MANAGER@SKIDMORE.BITNET (Leo Geoffrion) (01/15/88)
At our college, we keep Phone enabled, but most of our faculty dislike it.
The concern is not for VAX resource consumption, but the way that PHONE
is very intrusive on the user. Regardless of what you are doing, it
breaks into your task and forces you to respond, or put up with an
interrupting message every few seconds.
We emphasize the following points in our user training...
1. Use PHONE only when you need attention NOW. Otherwise, use
MAIL, since the orther party can then read it at leisure.
2. When you phone someone, let it "ring" 3 or 4 times, and then
break off and wait for the other person to PHONE back. In that
way, the other person is not harrassed and has the option to
ignore the call if he/she is in the middle of something important.
We also train folks how to add the SET BROADCAST command into their
personal LOGIN.COM files. As manager of Academic Computing, I keep my
phone enabled since panicked users need the ability to contact me,
although I far prefer VMS MAIL. When working from home, I use PHONE
occasionally to chat with the student asst. on duty, since my modem is already
tying up the phone line.
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Leo D. Geoffrion BITNET: MANAGER@SKIDMORE.BITNET
Associate Director for NYNEX: (518) 584-5000 Ext. 2628
Academic Computing
Skidmore College
Saratoga Springs, NY 12866