Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa20484; 5 May 94 1:33 EDT Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA29251; Wed, 4 May 94 21:54:11 CDT Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA29239; Wed, 4 May 94 21:54:06 CDT Date: Wed, 4 May 94 21:54:06 CDT From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Moderator) Message-Id: <9405050254.AA29239@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V14 #201 TELECOM Digest Wed, 4 May 94 21:54:00 CDT Volume 14 : Issue 201 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Ericsson Presents Its ATM Broadband Products (Terence Cross) Cellular Phone Abuse (Jeff Haran) Mail Order Source for Cell Phone Accessories (Bruce J. Miller) Slow Video Over Cellular (Gregory P. Monti) Can You Record Phone Conversations on Hard Disk Media? (Tai Duong) MCI PC Connect (Hugh Pritchard) Tandy 1400HD Acoustic Coupler (Joseph Romero) 900Mhz AT&T 9530 Cordless: ***CANCELLED*** (Michael Rosenthal) NYTel Goes 1+ Dialing (Dave Niebuhr) McCaw Cellular One (NYC) Introduces Anti-Fraud Program (Alan M. Gallatin) IXC Timing Problem (Steven L. Spak) Re: Demise of Newsgroups Feared (David Boettger) TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of public service systems and networks including Compuserve and GEnie. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available at no charge to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu * The Digest is edited, published and compilation-copyrighted by Patrick Townson of Skokie, Illinois USA. You can reach us by postal mail, fax or phone at: 9457-D Niles Center Road Skokie, IL USA 60076 Phone: 708-329-0571 Fax: 708-329-0572 ** Article submission address only: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu ** Our archives are located at lcs.mit.edu and are available by using anonymous ftp. The archives can also be accessed using our email information service. For a copy of a helpful file explaining how to use the information service, just ask. ************************************************************************* * TELECOM Digest is partially funded by a grant from the * * International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in Geneva, Switzerland * * under the aegis of its Telecom Information Exchange Services (TIES) * * project. Views expressed herein should not be construed as represent-* * ing views of the ITU. * ************************************************************************* Additionally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help is important and appreciated. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: eeitecs@eua.ericsson.se (Terence Cross) Subject: Ericsson Presents Its ATM Broadband Products Date: 4 May 1994 16:29:14 GMT Organization: Ellemtel Telecom Systems Labs, Stockholm, Sweden Reply-To: eeitecs@eua.ericsson.se ERICSSON PRESENTS ITS ATM BROADBAND PRODUCTS TO SUPPORT U.S. BROADBAND NETWORKS Ericsson Network Systems President Bo Hedfors today at Supercomm '94 presented Ericsson's asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) broadband switching system. The system is designed to enable customers to optimize the communications in the broadband and multi-media network. The Ericsson ATM products will fully support the needs of U.S. network operators for transport, switching and management. Ericsson's broadband system is flexible and can be adapted to meet the operators' or service providers' needs. Its patented ATM Pipe Switch architecture allows the system to be configured for a number of different applications, including backbone switching, access switching and multiplexing. The advantages of the Ericsson system include layered architecture that will allow operators to rapidly deploy and customize services throughout the network; separation of call control from the control of the physical resources, providing flexibility and reducing operating costs; a distributed architecture using a single platform and an inherent ability of the system to accommodate additional service capabilities such as mobility and intelligent networking. The Ericsson broadband system also has an advanced integrated network management system. The system's throughput can grow gracefully from approximately 3Gbps to more than 80Gbps. Bo Hedfors, president of Ericsson Network Systems Inc., said: "When other vendors were upgrading their existing system technology for broadband services, Ericsson invented a complete new ATM systems platform to meet our customers' demands for the multiservices networks era. In addition to providing services, we also considered network management to be a crucial part of our product development and developed an integrated Operation Administration Maintenance and Provisioning solution." Hedfors added that while the market for broadband in the U.S. and worldwide is real and significant, the near term future remains turbulent. "In times like these we believe that operators will come to Ericsson for a solid approach to the development of broadband technology and the broadband network. "Ericsson's new software methods have been vital to the development of our broadband system. Our evaluation shows that productivity can now be increased by 200 to 300 percent, which is true for about 90 percent of the software used in our ATM-based broadband system. System supliers who cannot match these figures will not be able to stay competitive. "Control of software development, handling and distribution is a matter of survival. Our system has been designed to speed up new service development through an inherently more adaptable hardware and software system structure as well as our new software development methods. Not only can new services be developed more quickly, they can also be more easily customized to meet changing market needs. The time to market of new services is critical in an increasingly competitive marketplace." Ericsson has been active in the development and prototyping of ATM and broadband technology and is now focusing on a third-generation ATM switch as part of its product strategy. Ericsson has also been involved in several industry activities involving ATM, including the European research program, RACE. In addition Ericsson has announced field trials with Deutsche Bundespost in Germany, SIP in Italy, Telia in Sweden, and Telefonica in Spain. Ericsson has also been involved in technology cooperations with companies like Texas Instruments for custom designed integrated circuits; Hewlett Packard for network management; NET for development of enterprise switching equipment and Reliance Comm/Tec for access technologies. Initial product availability will be later this year with additional capabilities to be introduced during 1995. Ericsson's 70,000 employees are active in more than 100 countries. Their combined expertise in switching, radio and networking makes Ericsson a world leader in telecommunications. Ericsson Network Systems Inc. is based in Richardson, Texas. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION, PLEASE CONTACT: Kathy Egan, Director of Press Relations, The Ericsson Corporation Tel. +1 212 685 4030 ------------------------------ From: jharan@cwa.com (Jeff Haran) Subject: Cellular Phone Abuse Organization: CWA Communications Products, Los Gatos, CA Date: Thu, 5 May 1994 00:56:45 GMT I've been reading and seeing a lot of television coverage lately about cellular telephone abuse. It seems that everything that the cellular providers use to identify which cellular phone is initiating a call is transmitted by the calling phone (caller's phone number and electronic serial number, ESN), therefore its not too tough for the technically proficient criminal to capture these signatures and encode them into his own phone and thus steal cellular service. It strikes me as a technology that invites abuse. Perhaps I'm being naive, but why don't the cellular providers use a more robust authentication service. Your cellular phone would contain an encription key that would also be known to the cellular provider. When your phone went off hook, it would send its telephone number. The provider would look up your number to get your key and send you some random sequence of digits which would vary from call to call. Your phone would take the sequence of digits, use its key to encode them and return them to the provider. Since the provider has your key, it can perform the same encription. If the encoded data that was returned doesn't match what the provider's copy of the key encripts, then its because the calling phone doesn't have the right key and the call is dropped. The key is never transmitted so the crook would have to steal the physical phone to steal the service. Maybe I'm missing something, but it seems like an obvious solution to an obvious problem. The thing that I can't understand is why this service abuse wasn't anticipated by the cellular telephone founders. Does anybody have any insights as to why it doesn't work this way today? [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: See also in this issue a report from Alan Gallitin about McCaw Cellular One's new anti-fraud program. PAT] ------------------------------ From: miller@vfl.paramax.com (Bruce J. Miller) Subject: Mail Order Source for Cell Phone Accessories Organization: Unisys Government Systems Group, Valley Forge Labs, Paoli, PA Date: Wed, 4 May 1994 15:32:00 GMT Having gingerly entered the cellular phone world last weekend with the purchase of what I believe is commonly called a Motorola 550 flip phone, I soon realized that several accessories (such as a carrying case and a charger that works in a car) would be nice to have. The cost of such items at local dealers exceeds what I paid for the phone. Based on what occurs in the PC business, one would think that mail order houses would have sprung up to satisfy such needs at discount prices. If this assumption is true, could someone knowledgeable supply me with the vital data on these companies? Thanks! miller@gvls1.vfl.paramax.com (Bruce J. Miller) (or 72247.202@compuserve.com) ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 4 May 1994 12:13:16 EDT From: Gregory P. Monti Subject: Slow Video Over Cellular According to an article in {Broadcasting} magazine, May 2, 1994, GTE Mobilnet is offering a slow-speed video transmission service over cellular telephone to broadcasters. A Tulsa-based firm called FoNet developed the hardware. Video is recorded on a portable device that compresses and digitizes the video as it is recorded. The station field crew can then choose the rate, in frames per second, by which the video will be 'uploaded' to the television studio. They then place a cellular call to a digitized receiving device at the TV station and upload the news clip or story. According to the article, a 15-second clip sent at a quality of 24 frames per second would take 16 minutes to upload. Reducing the quality to 7 frames per second would cut the upload time to 5 minutes. The story doesn't say how those slower frame rates are correlated back to 30 frames per second for broadcast. 'Inverse multiplexing' is also possible to save time. The mobile places two cellular calls and use twice the bandwidth to halve the time. The field compression and cell phone hardware are $16,900. The host and playback hardware are $22,995. GTE Mobilnet is letting broadcasters use the equipment for free as a promotion. Some broadcasters are not convinced that this is a substitute for electronic news gathering (ENG) [sending real-time, full-resolution, 30-frame-per-second video over microwave or satellite links]. The FoNet video quality, when played back in real time over the air, is equal to or worse than VHS home video quality. Also, at many disaster and accident scenes, it's impossible to get a cellular channel because they're all used up by emergency services on the site. Greg Monti Arlington, Virginia, USA gmonti@cap.gwu.edu ------------------------------ From: anhtai@engin.umich.edu (Tai Duong) Subject: Can You Record Phone Conversations on Hard Disk Media? Date: 4 May 1994 15:59:27 GMT Organization: University of Michigan Engineering, Ann Arbor Can anyone give me leads to find a way to record phone conversations on hard disk in my computer? I am working for a trading company that does business mostly by phone and fax. They want to organize "projects" which can contain documents, faxes, and stored phone conversations all on hard disk media. I know voice recordings take up lots of disk space but they are willing to buy many gigabytes of disk space if necessary. Money to implement this is not really an issue. Taking it one step further ... they want to be able to play back the recorded messages for any particular project to update others on the progress of deals. An advance feature would be to be able to search the many recordings from hard disk for words or patterns (eg. for all recordings that contain a particular name) Implementing this from normal magnetic tape recordings might be possible but searches would be very slow and they will not be able to organize recordings to projects. Correct me if I am wrong. Appreciate any leads to vendors, consultants, or ideas. Tai Duong anhtai@engin.umich.edu ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 4 May 94 12:35 EST From: Hugh Pritchard <0006348214@mcimail.com> Subject: MCI PC Connect This came from the April 25 issue of {MCI This Week}, which is a newsletter that's distributed in the public lobbies of some MCI buildings. I'm not an MCI employee; and I have no opinion as to the convenience or value of PC Connect. Hugh Pritchard Hugh_Pritchard@MCImail.com ] Take a Byte Out of Long Distance Bills (sm) MCI PC Connect Reduces "Tolls" on Info Highway [Accompanying picture, captioned "Sysop Partner Marketing manager Shelly Carrick and PC Connect product manager Bill Schmidt at the BBS Expo trade show."] One of the most painful bumps on the information superhighway can be the tolls. Computer afficionados quickly realize that toll calls to reach far away bulletin board systems (BBS) can mount up. Ask anyone who's tried to download a multi-megabit file on a 2400 baud modem. Now MCI has created MCI PC Connect (sm), a long distance plan specifically designed to lower the cost of long distance BBS calls by offering two low, fixed rates during the day and evening/weekend hours for a low monthly fee. Daytime plan hours are 8 am to 5 pm Monday through Friday; any other calling hours receive reduced evening/weekend rates. In addition, CyberSurfers can add their favorite BBS to their Calling Circle (r) to receive the 20 percent additional discount (if the BBS is an MCI customer) -- or even name one board as their Best Friend to receive up to 40 percent savings. There's even a program for the bulletin board owner/operators. BBS System Operators (Sysops) can join the Sysop Program and earn commissions for each customer they sign up for MCI service. For more information, call [internal phone number], or send an MCI Mail (r) message to PC Connect. (Internet E-mail address: 665-1059@mcimail.com). ------------------------------ From: 1JCR7732@ibm.mtsac.edu Subject: Tandy 1400HD Acoustic Coupler Date: Wed, 04 May 94 10:45:36 PST Organization: Mt. San Antonio College I have a TANDY 1400HD, does anyone know where i could get a eight-pin din acoustic coupler ... or do you have one you want to sell? If not, does anyone know the pin assingments for this beauty? Please post or email, preferably the latter. Joseph Romero 1jcr7732@ibm.mtsac.edu ------------------------------ From: mrosenth@mbsdev96.lehman.com (Michael Rosenthal) Subject: 900Mhz AT&T 9530 Cordless: ***CANCELLED*** Reply-To: mrosenth@mbsdev96.lehman.com Organization: Lehman Brothers Date: Wed, 4 May 1994 20:07:12 GMT I called AT&T today to find out the status of the LONG AWATED model 9530, 900Mhz cordless phone -- you know -- the one they claimed would have one mile range etc. etc. They told me they cancelled it, claiming it didn't meet their quality requirements (implies someone else was making it?) They said they would design a new long range cordless but it will not be available anytime soon. This really annoyed me since I have delayed purchasing any cordless for the past nine months when I first learned of the imminent release of this phone. So, being back in the market I would appreciate everyones opinion of their 900Mhz phone. I haven't heard anything about some newer models such as those from Uniden. Is anyone using those? What is the range, sound quality, digital?, SS? Thanks, Michael Rosenthal mrosenth@lehman.com [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: The best one on the market is the one sold by Radio Shack. I strongly suggest you check it out. PAT] ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 4 May 94 17:27:18 EDT From: dwn@dwn.ccd.bnl.gov (Dave Niebuhr) Subject: NYTel Goes 1+ Dialing In the new phone book delivered today, I noticed on page 15 of the White Pages that NYTel (oops NYNEX) is already going to 1+ dialing for long distance. What is written is this: Inside Area Code 516: 7D Outside Area Code 516: 1 + AC + 7D No other information about cutover dates was given, though either AC + 7D or 1 + AC + 7D has been available for a few years. Dave Niebuhr Internet: dwn@dwn.ccd.bnl.gov (preferred) niebuhr@bnl.gov / Bitnet: niebuhr@bnl Senior Technical Specialist, Scientific Computing Facility Brookhaven National Laboratory Upton, NY 11973 1+(516) 282-3093 FAX 1+(516) 282-7688 ------------------------------ From: amg@panix.com (Alan M. Gallatin) Subject: McCaw Cellular One (NYC) Introduces Anti-Fraud Program Date: 4 May 1994 10:58:47 -0400 Organization: PANIX Public Access Internet and Unix, NYC Here's a new one ... saw a brochure for this at a Cellular One center on Long Island yesterday. In an effort to thwart would-be counterfeit phone users, Cellular One just started up an anti-fraud program. A customer participating will simply pick a four digit PIN. Usage is something like this: If you dial *56 + PIN (SND) the fraud protection is turned on. Cellular One will refuse to complete any calls from that phone EXCEPT 611 and 911. Incoming calls, however, still work. Dialing *560 + PIN (SND) releases the phone and allows it to make calls. This is, of course, distinct from the lock feature of the phone, itself. Another neat part of the program is that once your phone is off (or out of area) for 20 minutes, the fraud protection goes on automatically. Apparently, many (though not all) roaming areas work with this fraud protection program. According to McCaw Cellular One, if the roaming area does NOT understand the *56 and *560 codes, calls will go through without a problem. Of course, they want to see as many roaming areas cooperating :-) Cell One advocates use of speed dial locations in phones for the lock and unlock codes. While anyone with the phone can view the contents of the location, the important thing to remember is that this is not meant for the phone's protection. Rather, it is designed to make a clone useless. For me, all I have to do is type 99(SND) to dial the memory location with my Cell One unlock code. The "inconvenience" (if you want to call it that) of having to do that once per time the phone is on that I want to make calls is more than worth the trouble it could save me if someone cloned my phone and was succesful in using it. One more tidbit I found interesting: When I called Cellular One to pick my PIN, they asked as many security type questions as they could come up with. (Granted, the dealer who did the activation and had a copy of my application, NAM and ESN could've posed as me, also, but we'll just hope that the dealer has SOME ethics ...) AFTER they entered my PIN in the system, they wanted to make sure that I understood that they would NEVER call me for my PIN. They explained how some people with a cloned phone would want to call my cellular number, hoping to reach me, then pose as Cellular One so they can get the unlock code. They advised that if anyone claiming to be Cellular One called me that I should refuse to talk with them unless I called them back and reached a designated extension. Banks, long distance companies and computer service providers should make such elaborate warnings about PINs and passwords. Alan M. Gallatin amg@panix.com amg@israel.nysernet.org amg@jerusalem1.datasrv.co.il [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Are we to assume then that since the lockout occurs automatically twenty minutes after the last use of the phone that when one starts out each morning it is necessary to use the *560 unlock thing as part of making the first call of the day? PAT] ------------------------------ From: sspak@seas.gwu.edu (Steven L. Spak) Subject: Re: IXC Timing Problem Date: 4 May 1994 11:15:53 GMT Organization: George Washington University I'm fairly certain that Bellcore does work on IXC/LEC interconnect standards. They probably have some TR's or TA's on signalling and timing for IXC/LEC handoffs. Steven Spak sspak@seas.gwu.edu Transmission Engineer Tel: (202) 392-1611 Fax: (202) 392-1261 ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 4 May 1994 07:41:00 -0500 From: david (d.) boettger Subject: Re: Demise of Newsgroups Feared > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: That First Amendment always has been a > troublesome thing ... Utter pap. > all the Bill of Rights was written under the mistaken assumption > that citizens in the USA would take *responsibilty* for their actions > and words; under the mistaken assumption that people This is simply false. The Bill of Rights was written for one purpose: to keep the government from stealing freedom from the citizens. > would know the difference between *freedom* on the one hand and *license* > on the other. Sadly, that is becoming less and less the case. The Bill > of Rights will cause the ultimate demise of the United States. Not today, You are totally clueless. I don't think that I've ever heard anyone berate the Bill of Rights as the "ultimate demise of the United States". I can't believe that you actually presented this idea for the entire Usenet to see. You sound like a GenX malcontent or a champion of political correctness, taking your freedoms for granted because YOU have been spoiled by them. Shame on you. Perhaps you should go live in some third-world toilet like Haiti so you could have all those pesky freedoms taken away from you at the point of a gun. There's an old saying that goes something like, "Be careful of what you wish for; you might get it." Shame on you, again. David Boettger boettger@bnr.ca [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I *do* live in a third world toilet; it is called Chicago. And I have had lots of my freedom taken away from me at the point of a gun, or in the government's case the implied threat that guns could always be produced to make me comply if I did not do so voluntarily. Lots of people in Chicago have had their freedom taken away from them at the point of a gun; their freedom to travel outside their home, their freedom to go to school or shopping, even their freedom to stand at their window and look outside. If one stands at the window of one's home or walks on the street outside even in broad daylight in large areas of Chicago at present, one will be gunned down in sniper fire and killed. Simple as that. Police are helpless to do much about it because a group calling itself the 'American Civil Liberties Union' says high-rise apartment snipers have Fourth Amendment rights. Unless the police can tell *exactly* which apartment (in, let's say a 25 story building covering an entire city block with 400-500 relatively tiny little apartments) is occupied by the sniper(s), they can't go into *any* of the apartments therein looking. See -- it has all been arranged nice and conveniently so none of the snipers gets their liberties violated. Little children continue to get killed every day on their way to school and other folks go out absolutely when they must to get groceries, etc. In the meantime I get cock-eyed letters from someone in *Canada* who hasn't the foggiest notion what is happening here. If you ask me, you'd do well to shut your mouth and mind your own business up there in Canada. Of all the people to talk about liberties, *your* government certainly did a number on free speech, didn't they? No, political correctness is not my thing at all -- most any long time readers here could tell you that -- but I would like to see eight-year old children in Chicago be able to play outside this summer and/or walk to and from school without the risk of having their head blown off or getting crippled for life. It won't happen while the ACLU is active here! Its not the Bill of Rights per se; its the bizarre and obnoxious interpretations that have been made of this precious document that I detest, by lawyers and judges who do not even live anywhere near the scene of the messes they have created. PAT] ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V14 #201 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa20750; 5 May 94 2:08 EDT Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA29950; Wed, 4 May 94 22:35:09 CDT Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA29941; Wed, 4 May 94 22:35:07 CDT Date: Wed, 4 May 94 22:35:07 CDT From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Moderator) Message-Id: <9405050335.AA29941@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V14 #202 TELECOM Digest Wed, 4 May 94 22:35:00 CDT Volume 14 : Issue 202 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson "TV & Movie Mania" Radio Show Hits the Info Superhighway (Lauren Weinstein) Sprint BBS List (Stuart Whitmore) 800 Numbers for Radio Shows (Paul Robinson) Dumb Question: DID - Centrex - Help! (Rob Allender) Internet White Pages (Jan Richert) Re: Fight A*vertising! Petition! (John Evans) Re: Fight A*vertising! Petition! (Mike King) Re: Unwelcome AT&T "Feature" (Laurent LECHELLE) Re: Unwelcome AT&T "Feature" (Tony Pelliccio) Re: Cellular Call Forwarding (Alan M. Gallatin) Re: NANP and Switches (David Esan) Re: Getting Phone Bills Over the Internet (Steve Cogorno) Re: Connect a Card Reader to a Cell Phone? (Ry Jones) Re: Any Modem Decode DTMF? (William C. Fenner) Re: Radio Frequency Interference on Residential Telephone Line (Paul Bates) Re: AT&T Public Phone 2000 Probably Dead (Edwin Green) Re: Equal Access in Canada (Vance Shipley) TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of public service systems and networks including Compuserve and GEnie. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available at no charge to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu * The Digest is edited, published and compilation-copyrighted by Patrick Townson of Skokie, Illinois USA. You can reach us by postal mail, fax or phone at: 9457-D Niles Center Road Skokie, IL USA 60076 Phone: 708-329-0571 Fax: 708-329-0572 ** Article submission address only: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu ** Our archives are located at lcs.mit.edu and are available by using anonymous ftp. The archives can also be accessed using our email information service. For a copy of a helpful file explaining how to use the information service, just ask. ************************************************************************* * TELECOM Digest is partially funded by a grant from the * * International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in Geneva, Switzerland * * under the aegis of its Telecom Information Exchange Services (TIES) * * project. Views expressed herein should not be construed as represent-* * ing views of the ITU. * ************************************************************************* Additionally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help is important and appreciated. