Telecom-Request%mit-mc@brl-bmd.UUCP (Telecom-Request@mit-mc) (02/24/84)
TELECOM Digest Friday, 24 Feb 1984 Volume 4 : Issue 26
Today's Topics:
Re: Interfacing mail systems
Inquiry: Stock of Regional Companies
SWB: Attorney General says "NO" to Bell
Some AT&T Calling Cards Are Less Equal than Others
Cure for Vadic Triple Modem Problem
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Date: 21-Feb-84 17:12 PST
From: Rich Zellich <RICH.GVT@OFFICE-3>
Subject: Re: Interfacing mail systems
It appears that the various network/electronic mail companies are
working towards interchange. There is an organization called the
Electronic Mail Association, to which many if not all of them belong,
and EMA is somewhat active in the international standards
arena...which, by definition, is promoting interchange.
-Rich Zellich
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Date: Wed, 22 Feb 84 08:37:07 PST
From: Theodore N. Vail <vail@UCLA-CS>
Today I received a brochure from Sprint advertising a "New Service" --
"Now you may Sprint to call any of the 9 sections of the State other
than the geographic section from which you're calling." It goes on to
state that I may use Sprint to call any of the 10 LATA's in
California, other than the one in which I am located, and "applauds
the California Public Utility Commission on their decision to allow
the expanded (sic) service to our Sprint Customers".
Until now, as I have noted before, you could use Sprint from any
Sprint location to any point in California. Thus what they call
"expanded" is just the opposite -- for I can no longer use Sprint to
call across town from, say, West Los Angles to Pasadena. This latter
service was extremely useful from pay phones (or restricted local
lines).
In addition, the LATA's are extremely convoluted, bearing an intrinsic
similarity to the famous Gerrymandered district of Massachusetts.
They don't seam to bare any relationship to the 10 area codes of
California, or to any reasonable geographical distribution. As far as
I can tell, they were set up without any notification to the vast
majority of customers -- undoubtedly the large users were aware and
had the opportunity to lobby for a distribution that was favorable to
them.
The Sprint rates are going up! up! and up! The primary advantage that
Sprint has, for a small user, such as myself, is that you can place a
call from a pay telephone or someone else's phone and have that
charged to you, with none of the surcharges currently imposed by AT&T.
Once AT&T is able to provide the same services and compete an an even
basis with Sprint, MCI, etc. (i.e. pay the same fees to access the
operating companies, etc.), just how competitive will these companies
be?
vail
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Date: 22-Feb-84 14:08 PST
From: Steve Kleiser <SGK.TYM@OFFICE-2>
Subject: Inquiry: Stock of Regional Companies
I haven't seen anything on TELECOM Re: the trade-offs in each regional
company, from a stock holding point of view. The trust I manage has
minor holdings in AT&T stock, and now, 1 share of each of the seven
regional companies for every 10 common shares of AT&T.
AT&T has given shareholders the option of moving their holdings around
- from the 7 piles automatically owned, to any other distribution IN
THE REGIONAL COMPANIES (not in AT&T itself). So I could elect to move
all shares to ONE regional company (probably what I would like to do -
for simplification if nothing else).
So how do I pick? Ameritech has a nice name - and of course, since I'm
a Californian, PacTel might be a reasonable way to go. Or how about
Bell Atlantic, BellSouth, NYNEX, Southwestern Bell, or U S WEST?
Promising to hold harmless all who respond, it would be interesting to
see comments on the strengths of weaknesses of going with a particular
Regional Company. Thanks! -steve-
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Date: Thu 23 Feb 84 07:16:44-CST
From: Werner Uhrig <CMP.WERNER@UTEXAS-20.ARPA>
Subject: SWB: Attorney General says "NO" to Bell
MATTOX SAYS BELL MUST DELAY INCREASE
====================================
( Austin American Statesman, Feb 21, 84 )
Attorney General Jim Mattox issued an opinion Tuesday
that SWB must wait until April 22 to put higher rates
into effect without the approval of the PUC.
