direct*Connection. You lift the receiver of the calling phone and it places a call to whomever is pre-programmed. The phone instrument is normal - It's a class of service set up in the CO. They are starting to replace the system used by our emergency highway call boxes with this system. (rings down to the highway patrol) They're also being used as emergency phones in elevators. Internet: slr@tybalt.caltech.edu | Voice-mail: (818) 794-6004 UUCP: ...elroy!tybalt!slr | USmail: Box 1000, Mt. Wilson, Ca. 91023
vances@xenitec.on.ca (Vance Shipley) (10/20/90)
Most PBX's do hotline in software, and some even allow incoming calls normally but lifting the receiver hotlines to a predetermined DN. If you're only going to call the bull pen then why bother dialing? Vance [Moderator's Note: The only reason you would 'bother dialing' is because you might want to instead call upstairs to the VIP Suite to talk to your wife who was sitting there watching the game instead of calling the bull-pen. One number dialing makes a phone too restrictive and should only be used when the phone needs definite security against misuse. PAT]
cowan@marob.masa.com (John Cowan) (10/23/90)
In article <13822@accuvax.nwu.edu>, riddle@hoss.unl.edu (Michael H. Riddle) writes: >Isn't there an "in-between" alternative, where the instrument appears >to be dedicated ring-down service, but in reality places the call when >the customer goes off-hook? New York Telephone provides exactly this service for the New York Stock Exchange. If I remember correctly, it's called a Virtual Dedicated Circuit, or something of that sort. It's essentially: 1) a special bit of programming in the CO such that the switch will automatically complete the call rather than extending dial tone, plus 2) some kind of tariff arrangement whereby if the call doesn't complete at least n% of the time you get your money back, where n% is tuneable but large. You pick up the instrument and wait about 2-4 sec, then hear ringing tone. The receiving line can be a POTS line in principle, although it's more typical for it to be another line of the same kind so that either end can call the other just by picking up. I suppose asymmetric solutions might be useful in other contexts. In article <13823@accuvax.nwu.edu> roy@phri.nyu.edu (Roy Smith) writes: > When I was a kid growing up in New York (1960's) there were >green boxes on lamp posts containg phones with which you could call >the police. You didn't have to dial, just lift the handset. Anybody >know exactly what these were? Leased ring-down lines from NYTel or >private wires actually owned by the police department? And where did >they ring-down to? The nearest precinct house, or some pre-911 >central location? I don't know where they went then, but as of now they ring the same place 911 does. However, they are a lousy system. Essentially, they are multidrop single circuits, and your call has to wait until all other calls on your particular circuit (potentially a lot of boxes) clear. The word from an acquaintance of mine, a former 911 operator, is "Avoid them. They take longer to get through and they have lower priority because of the high frequency of bogus calls -- take the time to find a payphone" For the non-New Yorker, payphones are very common here, both utility and COCOT; there is close to one per corner even in nlow-rent neighborhoods. cowan@marob.masa.com (aka ...!hombre!marob!cowan)
ehopper@ehpcb.wlk.com (Ed Hopper) (10/25/90)
In article <13822@accuvax.nwu.edu>, riddle@hoss.unl.edu (Michael H. Riddle) writes: >Isn't there an "in-between" alternative, where the instrument appears >to be dedicated ring-down service, but in reality places the call when >the customer goes off-hook? Absolutely, I remember one feature in the AT&T Dimension PBX called "Hot Line Service". With that, one translated two extensions to ring each other when they went off hook. They still connected to the PBX and didn't require auxiliary ringdown equipment like one might have implementing ringdown with 1A2 key equipment. One quick translation change and you were back to normal extensions (assuming you had the Customer Admin Panel, which most sites didn't in the 70's & early 80's). I don't know if Hot Line Service was carried over into the System 85/75/Definity world, I stopped doing dialtone in 1983. Ed Hopper AT&T Computer Systems
johnl@iecc.cambridge.ma.us (John R. Levine) (11/02/90)
In article <13758@accuvax.nwu.edu> Carl Moore writes: >Would it be possible for a baseball dugout to have phones connecting >only to, say, the bullpen? >From a dugout to a bullpen would be such an overkill when the >already-in-place PBX connects them anyway with three digit dialing, no? PAT] Most PBXes make it easy to make any extension a ring-down. You set the extension to call, generally the same way that you set any forwarding target, and set a status bit to make the extension a ring-down. Assuming you have a free port on the PBX, there's no real cost beyond wiring up the phone. I could imagine that a non-technophilic manager would like to have a few phones in the dugout on which he could just pick up and start talking. Regards, John Levine, johnl@esegue.segue.boston.ma.us, {spdcc|ima|world}!esegue!johnl