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 4 May 94 18:19 PDT From: lauren@vortex.com (Lauren Weinstein) Subject: "TV & Movie Mania" Radio Show Hits the Information Superhighway "TV & MOVIE MANIA" RADIO SHOW HITS THE INFORMATION SUPERHIGHWAY LOS ANGELES -- In a first for an entertainment-oriented show, a version of the popular "Professor Neon's TV & Movie Mania" radio program begins worldwide distribution directly to listeners this week via the Internet (or as it is becoming popularly known, the "Information Superhighway"). "The Internet now includes over 20 million users in more than 30 countries, and is growing at an enormous rate," pointed out the show's producer, Lauren Weinstein of Vortex Technology. "Professor Neon's TV & Movie Mania has also broadcast via over-the-air stations, but it's apparent that the time has finally arrived when the global facilities of the Internet can bring this audio show to an even wider audience. Nobody has ever used the Internet to transmit a show like this before," he added. "Professor Neon's TV & Movie Mania" is a unique show which features a look at a broad universe ranging from classic to current television, films, and videos, with a special emphasis on the unusual, odd, silly, strange, bizarre, cult, surreal, and weird. The shows include reviews, interviews, and a wide range of special audio clips, trailers, and many other features. The interview guest for the debut Internet version of the show is Robert Justman, a man whose work has greatly influenced classic television programs ranging from "The Outer Limits" (on which he was assistant director) to both the original "Star Trek" and "Star Trek: The Next Generation" (on which he was associate producer and co-producer, respectively). Many of the most familiar aspects of these programs were the result of his ideas, and he speaks candidly with the show's enigmatic host, Professor Neon, about the production of these programs in this fascinating interview. Professor Neon has featured programs focusing on topics ranging from "Plan 9 From Outer Space" (with guest "Vampira" who starred in the classic cult film), to Forrest J. Ackerman (publisher of "Famous Monsters" magazine), to shows focused on topics from "The Twilight Zone" to "The Three Stooges". The half hour Internet version of the program is being distributed biweekly on the Internet via the Internet Multicasting Service in Washington D.C., on the "Internet Town Hall" channel, and is also available as a file for retrieval by any Internet user from the many Internet Multicasting / Internet Talk Radio archive sites around the world. Users retrieving the audio files can then play them on virtually any workstation, PC, Mac, or other computer with even simple audio facilities. The most recent show, as well as other information regarding the program, can also be heard by calling Professor Neon's TV & Movie Mania Machine" on (310) 455-1212. The Internet version of the show is freely distributable via computer networks and BBS systems. Use by over-the-air broadcasters requires the permission of Vortex Technology. For more information regarding accessing the show via the Internet, please use the contact below. Inquiries regarding other access and versions of the show for broadcast use are also invited. CONTACT: Lauren Weinstein at Vortex Technology, Woodland Hills, CA. (818) 225-2800 (9:30-5:30 PDT) lauren@vortex.com Notes to Internet folks: Information regarding the show, including current guest schedule, etc. is also available via FTP from site "ftp.vortex.com" (in the "tv-film-video" subdirectory) or via gopher from site "gopher.vortex. com" (under the "TV/Film/Video" menu item). For a list of Internet Multicasting Service / Internet Talk Radio archive sites to obtain (via FTP) the audio file for playback, send a message (content is not important) to: sites@radio.com The debut of the Internet version of the show will run via Internet Multicast from Interop on Thursday, May 5. FTP to site "ftp.media.org" or "www.media.org" for schedule information. The audio file of the show should become available in the archive sites for retrieval within a few days, though exact timing is variable. The filenames will probably be "mania1.au" for the audio and "mania1.txt" for the accompanying descriptive text file, though the archive maintainers may change the names at some point to fit their overall naming system. If you have trouble locating the files after a few days, please let us know. If you have any other questions regarding the program, feel free to email or call. In two weeks, our interview guest for the next show will be Joel Engel, the author of the definitive Rod Serling biography: "The Dreams and Nightmares of Life in the Twilight Zone," and of the newly released and highly controversial new book, "Gene Roddenberry: The Myth and the Man Behind Star Trek." If you have any questions for Mr. Engel please email them to: neon@vortex.com as soon as possible. Thanks much! --Lauren-- [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Lauren Weinstein is a long time participant in the Internet, and a charter subscriber to TELECOM Digest, dating back to 1981 when this journal was first published. From time to time I like to reprint his classic message, "The Day the Bell System Died", and before long it will be time for it again. His latest venture, the "Neon" thing, has been enormously successful and if you have not called to listen to it, you really should. PAT] ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 04 May 1994 18:33:13 -0700 From: whitmore@tahoma.cwu.edu (Rattlesnake Stu) Subject: Sprint BBS List Organization: Central Washington University To reply to those who questioned how the Sprint BBS list I've started will be published, here's what I plan on: 1. It'll always be available for free download from the data number below; 2. I'll distribute it to all large BBS's that I normally call; 3. If it gets big enough, I'll attempt to get it included in the SimTel FTP archives and keep it updated regularly (quarterly?); 4. Also if it gets big enough, I'll try to do the same to keep current copies on new Night Owls CDs; 5. I'll e-mail it to anyone who wants a copy; 6. I'll post it in one or more appropriate newsgroups if people want it and don't complain about wasted bandwidth (perhaps quarterly, or less/more frequently as requested). I hope this answers the question -- essentially, I don't have the funds to do any formal "publication" but will use the same channels as shareware and freeware to get it distributed. If you run a BBS and use Sprint for your long distance carrier on outbound calls on at least one BBS line, send me e-mail to get a copy of the info submittal form. I hope this list will serve both SysOps and callers who use Sprint. Stuart Whitmore FAX: (509) 925-3893 Data: Same as FAX whitmore@tahoma.cwu.edu 71221.1737@compuserve.com ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 4 May 1994 22:28:49 EDT From: Paul Robinson Reply-To: Paul Robinson Subject: 800 Numbers for Radio Shows Organization: Tansin A. Darcos & Company, Silver Spring, MD USA > [Telecom Digest Editor's Note:... Very few [radio call-in shows] are > willing to provide an 800 number for you to camp out on at their > expense. A nationally syndicated one comes from here in the Washington, DC area. The phone number to call into it is 1-800-G-G-Liddy. The name of the host of the show is left as an exercise to the reader. :) Anyone else know of any beyond Rush Limbaugh, which was posted here earlier? Another local station has its own 800 number for its call-in programs. Paul Robinson - Paul@TDR.COM [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: A place where I frequently eat breakfast always has the Gordon G. Liddy show playing on the radio while I am there. He never interested me a lot. Limbaugh is interesting sometimes and quite funny sometimes. Liddy is sort of blah IMO. PAT] ------------------------------ From: rca@bfs.uwm.edu (Rob Allender) Subject: Dumb Question: DID - Centrex - Help! Date: Wed, 4 May 1994 19:44:25 GMT Organization: Business & Financial Services I've been looking for a network fax server for awhile and need to get inbound routing of faxes to peoples desktop PCs. A few companies have this capability but it requires DID. I know that we have Centrix lines, but I'm not sure if it will work with the wink-start and loop-start that the fax board companies are needing. Anybody know? Rob Allender rca@bfs.uwm.edu ------------------------------ From: jrichert@krefcom.GUN.de (Jan Richert) Subject: Internet White Pages Date: Wed, 4 May 1994 18:38:26 +0200 Hi, Could anyone email me the exact title of the Internet White Pages, publisher and ISBN number? Thanks, Krefcom Communication Services | Internet: jrichert@krefcom.GUN.de Jan Richert, Krefeld, FRG | Datex-J: 02151399843-0001 Voice: +49 2151 313124 | IBM VNET: I1006214 AT IBMMAIL GSM: +358 40 5005686 | IRC-Nick: jrichert FAX: +49 2151 396479 | NIC-ID: JR482 ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 4 May 94 16:46:49 BST From: eeijevs@eeiub.ericsson.se (John Evans) Subject: Re: Fight A*vertising! Petition! Michael P. O'Leary wrote.. > Read with great interest the article quoted below, it IS the future of > the internet. BUT, it shouldn't be. People like this have no right > to waste bandwidth on a valuable resource like the internet. We must > stop happenings like this with legislation so that the 'information > highway' (or whatever you want to call it) doesn't become expensive > and riddled with a*vertisi*g. (And oh yeah, I use the wild card so > people with the wor a* in their kill file still get this message. I > am taking upon myself the burden of collecting a petition from this > group (and eventually other groups as well) stating our opposition to > this practice and our support for legislation to stop it. We must act > fast though, because the bills that will govern the future are quickly > advancing through Congressional committees. Here is what to do: I must admit, I am a little confused with respect to the way in which people in the U.S. regard the Internet and Usenet -- that is, that it stops with that country's boundaries. I am in Ireland, my Usenet server is in Sweden, how would legislation in the U.S. congress relate to me? -- it wouldn't. If laws are passed in the US outlawing advertising on Usenet, surely ill-mannered advertisers will just obtain access in other countries to the US? What then? Censor every message entering sites in the US? In my view legislation and the Internet/Usenet do not sit well together. What we are seeing now is a shift in the rules of nettiquette. Up until now system admistrators have dealt with network abuse using the powers available to them in their companies and educational institutions, because if they did not, the hassle in flames would make their jobs difficult. Commercial providers will act similarly, making their contracts such that, if a user abuses their access, termination can be easily -- and legally achieved. At the same time, Usenet users are going to learn to use kill files more, to ignore those messages that annoy them, and use moderated groups more. John J.Evans. Ericsson Systems Expertese, Clonskeagh, Dublin4, Ireland, EU. eeijevs@eeiub.ericsson.se ------------------------------ From: mk@TFS.COM (Mike King) Subject: Re: Fight A*vertising! Petition! Date: Wed, 4 May 1994 10:03:29 PDT In TELECOM Digest, V14 #191, Michael P. O'Leary wrote: > ... We must > stop happenings like this with legislation so that the 'information > highway' (or whatever you want to call it) doesn't become expensive > and riddled with a*vertisi*g. (And oh yeah, I use the wild card so > people with the wor a* in their kill file still get this message. I > am taking upon myself the burden of collecting a petition from this > group (and eventually other groups as well) stating our opposition to > this practice and our support for legislation to stop it. We must act > fast though, because the bills that will govern the future are quickly > advancing through Congressional committees. Here is what to do: This bothers me. I really *fear* the day when the government gets involved in controlling the 'net. I can't think of one thing that is controlled by the government that works right. And the last thing I want is a bunch of bureaucrats who haven't the slightest clue as to how Internet- working works sitting around making laws that affect those of us who do. As soon as there is regulation, there will be organizations created to oversee and control. These organizations will then get bloated and bogged in red tape. And we *all* will have to pay for it. Quite honestly, I think use of the 'd' key while reading mail and the 'n' key when reading news is quite effective in dealing with trash and advertising on the 'net. Just the personal *opinion* of... Mike King mk@tfs.com ------------------------------ From: Laurent LECHELLE Subject: Re: Unwelcome AT&T "Feature" Reply-To: laurent@caladan.fdn.org Date: Wed, 4 May 1994 07:20:17 GMT In article jay@coyote.rain.org (Jay Hennigan) writes: > [In reference to AT&T disconnecting unanswered direct-dial calls] > This seems a bit hard to swallow. How many incoming trunks does Larry > King have? Maybe a dozen. Maybe two dozen. How many million calls a > day does AT&T carry? So ten or twenty people listen to ringing for an > hour or so. Are you suggesting that this is going to have enough > impact on AT&T's revenue that they are going to re-engineer their > network to prevent it? Thousands more get busy signals. If AT&T > would improve their call processing time by one second, they would > free up the thousands of busy signal circuits one second sooner (and > AT&T indeed has very fast setup times). I can't discuss AT&T revenue. But for your information, France Telecom does not let people ring more than 30 seconds. After the line is down you hang up. In the same way, when you use a phone terminal in France (a phone, a modem, an answering machine, ...) It needs to have an agreement from France Telecom. And in the special case of modems, it means that the dialer must not called twice within two minutes a busy number. So that, it means that companies probably spend a lot in calls that do not provide benefits. Laurent Lechelle, Courbevoie, France e-mail: laurent@caladan.fdn.org ------------------------------ From: Anthony_Pelliccio@brown.edu (Tony Pelliccio) Subject: Re: Unwelcome AT&T "Feature" Date: 4 May 1994 14:25:32 GMT Organization: Brown University Our esteemed Moderator wrote: > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: No, not at all. Your machine turns itself > on after 12 rings, or approximatly one minute. AT&T is letting calls > ring for at least two or three minutes before cutting them off. Anyway, > how often would it be the case that you forgot to turn your machine on > and an out-of-town call was the first one to arrive thereafrer (instead > of say, a local call, or your own call checking for messages, etc?) PAT] If you happen to have animals of the feline variety that like to walk on your answering machine this function is VERY useful. :) Anthony_Pelliccio@Brown.edu (Tony Pelliccio, KD1NR) Box 1908, Providence, RI 02912 Tel. (401) 863-1880 [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: This is true. My two cats like to climb on the fax machine and lay there. PAT] ------------------------------ From: amg@panix.com (Alan M. Gallatin) Subject: Re: Cellular Call Forwarding Date: 4 May 1994 10:45:40 -0400 Organization: PANIX Public Access Internet and Unix, NYC In a previous article, bruce.mchollan@keystone.keystone.fl.us (Bruce Mchollan) wrote: > A person I work with has a cellular phone with call forwarding. When > he forwards his calls to another number and then calls his own > cellular number he is not charged for the call ($0!). This works even > when he forwards his calls to a number within our LATA that would > invoke toll charges if dialed by land line. He takes advantage to > save the toll charges. Is this legal? Legal? Yes. Believable? No. I've seen a couple of different ways cell companies handle the forwarding charges. Basically, they don't like to give unlimited forwarding for free 'cause of the scenerio you described above. Setup 1) The cell company charges prevailing airtime per minute of the forwarded call. No land or toll (unless long distance) but full airtime. (This is the most common setup) Setup 2) Same as 1, except they only charge off peak rates on forwarding (recognizing that this isn't even an airtime usage problem but they need some rate to charge) (I think Sprint Cellular does this) Setup 3) This one I consider quite interesting: The cell provider first sees how many minutes of actual cellular calls (incoming and outgoing) that you made during the month. You then get up to that many minutes of free forwarding. Anything past that "flexible allowance" is treated under 1 or 2 above. (Unless I'm mistaken, some GTE Cellular One companies do this) What company is it that doesn't charge anything on the forwarded call? Alan M. Gallatin amg@panix.com amg@israel.nysernet.org amg@jerusalem1.datasrv.co.il ------------------------------ From: de@moscom.com (David Esan) Subject: Re: NANP and Switches Date: 4 May 94 14:15:57 GMT Organization: Moscom Corporation, Pittsford NY In article cmoore@BRL.MIL (Carl Moore) writes: > codes. But it's been known (certainly in the Digest) for years that > NNX area codes were coming. True. But that does not mean that switch or other telecom gear manufacturers actually ramped up to meet the deadline. One well known builder of telephone cost monitoring systems was warned by a long time reader of this Digest that 1995 was coming. In fact, the warnings have been coming for at least five years. They are finally ramping up to make the changes by September. They will not say what year however. ;-). I assume similar situations exist in other companies. David Esan de@moscom.com ------------------------------ From: cogorno@netcom.com (Steve Cogorno) Subject: Re: Getting Phone Bills Over the Internet Date: Wed, 4 May 1994 09:14:57 -0700 (PDT) Said by: Robin Fairbairns >> I would like to be able to receive my phone (and other bills) over >> the Internet. As I pay them by Direct Debit in any case their function >> is to inform me what I have spent the money on. It would be cheaper >> for my phone company (who would not have to print and mail a bill, and >> save time for me. > It would be nice, wouldn't it? > information. Since the internet is inherently insecure, that means > that the bill as transmitted would need (at the least) to be > encrypted; authentication information (e.g., digital signatures) > wouldn't come amiss either. Thst wouldn't be that big of a deal; the telco could encrypt using the calling card (main one I guess) number. Let's hope no one else as that! > I agree with you that electronic billing is highly desirable. I > disagree with the assertion that it's presently doable. Pacific Bell already offers electronic billing; unfortunately, it is on disk, and costs between 8-15 dollars per month (I can't remember the exact amount, but it was something that sounded outrageous considering that floppies cost anywhere from .50 to $1.00). Steve cogorno@netcom.com #608 Merrill * 200 McLaughlin Drive * Santa Cruz, CA 95064-1015 ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 4 May 1994 09:16:48 -0700 From: Ry Jones Subject: Re: Connect a Card Reader to a Cell Phone? > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Yes it is illegal, and yes people listen > illegally to cellular calls. However there is very little risk of fraud > by passing credit card numbers in this way. One, there has to be someone PAT: ugh, wrong, this stuff goes on all the time. What you are dismissing as "very little chance" is a popular pass time with "phreaks". Trust me. National press (Newsweek, Gray Areas) have both reported on this phenomena. > listening to a scanner which is in the proximity of the tower from which > the message is being transmitted. Two, they have to have their scanner > land on the channel (out of 832 such channels) during the five seconds > or so that the card number is being read. Third, credit card verification > involves reading the number, the expiration date and the amount of the > sale -- not the name and address of the card holder. The most fatal flaw. You don't need the name and address of the cardholder to commit fraud. You don't even need a valid credit card to commit fraud. > Fourth, without having physical possession of the card they cannot > make purchases in stores. True. > Fifth, with only the number but no name or address to go with it they > cannot very easily engage in mail order fraud. Not true. Very few companies verify with the bank on small purchases. > Sixth, without having actual possession of the card they cannot see > who the issuer of it was -- unless they have the list of four digit > (starting with three for AMEX, four for VISA, five for MC or six for > DISCOVER) codes telling which bank (or credit grantor) issued the card > -- thus no calls can be made to customer service putting in bogus > inquiries or name/address changes. In short, a non-issue here. Wrong. There is a widely available program called Credit Master that you can use to verify cards which has a list of all banks in it. It also generates algorithmically correct credit cards for any given bank. > If I were going to rip off credit card numbers, PINS and related data, I > would find it far easier to tap the phone line used by an ATM machine > and put some kind of data capture device on that instead ... yet people > use ATMs quite willingly. So what's the beef about cellular phones and > credit card numbers? On the one in a million chance someone *might* > happen to hear your credit card number read, what is it gonna get > them? PAT] Everything. 1 800 CAL LATT is the best thing to happen to credit card fraud in a long time. Sorry to be so pessimistic, but it's true. Instead of gaining tighter control over the credit card market, banks have ceded even more control to customers. Ry ------------------------------ From: fenner@cmf.nrl.navy.mil (William C. Fenner) Subject: Re: Any Modem Decode DTMF? Organization: NRL Connection Machine Facility, Washington, DC Date: Wed, 4 May 1994 17:16:14 GMT In article , mark boylan wrote: > Is there a modem that can accept and decode DTMF tones after it's > answered an incoming call? And also, how can I send the output of a > SoundBlaster card over the same phone line? You can solve both problems at once with a ZyXEL modem. Not only will it decode DTMF tones, but it will also play audio directly to the phone line. If you convert your WAV files to, say, 3-bit ZyXEL ADPCM, you can probably use one of the many shareware packages out there and get up and running very quickly. Bill Fenner fenner@cmf.nrl.navy.mil ------------------------------ From: paulb@coho.halcyon.com (Paul N. Bates) Subject: Re: Radio Frequency Interference on Residential Telephone Line Date: 4 May 1994 19:13:58 GMT Organization: A World of Information at Your Fingertips In article , wrote: >> My home is wired for two residential telephone lines. Because of my >> proximity to an am radio transmitter (am 1550khz), many of my audio >> and telephone devices suffer from "radio noise", from that one station >> only though. Some days it is worse than others, some days there is no >> interference at all. > This is an increasingly common problem. Newer more electronic devices > have more opportunities for rectification and internal amplification. > This makes them more susceptable to this kind of interference. I have > an AM Spanish-language station 3/4 of a mile from the house -- same > problem in my bulletprook ole' 1A2. The problem is occurring in the > music-on-hold receiver or amp. I know that the local AM broadcast station in my area provides filters specifically designed for the interference from AM broadcast freq.'s to people in the close proximity to their tower (free of charge). They provide these when you call and complain. Try the station there, maybe they have something that will work. I know for a fact the filters designed for the ham frequencies don't work. Paul N. Bates Celerex Corporation paulb@halcyon.com 14712 NE 87TH ST Phone: 206-869-7200 x20 Redmond, WA 98052 ------------------------------ From: egg@inuxs.att.com (Edwin Green) Date: Wed, 4 May 94 07:33:52 EST Subject: Re: AT&T Public Phone 2000 Probably Dead Organization: AT&T In article Hans-Gabriel Ridder writes: > I was in the Alaska Airlines terminal at the Seattle-Tacoma airport > two weeks ago, and saw a couple of Public Phone 2000's *with > keyboard*. I didn't have time to check them out ... I assume they > were working since after the tariff problems all the keyboards seem to > have been removed. Not true at all. We have not been removing any keyboards due to the problems with the FCC. We simply turn that feature off. Some sets are installed with keyboards, some are not (usually at the agent's request). All the sets with keyboards still need them for TDD usage. >> [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: That's a shame, because the 2000's were >> a very useful service. Too bad it did not work out. PAT] > Since John based his remarks on his experience in one airport, and not > from any offical announcements from AT&T, it's probably a bit premature > to be speaking in the past tense, don't you think? I sure hope so. Edwin G. Green AT&T Bell Laboratories Indianapolis, Indiana, USA INH 1A-519 317-845-3659 egg@inuxs.att.com ------------------------------ From: Vance Shipley Subject: Re: Equal Access in Canada Organization: XeniTec Consulting, Kitchener, Ontario, Canada Date: Wed, 4 May 1994 12:38:48 GMT In article Pat injects: > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I have been told it will by and large > follow the USA numbering scheme; i.e. 10288 for Mother, 10222 for MCI, > etc. with Canadian-only carriers getting a few numbers as well. PAT] Well your Mother (AT&T) isn't in Canada, neither is MCI. AT&T has a twenty percent stake (maximum foriegn ownership of a facilities based carrier allowed) in Unitel, our largest competing carrier. I don't think they will be using 10288 as their main CIC but I wouldn't be at all suprised if they did capture calls placed by roving Americans with it. (We at Northquest just might get a few misdialed AT&T calls having 10289 :) MCI have partnered with Bell Canada, they will be sharing technology. Bell may also trap thier CIC (10222) when dialed by travelling Americans through an agreement with MCI but I doubt it. > etc. with Canadian-only carriers getting a few numbers as well. PAT] Yeah, suprise, suprise our own national carriers will also get to have their own CIC codes, just like the REAL American carriers. Sheesh. Vance Shipley, vances@xenitec.on.ca ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V14 #202 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa23252; 5 May 94 4:31 EDT Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA02735; Thu, 5 May 94 01:25:02 CDT Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA02726; Thu, 5 May 94 01:25:00 CDT Date: Thu, 5 May 94 01:25:00 CDT From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Moderator) Message-Id: <9405050625.AA02726@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V14 #203 TELECOM Digest Thu, 5 May 94 01:25:00 CDT Volume 14 : Issue 203 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Re: ZMODEM - Proprietary? (Chuck Forsberg) Re: NPA Optional in 818 - it Works! (Alan Leon Varney) More E1 Questions (Ralph Walker) Re: "Howdy Mail"? Scrawl-Like Writing Device (Fred Blonder) Help Needed Contacting 1-800 Numbers (Ashley L. Brandwood) Looking For Phone Number/Directory Anecdotes (peicraft@bud.peinet.pe.ca) Can the FCC be Reached by FTP? (Kelly Breit) Re: Can Residential Voltage (?) Drop? (Jay Hennigan) Re: Cellular Privacy (Scott Townley) Re: Cut-Rate Domestic and International Calling Cards (Kevin Anderson) Re: FAX Mailbox Services (Jack Bzoza) Re: Pac Tel / Air Touch Communications (Lon Lowen Jr.) Kernels and Lt. Kernels (Randy Gellens) Need Used Mitel PAV Dialers (Al Cohan) 800 Market Growth (Judith Oppenheimer) Pagemart 15-Digit Restriction Update (Doug Reuben) Re: CallerID With Serial Port - Where? (Barry Bond) TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of public service systems and networks including Compuserve and GEnie. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available at no charge to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu * The Digest is edited, published and compilation-copyrighted by Patrick Townson of Skokie, Illinois USA. You can reach us by postal mail, fax or phone at: 9457-D Niles Center Road Skokie, IL USA 60076 Phone: 708-329-0571 Fax: 708-329-0572 ** Article submission address only: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu ** Our archives are located at lcs.mit.edu and are available by using anonymous ftp. The archives can also be accessed using our email information service. For a copy of a helpful file explaining how to use the information service, just ask. ************************************************************************* * TELECOM Digest is partially funded by a grant from the * * International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in Geneva, Switzerland * * under the aegis of its Telecom Information Exchange Services (TIES) * * project. Views expressed herein should not be construed as represent-* * ing views of the ITU. * ************************************************************************* Additionally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help is important and appreciated. