TELECOM@Usc-Eclb (07/13/82)
TELECOM AM Digest Tuesday, 13 July 1982 Volume 2 : Issue 87 Today's Topics: ACTS - Re: Your Automatic Operator Summary Of Splits, Etc. France Phone System - Terminals Replace Paper Phone Books MIT PBX Problems - Solution Will Never Be Found Rate Step Announcement Units ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: 10 Jul 1982 2135-PDT From: Ian H. Merritt <MERRITT at USC-ISIB> Subject: Re: Your automatic operator I think it relates to the ACTS (Automatic Coin Telephone Service) system. I submitted a paper some time ago which I had received from PAC-TEL in 1981. If you want to read it, I think JSOL has a copy; if not I will be glad to send you one. <>IHM<> [We distributed it only a month or so ago, but for the benefit of those who missed it, you can retrieve a copy from [USC-ECLB]BUG:<JSOL.TELECOM>ACTS.TXT, or if you can't; I will mail you a copy if you send mail to TELECOM-REQUEST@USC-ECLB. --JSol] ------------------------------ Date: 12 Jul 82 7:56:16-EDT (Mon) From: Carl Moore (VLD/VMB) <cmoore@BRL> cc: cmoore at BRL Subject: summary of splits, etc. Here are the Washington Post references for 1973 implementation of 804 area code in Virginia (which until then had only 1 area code, 703). May 16, 1973; section B, p. 1, col. 5 June 24, 1973; section B, p. 1, col. 4 The above articles say that the last previous implementation of new area code was in July 1965 when Florida got 3rd area code. I located older area code maps in microfilm of old Wilmington (Del.) phone books (this was in the Wilmington library), and saw that 904 used to be part of 305. (Also, long-distance dialing instructions from at least one of those old books used 904, which didn't exist then.) So we have the following dates (note that the implementation of N0X and N1X was an alternative to dividing the area immediately). July 1965: Fla. gets 3rd area code (904, split from 305). June 1973: Va. gets 2nd area code (804). July 1973: LA area (213) gets N0X and N1X. Nov. 1980: NYC (212) gets N0X and N1X. Nov. 1982: Calif. gets 9th area code (619, split from 714). 1984: Calif. gets 10th area code (818, split from 213). Objections to splitting an area are that you thus change phone numbers of half the people in it, and that you require 10 digits for calls from 1 side of it to other side. ------------------------------ Date: 12 Jul 1982 11:40 EDT From: Sewhuk.HENR at PARC-MAXC Subject: Re: TELECOM Digest V2 #83 I read in a trade magazine that France is eliminating paper phone books and giving all their customers a home terminal instead. They justified putting a terminal in everyones home on the savings in paper alone. If that system works the entire phone directory would in effect be on-line and up-to-date at all times, that should eliminate the operators I would assume, or turn them into data base maintainters... Dave ------------------------------ Date: 12 Jul 1982 1431-EDT From: John R. Covert <RSX-DEV at DEC-MARLBORO> cc: jmturn at MIT-AI, braun at IO Subject: The MIT/OZ problem It is unlikely that we will ever know precisely what the problem was. As JSol pointed out, 253/258 is plain vanilla No. 1 ESS CENTREX ser- vice, completely provided by New England Telephone. If the problem was that the numbers were restricted, the MIT operator would also have been prevented from connecting an outside call (Yes, ESS is that smart). I suggested that it could have been a hunting problem, but RKB said that he tried it from each of his 497 numbers, rapidly alternating between the one from which it worked and the one from which it didn't. The 497 machine is a separate machine from 253/258/494. (I'm sure of this, I just checked it from my 494 number.) I still think hunting is likely -- if RKB alternated in just the amount of time it took for the modem to time out, it may have appeared busy from one line and not the other. Since both of his numbers are in a different machine and ESSs don't send the calling number between each other, the problem has to be related to the instantaneous state of the number he was calling. His call would have to be processed the same regardless of which phone he was using. [Yes. I made the mistake of assuming that 497 and 258 were on the same ESS machine. --JSol] The 225 MIT-Dorm-phone numbers are *NOT* panel, and never have been. These phones are served by a privately owned SxS PBX which is treated as a satellite PBX by the CENTREX (i.e. the No. 1 ESS outpulses to the PBX). There are NO panel exchanges in Connecticutt, and there never have been any. Panel and SxS have a compatibility problem, i.e. they can not be interconnected, so there have never been any areas with both SxS and panel. ------------------------------ Date: 12 July 1982 2056-PDT (Monday) From: lauren at UCLA-Security (Lauren Weinstein) Subject: rate step announcement units Operator-access rate step announcing units have been around for quite a few years. They are *not* reachable by customers -- they have six digit intertoll access numbers (NPA+3D) which cannot be dialed from subscriber telephones. Similar simple (but useful) voice response announcement units have been used for telephone credit card (now named "calling cards") validation for a number of years as well. --Lauren-- P.S. Operators are generally not supposed to bridge the subscriber into calls to such announcement systems. Somebody is getting sloppy somewhere... --LW-- ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************** -------