However, Bell officials said they did not know how much
weight Mattox's opinion carries and said they plan to go
ahead and put the higher rates into effect Thursday.
Mattox said in an interview later that he would take the
phone company to court if the higher rates were imposed.
Mattox responded to a request from Jim Boyle of the
PUC-Counsel, who asked the PUC Friday to disapprove the
Bell request for an immediate rate increase. Bell told
the utility panel that the company would put a $2.75 per
month residential rate increase into effect Thursday,
pending the commission decision on the $1.3 billion Bell
rate case.
One-party business rates would go up $3.85 per month
under the bonded rates, which means Bell guarantees
refunds to customers if the commission denies the full
amount requested.
Boyle argued that Bell was using the old utility law to
put bonded rates into effect, but the new law, effective
Sept 1, would extend the time for 60 days or until April
22. Bell first filed for the rate increase in June, but
because of the divestiture of ATT it did not complete
the request until October.
"For those customers who must disconnect from the phone
system because pf higher charges the 'refund mechanism'
is a hollow defense against bonded rates," Boyle said Friday.
Mattox agreed that the filing for higher rates June 24
was "incomplete and therefore did not comply with the
law." He said the filing was not substantially complete
until Oct. 19, which was after the effective date of the
new law.
"They knew their original request was incomplete when
they filed it," Mattox said Tuesday. "We feel this
increase would do substantial harm to senior citizens
who are living right on the edge. If they go ahead and
raise rates, we'll try to stop them."
Bell official Jim Goodwin said company officials were
still analyzing Mattox's opinion late Tuesday. However,
he said the company feels it has a "strong legal basis"
for raising rates and plans to do so Thursday.
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From: tp3!nomdenet at RAND-UNIX
Date: Thursday, 23 Feb 1984 12:34-PST
Subject: Some AT&T Calling Cards Are Less Equal than Others
Just last week I received my new AT&T calling cards (three of them
-- in three separate envelopes!). Accompanying each card was a letter
over the signature of Charles L. Brown, chairman of the board of AT&T,
touting the features of calling cards. One feature was abbreviated
dialing; the blurb reads:
When calling the same phone number to which your card is
billed, simply enter the phone number, wait for the tone, and
then enter only the last four digits of your card number.
There's no need to enter your full card number.
Not true for me -- nor, I would assume, for anybody whose prefix is an
area code. My telephone number is (213) 202-1296, and my calling-card
number is 784 166 1296 nnnn. If I begin keying in 0 784 166 ..., the
exchange assumes I'm dialling 784-1661; if I key in 0 213 202-1296
from an ESS exchange, wait for the tone, then key in nnnn, the polite
voice asks me to enter the card number again, because the one I've
entered is invalid.
The letter gave a WATS number to call if I had questions [(800)
CALL ATT], so I called; I learned that cards such as mine are
"specially numbered," but little more. The person who answered gave
me another WATS number, (800) 222-0300. I called this second number,
and was told "You should be able to do anything with a
specially-numbered card that you can do with a regularly-numbered
card." But apparently it ain't so.
A. R. White
The Rand Corporation
1700 Main Street
Santa Monica, California
90406
(213) 393-0411, x7997
ARPA: tp3!nomdenet @ Rand-UNIX
UUCP: ... randvax!tp3!nomdenet
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From: vortex!lauren at RAND-UNIX
Date: Tue, 21-Feb-84 16:41:18-PST
Sender: Lauren Weinstein <vortex!lauren@RAND-UNIX>
Subject: Cure for Vadic Triple Modem Problem
[This is a repeat article due to digestifyer screwup. --JSol]
So bunky, you say you got yourself a Racal-Vadic triple modem
(3451-series) and you have some problems with it? You say that
sometimes in auto-answer mode it seems to hang offhook, making it
impossible for any new calls to arrive? You say that when this
happens it refuses to respond to DTR and only resets if you cycle the
power or fiddle with the mode toggle switch (if you have one, that
is)? Is that what's bothering you, bunky?