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: omen!caf (Chuck Forsberg WA7KGX) Subject: Re: ZMODEM - Proprietary? Organization: Omen Technology INC, Portland Rain Forest Date: Wed, 04 May 1994 20:53:04 GMT In article wjrst1@pitt.edu (William J Rehm) writes: > On 4 Apr 94 18:16:45 GMT, Matt Silveira wrote: >> With regard to ZMODEM, it is not proprietary and there are many >> "shareware" programs available for Macs, PCs, and UNIX boxes, check a >> "mirrored" INTERNET site or sumex.aim at Stanford for Macs. > As I understand the situation, zmodem is indeed a proprietary > protocol. It's use on hosts is only free under certain restricted > contexts, academic use being one of them. Clients, on the other hand, > are free to incorporate zmodem protocols, since a host is required to > use them. > I have admittedly limited knowledge of this situation, but this is how > it was explained to me when I contacted the author's company. The 1986 ZMODEM is public domain, as are the rz/sz sources of that vintage. Omen Technology has improved the performance and reliability of ZMODEM over the last decade. The Good Stuff is not public domain. One should carefully study the Copyright notices in all parts of rz/sz (and Columbia Kermit) software before making decisions that might violate Copyrights. Typical Copyright notices include: may not be, in whole or in part, licensed or sold for profit as a software product itself, nor may it be included in or distributed with commercial products or otherwise distributed by commercial concerns to their clients or customers without written permission This software may be freely used for educational (didactic only) purposes. This software may also be freely used to support file transfer operations to or from licensed Omen Technology products. Use with other commercial or shareware programs (Crosstalk, Procomm, etc.) REQUIRES REGISTRATION. Any programs which use part or all of this software must be provided in source form with this notice intact except by written permission from Omen Technology Incorporated. Use of this software for commercial or administrative purposes except when exclusively limited to interfacing Omen Technology products requires a per port license payment of $20.00 US per port (less in quantity). Use of this code by inclusion, decompilation, reverse engineering or any other means constitutes agreement to these conditions and acceptance of liability to license the materials and payment of reasonable legal costs necessary to enforce this license agreement. Chuck Forsberg WA7KGX caf@omen.COM 503-621-3406 Author of YMODEM, ZMODEM, Professional-YAM, ZCOMM, GSZ and DSZ Omen Technology Inc "The High Reliability Software" TeleGodzilla BBS: 503-621-3746 FAX:-3735 CIS:70007,2304 ------------------------------ From: Alan.Leon.Varney@att.com Subject: Re: NPA Optional in 818 - it Works! Date: 4 May 94 23:35:12 GMT Organization: AT&T Network Systems In article justfred@netcom.com (Fred Heald) writes: > To my surprise this morning I found that a feature I've been asking for > forever finally works! > My phone is in 818 (but I'm travelling all over LA, 213, 909, 310, > 714, 805, 619, and all. Not 524 yet, but soon I'm sure. So I tend to > always dial the entire number (1-NPA-NXX-XXXX) first, and get the > ridiculous message "We are sorry, it is not necesary to dial one and > the area code for this call". Well, this morning (in fact, calling > Netcom) I accidentally dialed the 1-818, and the call went through! > Since I'm in PacBel land, I'm hoping they've implemented this all over > the area. FINALLY! and yet with no fanfare or even notice -- I guess > they'd be admitting a mistake. No mistake, just evolution of the dialing plan. The following states have indicated they will permit 1+10-digit dialing for ANY number in the NANP (the first column indicates if Home NPA Toll calls can also be dialed as 7D, or requires 1+ for Toll) 7D California - by 5/94 1+ Dist. of Columbia - see below 1+ Maryland - see below 1+ Nevada - by 7/94 7D New Jersey 7D New York - date unknown (works for 212, 718, 917 now?) 7D Pennsylvania 1+ Virginia - see below 7D West Virginia - by 10/94 1+ Wisconsin - by 10/94 The Washington, DC metro states (Maryland, Virginia and DC itself) support 1+10D dialing for all numbers, but non-metro NPA 703 and the rest of Virginia may not be ready until mid-94. These states also support 10D dialing of Foreign NPA LOCAL calls, and non-metro Virginia areas support 7D dialing of such calls. (NPA 703 in Virginia will permit 7D or 10D or 1+10D local calls, except into the Washington metro area, where 10D or 1+10D is required.) Illinois is the ONE state that REQUIRES 7D dialing for all Home NPA calls, even Toll calls (i.e., does not PERMIT 1 + 10D for such calls). New Hampshire (by 8/94) will permit either 7D or 1+10D for Home NPA Toll calls, but requires 7D dialing for Home NPA Local calls. Foreign NPA Local calls require 1+10D. Some states are requiring 1+10D for Foreign NPA Local calls (Louisiana), others are requiring 7D (Oklahoma) and still others require 10D (Texas). There's probably some place at their intersection where moving in a small circle will hit all three dialing patterns. This analysis does not include Maine or Massachusetts, because I have not received IN WRITING any indication of their plans ... Al Varney - just my opinion ------------------------------ From: RALPH@larscom.com (Walker, Ralph) Subject: More E1 Questions Date: Wed, 04 May 94 16:44 Coming from a T1 background, I have limited knowled in regards to E1. My company is involved in selling products into Europe. But it very hard to obtain expertise on practical applications in the E1 realm. I have a few general questions: 1) At loss of signal from the DTE, what is the proper signal to emanate from the CSU/DSU towards the line side (using CAS signaling)? What comes out of Timeslot 0, 16 and the remaining data payload. 2) What is IRSM switiching mode and how and where is it implemented? 3) What is the repeater spacing on an E1 line and is there an end section (last repeater berfore entering the customer's site) repeater specification? 4) What are the variances from country to country in repects to the use of the national bits and international bits. If there is some place/person on the internet that will provide this information, I have a ton of questions. Any help you can provide will be greatly appreciated. ------------------------------ From: fred@nasirc.hq.nasa.gov (Fred Blonder) Subject: Re: "Howdy Mail"? Scrawl-Like Writing Device Date: 04 May 1994 23:42:40 GMT Organization: NASA Goddard Space Flight Center > Has anyone heard of a digital writing device presumably using > lightpens or something equivalent, that has two "terminals" for > people to use to communicate over the phone as if by writing? ... Back around 1967 or so I saw a system in use at the TWA terminal at what was then Friendship (now BWI) Airport. It consisted of a fairly normal ball-point pen connected to a plastic tab going into a box. It also had a wire coming off, giving a simple switch closure when the pen was pressed against the piece of paper on the top of the box. The box read the pen motions and sent them to a receiver elsewhere in the terminal, which operated a stylus to duplicate the writing onto another piece of paper in real-time. The paper on the transmitter and the receiver where both adding-machine type paper rolls which could be pulled out a few inches at a time, and torn off, and stuffed into a pocket. The pen on the receiver had no visible ink reservoir, so I suspect that the paper was electrically or heat sensitive. Fred Blonder fred@nasirc.hq.nasa.gov Hughes STX Corp. (301) 441-4079 7701 Greenbelt Rd. Greenbelt, Md. 20770 ------------------------------ From: Ashley L Brandwood Subject: Help Needed Contacting 1-800 Numbers Organization: Brunel University, Uxbridge, UK Date: Wed, 04 May 1994 10:57:32 GMT Hi, I have been given the 1-800-xxx-xxxx numbers of four companies in the US that I need to contact -- unfortunately I do not have any other number for them, and was hoping that someone in the US could tell me either the normal number or a fax number for them. The companies are: Smart Micro : 1-800-ROM-BIOS Bios Upgrades: 1-800-800-2467 Cmos Solutions: 1-800-266-7462 Rom Bios Upgrades: 1-800-541-1943 Any other means of contacting them would be most helpful. (All I do know is that they are supposed to be in the CA phone books!! -- not a lot of help in the UK ! ) Thanks in advance for any assistance ... Ashley A.L.Brandwood Mathematics & Computer Science Brunel University London, England ma90alb@brunel.ac.uk <----<< Prefered Address albrandw@nyx.cs.du.edu 100025.1644@compuserve.com ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 04 May 1994 17:26:15 ADT From: PEI Crafts Council, Charlottetown, PE Island Subject: Looking For Phone Number/Directory Anecdotes, Lore, Predictions As part of a series of short radio pieces for our local CBC Radio affiliate called "A User's Guide to the Future," I'm preparing an item which centres on the past, present and future of everything to do with telephone numbers. I'm looking for anecdotes, lore, predictions, etc. about telephone numbers and telephone directories. I'm not looking for specific technical details, just interesting information about different ways of communicating telephone numbers, compiling telephone numbers, spelling things with telephone numbers, about the history and future of the "phone book" (how having all of North America's telephone listings on a set of CDs changes telephony, for example), personal "portable" telephone numbers, etc. I've been impressed with the quality of the "asides" that correspondents often to contribute to the Digest and wonder if I might impose upon you all to contribute some by email to me :-) Thanks. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 04 May 1994 14:30:21 -0500 From: breit@MR.Net Subject: Can the FCC be Reached by FTP? Does anyone know if the FCC maintains a public ftp site? I would like to research more information on "Tariff 12" pricing for long distance services. One of my clients is interested in renego- tiating their rates. We had discussed several options including using a marketing agent for "Option 51 - EPSCS" as we have seen it referenced many times. I have only limited knowledge in this area and agreed to do some research on their behalf. If you can provide me additional information, I would greatly appreciate it. Sincerely, Kelly Breit Enterprise Wide Systems Integration Consultant Breit Companies, Inc. PO Box 47567 Minneapolis, MN 55447-0567 612-449-0951 612-449-8960 Fax Internet: breit@mr.net [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Why yes, in fact recently the FCC can be reached via FTP. We've touched on it here recently and perhaps one of our readers will be so kind as to send you the help file showing how it is done. PAT] ------------------------------ From: jay@coyote.rain.org (Jay Hennigan) Subject: Re: Can Residential Voltage (?) Drop? Date: 04 May 1994 09:38:48 -0700 Organization: Regional Access Information Network (RAIN) In article djo7613@u.washington.edu (Dick O'Connor) writes: > Strange thing happened recently on my second of two residential lines. > Suddenly one day the voice mail card stopped answering on that line, > but when I switched lines it worked fine. Handsets that ring just fine > on our first line stopped ringing on our second line in tests. Yet, > if I called the second line from the first, I hear the "ring", and if > my kid picks up a phone attached to the second line, it answers and we > can talk. > Is voltage somehow involved in "ringing" so that a decrease would > cause to small a *something* for devices like modem cards and handsets > to respond to? Where does this happen, and what's the fix? Ringing is a low-frequency AC signal applied to the line (Typically 90 volts at 20 Hertz). Tell the repair desk that "ringing voltage is not being applied". They will likely find the problem to be the line equipment (printed circuit card in modern exchanges) feeding your line. Jay Hennigan jay@rain.org ------------------------------ From: Scott Townley Subject: Re: Cellular Privacy??? Date: Wed, 04 May 94 16:42:41 -0500 Organization: Delphi (info@delphi.com email, 800-695-4005 voice) writes: > I saw a copy of RCD newsfax talking about cellular privacy. The gist > of the article is that the Illinois Attorney General said "persons who > use a telephone which transmits by radio waves have no justifiable > expectation of privacy." The Cellular Telecommunications Industry > Association quickly pointed out that this is not what the federal law > says and then goes on to say "As an industry, we are totally committed > to the personal privacy of cellular telephone users." > Hah! If they were that committed then they would encrypt the > transmission and not depend on silly laws. Ruling in circuit court in Louisiana (if I remember right) a few years ago held that the use of cellular telephones constituted the use of a *radio device*, therefore was subject to the de facto principles of radio reception, i.e, that no reasonabl e expectation of privacy was afforded radio users and therefore none could be guaranteed by a court of law. Note that this principle applies only to the air interface; once the call gets into the wired system, it's called wiretapping and is still illegal without court order. [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: However the court ruling to which you refer is a very grey area. The FCC thinks otherwise, as do the federal courts in some jurisdictions. Best not listen to cellular calls. PAT] ------------------------------ From: kevinander@aol.com (KevinAnder) Subject: Re: Cut-Rate Domestic and International Calling Cards Date: 04 May 1994 18:48:02 -0400 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) In article , hketola@agsm.ucla.edu (Heikki Ketola) writes: question about $0.45 rate to Finland deleted. The 24 hour/day 7 day rate to call anywhere in Western Europe (including Finland of course) is $0.45/minute on Cyberlink. The UK is $0.35/minute. Japan is $0.45/minute. Agent opportunities are available. Kevin Anderson FAX: 619-789-9446 ------------------------------ From: Jack Bzoza Subject: Re: FAX Mailbox Services Date: Wed, 4 May 1994 20:41:00 -0400 On Thu, 7 Apr 1994 09:31:27 PDT Les Reeves wrote and asked about: FAX Mailbox Services >> Does anyone have any info on companies that provide a >> FAXMAIL service? >> What I am looking for is a FAX Number I can give out that receives >> faxes and then allows me to retrieve them from any fax machine by >> dialing up my code. > AT&T came out with a bunch of services for "professionals on the go" > about a year ago, and a FAX mailbox was part of the package. The > disadvantage was that callers had to dial an 800 number and then enter > a bunch more digits for your mailbox. Most business users won't stand > for this nonsense; they punch the number into the fax machine and walk > away. Delrina (the makers of WinFax and PerForm) has just announced a fax mailbox service exactly as you describe. It will ship (i.e. be available) in about two weeks time. It provides you with a personal 1-800 telephone number which can receive faxes or voicemail. It also has a paging notification feature which you can have page you when a fax arrives for you in your mailbox.. To receive your faxes onto your computer, just click on 'Retrieve From MailBox' from the Service's menu found in WinFax PRO 4.0. Type in your password, and your faxes will automatically be sent to you. If you don+t have your computer, or access to one, you can instruct the service to send your faxes to a fax machine. Your faxes are retrieved from the same 1-800 number so there are no long distance access charges. It is currently the ONLY way to retrieve a fax sent to your fax mailbox directly to your hotel room with your laptop. You can call your Fax MailBox either from WinFax PRO or using a touch tone phone to find out if there are any faxes waiting for you. The service will let you know how many faxes you've got, how many pages are in each fax, and at what time each fax was received. And you can even pick and choose the faxes you want sent to you immediately, while leaving others in your mailbox for retrieval at a later time. Other options are available including DID numbers (for international access), and voicemail options (the same mailbox can also take your voicemail messages). Also your telephone company's "call forwarding" service lets you have your faxes forwarded directly to your MailBox. If you want to receive your messages immediately, either to your office or an out of town location, simply call forward your Delrina Fax MailBox number to your current location. Your messages will be automatically transferred. And if that line is busy, your transmission can be rerouted back into your MailBox through your phone company+s "call forward when busy" service. For more info you can call Delrina in California at 1-800-268-6082. Jack Bzoza jackb@delrina.com Delrina (Canada) Corporation ------------------------------ From: lllowen@netcom.com (Lon Lowen Jr.) Subject: Re: Pac Tel / Air Touch Communications Organization: Netcom Online Communications Date: Wed, 04 May 1994 05:31:42 GMT In article , Larry Jones wrote: > Recently, Pacific Telesis (by the way, is that pronounced TEL-uh-sis > or tuh-LEE-sus?) TEL-uh-sis. Lon Lowen Jr. Wayne State University Netcom Online Communications Detroit, Michigan, USA lllowen@netcom.com (lllowen@mts.cc.wayne.edu) ------------------------------ From: RANDY@MPA15AB.mv-oc.Unisys.COM Date: 04 May 94 18:20:00 CST Subject: Kernels and Lt. Kernels > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Thank you Colonel. Tell me this: any ideas > how Colonel came to be pronounced 'kernel' rather than 'call-on-nell'? > Or put another way, why is it we make popcorn and have left over kernels > rather than left over colonels? And even though this is April Fool's > Day, there *was* at one point in the Army an actual person of Colonel > in rank whose last name was Korne. At least it was not spelled 'corn'. > And why do we call it the kernel in Unix instead of the colonel? PAT The Unisys A Series operating system (known as the Master Control Program or MCP) has a module called the Kernel, and another one called the LtKernel. Randall Gellens randy@mv-oc.unisys.com Net**2 656-6350 (Please forward bounces to Mail Stop MV 237 rgellens@mcimail.com) ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 4 May 94 14:18 EST From: Al Cohan <0004526627@mcimail.com> Subject: Need Used Mitel PAV Dialers I need some used Mitel 4 Port PAV Dialers. If anyone out there has a few spares I'd appreciate a direct reply. Thanks in advance, Al Cohan ------------------------------ From: producer@pipeline.com (Judith Oppenheimer) Subject: 800 Market Growth Date: 4 May 1994 16:09:59 -0400 Organization: The Pipeline A 1994 Gallup survey found that much of the $7 billion 800 market is still up for grabs. So in 1994 its a $7 billion market. Can anyone tell me how big the 800 market was in 1993? And in 1992? J. Oppenheimer Producer@pipeline.com ------------------------------ From: dreuben@netcom.com (Cid Technologies) Subject: Pagemart 15-Digit Restriction Update Date: Wed, 4 May 1994 12:54:33 PDT Just noticed that my PageMart service is once again accepting pages over 15 digits and working as it used to. I'm not sure if someone read the post to the Digest or perhaps a manager at Pagemart was made aware of the situation by my inquiries, but whatever the case may be, it seems to be back to normal, at least for the past two days it has been! I'll keep checking to make sure that they don't try to go back to 15 digits. (No big deal, most of my pages are over 15 digits so in the event that limit is set back down at 15 I'll know about it shortly after they enact it, which of course I hope they don't!) Doug CID Technologies (203) 499-5221 ------------------------------ From: barryb@bilver.oau.org (Barry Bond) Subject: Re: CallerID With Serial Port - Where? Organization: W. J. Vermillion - Orlando / Winter Park, FL Date: Wed, 4 May 1994 21:31:26 GMT Greetings! > So the question remains: Where can I purchase a caller ID box with > serial port? I have a (rather expensive) Caller ID communications device from Rochelle Communications, but I believe they have cheaper (single line) units, too. Their address is: Rochelle Communications, Inc. 4030 W. Braker Lane, Suite 130 Austin, Texas 78759 Telephone: (512) 794-0088 Barry L. Bond, Software Engineer SAIC bond@aphst1.saic.com <- work 3045 Technology Parkway barryb@bilver.oau.org <- personal Orlando, FL 32826-3299 72235,1530 (CIS) <- personal Work: (407) 282-6700, Ext. 377 ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V14 #203 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa07735; 6 May 94 15:34 EDT Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA07700; Fri, 6 May 94 11:27:14 CDT Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA07691; Fri, 6 May 94 11:27:12 CDT Date: Fri, 6 May 94 11:27:12 CDT From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Moderator) Message-Id: <9405061627.AA07691@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V14 #204 TELECOM Digest Fri, 6 May 94 11:27:00 CDT Volume 14 : Issue 204 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Re: AT&T Divestiture Comments Wanted (John R. Levine) Re: AT&T Divestiture Comments Wanted (Ken Hoehn) Re: AT&T Public Phone 2000 Probably Dead (Dave Levenson) Re: PageMart Changes Services, No Notice (Rob Lockhart) Re: Protocol for Alpha-numeric Pagers (Rob Lockhart) Re: Equal Access in Canada (Dino Moriello) Re: "TV & Movie Mania" Radio Show Hits the Info Superhighway (Mike Godwin) Re: Cellular Privacy??? (Neil Weisenfeld) Re: Cellular Privacy??? (William H. Sohl) Re: NPA Optional in 818 - it Works! (Alan Leon Varney) TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of public service systems and networks including Compuserve and GEnie. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available at no charge to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu * The Digest is edited, published and compilation-copyrighted by Patrick Townson of Skokie, Illinois USA. You can reach us by postal mail, fax or phone at: 9457-D Niles Center Road Skokie, IL USA 60076 Phone: 708-329-0571 Fax: 708-329-0572 ** Article submission address only: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu ** Our archives are located at lcs.mit.edu and are available by using anonymous ftp. The archives can also be accessed using our email information service. For a copy of a helpful file explaining how to use the information service, just ask. ************************************************************************* * TELECOM Digest is partially funded by a grant from the * * International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in Geneva, Switzerland * * under the aegis of its Telecom Information Exchange Services (TIES) * * project. Views expressed herein should not be construed as represent-* * ing views of the ITU. * ************************************************************************* Additionally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help is important and appreciated. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: johnl@iecc.com (John R Levine) Subject: Re: AT&T Divestiture Comments Wanted Date: Fri, 6 May 94 0:17:12 EDT Ken Hoehn asked: > What do you think of the future of PCS, and the possible 'jump over' of > local services in its use? > I think that may have been what AT&T had in mind! Hi. I'm not a pundit, but sometimes I play one on the net. Second question first -- ten years ago nobody had the faintest idea that wireless telephony would be the runaway success that it is. If you look at projections for cellular usage compared to what's actually happened, you'll find that the projections were too low by about an order of magnitude. Also, nobody anticipated how effective software-based techniques would be in increasing the effectiveness of bandwidth usage, viz. CDMA cellular and all of the 900MHz spread spectrum wireless network and cellular telephone stuff. For example, my connection to the Internet is via a 900MHz spread spectrum wireless Ethernet, giving me a 2MB connection to the next network for a hardware outlay of under $2000, probably five times cheaper than a slower link would have cost three years ago. PCS will be a success, but I think that the main financial effect will be to make the wireline telcos even richer than they are now. For one thing, PCS runs at much higher frequencies than even cellular uses, which means that each PCS cell is going to be real small, and there'll be a lot of them, with a lot of wiring needed to connect to all of the base stations. Also, unlike cellular, PCS can be integrated much more tightly with the wireline network -- I read in America's Network (a trade rag that all telephone engineering managers read) about a test in Chicago in which fairly dumb PCS base stations were connected by ISDN, which runs over regular T1, to the wireline exchange, a 5ESS. All of the PCS fanciness including handoff from one cell to the next was handled by an upgrade to the 5ESS software. This means that to get PCS going, basically all you have to do is to wire up each PCS base station like an ISDN customer line. Compare this to what cellular requires, with large base stations that can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars and dedicated phone switches. If I were getting into the PCS biz and I didn't happen to be the local telco, I'd try to cut a deal with the telco to use their switch, greatly cutting both the time to get the system up and the capital cost. Remember, the telco's cost of capital is very low, since telephone bonds are considered to be extremely low risk, and in any event for the first few years PCS would be small enough that it'd be an insignificant increment to their existing capacity. Naturally, the telco isn't going to make this deal for free, so they'd end up with a big chunk of the revenue. If the telco owned a PCS franchise, they'd only make PCS deals with themselves, and they'd be at a huge advantage since they could get going real fast. Sure, there's some dial tone competition coming over the horizon, e.g. CAPs and cable companies. But I've never seen a cable company with the technical smarts to blow their own noses, and I don't think I'd be the only one to be very reluctant to trust my phone business to the same clowns who maintain the cable TV. (Here in Cambridge, for example, the cable company announced with great fanfare several months ago the availability of 500Kb Internet connections via cable. According to people who've tried to order it, it doesn't actually exist.) CAPs are starting to skim the cream, sort of like the pre-equal-access MCI. But dial tone competition from CAPs, PCS, or cellular isn't going to be much of a threat until there's local number portability, something that the existing telcos view with less than no enthusiasm. (Yeah, some of them say they welcome local competition, but their idea of a level playing field looks more like a ski jump.) I doubt portability will work for another decade, during which interval I expect that they'll lobby their way into being allowed to buy up cable and PCS companies, thereby eating the competition. Regards, John Levine, johnl@iecc.com, jlevine@delphi.com, 1037498@mcimail.com ------------------------------ Organization: The W8HD Group Date: Thu, 5 May 1994 22:53:35 EDT From: Ken Hoehn Subject: Re: AT&T Divestiture Comments Wanted > What do you think of the future of PCS, and the possible 'jump over' of > local services in it's use? I think that may have been what AT&T had in mind! kenh@w8hd.org Ken Hoehn - Teletech, Inc. Compuserve: 70007,2374 N8NYO P.O.Box 924 FAX: (313) 562-8612 Dearborn, MI 48121 VOICE: (313) 562-6873 ------------------------------ From: dave@westmark.com (Dave Levenson) Subject: Re: AT&T Public Phone 2000 Probably Dead Reply-To: dave@westmark.com Organization: Westmark, Inc. Date: Fri, 6 May 1994 04:21:38 GMT I have made good use of the AT&T Public Phone 2000: I once used one at the airport in Dallas to log into this Unix system, to read the telecom digest while waiting for my flight. More recently, as we have all noted, they no longer have keyboards on them, and the screen mostly just displays advertising. I did, however, plug the internal modem in my laptop machine into the RJ-11 jack provided on these keyboard-less telephones, and place a data call that way. Less expensive (you only pay the telco for the phone call, no `keyboard rental' add-on) and faster. The PP-2000 internal modem is limited to 2400 bps; my laptop has a V.32 modem in it. Dave Levenson Internet: dave@westmark.com Westmark, Inc. UUCP: {uunet | rutgers | att}!westmark!dave Stirling, NJ, USA Voice: 908 647 0900 Fax: 908 647 6857 ------------------------------ From: rlockhart@aol.com (RLockhart) Subject: Re: PageMart Changes Services, No Notice Date: 6 May 1994 08:08:07 -0400 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) In article , dreuben@netcom.com (Cid Technologies) writes: > Since Monday, I noticed that PageMart -- a local and nationwide paging > company -- has REDUCED the number of digits per page to only 15. They > used to take at least 22, perhaps even more (24 Max). > It seems all so silly me to that they think they are going to speed up > paging so much by going from 24 digits to 15; how many people do a > full 24 and how much time would 9 digits less really save? Doug ... do you mind if I send a copy of this to a friend of mine at PageMart? Real customer feedback usually has an effect on things like this 'specially at his level. Hmmm ... wonder what sort of savings dropping from 24 to 15 numeric pages gives? Let's see ... a standard POCSAG block is 20 bits with 12 check bits. 20 bits is five numeric digits, so 24 digits is 5 blocks with one burned digit and 15 digits is 3 blocks with no burned digits. This gives a two block difference. Two blocks is about a single POCSAG paging address, sooooo every time they send a reduced length page for one that would've been 21 digits or longer, they can add a tone only page. Save two pages worth and they can add a numeric page with 10 digits or less. If they average 10K pages per day and 10% (just very conservatively SWAG'ing numbers here on call rates) were 20+ digits, that would give an extra (10% or 10K -> 1K -> 1 extra 10 digit page for every 2 of the 10%'rs ->) 500 pages per day. This would allow them to add 500 pages per day. At a .1 call rate, this would give an extra (500/24 pages per hour at .1 call rate per hour ->) uhmmm .. a little over 200 customers -.. real rates, though, would be vastly different. Rob Lockhart, Resource Manager, Interactive Data Systems Paging Products Group, Motorola, Inc. Desktop I'net: lockhart-epag06_rob@email.mot.com Wireless I'net (<32K characters): rob_lockhart-erl003e@email.mot.com ------------------------------ From: rlockhart@aol.com (RLockhart) Subject: Re: Protocol for Alpha-numeric Pagers Date: 6 May 1994 08:25:09 -0400 