Telecom-Request%usc-eclc@brl-bmd.UUCP (Telecom-Request@usc-eclc) (10/23/83)
TELECOM Digest Sunday, 23 Oct 1983 Volume 3 : Issue 82 Today's Topics: Ringing your phone Re: "Ring back" numbers MCI Mail VADIC Modems TELTONE DTMF Receivers ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 21 Oct 83 07:39:21 EST From: <ECN.davy@PURDUE.ARPA> Subject: Ringing your phone Around here (Lafayette, IN), we only have two ESS exchanges, the rest are some sort of "mechanical" type. On the old ones, the way to ring your own phone is to dial 115 and then your phone number. You get a busy signal, hang up, your phone rings, and you get a clicking noise when you pick up. Dialing 115 is the method used for dialing another party on your party line. I don't believe this method works on the ESS exchanges. On my exchange (ESS), I can ring my phone simply by dialing my phone number. I get a busy signal, hang up, and the phone rings. The other "fun" numbers, such as tone generators, a voice that recites your phone number back to you, etc. all seem to be 423-12XX where the XX varies, and 423 is my exchange. I suppose these numbers vary from place to place, but you might try -1210, -1208, -1202. I could tell horror stories about GTE trying to install this ESS stuff, but I haven't got time to type in that much. Leave it go at the thing was supposed to be in by Dec. '81, finally was installed in May '83, and still crashes for unknown reasons. Call forwarding and all those other neat options are still unavailable. --Dave Curry pur-ee!davy eevax.davy@purdue ------------------------------ Date: 21 Oct 83 23:50:17 EDT From: Don <WATROUS@RUTGERS.ARPA> Subject: Re: "Ring back" numbers I learned about this back in the late 50's. Most places around North Jersey, I've been able to get a ring back by dialing one of (550, 551, 552, ... - stopping before 555) followed by the last four digits of your number until you get a dial tone. To this dial tone you hang up briefly once or twice (like trying to get back to an operator), and you get a single tone. Hang up and your phone rings. Pick up and you get the tone. Flash the hook again (phone acknowledges with a break in the tone) and you can get another ringback. This works for party lines also (dialing the other party's last four digits). I remember we used to get great delight doing this to a grouch down the street.... Don ------------------------------ Date: 22 October 1983 02:46 edt From: Dehn.DEHN at MIT-MULTICS Subject: MCI Mail Well, I finally got my "Welcome Kit" (they said 7-10 days, and sure enough, it took 10 days; they apparently had more people signing up than they were really ready for). Anyway, some observations: 1) I wonder how the typical letter-writer is going to react to the apparent complexity of the system. It is not that it is really complex (the documentation seems pretty clear, and anyone who has used computer mail and a text editor before will find nothing new), but it is an order of magnitude more complex than using the phone system or the U.S. Postal Service. Anyone who is intimidated by ZIP+4 will be overwhelmed by the number of identifiers and codes involved (only some of which are needed to send a message, of course): a user name (for logging in) a password (for logging in) a unique "MCI Mail ID" (numeric) a customer number (for billing) another password (defaults to mother's maiden name) for telephone queries local access telephone number 2)There is no mention in the documentation about privacy, other than warnings to keep your password secret. There is a prohibition against transmitting "material which constitutes an infringement of any copyright or trademark or a violation of Section 223 of the Communications Act...". It doesn't say if they consider it OK to police this by looking at your messages. It doesn't say whether they keep copies of your messages on "backup" tapes. 3) I was really surprised that there seems to be no connection between MCI Mail and the long distance service. No clever sharing of local access numbers. Apparently two separate bills, in two separate envelopes (on top of the fact that it is not clear why either of them need to be in envelopes now that I have this new electronic mailbox). Nothing in the Welcome Kit even invites you to find out about the long distance service. 4) Some of the aspects of the user interface seem likely to run into scaling-up problems. For example, if you specify a recipient name that is not unique, it gives you a list of the possibilities. If you say "Smith", you get all the Smiths in the whole country. (Right now there seem to be only 20.) -jwd3 ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 22 Oct 83 15:42:57 EDT From: Ron Natalie <ron@brl-vgr> Subject: VADIC Modems The University of Maryland bought some Vadic modems from a different company who took the VADIC two ways and converted them into three ways. The price was comperable with the two way price. VADIC took legal action over this. -Ron ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 22 Oct 83 11:10:56 pdt From: jlapsley%D.CC@Berkeley Subject: TELTONE DTMF Receivers I recently came across a product anouncement from Teltone Corporation, which described their new line of DTMF decoders. These are all one chip devices, most requiring only a +5 volt power supply and an external osc- illator. The amazing thing is their prices: $24.75 for their M-957 chip, which is a DTMF only decoder (they also make pulse decoders), has dial tone immunity, runs on either +12 or +5 volts, is CMOS, and has binary data outputs. All contained in a 22 pin DIP. If you're interested, ask for data sheets. Teltone Corporation P.O. Box 657 10801 120th Avenue Northeast Kirkland, Washington 98033-0657 (206) 827-9626 Phil ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest *********************