WELLLLL! Lift up your head and greet the sun, 'cause a solution does
exist -- and it doesn't even involve hydrochloric acid or jackhammers!
Seriously, though, many persons have reported problems with triple
modems getting into a strange wedged condition from which it is
difficult to escape. Both manual dial and autodial triples have shown
this behavior, which is characterized by the modem being offhook,
sending a 212 carrier, and having both the HS and DSR lights lit.
Only cycling the power or performing a software reset (by flipping the
toggle switch between auto and manual on the autodial modems) will
clear this condition; the modem is oblivious to DTR. After having
this occur repeatedly on the main Vortex dialup line, I started
harassing the engineers up at Racal. Actually, they were quite
helpful, once they realized that I knew what I was talking about and
hadn't plugged the RJ-11C phone plug into an AC wall outlet!
After talking with three different engineers and having them duplicate
the problem on their test benches, we arrived at the cause of the
problem and a (simple) solution. The problem is caused by a "hole" in
the triple modem protocol select algorithm. Under certain random
timing conditions, the modem may be "fooled" into entering a
pseudo-originate mode during its answer-mode operations. The exact
reasons are too complex to go into here, but the cure is
straightforward:
Inside the modem, option dip switch A1 is described by the manual
as:
"Attended/Unattended Disconnect -- Set to Attended [ON] for Auto Dial
modems. (Unattended setting relates to manual originate operation
only.)"
DON'T YOU BELIEVE IT! This switch also affects the handling of DTR
during answer mode processing. The "normal" setting of this option
(as set by the "standard-options" switch A6) is ON (Attended). This
is WRONG for almost all operations. For both auto-dial and
non-autodial triple modems, this option should normally be set to OFF
(Unattended). The only side effect of this is that if you attempt to
use the modem in a MANUAL originate mode, you will probably have to
supply DTR at the RS232 interface (big deal!) If you leave A1 OFF,
the answer mode wedging problem should vanish! Auto-dial operations
on auto-dial modems should work as always.
NOTE: If your triple has switch A6 OFF, then "standard-options" mode
is ENABLED and the remaining A and B switches are ignored. In order
to change the state of A1 to OFF, you must also turn switch A6 ON to
disable "standard-options" and make sure that all other switches are
set appropriately.
I recommend the following settings (some of these are NOT the
default settings):
A1 -- OFF (Unattended -- fixes the answer wedge problem)
A2 -- OFF (Do NOT respond to remote test) [do you want everyone in
the universe "testing" your modem for you?]
A3 -- ON (10 bit chars -- this is normal)
A4 -- ON 103 operation enabled
A5 -- OFF (10 bit chars -- this is normal)
A6 -- ON Disable standard-options (enables all other switches)
A7 -- ON Auto-disconnect on loss of carrier enabled
B1 -- OFF Local digital loopback select (ignored when not testing)
B2 -- OFF DTR controlled from RS232 interface
B3 -- OFF Originate and Answer modes allowed
B4 -- OFF 1204 bps speed (this is normal)
B5 -- ON Auto-disconnect/Abort timer enabled
B6 -- OFF Asynchronous operation
B7 -- ON DSR off in test (ignored when not testing)
In addition, I recommend the following two jumper changes on the
BOTTOM pc board:
Insert jumper "r" -- enable data rate indicator on RS232 pin 12
Remove jumper "ag" -- do not tie carrier detect high (RS232 pin 8)
------
The "wedged" condition mentioned above, being related to a rather
random timing window, is more likely to have been seen on modems that
have a high volume of calls than on low volume incoming lines.
However, it occurs frequently enough that I recommend the option
change for all triple modems being used for incoming calls.
Be sure to let me know if you have any questions about or problems
with this info. I hope it's of some use, bunky...
--Lauren--
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End of TELECOM Digest
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