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) In article , garym@alsys.com (Gary Morris @ignite) writes: > I would like to write some software for a specialized computer system > to send pages to alpha-numeric pagers. Is there a standard protocol > that these services use to accept messages via a modem? The protocol you seek is called TAP (Telocator Alpha Paging .. PET and IXO are different names for the same alpha paging) protocol. The only formal supplier of the spec for TAP is PCIA (Personal Communications Industry Association .. formerly Telocator) in Washington, DC, at 202.467.4770. Alternatively, if you just want to take a look at the more commonly used portions of the protocol, I've a thread gleaned from a now-out-of-print manual of ours that was used by Telocator as the basis for TAP and would be happy to POST you a copy. > I haven't selected a pager provider yet, so if some use proprietary > protocols I would be interested in know which ones to avoid. I've > talked to several providers and they have said we can do paging from a > PC and they have a software package for PC's, but I have a special > need that requires custom software (and it's running on Sun/Unix). Several use proprietary protocols (e.g., SkyTel has SkyWord (proprietary) access to it's SkyWord service), but almost to a carrier they also support TAP (e.g., SkyTel has SkyMemo (TAP) access to it's SkyWord service, too). We publish a freebie called the Motorola Third Party Referral Guide to Alpha and Data Paging that gets updated on a quarterly basis (current edition is 04 March 94) and includes sections on platform-specific support (Mac, DOS, Windows, Unix, OS/2, MainFrames ..), application and application enablers (e.g., APIs, DDE, AppleEvents, ...), and manufacturers/publishers. If that's of interest to you, it's a Stuffed MacWord 5.1 file available on some of the commercial services like CIS, AOL, and AppleLink (I'm FTP-challenged in addition to being chronologically- and gravitationally-challenged ). Paper copies are available from our NewsStream/NewsCard hotline at 1.800.542.7882, but ask for it by name. Rob Lockhart, Resource Manager, Interactive Data Systems Paging Products Group, Motorola, Inc. Desktop I'net: lockhart-epag06_rob@email.mot.com Wireless I'net (<32K characters): rob_lockhart-erl003e@email.mot.com ------------------------------ From: dino@CAM.ORG (Dino Moriello) Subject: Re: Equal Access in Canada Date: Fri, 06 May 1994 09:40:32 -0500 Organization: VE2DM In article , Carl Moore wrote: > Back in January, I went to Sault Ste. Marie, Ont. before turning > around back into the U.S. I got to a pay phone on 705-759 there, and > 10288 didn't work (I then omitted it, got the "boing" for Bell Canada, > then punched in my AT&T card number and the call, going to the U.S., > went through). The call didn't make it to my phone bill until March, > and it was in the AT&T part of the bill. So there are no 10xxx codes > currently useable in Canada? All I've seen is a note with my phone bill asking me if I wanted Unitel to ask Bell to give me access to Unitel by simply dialing 1+. Dino Moriello PO BOX 105 Internet: dino@CAM.ORG Radisson,Quebec Compuserve: 76120,1472 Tel.: 514-974-0773 CANADA J0Y 2X0 Packet: VE2DM@VE2FKB 819-638-8281 Please E-mail replies since I can't always read the USENET postings. ------------------------------ From: mgodwin@mcl.bdm.com (Michael G. Godwin) Subject: Re: "TV & Movie Mania" Radio Show Hits the Info Superhighway Date: Fri, 6 May 1994 11:52:42 Organization: BDM International, Inc. In article lauren@vortex.com (Lauren Weinstein) writes: > The half hour Internet version of the program is being distributed > biweekly on the Internet via the Internet Multicasting Service in > Washington D.C., on the "Internet Town Hall" channel, and is also > available as a file for retrieval by any Internet user from the many > Internet Multicasting / Internet Talk Radio archive sites around the > world. What is this Internet Multicasting Service/town hall channel, and how does one access it??? Is there a more suitable newsgroup foinformation/ discussion on this?? Mike ------------------------------ From: weisen@alw.nih.gov (Neil Weisenfeld) Subject: Re: Cellular Privacy? Organization: NIH Div of Comp Rsrch and Technology Date: Fri, 6 May 1994 15:58:38 GMT Scott Townley (nx7u@delphi.com) wrote: > few years ago held that the use of cellular telephones constituted the > use of a *radio device*, therefore was subject to the de facto > principles of radio reception, i.e, that no reasonabl e expectation of > privacy was afforded radio users and therefore none could be Historically, it has been upheld that users of a radio device should not be able to expect privacy. Unless I'm mistaken, however, the Electronic Communications Privacy Act of 1986 changed all of this. Right now it is illegal to monitor cellular phone calls, studio to transmitter relays, and other things. This is probably largely due to pressure from the cell phone services, but I'm not really up on the political background. As of April 26, 1994 (if I got that date right), it became illegal to manufacture in the US, or to import, a radio *capable* of receiving the cellular phone frequencies. This includes radios that can be easily modified (e.g. certain scanners that simply needed a diode clipped). Neil Weisenfeld, Computer Engineer Internet: weisen@alw.nih.gov Nat'l Insts. of Health, 12A/2033 Voice: 301/402-4030 Bethesda, MD 20892 Fax: 301/402-2867 ------------------------------ From: whs70@cc.bellcore.com (sohl,william h) Subject: Re: Cellular Privacy? Date: 5 May 1994 11:42:02 -0400 Organization: Bell Communications Research (Bellcore) In article , Scott Townley wrote: > writes: >> I saw a copy of RCD newsfax talking about cellular privacy. The gist >> of the article is that the Illinois Attorney General said "persons who >> use a telephone which transmits by radio waves have no justifiable >> expectation of privacy." The Cellular Telecommunications Industry >> Association quickly pointed out that this is not what the federal law >> says and then goes on to say "As an industry, we are totally committed >> to the personal privacy of cellular telephone users." Practically speaking, however, the existence of legislation (laws) forbiding the listening to cellular communications have no real impact on what actually is being done. The only true privacy for cellular is with encryption of the call. >> Hah! If they were that committed then they would encrypt the >> transmission and not depend on silly laws. Ditto this statement per above. > Ruling in circuit court in Louisiana (if I remember right) a > few years ago held that the use of cellular telephones constituted the > use of a *radio device*, therefore was subject to the de facto > principles of radio reception, i.e, that no reasonabl e expectation of > privacy was afforded radio users and therefore none could be > guaranteed by a court of law. Note that this principle applies only > to the air interface; once the call gets into the wired system, it's > called wiretapping and is still illegal without court order. All essentially true. > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: However the court ruling to which you > refer is a very grey area. The FCC thinks otherwise, as do the federal > courts in some jurisdictions. Best not listen to cellular calls. PAT] The fundamental problem facing the user of cellular is that s/he never knows if the call is actually being listened to by an unauthorized listener. Cellular calls use radio and there are probably over one million or more radio recievers (scanners, etc.) which have the ability to receive the cellular frequencies. None of that equipment is illegal to own (although the FCC, effective 4/26/94, now bans the importation or manufacture of cellular capable scaners) and it simply isn't going to disappear because the ECPA says don't listen to cellular. Bottom line, if you use cellular, is to treat each call as if it was being interecepted and, therefore, offer nothing "over the air" that you would ever want divulged or made known to someone you didn't want to hear it (e.g. credit card numbers, etc.) The same can be said for the use of cordless phones, which have no laws (except for a handful of individual state laws) prohibiting listening to their (cordless) conversations. Personally I have no desire to listen to cellular or cordless, I offer this advice to caution folks that the existence of federal and/or state laws prohibiting listening does nothing to actually prevent it from happening. In fact, in those rare cases where someone has possibly been charged for illegal listening, it has only been "discovered" because the individual was blatant about his/her listening (usually through some media coverage of a political figure's cellular phone converstation which was tape recorded by the person being charged). Bill Sohl (K2UNK) BELLCORE (Bell Communications Research, Inc.) Morristown, NJ email via UUCP bcr!cc!whs70 201-829-2879 Weekdays email via Internet whs70@cc.bellcore.com [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: The same could really be said of wired landline phones as well. Although probably more secure than any form of radio, it is still not a good idea to say over the phone anything you would not like others to know about. PAT] ------------------------------ From: Alan.Leon.Varney@att.com Date: Thu, 5 May 1994 14:59:35 +0600 Subject: Re: NPA Optional in 818 - it Works! [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Forwarded to the Digest by Carl Moore who received it as a response from Al Varney. PAT] You mentioned: > Since I update history.of.area.splits from time to time, I have > some questions for Al Varney: > All my recent NANP statements were derived (or perhaps assumed) from > a Bellcore Letter (IL-94/01-001, "Status of Numbering in the NANP Served > Area") dated 3 January 1994. Obviously, TELCos can change their minds, > so take this "information", not "truth". >> If, in your message, "Home NPA Toll calls ... require 1+ for Toll", >> do you mean: >> 1. 1+NPA+7D must be used? (I know this applies to Maryland and area >> 703 in Virginia; no information yet for 804 in Va.) >> 2. 1+7D can still be used? (I have not received information about >> Nevada, Wisconsin, or area 804 in Va. requiring 1+NPA+7D for long >> distance within area code.) Sorry I was so unclear -- on re-reading, it was a stupid comment. I should have said "Home NPA Toll calls ... require 1+10D dialing". The 1+7D pattern is not, after January 1995, going to be permitted anywhere in the NANP, including NPA 809 and Canada. Many areas, such as Texas NPAs 409, 806 and 915, appear to be waiting until 1995 to block 1 + 7D calls. Canada is uniformly requiring 1+10D for Toll calls effective 1/7/95. >> And where do you arrive at 7D being allowed for intra-NPA toll calls >> in West Virginia? That would be new information for me. Just reading the Bellcore "table" -- West Virginia appears to be following the Pennsylvania model of "7D Toll" calls, rather than the "1 + 10D Toll" model of Maryland, Virginia, Kentucky and Ohio. Like Pennsylvania, 1+10D will also work for such calls. >>> NPA 703 in Virginia will >>> permit 7D or 10D or 1+10D local calls, except into the Washington >>> metro area, where 10D or 1+10D is required. >> NPA 703 in Virginia does allow 7D for local calls into the Washington >> metro area WITHIN AN AREA CODE, with the "10D or 1+10D is required" >> kicking in if calling different area code. Again I stupid comment make -- 7D local is permitted within an area code EVERYWHERE within the NANP area. So perhaps: "NPA 703 in Virginia will allow 7D Inter-NPA local calls, except when calling INTO the Washington metro area. Both 10D and 1+10D will work for ALL local calls from NPA 703." The distinction I gather from Bellcore's table is that 7D local calls to other NPAs will work from 703, so long as the destination is not the Metro area -- for example, into NPA 804. The actual term they use for the 7D-not-permitted is Foreign NPA Local calls to the "WMEA". So what is WMEA? Is all of NPA 301 in WMEA from 703's perspective? What about 410? >>> Illinois is the ONE state that REQUIRES 7D dialing for all Home NPA >>> calls, even Toll calls (i.e., does not PERMIT 1 + 10D for such calls). >> Old area 312 never had 1+ for long distance until it needed N0X/N1X >> prefixes, and at that time it got 1+ for long distance to other area >> codes. Are you saying the rest of Illinois is dropping the leading >> 1 for intra-NPA if it was still publishing 1+7D for such? Per the "table", NPAs 312, 618, 708 and 815 do not NOW permit 1+7D dialing for calls. Intra-NPA calls must be dialed 7D and Inter-NPA calls must be dialed 1+10D, regardless of "toll/local" status. The remaining NPAs (217 and 309) will change to these rules by a yet-to- be-announced date. It will probably be before January 1995. Al Varney - any errors are mine, including this statement ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V14 #204 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa00350; 6 May 94 16:40 EDT Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA10550; Fri, 6 May 94 12:59:02 CDT Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA10539; Fri, 6 May 94 12:59:00 CDT Date: Fri, 6 May 94 12:59:00 CDT From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Moderator) Message-Id: <9405061759.AA10539@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V14 #205 TELECOM Digest Fri, 6 May 94 12:59:00 CDT Volume 14 : Issue 205 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson LDDS Take Over of WilTel (Associated Press via David W. Prince) Firms Vie for Three-Digit Phone Numbers (Boston Globe via Monty Solomon) Three-Digit Phone Numbers (Peter Capek) Book Review: "Understanding Computer Networks" by Apple (Rob Slade) Verifone Programming Manuals (Ry Jones) Help Setting up FTP Server Site (Kenn Krasner) Sprint Resellers (Rich Holland) When is a 'Page' Not a Page? (Michael Diehr) Hackers On Planet Earth (Kevin Crow) Wanted: Merlin or Spirit Phones (Drew Benson) Fax Cited in Numbers Bust (New York Times via Dave Thompson) FCC March Caller ID Order (Carl B. Page) Mac Tie-in to T1 Line? (Steve Rogers) Toronto Utilities Consider Fibre Local Network (Dave Leibold) Directory Formats to Change (Dave Leibold) Prices on DFB Laser, Fiber, Mobile Switching Centers (Hanwook Jung) Mail Order Source for Cell Phone Accessories (Randal Hayes) TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of public service systems and networks including Compuserve and GEnie. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available at no charge to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu * The Digest is edited, published and compilation-copyrighted by Patrick Townson of Skokie, Illinois USA. You can reach us by postal mail, fax or phone at: 9457-D Niles Center Road Skokie, IL USA 60076 Phone: 708-329-0571 Fax: 708-329-0572 ** Article submission address only: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu ** Our archives are located at lcs.mit.edu and are available by using anonymous ftp. The archives can also be accessed using our email information service. For a copy of a helpful file explaining how to use the information service, just ask. ************************************************************************* * TELECOM Digest is partially funded by a grant from the * * International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in Geneva, Switzerland * * under the aegis of its Telecom Information Exchange Services (TIES) * * project. Views expressed herein should not be construed as represent-* * ing views of the ITU. * ************************************************************************* Additionally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help is important and appreciated. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: David W. Prince Subject: LDDS Take Over of WilTel Date: Thu, 5 May 1994 04:59:32 EDT Description: LDDS Makes Offer For WilTel Header: AP Online AP 05/04 18:33 EDT V0989 Copyright 1994. The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. TULSA, Okla. (AP) -- Long distance phone company LDDS Communications Inc. has offered $2 billion to buy rival Williams Telecommunications Group, saying it wants WilTel's technology and base of large private customers. LDDS is the nation's fourth largest long distance telephone company. Based in Jackson, Miss., it is chaired by billionaire John Kluge, one of the country's richest people. It serves mostly small- to medium-size customers nationwide and is a customer of Tulsa-based WilTel, leasing some lines on its phone network. WilTel, one of the Williams Cos., caters mostly to large business clients. It laid a national fiber-optic network in the late 1980s in the United States by running cable through decommissioned oil and gas pipelines owned by its parent. It leases its lines to other carriers like LDDS as well as to business and government customers. A merger would create a long distance company that could begin to rival AT&T, MCI and Sprint. LDDS had more than $1 billion in revenues last year while WilTel had just under that amount. The president and chief executive officer of Williams, Keith E. Bailey, said Wednesday in a written statement that Williams is pleased with the recent performance of WilTel and comfortable keeping ownership. But Bailey added that LDDS' offer "will be taken into consideration along with a number of other alternatives that we are carefully examining to continue to enhance the long-term value of this asset for our shareholders." LDDS Chief Executive Officer Bernard Ebbers said LDDS would offer $2 billion in cash to Williams or in stock paid directly to shareholders, or in a mix of $1 billion cash and $1 billion stock. Williams board of directors meet next on May 19. Williams shares closed up $3.37 1/2 at $28.87 1/2 in brisk New York Stock Exchange trading. LDDS shares rose 25 cents to $23.75 on the Nasdaq stock market. The purchase offer became public after LDDS filed a form disclosing it with the Securities and Exchange Commission. WilTel International Inc. and LDDS were among three companies that announced earlier this year that they expect to provide long-distance service to Cuba within the next few months. But that plan is stalled because of concerns by the State Department over a relatively large $4.85 surcharge allowed in the agreements for collect calls. The State Department has said it will allow no such surcharge, which would give the Cuban government sorely needed hard currency. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 6 May 1994 12:05:45 -0400 From: Monty Solomon Subject: Firms Vie for Three-Digit Phone Numbers Excerpt from {The Boston Globe}, Friday, May 6, 1994 Businesses eager for a new outlet in the information age grabbed up three-digit telephone numbers awarded in a first-ever lottery by Southern Bell yesterday. The company, a unit of BellSouth Corp., assigned the numbers, 211, 311, 511, 711 and 811 in Miami, Fort Lauderdale, and Orlando. Anyone willing to pay a $25,000 start-up fee and a minimum $10,000 per month was eligible for the giveaway. The winners were newspapers, the Yellow Pages division of Bell South, and a few other businesses that see value in the memorable numbers. None released specific plans for products. ... The winners could charge for each call or offer services to callers for free while tacking on advertising to those services. ... Petitions for N11 numbers have been filed in most states. But no utility regulators outside Florida have endorsed the service, and BellSouth is the only regional Bell operating company to push for sales, said Mark Long of the Florida Public Service Commission. Monty Solomon / PO Box 2486 / Framingham, MA 01701-0405 monty@roscom.com ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 6 May 94 10:58:07 EDT From: Peter Capek Subject: Three-Digit Phone Numbers I have no further details, but I saw a press clipping summary that said Southern Bell is going to sell a "limited number" of three-digit telephone numbers for $25,000 apiece, and a somewhat larger quantity of four-digit telephone numbers for an unspecified price. I'd be interested to know further details. Does anyone know whether, if this is true, these numbers are likely to be dialable nationwide? Or does the existing infrastructure assume that all numbers are ten digits when dialed with the area code? Peter Capek [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: See the related article in this issue. The numbers will be dialable only from within Southern Bell's service area. SB certainly has no right to sell away those prime numbers where other telcos are concerned, to say nothing of the logistics involved in trying to call them from elsewhere. PAT] ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 06 May 1994 10:45:42 MDT From: Rob Slade Subject: Book Review: "Understanding Computer Networks" by Apple BKUNDCNT.RVW 940126 Addison-Wesley Publishing Company Heather Rignanesi, Marketing, x340, 73171.657@Compuserve.com P.O. Box 520 26 Prince Andrew Place Don Mills, Ontario M3C 2T8 416-447-5101 fax: 416-443-0948 or Tiffany Moore, Publicity tiffanym@aw.com Bob Donegon bobd@aw.com John Wait, Editor, Corporate and Professional Publishing johnw@aw.com Tom Stone, Editor, Higher Education Division tomsto@aw.com 1 Jacob Way Reading, MA 01867-9984 800-822-6339 617-944-3700 Fax: (617) 944-7273 "Understanding Computer Networks", Apple, 1989, 0-201-19773-1, U$10.95/C$13.95 This is sort of the Classics Comics version of computer networking. In fewer than eighty pages, less than half of them text, you have a very quick overview of data communications. While the majority of the illustrations add little to the concepts being presented, overall this book works reasonably well. It certainly is easily accessible and nonthreatening. The material is extremely limited, but many longer and more tedious books give no more accurate information than does this. As a quick introduction to network and data communications concepts, this may be handy to the busy executive starting with a related project. copyright Robert M. Slade, 1994 BKUNDCNT.RVW 940126 - Redistribution permitted on TELECOM Digest and associated newsgroups/mailing lists. DECUS Canada Communications, Desktop, Education and Security group newsletters Editor and/or reviewer ROBERTS@decus.ca, RSlade@sfu.ca, Rob Slade at 1:153/733 DECUS Symposium '95, Toronto, ON, February 13-17, 1995, contact: rulag@decus.ca ------------------------------ From: Ry Jones Subject: Verifone Programming Manuals Date: Fri, 6 May 94 9:55:30 PDT With all this talk about Verifones, I am reminded that I have one (a Verifone Junior, tan model, green LED screen) with no manual. I bought it at a Tru Value going out of business sale; they didn't have the manual, or password, or anything. I called Verifone in Hawaii, and never got a response (and that was not a cheap call!). So here's the problem: I want to reprogram the thing to use my Visa validation strings. How can I do this? Some people have suggested pulling the battery out of it and letting the NVRAM drain (to reset the password), but I fear this would merely reset it to a random state (not a null state). Anyone offer any help here? Ry ------------------------------ From: Kenn Krasner From: kkrasner@ritz.mordor.com (Kenn Krasner) Subject: Help setting up FTP server site Organization: Mordor International BBS Date: Thu, 5 May 1994 21:36:57 GMT Can anyone point me to some detailed info on setting up an FTP server site? I'd greatly appreciate it! Please respond to me via email at kkrasner@mordor.com. Thank you for your help! Kenn ------------------------------ From: holland@godiva.ne.ksu.edu (Rich Holland) Subject: Sprint Resellers Date: 5 May 1994 21:38:10 GMT Organization: Kansas State University Does anyone have a list of Sprint WATS resellers they'd be willing to mail me? Thanks! Rich Holland | Internet: holland@godiva.ne.ksu.edu 723 Allison Ave, #8 | Bitnet : holland@ksuvm Manhattan, KS 66502-3273 | WWW : http://godiva.ne.ksu.edu/~holland ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 5 May 1994 14:41:38 -0800 From: mdiehr@sdcc3.ucsd.edu (Michael Diehr) Subject: When is a 'Page' Not a Page? When is a 'page' not a page? When it is a call into your voicemail system. To explain: Recently, I bought a pager with service package from Costco, one of those membership wherehouse retail stores. I took it to Airtouch Paging (nee' PacTel Paging) here in San Diego and had it activated, and added their $6/month voicemail package to the plan (one phone number). One month later, and I get billed for 113 pager overcalls. Hmm, sez I, "I know I don't get ten pages per day, this must be an error." Two times, I talk to a customer service rep, and they say they'll look into it. The third time I call (after they threaten to disconnect me for nonpayment), someone clears up the mystery: Their policy is to charge for all pages sent to your pager, AS WELL AS ALL CALLS INTO YOUR VOICEMAIL ACCOUNT TO RETRIEVE MESSAGES. Well, I double checked my contract, and it says, clear as day "200 pages per month, with $0.10 / page over 200". A few calls later, and I talk to a manager there, who confirms their policy of charging for ALL calls to the number, and says "I should have been notified". My impression after talking to several people is that their policy is not written down on any brochure, and is certainly not on any contract that they provide. So. They agreed to refund the existing charges, but not change their policy. In my mind this is at best deceptive advertising, and perhaps breach of contract and maybe against CPUC regulations. Any comments? mdiehr@ucsd.edu (Michael Diehr) ------------------------------ From: kc@netsys.com (Kevin Crow) Subject: Hackers On Planet Earth Organization: Netsys Inc. Date: Thu, 5 May 1994 22:46:14 GMT It's not Summercon. It's not the Galactic Hacker Party. | H O P E | It's Hackers On Planet Earth. August 13th and 14th, 1994 In the middle of NEW YORK CITY A celebration of the hacker world and the tenth anniversary of 2600. - watch for further details - [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: The *tenth* anniversary of 2600? I am certain the magazine has been around longer than that. I seem to recall hearing about it back in the 1960-70's ... PAT] ------------------------------ From: drew@mtu.edu (Drew Benson) Subject: Wanted: Merlin or Spirit phones Date: 5 May 1994 23:02:59 GMT Organization: Michigan Technological University Reply-To: drew@mtu.edu Does anyone have any AT&T Merlin or Spirit phones or phone system for sale? If not, where can I get them? Our budget is limited here. Actually, a similar phone system would be fine as well. It doesn't NEED to be those particular ones, but I'm looking for something similar. Thanks, Andrew Benson (drew@mtu.edu) ------------------------------ From: Thompson, Dave Subject: Fax Cited in Numbers Bust Date: Thu, 05 May 94 19:07:00 PDT From {The New York Times}, Thu 21 Apr 1994, pp A1,B4 [non-telecom portions condensed] Fax Use Spells / Numbers Arrest / To Harlem Ring (Jump: Use of Fax Leads to Arrest / Of Suspected Numbers King) By Selwyn Raab For 30 years, Raymond Marquez was a thorn to law-enforcement agencies and a legend to countless gamblers in Harlem and East Harlem. ... authorities say ... [he] built a gambling empire that raked in about $30M a year. ... conducted from fake stores in ... northern Manhattan, [while he] lived regally in ... [Long Island and] Florida. .... But the authorities said yesterday that they had arrested Mr. Marquez, 64, and his wife, Alice, 63, on felony gambling charges and had raided and closed 56 gambling parlors and backroom offices .... The Manhattan District Attorney, Robert M. Morgenthau, said a large part of the case against Mr. Marquez stemmed from one mistake: his use of a fax to get daily reports on his illegal gambling profits from Manhattan to his vacation retreat in Fort Lauderdale. Mr. Morgenthau, who announced the arrests ..., said the faxes, which were intercepted under a court order, included the names of gambling sites, accounts over the last month of profits at each site and the payrolls for more than 100 people employed by Mr. Marquez in one of the city's largest illegal gambling rings. Mr. Morgenthau's office obtained a court order yesterday attaching more than $35M in assets .... "Up here [he] is sort of a legend," said Lt. Gregory J. Levine of the Manhattan North Public Morals District. "... this time we got him good." Detective Angel Ramirez ... said Mr. Marquez followed the same schedule almost every day. .... "... he's got expensive tastes and ... acts like a Mafia don." .... Since the early 1960's, ... officials have described Mr. Marquez as one of the city's most successful numbers operators. In the Harlem neighborhoods ... [one resident said] "They've destroyed this neighborhood. ... turned into a stinking rat hole." .... [Police Commissioner] Bratton said no evidence of police corruption was uncovered [in connection with this case] .... ... [the] betting parlors offered several numbers games. .... .... Each wager was recorded ... [and sent to] the policy bank ... [on] the second floor of a residential building at 3650 Broadway near 151st Street. ... Claudia Hernandez, 25, who was also arrested ... was in charge of Mr. Marquez's main office on Riverside Drive .... Reports on the daily operations were faxed by Ms. Hernandez to Mr. Marquez and his wife while they were in Fort Lauderdale .... "We intercepted 30 to 40 faxes a day .... It [sic] spelled out in minute details everything about the organization." Mr. Marquez['s] ... father was a numbers operator in the 1940's ... [and] Mr. Marquez ran numbers games for ... a Mafia leader in East Harlem in the 1950's, before branching out on his own. [Comment: no indication of whether they thought fax was secure, or tried to make it so, although in recent years at least some Mafiosi reportedly refuse to talk "business" indoors on by phone for fear of surveillance.] Dave Thompson, davet@fpg.logica.com Logica North America, +1 617-890-7730 ------------------------------ From: carlp@teleport.com (Carl B. Page) Subject: FCC March Caller ID Order Date: 6 May 1994 00:41:59 -0700 Organization: Teleport - Portland's Public Access (503) 220-1016 Private Unlisted Phone Numbers Banned Nationwide. Law Enforcement Explicitly Compromised. Women's Shelters Security Threatened. Telephone Rules of 30 States Overturned. Direct Marketing Association Anticipates Profit. The FCC released its Report and Order And Notice of Proposed Rulemaking of March 29th, 1994 (CC Docket No. 91-281) With the arrogance that only federal bureaucrats can muster, the Federal Communications Commission has turned the clock back on Calling Number ID and privacy protection rules nationwide. Have you ever had any trouble giving a direct marketer your phone number? You won't any more. Your Per Line Caller ID blocking will be banned, thanks to the FCC Order which preempts the privacy protections provided by 30 states. The order carefully enumerates the concerns of law-enforcement agencies which need per-line blocking to do their jobs. It mentions the need Women's shelters have for per-line blocking. (A matter of life and death on a day-to-day basis) It mentions that the customers who attempt to keep unlisted numbers confidential will be certainly be thwarted. (Can one train all kids and house-guests to dial *67 before every call? Can you remember to do it yourself?) But the Order dismisses all of these problems, and determines that the greatest good for the greater number will be accomplished if RBOC's can profit a bit more by selling our numbers and if the direct marketers have less trouble gathering them. The FCC doesn't seem to trust consumers to be able to decide whether they want per-line blocking. It praises the $40 cost of an automatic *67 dialer as an appropriate disincentive that will benefit the nation by discouraging people's choice of per-line blocking. There was one part of the order I was pretty happy about, until I read it. The FCC has also banned the sale of numbers gathered by 800-900 number subscribers using the ANI system, unless they obtain verbal consent. (Note that no rules prevent sale of numbers from the presumably blockable CNID system.) The problem is that the only enforcement of the rule seems to be that the requirement must be included in the fine print of the ANI sale contract between the common-carrier and the ANI subscriber. So it seems to be up to the common-carrier to enforce a rule which is contrary to their financial interest. How can a person who suffers from publication or sale of their number recover compensation? The FCC is soliciting comments, due May 18th in their Further Notice Of Proposed Rulemaking on two issues: o Whether the Commission should prescribe more precise educational requirements. o Whether and how the policies adopted on caller ID should be extended to other identification services, such as caller party name or CPNI. I can think of some suggestions ... (arl carlp@teleport.COM Public Access User --- Not affiliated with TECHbooks Public Access UNIX and Internet in PDX at (503) 220-0636 (1200/2400, N81) ------------------------------ From: suned1!srogers@elroy.jpl.nasa.gov (Steve Rogers) Subject: Mac Tie-in to T1 Line? Date: 5 May 94 20:06:58 GMT Organization: PHD NSWC, Port Hueneme, CA There is a dedicated T1 line used here for video teleconferencing and I would like to use it after hours transferring large data files from Mac-to-Mac at other sites that are also on this video net. Could anyone please tell me what kind of hardware I would need in order to interface between a Mac and the T1 line (incl. vendor names, ph. numbers, etc, if known)? Thanks in advance, Steve Rogers "Once we Americans roared MHIP Program like lions for liberty: now we bleat like sheep for security" - Norman Vincent Peale Port Hueneme Division, Naval Surface Warfare Center ------------------------------ From: Dave.Leibold@f730.n250.z1.fidonet.org (Dave Leibold) Date: 05 May 94 21:18:28 -0500 Subject: Toronto Utilities Consider Fibre Local Network Organization: FidoNet Nameserver/Gateway [from Bell News, 2 May 1994] Utilities envisage their own fibre optic network. Five Toronto-area electric utilities are weighing plans to build a fibre optic network to rival those of the telcos and the cablecos. Grouped under the banner of the Metro Utility Taskforce on Fibreoptic Services, the utilities plan to use a portion of the network's capacity to control the consumption and metering of electricity, and lease the unused capacity to those who desire access. Said Taskforce chairman Clive Chu: "We could probably build this kind of infrastructure cheaper than anyone else. We've got the poles and rights-of-way in place. We go out and service our lines on a regular basis anyway. All we have to do is run another cable." ------------------------------ From: Dave.Leibold@f730.n250.z1.fidonet.org (Dave Leibold) Date: 05 May 94 21:18:16 -0500 Subject: Directory formats to change Organization: FidoNet Nameserver/Gateway [from Bell News, 2 May 1994] New-look directories get OK from CRTC Our customers asked for it. We listened, and agreed. And so did the CRTC which just approved our proposal to change the presentation and improve the legibility of our telephone directories. The new-look directories will initially be introduced in Montreal in December 1994, and Toronto in April of 1995. Other directories may be converted at a future time. Two major format changes are involved. The first is the separation of residence and business customers into two distinct sections in the book. The second applies to the residence section of the book. The family name will be printed only once, in bold type. Each individual listing with the same family name (Larissa Jones, Larry Jones) will appear indented under that name. This indented style is both a cost saving as well as a legibility initiative. Splitting the residence and business listings is a revenue initiative (about $90,000 per annum for both Bell Ontario and Bell Quebec). There will be a charge of $2.65 a month for business customers who choose to purchase an additional listing in the residence section of the directory. A recent customer survey showed that of those surveyed, 73 per cent approved of the change to separate residential and business sections. Directories in many American markets already use this style. ------------------------------ From: hjung@acsu.buffalo.edu (Hanwook Jung) Subject: Prices on DFB Laser, fiber, Mobile switching centers, etc.. Organization: UB Date: Thu, 5 May 1994 16:04:25 GMT In future, as the subscription ratio increases to the wireless services, microcells( a few hundred meters in radius) will be deployed. Then, the subcarrier multipled opticla link can be used for the radio remoting purpose for the microcells. The major components to construting the subcarrier multiplexed optical link for the microcell are: . DFB laser( or other laser, LED ) . PIN detector . fiber and conduit . mobile switching center( exchanges, and real estate) . Base station equipment For those who involved in companies which produce any of above products, would you give me some approximate prices on those with some past years' prices also if available? It will be a great help to have some ideas on real world and products. I don't need the exact prices at this time to know reality. Thank you in advance. H.Jung hjung@eng.buffalo.edu ------------------------------ From: HayesR@uihc-telecomm-po.htc.uiowa.edu Date: 5 May 94 11:29 CST Subject: Mail Order Source for Cell Phone Accessories > Could someone knowledgeable supply me with the vital data on (mail > order for cell phone accessories) these companies? I received a catalog and brochures from: Hutton Communications 4112 Billy Mitchell Drive Dallas, TX 75244-2315 214-239-0580 Fax-214-239-5264 800-442-3811 They had quite a few cellular accessories. Randy Hayes randal-hayes@uiowa.edu ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V14 #205 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa01859; 6 May 94 17:09 EDT Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA11682; Fri, 6 May 94 13:36:10 CDT Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA11662; Fri, 6 May 94 13:36:03 CDT Date: Fri, 6 May 94 13:36:03 CDT From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Moderator) Message-Id: <9405061836.AA11662@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V14 #206 TELECOM Digest Fri, 6 May 94 13:36:00 CDT Volume 14 : Issue 206 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Re: Question About Digital Telephony and Delayed Dial Tone (Sean Peacock) Re: NANP and Switches (Paul A. Lee) Re: TCP/IP Over X.25/Datapac (Soren Aalto) Re: McCaw Cellular One (NYC) Introduces Anti-Fraud Program (Doug Reuben) Re: McCaw Cellular One (NYC) Introduces Anti-Fraud Program (Alan Gallatin) Re: McCaw Cellular One (NYC) Introduces Anti-Fraud Program (Erik Ramberg) Re: Can the FCC be Reached by FTP? (Bob Keller) Re: Can the FCC be Reached by FTP? (Michael D. Sullivan) TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of public service systems and networks including Compuserve and GEnie. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available at no charge to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu * The Digest is edited, published and compilation-copyrighted by Patrick Townson of Skokie, Illinois USA. You can reach us by postal mail, fax or phone at: 9457-D Niles Center Road Skokie, IL USA 60076 Phone: 708-329-0571 Fax: 708-329-0572 ** Article submission address only: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu ** Our archives are located at lcs.mit.edu and are available by using anonymous ftp. The archives can also be accessed using our email information service. For a copy of a helpful file explaining how to use the information service, just ask. ************************************************************************* * TELECOM Digest is partially funded by a grant from the * * International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in Geneva, Switzerland * * under the aegis of its Telecom Information Exchange Services (TIES) * * project. Views expressed herein should not be construed as represent-* * ing views of the ITU. * ************************************************************************* Additionally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help is important and appreciated. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: speacock@netcom.com (Sean P Peacock) Subject: Re: Question About Digital Telephony and Delayed Dial Tone Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 241-9760 guest) Date: Fri, 6 May 1994 07:40:38 GMT John Lundgren (jlundgre@kn.pacbell.com) wrote: > My understanding was at this time, if you have ISDN, or 2B+D, you have > a full channel all the way to the CO. That goes for POTS too, even if > your pots line runs into a SLIC channel bank at the corner. You still > get a dedicated 'bit in the bitstream'. It seems obvious to me that Not totally true. A SLC-96 for example, takes 96 POTS and places them on two T-1s with a third as backup. If 48 people are already using the SLC you'll get blocked. > this can't continue when the home gets a coax to the nearest > 'muxer', and then the muxer talks to the central office using fiber > optics. But still, if the telco expects to offer the mythical 500 > channels and all the other stuff too, then the bandwidth of all the > links to the CO, and beyond will have to be increased. To offer T1 to > the home, where the home already has ISDN, would mean an increase in > bandwidth of approximatly 12. That doesn't sound unreasonable, and > could be done by the telco. Possibly, however there are some costs to be dealt with. Some COs run 50Kft of wire from CO to demarc on pots lines. ISDN is limited to 18Kft without repeaters, T-1 is only 5-6Kft between repeaters. T-1 requires 2 pair instead of 1. Due to the explosion of 2nd lines, teen lines, fax lines etc many areas are out of copper pairs and are going to SLCs. Providing T-1 to the home would only make things worse. And for really high bandwidth traffic (video etc) T-1s arent all that fast. A cd-rom plays at 150KB/sec minimum Converting that into bits/sec is 1.2 Mbit/sec or 77% of the T-1 used for just 1 channel of CD quality audio/MPEG encoded movie. Two TVs, two T-1s not good. With toll-quality audio being trivial in comparison to the data rates required by these newer apps, (64Kbps compressible down to 16Kbps or less depending on quality desired) it may be realistic to expect dedicated channels for phone audio on the fiber/coax systems of the future so that you're not competiting with net overloading from joe sixpack's download of the playboy movie while trying to call 911. Sean ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 6 May 1994 09:19:57 -0400 Subject: Re: NANP and Switches From: Paul A. Lee Organization: Woolworth Corporation In TELECOM Digest V14 #197, James Slupsky writes: > Firstly, if you are using an access code to dial outside calls (such as > "9"), then your software will not care what digits are dialed after that. That's untrue in many switches. Dialing "9" is often programmed as access to the switch's Least Cost Routing routine. Depending on the architecture and programming of the switch -- and even if dial tone is returned to the caller after dialing "9" -- the digits following the "9" may be simply captured for analysis by the restriction and LCR routines within the PBX, while the PBX itself returns dial tone to the caller. Only after the PBX analyzes and authorizes the dial string will it select (based on LCR) and sieze a trunk and send the dialed digits (or a translation of the dialed digits). > An exception is if your local area gets an NXX ... that has a "1" or a "0" > as the second digit. ... This is not a very large possibility, since it > will take time for telco's to introduce these NXX's. CO codes in the N0/1X range have been around for some time, especially in dense metropolitan NPAs, such as 212, 213, 312, 415, 202, etc.. > For Toll calls, you would not have this problem. Just tell all the users > that Toll calls MUST be 10 digits, and you MUST use a "1" in front of the 10 > digits. (so a typical toll call might look like -assuming you access > outgoing trunks using "9"- "9 1 520 447 5003". Your switch will cheerfully > pass "1 520 447 5003" to the serving CO. Several variables can act to contravene such a broad assupmtion. How does the dialing plan of the serving telco work for toll calls? Is it HNPA=7D and FNPA=1+10D, or must all toll calls be sent 1+10D? What kind of lookup and translation can the PBX perform for LCR and dial string resolution? With the right PBX capabilities and programming, a lot of other possibilities exist. Ensuring the desired toll restriction and call routing, as well as relieving callers of unnecessary dialing, can be accomplished only with careful analysis of a site's local calling area and dialing plan. > It is unlikely that you will run into NXX codes using a "1" or "0" as the > second digit for some time to come. Not true -- see above. The phone systems that will be impacted by interchangeable area codes are those that perform least cost routing and/or toll restriction. The LCR software of many PBXs requires the "1N0/1X" pattern of initial digits to locate the area code within the dial string, along with a table holding area codes and routing codes. The toll restriction software of many PBXs requires an initial "1" to determine whether the call is a toll call. Both of those assumptions are being invalidated. Different software routines, larger tables, more memory, and more processor power are going to be needed in many PBXs to handle the complexity left by the destruction of those assumptions. _Exactly_ how that complexity affects a particular model of PBX at a particular location is the crucial question. The answers will vary widely, and will be accurately determined only with careful, individual analysis. Paul A. Lee Voice 414 357-1409 Telecommunications Analyst FAX 414 357-1450 Woolworth Corporation CompuServe 70353,566 INTERNET ------------------------------ From: soren@goofy.sun.ac.za (Soren Aalto) Subject: Re: TCP/IP Over X.25/Datapac Date: 5 May 1994 15:28:28 GMT Organization: University of Stellenbosch > In article , Gordon Sawatzky mb.ca> wrote: >> Does anyone know of products that allow TCP/IP over X.25 (datapac) >> connections for Windows? > I don't know of any for Windows, as PCs in general tend to have lousy > serial interfaces and synchronous cards are generally very expensive > (cheaper to build 'em yourself if you have the EE expertise). > However, IP has been running over X.25 for a LONG time now, so it > wouldn't surprise me if you could dig up someone who has done it. For DOS/Windows TCP/X.25, what you need is an X.25 card and a packet driver that supports it. The company I am working for has developed an intelligent (their term, not mine) X.25 card and we have written an RFC-1356 (Multiprotocol Interconnect over something-or-other) SLIP class packet driver for it. The packet driver allows you to associate different X.25 connections (SVC to a given X.121 address or a PVC) with a different SLIP interfaces--I'm not explaining this well, so the example: As you would configure a normal ethernet packet driver for a given S/W interrupt, i.e. wd8003e 0x70 ... loads the wd8003e driver & provides it's API interface on S/W int 0x70, with our driver you can provide interfaces on several S/W interrupts and each interface will correspond to a different X.25 VC, typically to different X.121 addresses. I.e., we can configure it so that int 0x63 --> 12111196 int 0x64 --> 1212234260 int 0x65 --> 121012541 (although at the moment each of these addresses has a XXX-pad sitting on it here and the calls made by the packet driver will be cleared). Anyway, this packet driver will encapsulate IP traffic in accordance with RFC1356 & so will talk to most other IP routers that talk X.25. You can run DOS applications over this or you can run Trumpet Winsock over this as well. The main reason people wouldn't typically do this is that you would have a single user machine monopolizing an entire X.25 port -- and these tend to cost a fair bit/month. What is more popular is to use this card in a PC-based router & use the router to connect a LAN to the Internet via X.25. There are a few PC routers on the S. African commercial Internet doing this at the moment. I must add that the same card we use for X.25 works for frame relay (the firmware is downloadable at runtime) and we have a similar packet driver that encapsulates IP (or other protocols) over several frame relay PVCs. Several PC routers were also running this way over 64Kbit/sec frame relay links here in S.A., although these have tended to be replaced by dinkum Cisco and Wellfleet routers as most of the commercial organisations with 64K access are service providers. I don't know what is considered horribly expensive -- and I can't be held to a quote (other people entirely that _pretend_ to sell the things), but I guess that our card sells in the R2000 -- R3000 range. Now what that means in real money (is about 150 -- 200 fresh chickens?) is US$600 -- 900, or about the before tax salary of the better paid school teachers here in S.A. Feel free to contact my by mail if either interested or disinterested (as I mostly am myself) ... Soren Aalto (commercially known as--but they don't pay for the mail, I do.) Linkdata Cape Town, S. Africa ------------------------------ From: dreuben@netcom.com (Cid Technologies) Subject: Re: McCaw Cellular One (NYC) Introduces Anti-Fraud Program Date: Fri, 6 May 1994 02:27:03 PDT Yesterday, amg@panix.com (Alan M. Gallatin) wrote: > If you dial *56 + PIN (SND) the fraud protection is turned on. > Cellular One will refuse to complete any calls from that phone EXCEPT > 611 and 911. Incoming calls, however, still work. Dialing *560 + PIN > (SND) releases the phone and allows it to make calls. This is, of > course, distinct from the lock feature of the phone, itself. > Apparently, many (though not all) roaming areas work with this fraud > protection program. According to McCaw Cellular One, if the roaming > area does NOT understand the *56 and *560 codes, calls will go through > without a problem. Of course, they want to see as many roaming areas > cooperating :-) This is not true at all! If the area you ar roaming in is NOT connected to CO/NY, THEN it is *likely* that the features will be ignored. Otherwise, if you roam into Connecticut or New Jersey, you will NOT be able to make calls, and you will NOT be able to use your features like Call-Forwarding (an of course Three-Way ... forget Call-Waiting, it won't work there anyhow, regardless of what they say :( ) When my phone was cloned, they put the *56/*560 protection feature on it, and I thought it was a great idea. This was before they had the 20-minute time-out period - I think I wouldn't want to have to hit *560 each time my phone was off for more than 20 minutes. However, when I went to CT (SID 00119) or the ComCast/NJ systems (SIDs 00173, 00575, 01487), UNLESS I turned off fraud-protection (ie, told the switch "Let me make calls without having to enter my "unprotect" code), when I tried to make a call from CT or NJ, or use a Call-Forwarding feature, I could not do so. Since the EMXs in CT and NJ are connected to the Ericsson in NY, they "look" to NY to see what the NY subscriber is allowed to "do" while roaming in CT or NJ. If you forgot to turn protection "Off", ie, "unprotect" your phone PRIOR to leaving the NY/00025 system, too bad! The NY switch would tell the NJ or CT switch "Sorry, this guy can't make outgoing calls, deny him!", and that's that! Same holds true for Call-Forwarding. Not that this was bad enough, but then they came up with this 20-minute deal where if you don't register in THEIR switch in 20 minutes you get denied outbound service and forwarding, so even if you do "unprotect" your phone before leaving the NY system and roaming to the CT or NJ systems, after 20 minutes out of NY you will be denied, and there is NOTHING you can do to make calls, short of calling CO/NY (from where? your carphone won't work!). Note that even though Philly is an EMX switch, it's on the NACN (when they feel like it -- don't expect it to work too well at night...). So *56 and *560 usually work. However, I've noticed recently that Philly is doing a lot of switch work on weekends, and *XX/*XXX codes won't work. Add this to CO/NY's nighttime switch work, and there are significant periods of time where your phone may not be able to make outgoing calls. Additionally, even when roaming in an NACN market, the * codes don't always well -- I found that the *56/*560 didn't work from LA at all, which is what promulgated me finally to tell them to just take it off my account already. I think they may want to fix this so that *56/*560 works only for the NY system, but I think that the way the links are set up to CmCast and Metro Mobile/Bell Atlantic this may not be so easy to do. If the roaming system you are in has no connection with CO/NY in terms of call-delivery and stuff like that, the *56/*560 shouldn't make a difference. Thus, if you roamed to Orange County (where you pay ONLY your home airtime rates, no daily surcharge or what I'm sure McCaw thinks is a *very generous* $.99 per min NACN charge, which is a ridiculous price to pay to roam), you would have no problem completing calls, but if you drove over to CT, you'd have no way of entering a *560 and thus no way of placing outgoing calls. (They may have fixed this in the past few months, but I doubt it ...) > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Are we to assume then that since the > lockout occurs automatically twenty minutes after the last use of the > phone that when one starts out each morning it is necessary to use the > *560 unlock thing as part of making the first call of the day? PAT] Well, if you leave your phone on all night to see if anyone called, no. But generally this is correct -- if the switch does not see you register (NOT use, just register autonomously), after 20 minutes you gotta "unprotect" yourself all over again. BTW, on a different issue, CO/SF (also McCaw) has this new policy where you can check your VM for free for ten seconds to see if anyone has left messages. If you listen to them for more than ten seconds, you pay airtime, but you never pay airtime for land retrieval or when a caller deposits a message or just hangs up. A much better policy in my mind than PAYING to have people hang up on your voicemail like GTE Mobilnet does. Maybe NY should think about something similar ... (And NO, GTE has not fixed the "caller pays to hear a busy/unanswered signal" problem yet, although they are now aware of it, and NO, GTE/SF hasn't been able to get Call Waiting to work in the Motorola systems owned by Pac*Bell or Air-Head cellular or whatever they call themselves now ...) Doug CID Technologies (203) 499-5221 ------------------------------ From: amg@panix.com (Alan M. Gallatin) Subject: Re: McCaw Cellular One (NYC) Introduces Anti-Fraud Program Date: 5 May 1994 23:14:41 -0400 Organization: PANIX Public Access Internet and Unix, NYC In a previous article, I wrote about McCaw Cellular's anti-fraud feature which turns itself on after 20 minutes of your phone being off ... Following this, our Moderator noted: > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Are we to assume then that since the > lockout occurs automatically twenty minutes after the last use of the > phone that when one starts out each morning it is necessary to use the > *560 unlock thing as part of making the first call of the day? PAT] Yes ... according to Cell One, once you turn on the phone, you need to dial the unlock code -- *560 + PIN (SND) -- before making your first call. In that this only needs to be done before the first call and since this can be simplified greatly via most phones' speed dialing, Cellular One tries to convince us that this isn't really an inconvenience. I'm apt to agree. Incidentally, I forgot to mention in my previous post: This is not a mandatory feature of the phone service. You only have it if you ask for it. There is, of course, no charge for it. So far, the only area I know of that offers this feature is McCaw's NY/NJ market. I believe that other McCaw Cellular One markets are also instituting the same program, but I'm just not sure. Anyone know of another company doing the same thing? Alan M. Gallatin amg@panix.com amg@israel.nysernet.org amg@jerusalem1.datasrv.co.il ------------------------------ From: erik_ramberg@SMTP.esl.com (Erik Ramberg) Subject: Re: McCaw Cellular One (NYC) Introduces Anti-Fraud Program Date: 5 May 1994 18:59:49 GMT Organization: ESL Inc. In article , amg@panix.com (Alan M. Gallatin) wrote: > Here's a new one ... saw a brochure for this at a Cellular One center > on Long Island yesterday. > In an effort to thwart would-be counterfeit phone users, Cellular One > just started up an anti-fraud program. A customer participating will > simply pick a four digit PIN. Usage is something like this: > If you dial *56 + PIN (SND) the fraud protection is turned on. > Cellular One will refuse to complete any calls from that phone EXCEPT > 611 and 911. Incoming calls, however, still work. Dialing *560 + PIN > (SND) releases the phone and allows it to make calls. This is, of > course, distinct from the lock feature of the phone, itself. ...stuff deleted > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Are we to assume then that since the > lockout occurs automatically twenty minutes after the last use of the > phone that when one starts out each morning it is necessary to use the > *560 unlock thing as part of making the first call of the day? PAT] Yes ... but also keep in mind how easy this scheme is to circumvent ... albeit a bit less likely ... all the criminal needs to do is to track all the pin entries in the area (which also come with their MIN ESN's) and they've got the new code. Essentially all that's been done is to extend the ESN to some more digits, and send these digits out a bit less often. Erik ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 6 May 1994 08:34:03 EDT From: Bob Keller Reply-To: Bob Keller Subject: Re: Can the FCC be Reached by FTP? breit@MR.Net asked: > Does anyone know if the FCC maintains a public ftp site? You can FTP or Gopher to the FCC: "ftp ftp.fcc.gov" or "gopher fcc.gov". Once you get connected to the site, change to the /pub directory and look around. This site is still quite new and "under construction" so don't expect a great depth of information just yet. Here is a list of the subdirectories under /pub: Daily_Business Daily_Digest Events News_Releases Notices Orders Panel_Discussions Public_Notices Reports Speeches The FCC plans eventually to set up a mail reflector and/or mailing list. Until then, I am maintaining a collection of the five most recent FCC Daily Digests in my .plan file and update it daily. You can get this file at any time by fingering my account: "finger rjk@telcomlaw.com". If you don't have finger you can use one of the e-mail finger servers. For example, e-mail to "jfesler@netcom.com" with "#finger rjk@telcomlaw.com" in the subject line (don't include the quote marks and make sure to start the subject line with #), and you will receive the Digests by e-mail response. Bob Keller Robert J. Keller, P.C. Tel +1 301.229.5208 rjk@telcomlaw.com Federal Telecommunications Law Fax +1 301.229.6875 ------------------------------ From: mds@access.digex.net (Michael D. Sullivan) Subject: Re: Can the FCC be Reached by FTP? Date: 6 May 1994 01:45:44 -0400 Organization: Express Access Online Communications, Greenbelt, MD USA breit@MR.Net writes: > Does anyone know if the FCC maintains a public ftp site? ftp.fcc.gov is accessible by anonymous ftp. At present, the only things posted are news releases and speeches, pretty much. Rules, texts of decisions, and public notices are not yet online (if they ever will be). > I would like to research more information on "Tariff 12" pricing for > long distance services. One of my clients is interested in renego- > tiating their rates. We had discussed several options including > using a marketing agent for "Option 51 - EPSCS" as we have seen it > referenced many times. The FCC ftp site won't help for this. Michael D. Sullivan | INTERNET E-MAIL TO: |also: avogadro@well.sf.ca.us Washington, D.C. | mds@access.digex.net | 74160.1134@compuserve.com ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V14 #206 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa02710; 6 May 94 18:42 EDT Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA14517; Fri, 6 May 94 15:12:14 CDT Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA14508; Fri, 6 May 94 15:12:12 CDT Date: Fri, 6 May 94 15:12:12 CDT From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Moderator) Message-Id: <9405062012.AA14508@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V14 #207 TELECOM Digest Fri, 6 May 94 15:12:00 CDT Volume 14 : Issue 207 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson GSM/DECT Radio Emissions (Stewart Fist) Help: Telecom/Radio Equipment Firm Addresses (Christoph Berger) Teleglobe Ambitions (Toronto Star via Dave Leibold) AT&T Collect Calling Comes to Canada (Dave Leibold) Wireless Local Loop in Mexico (Alex Cena) LAPD, Q.931 Software Vendors (Joel Estes) Need Date of First Undersea Cable (Bill Brasuell) Remote Point-of-Presence (Dave Bell) PEP Pager Protocol Software Information Wanted (Mathias Koerber) Link Two LANs Over Two Wire Leased Line? (Alfredo E. Cotroneo) I Have Some Basic Telecom Questions - Help! (domet@ucbeh.san.uc.edu) Northern Telecom Gets Colombia Contract (Dave Leibold) Series 5 Digital Loop Carrier System (DLC) (Chen Xie) ISDN via Microwave Multipoint (Omar Jennings) Re: Cellular Call Forwarding (Shawn Gordhamer) Re: Cellular Call Forwarding (Paul Barnett) Re: Cellular Phone Abuse (Aamer Soomro) Re: Cellular Phone Abuse (John R. Levine) Lastest Update on Info Superhighway Seminar (Roy Kerwood) TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of public service systems and networks including Compuserve and GEnie. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available at no charge to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu * The Digest is edited, published and compilation-copyrighted by Patrick Townson of Skokie, Illinois USA. You can reach us by postal mail, fax or phone at: 9457-D Niles Center Road Skokie, IL USA 60076 Phone: 708-329-0571 Fax: 708-329-0572 ** Article submission address only: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu ** Our archives are located at lcs.mit.edu and are available by using anonymous ftp. The archives can also be accessed using our email information service. For a copy of a helpful file explaining how to use the information service, just ask. ************************************************************************* * TELECOM Digest is partially funded by a grant from the * * International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in Geneva, Switzerland * * under the aegis of its Telecom Information Exchange Services (TIES) * * project. Views expressed herein should not be construed as represent-* * ing views of the ITU. * ************************************************************************* Additionally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help is important and appreciated. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: 05 May 94 08:32:57 EDT From: Stewart Fist <100033.2145@CompuServe.COM> Subject: GSM/DECT Radio Emissions The European Commission is about to issue a directive to limit the amount of EMI that digital phones can produce. The EC is said to be compiling results from a number of studies on the problem, in association with a number of universities. The World Health Organization is also involved in looking at the results and preparing recommendations. The most probable course of action is for the EC to pass the problem over to CENELEC to write up the actual standards. So far they have concentrated on creating 'immunity' standards (shielding for existing equipment) rather than emission standards for the producers of the radio pollution. This looks like a sea change in their thinking. Has anyone got more information on any of this? I'd be very interested to know who is involved, and what has been found, and what is being proposed. ------------------------------ From: tfa589@hp1.uni-rostock.de (Christoph Berger) Subject: Help: Telecom/Radio Equipment Firm Addresses Date: 5 May 1994 13:10:14 GMT Organization: University of Rostock (Germany) Hello, I am looking for adresses of firms in the area of telecommunication systems and radio equipment in the USA or Canada. I'm a German student in telecom and radiotechnic and I want to get a practical training in a North American company. It would be nice if someone can help me. e-mail to tfa589@hp1.uni-rostock.de christoph berger, friedrich-engels-platz 1, rostock, 18055, germany ------------------------------ From: Dave.Leibold@f730.n250.z1.fidonet.org (Dave Leibold) Date: 05 May 94 21:18:04 -0500 Subject: Teleglobe Ambitions Organization: FidoNet Nameserver/Gateway {The Toronto Star} reported 4 May 94 of Teleglobe's Montreal annual meeting. Buoyed by a record net income last year, recovering from the previous year's loss, Chair/CEO Charles Sirois said "Teleglobe's goal is to triple its traffic volume by 1998, thereby advancing from seventh to third place among the world's intercontinental carriers." ------------------------------ From: Dave.Leibold@f730.n250.z1.fidonet.org (Dave Leibold) Date: 05 May 94 21:34:19 -0500 Subject: AT&T Collect Calling Comes to Canada Organization: FidoNet Nameserver/Gateway AT&T just announced the availability of its 1 800 CALL-ATT service in Canada. This now allows Canadian callers to place collect calls to U.S. destinations via AT&T. An introductory offer gives a 20% discount to the called party's charges, at least for the next several weeks. MCI's 1 800 COLLECT is still unavailable in Canada. There is a recording which says the service is hoped to be available "later this summer" -- a recording which is apparently still in place from *last* summer. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 05 May 94 14:00:46 EST From: Alex Cena Subject: Wireless Local Loop in Mexico "Northern Telecom Ltd. (NT) said it has signed a supply agreement with Grupo IUSACELL, the largest non-telco cellular operator in Mexico, to deploy the infrastructure for a nationwide basic telephony network. The company said the supply agreement is intended to be $330 million (U.S.) over three years and calls for Northern Telecom to supply innovative digital wireless technology based on a time division multiple access (TDMA) fixed wireless access network for Grupo IUSACELL ..." Does anyone have have additional details on this contract or service? o Deployment schedule o # of Subscribers that will be using the system o Where will most of the equipment be deployed o Where were the trials held and feedback from the trials o Cost of the service Thanks in Advance, Alex M. Cena, acena@lehman.com Telecom Equipment Analyst Lehman Brothers 200 Vesey Street, 14th Fl New York, NY 10285 (P) 212-526-2499 (F) 212-619-6826 ------------------------------ From: iex!estes@uunet.UU.NET (Joel Estes) Subject: LAPD, Q.931 Software Vendors Organization: iex Date: Thu, 5 May 1994 20:09:07 GMT I am looking for vendors of software for Q.931 and LAPD applications. Any suggestions? Please send e-mail to me directly. Regardz(tm), Joel Estes estes@iex.com ------------------------------ From: Brasuell_Bill@tandem.com (Bill Brasuell) Subject: Need Date of First Undersea Cable Organization: Tandem Computers Inc. Date: Thu, 5 May 1994 18:29:35 GMT Does anyone know the date of the first undersea cable between the USA and Europe/UK? In return I'll supply a bit of trivia, in 1876 it cost $7.50 per word to send a cablegram between New York and Buenos Aires. Bill Brasuell "This is cool." Abraham Lincoln Feb.1860 Tandem Computers Inc. Frequently quoted by today's kids. ------------------------------ From: dbell@cup.portal.com Subject: Remote Point-of-Presence Date: Thu, 5 May 94 17:54:58 PDT Is there a procedure whereby I can acquire a number, local to a remote exchange, from my home area? Specifically, I want to set up a line, either in my own place of business in California, or, alternatively, in the state of Pennsylvania, which can give me a local point of access in PA. I should be able to have local calls made from PA. to my p-o-p number forwarded to my California number, and likewise, be able to place calls out of the Pennsylvania line, so that they originate in PA. Naturally, I would incur any toll charges associated with the forwarding in either direction. Can this be done by subscribing to a PA telco, and activating (remotely!) call forwarding? Can this be done with a Pacific Telephone line, locally? Thanks for any information available! I'll watch here for replies, but would appreciate an email note as well ... Dave dbell@cup.portal.com [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: The problem with remote call forwarding is that it only handles incoming calls (in PA) outbound to CA. You can arrange this with some telco in PA; they will give you a number there which terminates only in the desired central office and calls to that number will be forwarded at your expense by direct dialing to California. If you want to work it the other way around, where you in California can make outgoing *local* calls to people in Pennsylvania then you need a Foreign Exchange line. These have largely fallen into disuse in recent years because of the inexpensive nature of long distance calls and the use of WATS lines, remote call forwarding, etc, but they are available. Again you would need to contact the local telco in the place in Pennsylvania of your choice and specifically request Foreign Exchange (known as FX) service. They might tell you your local telco in California has to initiate the request. What will happen literally is that a pair of wires from the selected place in PA will be connected permanently to a phone at your premises in California. When you lift the receiver on that phone, the dial tone you hear will be coming to you direct from PA ... and the calls you make will be handled on a 'local' basis from the place where it is connected in PA. Whether PA or CA is the originator of the request, the two telcos will coordinate it and your local telco in CA will still be the company providing the wires to you from your local central office (where the PA telco will drop the wires coming to you). FX service is -- no kidding here! -- quite expensive. Your permanent, full time wired line from PA will cost you many hundreds of dollars per month fixed rate, and of course you will additionally pay whatever charges apply for a business in PA with a phone there as well. Most likely the billing will all come from your local telco for the whole thing with your local telco doing inter- company accounting/billing with the PA telco, AT&T and whoever else in the middle physically owns the wires and interim switches, etc. The thing with FX is, you've got to be able to justify the cost with *lots* of traffic ... like keeping that line loaded several hours per day minimum. If you can keep the line loaded with traffic several hours per day it will break even; but less than that, you'll find that DDD over the public network costs a lot less. People in PA who dial your 'local' number will in fact unwittingly ring your phone in CA for the price of a local (to them) call; ditto you in reverse. You cannot count evening/overnight/weekend hours in the calculations regards traffic. Nothing beats weekend rates. That several hours of traffic daily has to come from mid-day business hours. Another alternative would be to find an answering service in PA which would hang a call diverter on the wall for you and let you dial into it via DDD only to outdial through the diverter on a local basis. Of course phreaking is rampant; anyone else who finds the diverter can do the same thing, god forbid *their* calls were only local ... ... But now you would be paying (1) a long distance call, (2) a local call and/or local service fees to PA telco, (3) some fee to the answering service each month and (4) your 'dues' to the United Hackerphreaks of America just to get your physical presence there. My thinking is you would be better off with remote call forwarding inbound from PA with a listing in the local PA phone directory while making your outgoing calls DDD from California and glossing over the fact that you are actually in California unless the called party specifically asks your location. Remote call forwarding will cost you $20-30 per path/month out of Pennsylvania plus the per minute DDD rate in effect at the time the call is received. This is much less expensive than FX unless you are running a phone intensive operation like customer service or a credit/collection center or telemarketing, etc. PAT] ------------------------------ From: mathias@solomon.technet.sg (Mathias Koerber) Subject: PEP Pager Protocol Software Information Wanted Date: 6 May 1994 09:22:40 GMT Organization: TECHNET, Singapore Reply-To: Mathias.Koerber@swi.com.sg Where can I get info/src about the pep protocol for pagers? I couldn't find a FAQ. Mathias Koerber | Tel: +65 / 778 00 66 x 29 SW International Systems Pte Ltd | Fax: +65 / 777 94 01 14 Science Park Drive #04-01 The Maxwell | e-mail: Mathias.Koerber@swi.com.sg Singapore 0511 | mathias@solomon.technet.sg ------------------------------ From: alfredo@quickt2.it12.bull.it (Alfredo E. Cotroneo) Subject: Link Two LANs Over Two Wire Leased Line? Date: Fri, 6 May 94 15:50:28 MET DST I am looking for a solution to link two Windows for Workgroup LANS which are 800 metres distant from each other over a (possibly) two wire leased line. The line is just a wire installed by the telephone company and has electrical continuity, if that matters. An alternative would be to have just file transfer between two PCs, if network connection is impractical, too expensive or would strictly require four wires. Current modem technology at 28kbits (+ with compression) or ISDN at 64/128kbit would be too slow since the data to transfer may be in the range of one or two Gbytes per day. (BTW: Did anybody hear of ISDN over a leased line, is that possible?) An alternative to the network connection (bridge?) would be to have just file transfer between two PCs, if that is possible somehow at speeds >= 1Mbit over two wires at 800 metres? Any pointer to specific products (HW and SW), phones, faxes, of suppliers, etc. will be gladly appreciated. Please answer directly, since I am not getting newsfeeds on a regular basis, and if there is interest I will summarize. Thank you, Alfredo E. Cotroneo, Milano, Italy E-mail : 100020.1013@compuserve.com fax: +39-2-706 38 151, ph: +39-2-266 6971 ------------------------------ From: domet@ucbeh.san.uc.edu Subject: I Have Some Basic Telecom Questions: HELP! Date: 6 May 94 14:33:06 EST Organization: University of Cincinnati I recently posted a message requesting help with Telecom ACRONYMS. The response to my message was huge and I thank everyone who responded with suggestions. I am still researching the area of Telecom and have learned a lot in the past few weeks. I obtained Newton's Telecom Dictionary which is a BIG help. I still am having trouble with a few topics. I am aware of what many are but do not know enough about Telecomm to understand many of the technical descriptions. 1.) Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN) concept and the basic (2B+D) service. 2.) Broadband ISDN (BISDN) concept. 3.) National ISDN-1. I have found a lot on ISDN but not much that talks about National ISDN-1. At least not in a way I can understand. 4.) Concept of circuit switching. Major steps involved in call setup and take down. 5.) How do you determine/choose a packet size? 6.) Instead of using a bridge to connect two identical networks, why don't system developers just create one larger network? I realize people don't always have the time to sit and answer questions so if you could expand on even ONE of these topics, I would really appr@cup.portal.com)RN~ eciate it. ANY ANSWERS WOULD BE APPRECIATED. In return, I am going to create a FAQ of all basic questions that I answer or get answers to. It will hopefully lessen the amount of questions asked. Luke [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: You may want to check out the FAQ for this group. The telecom Frequently Asked Questions file is sent out automatically to each new subscriber to the mailing list and is also posted on comp.dcom.telecom from time to time. In addition you can get a copy from the Telecom Archives at lcs.mit.edu by anonymous ftp or email server. PAT] ------------------------------ From: Dave.Leibold@f730.n250.z1.fidonet.org (Dave Leibold) Date: 05 May 94 22:11:36 -0500 Subject: Northern Telecom gets Colombia contract Organization: FidoNet Nameserver/Gateway [from Bell News, 2 May 1994] Nortel to install digital network in Colombia. Northern Telecom, our sister company in the BCE family, has landed its largest contract in Latin America with the signing of a $350 million deal to install a digital phone network in Colombia. The contract includes 205,000 digital phone lines in ten regions of Colombia as well as transmission equipment and microwave systems. The agreement follows one signed only weeks earlier by Bell Canada International to provide cellular phone service to the eastern region of Colombia, including the capital, Bogota. ------------------------------ From: chenxie@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Chen Xie) Subject: Series 5 Digital Loop Carrier System (DLC) Date: 6 May 1994 12:25:40 -0500 Organization: The University of Texas - Austin Hi Folks: I am looking to purchase large quantity of Series 5 DLC systems. Could somebody tell me who are the players out there besides AT&T? Small manufacturers are acceptable as long as their products are compliant to the standards. Any other information will also be appreciated. Chen Xie ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 6 May 1994 13:32:42 EDT From: Omar Jennings Subject: ISDN via Microwave Multipoint We are interested in any work being done in the area of the (B-ISDN) user connection via wireless in the microwave bands above 2 gHz. Any leads would be appreciated. ------------------------------ From: shawnlg@netcom.com (Shawn Gordhamer) Subject: Re: Cellular Call Forwarding Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 241-9760 guest) Date: Thu, 5 May 1994 09:09:32 GMT amg@panix.com (Alan M. Gallatin) writes: > What company is it that doesn't charge anything on the forwarded call? Cellular One in Rochester, MN does not charge anything for forwarding calls. However, I haven't seen any way to use call forwarding to make free long distance calls, and I've tried :). Our coverage spans two area codes, so if someone in the 612 area code calls me on my cell phone, there is no LD charge (I'm in 507). However, if I call him from my cell phone or via call forwarding, there is a LD charge. Shawn Gordhamer shawnlg@netcom.com Rochester, Minnesota USA ------------------------------ From: barnett@convex.com (Paul Barnett) Subject: Re: Cellular Call Forwarding Date: 5 May 94 14:08:11 GMT Organization: CONVEX News Network, Engineering (cnn.eng), Richardson, Tx USA In amg@panix.com (Alan M. Gallatin) writes: > What company is it that doesn't charge anything on the forwarded call? Southwestern Bell Mobile Systems. Except, in the Dallas Ft. Worth area, when the number that the call is being forwarded to is a different area code that is normally NOT long-distance, the prevailing airtime rate is charged. This is a little hard to explain. In D/FW, the mobile phone numbers are 'metro' numbers, which can be called from anywhere in Dallas, Ft. Worth, and suburbs (most of the 214 and 817 area codes), without a long-distance toll charge. Conversely, through some magic I only vaguely understand, SBMS will place cellular phone calls to land phones anywhere in the the D/FW 'home' market (it is quite large) without charging a long-distance toll ... airtime only. I believe Cellular One (the A-side provider in D/FW) has a similar policy. And, unless they have changed it in the past year, US West Cellular does not charge air-time or any other fees on locally forwarded calls in the Mpls-St. Paul service area. Paul Barnett Convex Computer Corp. MPP OS Development Richardson, TX ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 5 May 94 13:21:16 EDT From: asoomro@bass.gmu.edu (Aamer Soomro) Subject: Re: Cellular Phone Abuse In article jharan@cwa.com writes: > ... but why don't the cellular providers use a more robust > authentication service. Your cellular phone would contain an > encription key that would also be known to the cellular provider. When > your phone went off hook, it would send its telephone number. The > provider would look up your number to get your key and send you some > random sequence of digits which would vary from call to call. Your > phone would take the sequence of digits, use its key to encode them > and return them to the provider. Since the provider has your key, it > can perform the same encription. If the encoded data that was returned > doesn't match what the provider's copy of the key encripts, then its > because the calling phone doesn't have the right key and the call is > dropped. The key is never transmitted so the crook would have to > steal the physical phone to steal the service. To me this seems hitting pretty close to the Clipper Chip controversy. All the service providers and cell phone manufactures would have to conform to a standard encryption, so that the cell phones could be used with any carrier service. The encryption keys analogous to the phone numbers would be another database to be maintained by the service providers. Would it be feasable to complicate the registeration process by introducing two encryption steps and a comparisson step along with two steps for digit transmission? Aamer Soomro George Mason University Fairfax, Virginia. USA ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 6 May 94 12:36 EDT From: johnl@iecc.com (John R Levine) Subject: Re: Cellular Phone Abuse Organization: I.E.C.C., Cambridge, Mass. > Does anybody have any insights as to why it doesn't work this way > [with per-phone challenge-response passwords] today? The AMPS system in use in the U.S. was designed over a decade ago, and has become much more popular than even the most optimistic forecasts predicted. There's a balance between cost and function, and ten years ago the cost of adding the security features would have been quite high, and the advantage, given the relatively modest popularity they expected, low. On the other hand, if the next round of cell phones (CDMA or TDMA) don't include effective security features, that's just stupid. Regards, John Levine, johnl@iecc.com, jlevine@delphi.com, 1037498@mcimail.com ------------------------------ From: Roy_Kerwood@mindlink.bc.ca (Roy Kerwood) Subject: Lastest Update on Info Superhighway Seminar Date: Thu, 05 May 94 20:18:15 -0700 (PDT) Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: This is a revised copy of the notice posted here earlier this week which did not have all the details. PAT] All seats are reserved and must be purchased in advance. THE 1st TRAVELLERS GUIDE TO THE INFO SUPERHIGHWAY At Hotel Vancouver June 24, 1994 Vancouver, BC Canada All the information you need to know about the INFO SUPERHIGHWAY!! Keynote Addresses Respected professionals involved with the Info Superhighway will provide detailed info on the superhighway and a personalized ROAD MAP for you so you or your company can get onto the SUPERHIGHWAY and get there at the highest speed. Hands on displays of the latest Communications Software and hardware. Video Tele-Conference. On line Databases . WORLDWIDE Internet Connections. World Wide Information access. You will be part of the highest level of the Information SUPERHIGHWAY and have access to the leading edge of the latest Communications Technologies. Lectures on The Information Superhighway. Display by hardware, Software, Communications, Information Suppliers. Timing: 8:00 - Registration of attendees; explore exhibits 8:30 - Introduction to show by Roy Kerwood 8:45 - Honorable Robin Blencoe Minister of Government services and Minister responsible for Sport and The Commonwealth Games been invited to give a keynote address. 9:10 - Mr AF Khan of AF Khan & Assosciates will speak on Voice call processing remote data processing Interfacing to Host Database and I.V.R. Tooolkit as well as Interactive Fax/Records Management. 10:00 - BC Systems Corporation will participate by discussing what government is doing today to support the public and private sectors access to the information highway and could also discuss some future plans which are on the drawing board. 10:20 - Mr. Mike Patterson, Internet expert informs audience of latest developments in the Superhighway from his perspective and future visions in panel format. 11:00 - Mr. Hung Vu of Fonorola will speak on recent developments in data-communications from a providers point of view and will discuss future directions for the information networks. 11:30 - Mr. Mark Watson Of Westel Tele-Communications will speak on the mst current advances in their compnies services. 12:00 - Break for lunch and to examine the exhibits ( lunch will be provided.) 1:00 - Hon. John Manly has been invited to Video Tele-conference link to Ottawa. 1:20 - Det Schmidt of ORB Satellite Communications will provide us with an insight into the outer reaches of the communications world and let us know how close (or Far) we are from truly global instant satellite communications from our own computers or homes. 2:10 - Richard Pitt of Wimsey, a local Internet access, explains "point and click" access to the information super highway using Mosaic and give live demonstration of the World Wide Web, Archie and other exciting new developments in the state of the art. 3:00 - Bruce Woodward of The Cyberstore BBS will do a live demonstration of a LOCAL BBS. 3:30 - A speaker from BCNet the Internet Provider for BC will discuss the present state of BCNET as well as their plans for the future. 4:00 - Question and answer session in panel format with audience participation. 5:00 - Wrap up by Roy Kerwood 5:10 - 8:00 Move to the Vancouver Island room for refreshments and hands on demonstrations by exhibitors and further discussion groups. 8:00 - Show closes Thank you for you interest in the seminar. PLEASE COPY THIS AND PASS IT ALONG TO ANYONE WHO IS INTERESTED OR POST IT ON YOUR BULLETIN BOARD. Time is of the essence! Roy Kerwood & Associates 907-1011 Beach Ave. Vancouver BC V6E 1T8 ph-fax (604) 687-3422 Tickets Including Lunch $40.00. ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V14 #207 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa15156; 11 May 94 14:29 EDT Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA29357; Wed, 11 May 94 10:36:26 CDT Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA29346; Wed, 11 May 94 10:36:23 CDT Date: Wed, 11 May 94 10:36:23 CDT From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Moderator) Message-Id: <9405111536.AA29346@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V14 #208 TELECOM Digest Wed, 11 May 94 10:36:00 CDT Volume 14 : Issue 208 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson FCC Order on Interstate Caller ID (John R. Levine) Searching For High School Classmates ... Help, Please! (Glen Gilbert) Cellular Telephone Pirates (Knight-Ridder via Van Hefner) Graceful Degradation (Jerry Levin) Erlang B Algorithm (James Slupsky) AT&T Major Billing Errors!! (Shantanu Jana) Need Criteria for Choosing a Phone Number (Barry S. Rein) SRI Ends Two Bobs' MGR (Alfredo E. Cotroneo) Cable Dates (Stewart Fist) TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of public service systems and networks including Compuserve and GEnie. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available at no charge to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu * The Digest is edited, published and compilation-copyrighted by Patrick Townson of Skokie, Illinois USA. You can reach us by postal mail, fax or phone at: 9457-D Niles Center Road Skokie, IL USA 60076 Phone: 708-329-0571 Fax: 708-329-0572 ** Article submission address only: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu ** Our archives are located at lcs.mit.edu and are available by using anonymous ftp. The archives can also be accessed using our email information service. For a copy of a helpful file explaining how to use the information service, just ask. ************************************************************************* * TELECOM Digest is partially funded by a grant from the * * International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in Geneva, Switzerland * * under the aegis of its Telecom Information Exchange Services (TIES) * * project. Views expressed herein should not be construed as represent-* * ing views of the ITU. * ************************************************************************* Additionally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help is important and appreciated. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: johnl@iecc.com (John R Levine) Subject: FCC order on interstate Caller ID Date: Wed, 11 May 94 02:39:45 EDT I picked up a copy of the FCC's Caller ID order, which is available by FTP as /pub/Orders/Common_Carrier/orcc4001.txt or orcc4001.wp. (Kudos to the FCC for making this info available so easily and quickly, by the way.) Much of the order is straightforward and not contentious, e.g. delivering CNID between local and long distance carriers is so cheap to implement that neither may charge the other for the data. They also note that per-call blocking is a good idea, and that *67 should be the universal code to block CNID delivery. But the arguments they list against per-line CNID seem, to me, to be astonishingly specious. There are three blocking options 1) per call for anyone, 2) per line for anyone, and 3) per line for special groups. The FCC thinks, not unreasonably, that it's a mare's nest to ask the telco to implement 3, since they have to determine who's in the special groups and who isn't. Then they say: 43. In the NPRM, we tentatively concluded that per line blocking unduly burdens calling party number based services overall by failing to limit its applicability to those calls for which privacy is of concern to the caller. The Commission noted that even in the case of law enforcement personnel, there may be a need to maintain calling number privacy on some calls, but that the same number may be used to telephone other law enforcement personnel, victims of crimes, cooperative witnesses, and family or friends. The Commission asserted that in these types of calls, calling number privacy is not needed and calling number identification can actually be a valuable piece of information for both the caller and called parties. The record reflects the useful nature of CPN based services, and the comments of Rochester illustrate that callers are likely to be interested in blocking only a small percentage of their calls. The comments of USCG illustrate the usefulness of caller ID to emergency services. In contrast, Missouri Counsel's analogy to unlisted numbers is inapposite because caller ID only permits parties called by the calling party to capture the calling party number, and then only if the calling party has not activated a per call blocking mechanism. We find that the availability of per call unblocking does not cure the ill effects of per line blocking. Moreover, in an emergency, a caller is not likely to remember to dial or even to know to dial an unblocking code. For the foregoing reasons, we find that a federal per line blocking requirement for interstate CPN based services, including caller ID, is not the best policy choice of those available to recognize the privacy interests of callers. Thus, carriers may not offer per line blocking as a privacy protection mechanism on interstate calls. We agree that certain uses of captured calling numbers need to be controlled, and address that issue infra. In other words, per-line blocking is a bad idea because subscribers are too dumb to unblock calls when they want to unblock them, although they're not to dumb to block calls when they want to block them. In paragraph 47 they note that where per-line blocking is offered, telcos use *67 as a blocking toggle, so users can't really tell what *67 does, but it doesn't seem to occur to them that the problem is easily solved by requiring a different code for unblock than for block. In paragraph 48 they wave their hands and say that people who care about privacy can just buy a box for "as little as $40.00 per unit" that will stuff *67 in front of each call. Thanks, guys. The docket number is 91-281, with comments due by May 18th. Comments must reference the docket number. Send ten copies (yes, 10) to: Office of the Secretary Federal Communications Commission Washington DC 20554 Before you fire off a comment, please get a copy of the order, since there's a lot of material beyond what I've summarized. For people without FTP access, I've put them on my mail server. Send: send fcc-cnid.txt (for the text version) send fcc-cnid.wp.uu (for uuencoded compressed WP version) to compilers-server@iecc.com. Regards, John Levine, johnl@iecc.com, jlevine@delphi.com, 1037498@mcimail.com ------------------------------ From: gilbert@cs.ucsd.edu (Glen Gilbert) Subject: Searching for High School Classmates ... Help, please! Date: 10 May 94 21:54:13 GMT At the suggestion of someone more knowledgeable than I, relative to the power of computer-aided search, I have been directed to this group to ask for help. I am wanting to locate a list of people (or do a search for these people via net), about 300+ of them, who are being sought for our thirtieth high school class reunion. One (manual) way is to go to the telephone books for the general area, available here in out University library for most all of the US, (Oakland, CA and San Francisco Bay Area) and go through each of them (there are about two dozen covering the Alameda County area and outlaying districts!) to find the names of the people who are "missing". But, aside from being a gargantuan task and extremely time consuming, I am wondering if there is a manner of doing a search of users in that area -- those who are connected to some computing system that is readable from this net? (My lack of expertise is about to show here 8-( ) I don't know if a list of names could be given as a list for a script to do searches of computing resources it that particular area. And, how time-consuming it would be. But, is it a feasible task? And, how would I go about it? I have some pretty good resources (personnel) who could help with the script, but I wanted to throw it out to this group since the numbers who read/write to this group certainly must exceed my wildest dreams -- including the depth and breadth of knowledge!!! Or, would it be a better thing to send a blanket list to cites in the area (SF/Bay Area) and/or the USA to ask others to look thru the list for names of friends/employees whose names they recognize and ask that they ask them to be in touch with me? [Now _that_ one is a task that I shudder to think about. How many would be willing to receive a list of 300+ peoples' names and search through them for people they might know? But, then again, if I knew someone from the Boston area as a coworker and read about a class reuniong from that area, I might look thru the list for his/her name. Then again, I may not! 8-/ ] Have I given enough information to warrant a thumbs up, =b d=, or a thumbs down, =p q=, on this thing? Comments are most welcome. And, if this is not the most appropriate group, then where would you suggest I send this? Oh, yes, I was also thinking of setting up a Group called alt.rec.class.reunions. Does this sound like a good idea? I've not done anything like that before. My experiences have been in reading, replying to and posting articles in the netnews. Thank you for your help. Glen W. Gilbert CSE Operations, UCSD (ggilbert@ucsd.edu) Glen Gilbert, UC San Diego Computer Science & Engineering Dept (619) 534-0454 email: ggilbert@UCSD.EDU ------------------------------ From: vantek@aol.com Date: Tue, 10 May 94 19:47:42 EDT Subject: Cellular Telephone Pirates CELLULAR TELEPHONE PIRATES IN CARIBBEAN COST FIRMS HEAVILY BY DAVID KIDWELL Knight-Ridder News Service MIAMI -- Modern-day pirates of the Caribbean are sailing the waves -- the high-tech airwaves of cellular telephones. So pesky and adept have they become at cloning cellular telephones and running up thousands of dollars in fraudulent overseas bills that Florida cellular companies have begun to block direct dial service to the Bahamas and parts of the Caribbean. BellSouth Mobility this month stopped direct-dial service to Jamaica, Haiti, the Dominican Republic and the Bahamas. Cellular One blocked the Dominican Republic last fall and Jamaica in February. "It's a few bad apples," said Jim Walz, BellSouth's regional vice president. "This cloning problem didn't really hit us until late last year. It's now enough of an inconvenience to our customer base to do something about it. "We don't want any more of our customers to get these exploding phone bills," he said. "And we want them to know if they do get one of these bills, it's not their problem. It's ours. We eat it." Customers can still use their cellular telephones to call the blocked countries, but must use an operator and a personal credit card. Here's how the pirates pillage the airwaves: With a special radio scanner and the right computer equipment, they can pluck from the airwaves the cellular code numbers of legitimate customers. From there, they are able to load the codes into other telephones, then sell them to drug dealers, smugglers or immigrants who can't afford regular long distance service to their former homelands. Charges for the calls, sometimes reaching $10,000 in a month, then show up on the legitimate customer's bill. When the customer complains, the phone codes are replaced, making the duplicate phone inoperable. But catching the pirates is difficult, especially because they're calling numbers overseas. "This particular area -- Miami in particular -- has become a mecca for cellular phone fraud," said Brian Stafford, assistant agent in charge of the U.S. Secret Service's Miami Office. "We're getting dozens of reports every month, and the average for one of these bills is about $6,000." Stafford said South Florida's large Caribbean immigrant population makes it a natural market for cellular pirates. "It's tempting when they can make free calls home for price of a clone phone," he said, adding that the phones sell for an average of $150. Nationwide, the cellular industry estimates fraudulent calls cost about $1 million per day. South Florida is among the top three markets, both in legitimate and fraudulent calls. The others are Los Angeles and New York City. Walz said the battle against the pirates is being waged on computer screens. BellSouth has already persuaded the Bahamas to install computer software like that used in the United States that makes easier to detect duplicate phones and shut them down. "We expect to have service restored to the Bahamas sometime next month," Walz said. Van Hefner Discount Long Distance Digest vantek@aol.com ------------------------------ From: levin@1.121.159.165.in-addr.arpa (jerry levin) Subject: Graceful Degradation Date: 10 May 1994 23:58:45 GMT Organization: Trident Data Systems Can anyone explain to me what is meant by graceful degradation when referring to a data bus? Thanks for your help in advance. Jerry Levin Voice-mail, 703-802-3685 ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 04:57:54 +0700 From: jslupsky@pwss.gov.ab.ca (James Slupsky) Subject: Erlang B Algorithm If you are looking for the Erlang-b formula, it is: B(C,A) = [(A**C)/C!]/[sum from i=0 to C of ((A**i)/i!)], where C=# of trunks and A=offered load (in erlangs=CCS/36). A neat recursive formula (for calculating on a computer) is: (taken from "An introductin to Telecommunications Network Traffic Engineering", by Dr. Lansun Lee, 1986 Edition, Alta Telecom International Inc) B(0,A) = 1, B(C,A) = [A*B(C-1,A)]/[C + A*B(C-1,A)] Hope this helps! James ------------------------------ From: sjana@chaph.usc.edu (Shantanu Jana) Subject: AT&T Major Billing Errors!! Date: 10 May 1994 19:08:25 -0700 Organization: University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA Hi everybody, This is Shantanu Jana from Los Angeles warning you about the present misdeeds of AT&T. I believe that most if not all of you have seen the aggressive campaigning of AT&T on television, wherein they started by offering True USA rewards of 20% of all US calls totalling to more than $25, and True World savings, to all numbers in one country of your choice, giving 50% off to all the numbers. Well, I signed up in March 1994, and in the March bill, I did not receive the 20% off, and also on one weekend, when AT&T went to match MCI and offered 73 cents a minute on weekends to India. Guess what, I was billed 86 cents a minute, which is more than half which was guaranteed otherwise. Calling them is no joke too. I called the billing inquiries number, and was put on hold for 24 minutes, after which I went through the operator and managed to reach them. I was given the figure for the credit, and they also noted my complaint for their billing irregularities and for the difficulty in reaching them. Now, a month later, my second bill contains only the True USA credit and not the True World credit, and my billing for International is far from the half off at 78 cents a minute. They billed me at $1.33 per minute. When I spoke to the customer service representative, she could not even give me the credit amount to appear in my future bills. She mentioned something about two working days. Then I asked to be connected to a supervisor, and I was connected to VICKI GARCIA, who managed to find the credit amounts owed to me. I requested her to send me a letter of apology mentioning how they mess up the billing, which she declined, and so I asked her to attach to the bill, a statement informing the subscribers that the bills were messed up and that they should go through them carefully. This too could not be done. At this stage in exasperation, I asked to speak to a person in charge, who could own up to their mistake and send the apology note, only to be informed, that in AT&T (A phone company I believe) beyond the supervisor, you need to write to the Vice President, and you could not speak to anyone further, even if they cannot answer your questions or solve your problems. This I believe speaks highly of an establishment as big and spread out as AT&T. I am really surprised that in a country like the US, such a firm, with such a terrible customer service exists and thrives. GOD SAVE AMERICA!!! I believe that many subscribers who trust AT&T as a good phone company, are being cheated out of what is promised to them, unless they are willing to go through this ridiculous (suposedly customer service), who are only out to con. When, in their advertisements, they have the audacity to ask you to ask them to give it in writing, they are the ones who are covering the big fraud. An obviously harassed subscriber, Shantanu Jana (213) 747-0855. [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Part or all of the problem lies in the fact that AT&T billing is done by the various local telephone companies and they (the local telcos) seem to not always be up to snuff at having the right software for billing in place. Probably AT&T should have mentioned to you when you first enrolled in their various offerings that in the event your bill -- as prepared and sent to you by the local telco -- was incorrect you should call them (as you have done) and they would issue a manual credit covering the differences between what they advertised and what the local telco in fact charged. I think you may be coming down a little to hard on them demanding a written apology, etc. PAT] ------------------------------ From: barry.s.rein@jpl.nasa.gov (Barry S. Rein) Subject: Need Criteria for Choosing a Phone Number Date: 10 May 1994 23:32:09 GMT Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory We're moving soon and we'll have to get a new phone number. For $10.00 Pacific Bell will let me choose any phone number with the right prefix as long as it's not already taken. I'm looking for criteria on what makes a telephone number easy to remember. Restaurants are supposedly willing to kill for a memorable phone number, so I wonder if there is any research or recommendations on how to select one, ie what combinations are remembered; what combinations are most often mis-dialled, etc. Incidentally, our exchange prefixes are 398, 791, 794, 797, and 798 -- 818 area code. Thanks very much for your advice, Barry Rein barry.s.rein@jpl.nasa.gov ------------------------------ Date: 11 May 94 01:17:28 EDT From: Alfredo E. Cotroneo <100020.1013@CompuServe.COM> Subject: SRI Ends Two Bobs' MGR Swiss Radio International announces a restructuring of its services which will come into effect on June 6, 1994, and will bring -- among other things -- the close down of the popular weekly DX program "The Swiss Merry Go Round", hosted by the "Two Bobs", Bob Thomann and Bob Zanotti. Details on what has been heard today on SRI follow. As reported today by Paul Saffren on the "Grapevine" on Swiss Radio International, in an interview with Nicholas Lombard, Head of the English Satellite Project, these are the dramatic changes coming into effect at SRI on June 6, 1994: - SRI will establish a 24 hours English service on European satellite (Astra, current transponder/subcarrier?), with 1/2 hours news (bulletins, commentaries, press reviews, and Swiss matters to interest to Intl audience) and 1/2 hour feature programs (life, science, economy, culture in Switzerland) every hour; - The current twenty-five people of the news room and English Service will be amalgamated into a one single Dept. for both Shortwave and Satellite service; - There will be an addition of commercial and financial news (advertising?) to the current programs; - There will be definitely a loss of emphasis on Shortwave transmissions, especially in Europe, justified by the "inevitable further decline of Shortwave", especially after the introduction of "mobile satellite receivers". Shortwave transmissions in Europe will be available "only during prime time (morning, midday and evening)", while at the moment there seem to be "no intention to close down overseas". (Might this prelude to a close down of Shortwave in Europe?). No details were given on where "mobile satellite receivers" to receive SRI can be purchased, and at which price. - It was stated that one of the reasons behind the change in broadcast policy is that "satellite is much cheaper" vs. Shortwave as far a the technical infrastructure is concerned, although this choice means "losing autonomy" and depending on other organizations/countries for satellite usage. - On Shortwave only the first half hour (i.e. news, no feature programmes) will be used. Features will be only aired once at 14:30 on SW to Europe, but not to overseas. - The Grapevine and the Swiss MGR as they are now will not continue. As for the two Bob's MGR Nicholas Lombard made a strong comment on the air stating that as "a DX program we will forget about that particular program". There might be a replacement -- perhaps -- strictly in the form of a media program, and on European satellite only, but it will be very different from the current DX program. ----- No mention of the restructuring was given at all on the MGR this week (following the Grapevine program), maybe due to the fact that the MGR was recorded before the announcement was given. Bob Zanotti in today's MGR, however, seemed to anticipate what might be explained on one of the next and last editions of the two Bobs', before closing down on June 6 : "The whole field of telecommunications is changing, moving, and we are moving with it". You get all the irony and sadness of the sentence, once you know the full story. I immediately contacted Bob Zanotti, who has been a good friend of mine for many years, but he declined to add any further comments besides what has being heard today on the air. He only mentioned his sadness and disbelief in hearing himself the complete details of the project on the air. The restructuring of SRI was apparently announced internally only a few days ago. SRI may not be reached by e-mail, but you may contact them by fax on +41-31-350 9569 for inquires or comments on the above. I am sure the two Bobs will be glad to have your support, and hear your comments (maybe there might be a last minute change if there are enough protests). We have offered to relay any e-mail directed to them to us here (100020.1013@compuserve.com or Compuserve: 100020,1013). Well forward all comments to them, if you want to convey your support or protest. We will also appreciate receiving by direct e-mail copy or echo of any comment on the above which appears on Internet/USENET, and on other media, since we do not have a direct Internet/USENET connection. We will also try to interview the two Bobs and other SRI representatives on the next edition of the "Hello There" on IRRS-Shortwave on the air on the week-end of May 15, in an effort to better understand the reasons behind what appears an insane decision. Thank You. 73, Alfredo E. Cotroneo, President NEXUS-IBA is a NEXUS-Int'l Broadcasting Association non profit org. PO Box 10980, I-20110 Milano, Italy which operates Phone: +39-337-297788 / +39-2-2666971 IRRS-Shortwave & email: 100020.1013@compuserve.com IRRS-GRM on FM [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Although there is a lot of nostalgia and romanticism where shortwave radio is concerned, the SRI people *are* correct that satellite is less expensive and probably it is more reliable also. Consider all the changes in the past few years: radio (in general) yielded much of its influence to television. For a half century or so, Hollywood reigned supreme with radio in the lives of Americans at least. Then television began to replace going to the theatres since talking-pictures were now common in one's own home. Why just listen to the radio when you could listen and *see* what was going on? Now television has been to a large extent been made obsolete by cable and satellite programs. All the inconveniences of listening to shortwave radio have been rendered moot by the ease of a couple buttons on a receiver. People went to motion picture theatres in the 1940's for entertainment which was impossible to obtain elsewhere and to watch the newsreels. We had a theatre here in Chicago called The Forum which showed nothing but newsreels; the news of the day in a 50 minute program which started every hour on the hour from 6 AM until 3 AM the next day. (They closed for a couple of hours in the early morning so the janitor could clean the place up.) During the intermissions between shows they piped in the BBC over a loudspeaker. People were angry when The Forum closed its doors about 1960 saying that television news had put them out of business. And now computers and satellites have largely replaced television and Hollywood. So, I feel shortwave radio served us well and continues to serve us to some extent, but if the purpose is communication among the people of the world over a large geographical span in a very short period of time -- almost instantly -- then there *are* better ways to go about it than shortwave radio with the unreliable and unpredictable problems of radio transmissions as they were done in the past. Which magazine was it a few years ago that grumbled about how the 'challenge' behind receiving shortwave transmissions was now gone. They cited all the shortwave stations which were using repeaters all over the world and how there no longer was any challenge or need for skill in tuning in distant, weak transmissions; no longer any need to know anything at all about how to construct an antenna for best reception. But that was the point, you see: the broadcasters of the world did not want a challenge or stumbling block in the way; they wanted their information widely available. As an information provider, I want the same thing. I don't want it to be hard for you to read this Digest, I want it to be easy ... in the case of SRI and others, I guess their conclusion is they can reach more people for less money and less effort by ditching the old techniques and going with new methods. In that sense, can you blame them? I also love to live in the past, but ... well I think you get the point. PAT] ------------------------------ Date: 11 May 94 07:43:21 EDT From: Stewart Fist <100033.2145@CompuServe.COM> Subject: Cable Dates Bill Brasuell asks: > Does anyone know the date of the first undersea cable between the USA > and Europe/UK? You'll probably get a couple of different replies to this query, because of the three attempts. I've got a database on this trivia, so let me straighten it out now. This is the main sequence of events: Back in 1852 the cable crossed the Irish Sea from the UK. This was the first essential step. Dover to Calais had been completed in 1851, thus making the continental connection possible. In 1854 Cyrus Field established a company in America to construct the Atlantic cable from Ireland to be landed in Newfoundland. Lord Kelvin led the push on the English end. It was to be 4000kms (end-to-end) and laid to maximum depth of 4400 m. In 1856 two cables were laid from Canada to Newfoundland to get ready for the Atlantic connection. On August 7, 1857 laying began on the main Atlantic cable but it broke on third day. They tried again early in 1858 and failed again. On the third try later in 1858 they succeeded in laying the cable and getting messages across it. On August 7, 1858 Queen Victoria and US President James Buchanan exchange telegraphed greetings. The cable only carried messages for 27 days, and failed. They laid another using the "Great Eastern" in 1866, and on August 4, 1866 the first permanently-operating Atlantic telegraphy cable link was opened from New York to London -- and via London onto Paris. And later: December 12, 1901 was the first trans-Atlantic radio signal. The letter 'S' was send from Cornwall to Newfoundland by Marconi. The Anglo-American Telegraph Company (cable owners) threatened him with legal action because they claimed exclusive rights to electrical communications in the British colonies. September 25, 1956 was the day the first trans-Atlantic coaxial telephone cable came into operations. Let me add another bit of trivia. November 20, 1871 was the date the first overseas telegram reached Australia. It came via India, Singapore, Djakata to Darwin (later Djakata (then Batavia) was by-passed) and was then carried overland by horse messager to Sydney. Because of many problems, the overland link from Adelaide to Darwin (1937 miles) was only completed on August 22, 1872 when it joined the cable to Melbourne and Sydney. The signals needed to be rekeyed 18 times between Sydney and London, and many of the Morse operators couldn't speak English. Shortly after the official opening of the London link, a Sydney Reuter's correspondent sent a news story to the UK about a ground-breaking ceremony for the new Queensland railway. His despatch began: "Governer turns first sod ..." Unfortunately, by the time it reached London and went into print it had been translated by the Morse operators into "Governer twins first son ..." As he was 80 years old and well-known in London society circles as a gay batchelor, this created some consternation! [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Thanks for a neat article to close this issue. Does anyone remember the game played by children in the past called 'Chinese Telephone'? A group of people stand in a circle (the more the merrier; twenty or more people are recommended) and the first person must whisper a short sentence one time only to the person to his left. That person in turn must whisper one time only what he *thought* he heard to the person to his left; and on it goes until the final person in the circle tells the person to his left (the originator) what he *thinks* he heard said by the person to his right. The deviation between the original message and the final report can be hilarious. PAT] ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V14 #208 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa15942; 11 May 94 16:01 EDT Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA03961; Wed, 11 May 94 12:15:21 CDT Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA03952; Wed, 11 May 94 12:15:19 CDT Date: Wed, 11 May 94 12:15:19 CDT From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Moderator) Message-Id: <9405111715.AA03952@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V14 #209 TELECOM Digest Wed, 11 May 94 12:15:00 CDT Volume 14 : Issue 209 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Questionnaire for Telecommunications Directory (Nigel Allen) First CAP All Fiber-Optic Transatlantic Videoconfernce (FCC via Bob Keller) Electronic FCC Fees Payment Workshop - May 18 (FCC via Bob Keller) Hackers On Planet Earth -Update- (Kevin Crow) European Real-Time Seminar 1994 (Alf Oennestam) Bellcore to Assign NPA 500 Codes (Communications Daily via Gregory Monti) Conference: Using ISDN to Work through the Next Earthquake (Bob Larribeau) Wanted: X25 Package For SCO UNIX (Michael A. Leo) TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of public service systems and networks including Compuserve and GEnie. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available at no charge to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu * The Digest is edited, published and compilation-copyrighted by Patrick Townson of Skokie, Illinois USA. You can reach us by postal mail, fax or phone at: 9457-D Niles Center Road Skokie, IL USA 60076 Phone: 708-329-0571 Fax: 708-329-0572 ** Article submission address only: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu ** Our archives are located at lcs.mit.edu and are available by using anonymous ftp. The archives can also be accessed using our email information service. For a copy of a helpful file explaining how to use the information service, just ask. ************************************************************************* * TELECOM Digest is partially funded by a grant from the * * International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in Geneva, Switzerland * * under the aegis of its Telecom Information Exchange Services (TIES) * * project. Views expressed herein should not be construed as represent-* * ing views of the ITU. * ************************************************************************* Additionally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help is important and appreciated. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 11 May 94 11:25 WET Subject: Questionnaire for Telecommunications Directory From: ndallen@io.org (Nigel Allen) Organization: Internex Online (io.org) Data: 416-363-4151 Voice: 416-363-8676 [Note from NDA: Here is the text of a questionnaire that I thought would be of interest to readers of this newsgroupu.] QUESTIONNAIRE FOR FREE LISTING TELECOMMUNICATIONS DIRECTORY An International Descriptive Guide to Telecommunications Companies, Services, systems, and Related Organizations in the Field If you would like your telecommunications service considered for listing free of charge in the Telecommunications Directory published by Gale Research Inc. and your system or service is described by one or more of the categories listed below, please complete this questionnaire and return it by May 31 to: Telecommunications Directory Gale Research Inc. 835 Penobscot Building Detroit, MI 48226-4094 U.S.A. Telephone (313) 961-2242 ext. 1551 or 800-347-GALE, ext. 1551 in Canada and the U.S. Fax (313) 961-6815 If you are already listed, please ignore this questionnaire. Please enclose any literature or other information that might help the editors put together a more complete listing for your organization or service. If your organization has multiple services that should be described in separate listings, please complete a separate questionnaire for each. 1. Company/organization name and address: 2. Unit (particular system/service/unit under discussion): Address: 3. Telephone: Toll-free phone (if any): Fax: Electronic mail address (give system name and your code or address): Telex: Year organization founded: Year system/service established: 4. Head of unit listed in item 2 (name, position, unit): 5. Public/business contact for additional information (name, position, unit): 6. Related organizations (other sponsoring, affiliated, or supporting organizations - please specify relationship [i.e., wholly owned subsidiary, etc.] and indicate city/state/country location): 7. Staff of unit listed in item 2 (indicate number in each category): Total: Management: Technical: Sales and Marketing: Clerical: Other: 8. Service Types (Please check those boxes that describe your type of organizaton, system, or service. For example, a telephone resale carrier would designate "Long Distance Telephone Service". An organization that provides consulting and educational services would designate "Consultant" and "Conference/Seminar/Training Provider". Item 9, General Description, will ask you to briefly amplify the indicators checked here.) Systems or Services [ ] Data Communications Service [ ] Long Distance Telephonme Service [ ] Intrastate [ ] Interstate [ ] International [ ] Cellular Radio Service [ ] Local Area Network Supplier [ ] Teleconferencing [ ] Audio Only Service [ ] Audio/Video Service [ ] Equipment Supplier [ ] Audiotex Service [ ] Videotex/Teletext Service [ ] Videotex/Teletext Equipment or Software [ ] Electronic Mail [ ] Service [ ] Equipment/Software [ ] Voice Store & Forward [ ] Service [ ] Equipment/Software [ ] Satellite/Microwave Networking Service (i.e. uplinks, downlinks, transponder leasing, etc.) [ ] Shared Tenant Service [ ] Facsimile Service (includes fax-0n-demand, broadcast fax, or enhanced fax) [ ] Telegram Service [ ] Teletex Service [ ] Telex Service [ ] Transactional Service (electronic fund transfer, home banking, reservations systems, interactive shopping, etc.) [ ] Two-way Cable Television Other Organizations [ ] Consulting [ ] Legal Service [ ] Financial Service/Insurance Service [ ] Conference/Seminar/Training Provider [ ] Association [ ] Publisher/Information Service [ ] Government/Regulatory/Standards Body [ ] Research [ ] Other (please specify): 9. General description of unit listed in item 2: 10. Specific user applications of system/service (what is system/ service used for?): 11. Geographic areas served (cities, countries, or general geographic regions served): 12. Rate structure (please indicate general rates, fees, or other charges, including start-up costs if applicable): 13. Clientele/availability (primary types of clients; any restrictions or limitations) 14. Means of access (how is the system/service accessed? what equipment is required?) 15. Equipment supplied as part of system/service 16. Publications (periodicals, books, documentation/user aids; please indicate title, price, frequency, and where available from); 17. Other communications services (if possible, please send additional literature on these services for possible inclusion in the Directory): 18. Planned new services (indicate starting date; please enclose additional information if available): 19. Key Features Summary (please recap the main advantages and feastures of your system or service): 20. Questionnaire completed by: Name: Title: Date: Telephone: Fax: 21. [ ] Descriptive material enclosed [ ] Descriptive material sent under separate cover ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 11:38:16 EDT From: Bob Keller Subject: First CAP All Fiber-Optic Transatlantic Videoconfernce May 11, 1994 CHAIRMAN HUNDT WILL TAKE PART IN FIRST ALL FIBER-OPTIC TRANSATLANTIC VIDEOCONFERENCE USING COMPETITIVE ACCESS CONNECTIONS WITH SIR BRYAN CARSBERG, DIRECTOR GENERAL OF FAIR TRADING, UNITED KINGDOM Chairman Hundt will make the first all fiber-optic transatlantic call using competitive access connections by having a videoconference between the FCC and UK at 8:00 a.m., Wednesday, May 25, in Room 856 at the FCC headquarters building, 1919 M St., NW. MFS Communications Co. is providing the technical demonstration using solely competitive networks between the Chairman and Sir Bryan Carsberg, the United Kingdom's Director General of Fair Trading. Both officials plan to discuss informally the value of competition and the benefits of bringing competition to users during the videoconference. The press is invited to attend. News Media contact: Stephen Svab at (202) 632-5050. -FCC- Bob Keller Robert J. Keller, P.C. Tel +1 301.229.5208 A.R.S. KY3R Federal Telecommunications Law Fax +1 301.229.6875 rjk@telcomlaw.com (Finger me for FCC Daily Digest) CompuServe 76100,3333 ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 11:41:17 EDT From: Bob Keller Subject: Electronic FCC Fees Payment Workshop - May 18 May 11, 1994 FEES ELECTRONIC PAYMENT WORKSHOP WEDNESDAY, MAY 18, 1994 9:00 AM to 12:00 PM The Public Service Division will sponsor a Fees Electronic Payment Workshop on Wednesday, May 18, 1994 from 9:00 AM until 12:00 PM at the FCC, Room 856, 1919 M Street, NW, Washington, DC. This workshop is designed for those firms interested in paying processing and/or regulatory fees electronically. Currently, it is proposed that those who pay their fees electronically will file the accompanying paperwork with the Office of the Secretary, Room 222, 1919 M Street, NW, Washington, DC 20554 or Route 116, Gettysburg, PA 17326, depending on the particular filing. THIS NEW PROPOSED RULE PERTAINS TO ELECTRONIC PAYERS ONLY. Two types of electronic payment that will be discussed at the workshop are: 1)'CTX' type payments where money is transferred from the payer's bank directly to Mellon Bank, our lockbox bank via mainframe computer. 'CTX' type payments have been widely used by larger corporations to pay their accounts. Use of the 'CTX' payment system is designed for those companies already using electronic computer transfer. 2) The Customer Initiated Payments (CIP) Program where the payers authorize our lockbox bank to debit their bank account. This is a personal computer or touch-tone telephone based system designed for companies not currently involved in electronic data transfer. The majority of the workshop will be devoted to the CIP Program because it fits the needs of most of FCC's clients. The CIP Program is a convenient, safe, and reliable way for your organization to pay its processing and regulatory fees. FCC CIP has been developed especially for FCC fee payments in conjunction with Mellon Bank. Please join us for a discussion and demonstration of this new and exciting innovation at the FCC. Staff from Mellon Bank and the FCC will be there to answer your questions. Please contact Kara Casey or Michelle Mitchell at 202/632-0244 if you are interested in attending. -FCC- Bob Keller Robert J. Keller, P.C. Tel +1 301.229.5208 A.R.S. KY3R Federal Telecommunications Law Fax +1 301.229.6875 rjk@telcomlaw.com (Finger me for FCC Daily Digest) CompuServe 76100,3333 ------------------------------ From: kc@netsys.com (Kevin Crow) Subject: Hackers On Planet Earth -Update- Organization: Netsys Inc. Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 06:54:05 GMT Hackers On Planet Earth The First U.S. Hacker Congress Come together in the summer of 1994 to celebrate the hacker world and the tenth anniversary of 2600 Magazine. We will have speakers and demonstrations from around the globe, a collection of films and rare videos on hacking, and our very own network between all of us and the outside world! This is an opportunity to feel the real magic of hacking instead of hearing about how we're about to destroy the world in some cheap tabloid or on the news during sweeps week. Government propaganda and corporate doublespeak have finally met their match! If you want to help put together this historic event, contact us by telephone at (516) 751-2600, through the mail at H.O.P.E., PO Box 848, Middle Island, NY 11953, on the Internet at 2600@well.sf.ca.us. We need ideas, people, technology, and karma. H.O.P.E. - August 13th and 14th at the Hotel Pennsylvania, right in the middle of bustling New York City (Seventh Avenue and 34th Street, right across the street from Penn Station). We've rented out the entire top floor (except for the mysterious NYNEX office). Special rates of $99 a night are available from the hotel (double rooms, four can probably fit easily). Cheaper places are also available as is nearly anything else. This is New York City, after all. Admission to the conference is $20 for the entire weekend if you preregister, $25 at the door, regardless of whether you stay for two days or five minutes. We encourage you to bring a computer so you can tie into our giant Ethernet and add to the fun. We hope you try to hack root on the system we'll be running -- all attendees will get accounts with prizes for the penetrators. Dancing and merchandising in the halls; Cellular phone workshop; Celebration of the Clipper Chip (not); Hacker videos from all over the world; Surveillance demos; Hacker legends from around the globe; It's not Woodstock - It's The Future; Many more details are on the way. Information sources: 2600 Magazine The Hacker Quarterly Summer 1994 edition Off The Hook Wednesdays, 10:00 pm WBAI 99.5 FM New York City 2600 Voice BBS 516-473-2626 alt.2600 on the Internet ------------------------------ From: alf@enea.se (Alf Oennestam) Subject: European Real-Time Seminar 1994 Organization: Enea Data AB Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 10:08:24 GMT ENEA DATA AB and TELELOGIC AB are pleased to invite you to the seminar: ********** Designing communication systems for future demands ********* This seminar will give you an overwiew of the possibilities our tools can offer you in real-time design, to preserve your investment for the future. TELELOGIC AB The product SDT, which is an SDL Design Tool for development and ITEX used for test specification of real-time systems. ENEA DATA AB which is OSE real-time operating system products, including OSE delta, designed for distributed and fault-tolerant applications. Seminars will be held at foolowing places: Sweden Stockholm May 24 Norway Oslo May 26 Finland Helsinki May 27 Italy Milan May 30 France Toulouse May 31 Aix de Provence June 1 Rennes June 2 Paris June 3 Austria Vienna June 6 Switzerland Zurich June 7 Germany Stuttgart June 8 Munich June 9 Frankfurt June 10 England London June 21 All seminars are free of charge. Please request further information by email from: alf@enea.se or from: ENEA DATA AB Phone +46 8 638 50 00 Fax +46 8 538 50 50 Box 232 S-183 23 TABY SWEDEN ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 07:03:39 EDT From: Gregory P. Monti Subject: Bellcore to Assign NPA 500 codes A story in the May 11 issue of {Communications Daily} notes that the FCC has given Bellcore permision to assign NXX codes within new NPA 500. 500 is the special access code that will be used for non-geographically-based services, mainly wireless ones like beepers, personal communications services (PCS) and cellular phones. The idea is to avoid separate roamer port numbers and roaming charges. Bellcore had been asked to delay any work on the 500 front until fairness issues were worked out. Now that an Industry Carriers Compatibility Forum has reached consensus on assignment guidelines, the Commission felt it was time to release Bellcore from their 'hold'. The FCC cautioned that it does not want to see numbers assigned "frivolously, hoarded by assignees or prematurely exhausted." Number portability among carriers is not required by the order but it is assumed that numbers within NPA 500 will eventually become portable. Bellcore will need to negotiate with (and adjudicate conflicts among) the 126 carriers who have requested 437 of the possible 792 NXX codes within the 500 NPA. Bellcore would probably start assignments within a few months. Greg Monti Arlington, Virginia, USA gmonti@cap.gwu.edu ------------------------------ From: blarrib@netcom.com (Bob Larribeau) Subject: Conference: Using ISDN to Work Through the Next Earthquake Date: Tue, 10 May 1994 21:22:27 GMT Using ISDN to Work through the Next Earthquake The California ISDN Users' Group Conference June 7 & 8, Sheraton Newport Beach The California ISDN Users' Group is holding a conference on how ISDN and other new communications technologies can be used to keep people working after a major disaster. The conference will include presentations and demonstrations of disaster backup, internetworking and network access, voice, video, and groupware technologies using ISDN. To attend fill out the form below and send a check for $80 ($50 without lunches) to: California ISDN Users' Group P.O. Box 27901-774 San Francisco, CA 94127 Name_____________________________________________________________________ Company__________________________________________________________________ Address__________________________________________________________________ City/State/Zip___________________________________________________________ Telephone/email__________________________________________________________ ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Send any questions to Bob Larribeau at "blarrib@netcom.com". Plenary Tuesday 8:30 - 10:00 Stan Kluz - Chairman Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory Welcome and CIUG activities. Keynote - Byron Wagner World-class technology consultant describes his experience using ISDN to solve problems for global organizations like the Walt Disney Company, Apple Computer, Ricoh, and 20th Century Fox. Here's your opportunity to see how media-savvy companies are reinventing themselves with technology and get a high altitude view of the implosion of media and communications. Bob Larribeau - Program Chairman Conference program. Data Networking Track ISDN Data Networking Overview Tuesday 10:30 - 12:00 Bob Larribeau - Consultant Overview of using ISDN for backing up and accessing remote networks. Anita Freeman & Jack Robertson - Pacific Bell Experiences with ISDN after the Northridge earthquake. Ruth Winkler - Pacific Bell Switched 56 service and its relationship to ISDN Wayne McCallum - GTE How GTE's ISDN implementation enhances remote network applications. ISDN Backup for Data Networks Tuesday 1:30 - 3:00 Heather Vaughn - Racal Data Communications Gene Litt - Controlware Two suppliers discuss ISDN as an ideal technology for keeping networks up during a disaster at minimum cost. Larry Cynar - Pacific Bell Pacific Bell customizes private data networks to increase disaster resistance. Bill Bloom - Dunsnet How Dunsnet uses ISDN to keep their network in operation. Data Connectivity Tuesday 3:00 - 5:00 Leslie Conway - Adtran ISDN connectivity for a broad range of high speed data communications applications. Bruce Dillon - IBM Board for the PC that not only supports ISDN, but also can be used as a data or fax modem. Richard Brennan - AT&T Using ISDN to support both voice, video and data in the home. ISDN Remote Network Access Wednesday 8:30 - 10:30 Tom Williams - Combinet Gene Chang - Extension Technology Greg Larson - Digiboard Three suppliers of ISDN equipment that provide high performance remote access to LANs Scott Yeager - MFS Datanet User of ISDN for dialup access to an ATM network. Data Networking Solutions Wednesday 10:30 - 12:00 Pete Moulds - Ascend Communications Danny Young - Intel Jim Hietala - Network Express Jerome Calgo - Transtream Four suppliers of ISDN equipment that interconnects LANs or provides remote access to LANs. Terry Tompkins - Motorola An ISDN user's experience with hardware and software options for accessing LANs from home. Data Networking User Experience Wednesday 1:30 - 3:00 Bill Brasuell - Tandem Experiences at the early stages of extending a large modem based work at home program to ISDN. Ed Tynan - Motorola Inexpensive security measures that significantly reduce the security risks of dialup LAN access. Natalie Clinton - LLNL Lawrence Livermore Labs experiences in implementing a large ISDN based work at home program. Pat Krause - McDonald's The first ISDN user in the U.S. will say how and why he are uses ISDN to support work at home and LAN interconnection. Voice/Video/Groupware Track ISDN Centrex Voice Services Tuesday 10:30 - 12:00 Ella Spradley - Pacific Bell J. Griffin - GTE How ISDN Centrex offerings can assure continued communications after a disaster. ISDN Centrex Voice Applications Tuesday 1:30 - 3:00 Joe Saaveda - Telrad T. Gartman - Lodestar Two suppliers of ISDN telephones will describe how ISDN supports low cost, flexible phone services. J. Pokress - Teloquent Will describe how ISDN can be used to support distributed, work at home customer service. ISDN Groupware Tuesday 3:30 - 5:00 Gary Gysin - Crosswise Curtis Albrecht - Eye Tel Two suppliers of groupware software applications will discuss enhancing communications after a disaster. ISDN Video Wednesday 8:30 - 10:00 Richard Grace - British Telecom New cost effective video solutions for up new applications at lower cost and with rapid deployment. Carl Kikerpill - Compression Labs ISDN providing flexible video conferencing that supports face to face communication after a disaster. Jeffrey Starr - McGaw, Inc. Experience using video conferencing over ISDN. ISDN Video Wednesday 10:30 - 12:00 Intel - name not available at press time PC based video solutions using ISDN. Pat Krause - McDonald's User evaluation of ISDN video systems. Special Session Alternative Technologies Wednesday 1:30 - 3:00 Pushpendra Mohta - CERFNet The role of the Internet in work at home and disaster recovery. Keith Nesson - Pacific Bell Applications using Fast Packet Services (SMDS, Frame Relay, ATM) to provide distributed, fault-tolerant corporate networks. Demonstrations ISDN products and applications will be demonstrated by 17 different companies on both Tuesday and Wednesday. Adtran Extension Technology Ascend Communications IBM AT&T Intel British Telecom Lodestar Technologies Combinet Network Express Compression Labs Northern Telecom Controlware Pacific Bell Crosswise Transtream Digiboard ------------------------------ From: mal@adc.com (Michael A Leo) Subject: Wanted: X25 Package For SCO UNIX Date: 11 May 1994 16:51:16 GMT Organization: ADC Telecommunications Hi, I am looking for an x25 communications package for use with SCO UNIX. We are porting our product to the SCO environment from the Sun environment. I am most familiar with SunConnect's SunLink X.25 product. If anyone knows of a solution, please let me know. Thank you, Michael Leo ADC Telecommunications (612) 936-8305 (voice) mike_leo@adc.com ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V14 #209 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa16386; 11 May 94 16:49 EDT Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA05601; Wed, 11 May 94 13:19:05 CDT Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA05590; Wed, 11 May 94 13:19:03 CDT Date: Wed, 11 May 94 13:19:03 CDT From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Moderator) Message-Id: <9405111819.AA05590@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V14 #210 TELECOM Digest Wed, 11 May 94 13:19:00 CDT Volume 14 : Issue 210 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Digital Links Over Analog Carriers? (Taavi Talvik) What Network Equipment is Needed to Set up Access Point? (Chuck Campbell) Wanted: Used Octel Voice Mail Systems (Eric A. Litman) Speech Recognition: "Word Spotting" - Help! (Peter B. Flower) Anybody Know Communitronics? (Rich Osman) 'Wireless Cable' Over a Cellular Network? (Barry Raveendran Greene) Telecommunication Events (Jose Luis Sanchez) Bell Canada Alex Videotex Service Officially Closing (Dave Leibold) What is a T-10 Carrier? (Mitch Barrett) New Call Centre (Jeff Robertson) Press Releases via Fax-on-Demand (Nigel Allen) Phone Directory Technology (Stewart Fist) Junk Mail From US Sprint (Dave Levenson) In-Building Cabling For Different Operators (Warren Kwok) Need Modem CID Strings (Maurice Dykes) Correct Contact Information For CallerID-> Serial (John Landwehr) Help Needed With B-ISDN (Padmakar Jogdankar) Contact Representatives NOW to Help Sink Clipper (Monty Solomon) HOTT: Issue 940425, Part 1 of 3 on comp.ai (David Scott Lewis) Need Information on Complete PC (Al Cohan) Need Help: Telecom Interface (Dr. Gerry Higgins) Sprint "Combined Billing" Error (Mike Pollock) TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of public service systems and networks including Compuserve and GEnie. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available at no charge to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu * The Digest is edited, published and compilation-copyrighted by Patrick Townson of Skokie, Illinois USA. You can reach us by postal mail, fax or phone at: 9457-D Niles Center Road Skokie, IL USA 60076 Phone: 708-329-0571 Fax: 708-329-0572 ** Article submission address only: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu ** Our archives are located at lcs.mit.edu and are available by using anonymous ftp. The archives can also be accessed using our email information service. For a copy of a helpful file explaining how to use the information service, just ask. ************************************************************************* * TELECOM Digest is partially funded by a grant from the * * International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in Geneva, Switzerland * * under the aegis of its Telecom Information Exchange Services (TIES) * * project. Views expressed herein should not be construed as represent-* * ing views of the ITU. * ************************************************************************* Additionally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help is important and appreciated. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Taavi Talvik Subject: Digital Links Over Analog Carriers? Date: Tue, 10 May 1994 20:01:26 EET Does anybody remember from old times some equipment capable for transmission of 64kbps or higher G.703 data rates over analog carriers. In Estonia we have a situation that there are plenty of analog group channels available but no country-wide digital links. Any hints or references to such equipment are welcome. taavi talvik taavi@vs.ee tel. +372 6 39 9000 fax. +372 6 39 9001 ------------------------------ From: campbell@uuneo.NeoSoft.COM (Chuck Campbell) Subject: What Network Equipment is Needed to Set up Access Point Date: 11 May 1994 00:26:30 GMT Organization: ACCEL Services, Inc. ph:(713)993-0671, fax:(713)960-1157 Reply-To: campbell@neosoft.com I am looking for information on the hardware necessary to set up a network access point. I would like to make some resources available to my clients via the Internet (anon ftp, telnet, s/w services). I would like to have about five incoming lines fo dial up as well (slip, ppp, etc). I am hoping for a FAQ or a list of all the FAQ's I need to start with. Any suggestions would be helpful, especially on the following: modems, phone service, gateways, bridges, whatever it will take, and some information about pros and cons of various approaches. I'll be happy with text recommendations as well. Please respond by email and I'll summarize. Thanks, ACCEL Services, Inc. | Specialists in Gravity, Magnetics 1980 Post Oak Blvd., Suite 2050 | and Integrated Interpretation Houston, TX, 77056 | | 1(713)993-0671 voice Chuck Campbell | 1(713)960-1157 fax President & Chief Geoscientist | email campbell@neosoft.com ------------------------------ From: elitman@proxima.com (Eric A. Litman) Subject: Wanted: Used Octel Voice Mail Systems Date: 10 May 1994 21:43:50 -0500 Organization: Proxima, Inc. I am in immediate need of used Octel systems, both Branch and Aspen. Please contact me if you have a system you would like to sell or know someplace where one can be purchased. Thanks in advance. Eric Litman Proxima, Inc. vox: (703) 506.1661 Director, ProxNet McLean, VA elitman+@proxima.com ------------------------------ From: pbflower@uts.EDU.AU (-s89432566-p.bflower-ele-500-) Subject: Speech Recognition: "Word Spotting" - Help! Date: 11 May 1994 06:00:44 GMT Organization: University of Technology, Sydney I'm presently doing some studies on speech recognition. I'm looking at developing the HMM so that I can do "word spotting". However I don't know enough about word spotting. If anyone has any information I would gladly accept it. Thanking you in advance, Peter ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 94 8:40:39 CDT From: ROsman@swri.edu Subject: Anybody Know Communitronics? I'm looking for a company called Communitronics. They made a WWV receiver that I own a copy of (Model 6010). Their last known location was Hauppauge, NY, but mail to that address comes back. I'm trying to get in touch with then to get the service manual (mine is broken). Rich Osman, WB0HUQ (210) 699-1302 (h:v/fax/msg) Oz@SwRI.edu (210) 522-5050 (w) ------------------------------ From: greenebr@aplcomm.jhuapl.edu (Barry Raveendran Greene) Subject: 'Wireless Cable' Over a Cellular Network? Any Information? Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 09:52:09 -0500 Organization: Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab Reply-To: greenebr@aplcomm.jhuapl.edu (Barry Raveendran Greene) Hello All, I'm trying to track down some information on a new venture between Bell Alantic and Cellular Vision. It is a trial service that provides 'wireless cable' services over a cellular network. If you know anything or have a pointers to a Internet site that has more information on this trail or the technology, please E-mail directly to my E- mail account. Thanks, Barry Raveendran Greene Internet: greenebr@aplcomm.jhuapl.edu Network Engineer (301) 953-6064 (301) 953-5727 FAX Johns Hopkins University / Applied Physics Lab ------------------------------ From: josel@vms.ucc.okstate.edu Subject: Telecommunication Events Organization: Oklahoma State University Computer Center Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 16:08:18 GMT Hello, I am looking for special events (one or two weeks) related to: - Managament, marketing, strategic planning, public-policy analysis, privatization, and consulting in Telecommunications. People background selected for these events are managers in certain telecommunication areas without technical background. Please, let me know about institutions, universities, etc., which offers such events. The dates required for these events are due August and September 1994. I want to thank you, beforehand, for your prompt response. Jose Luis Sanchez josel@vms.ucc.okstate.edu Electrical and Computer Eng. Oklahoma State University ------------------------------ From: Dave.Leibold@f730.n250.z1.fidonet.org (Dave Leibold) Date: 10 May 94 21:54:54 -0500 Subject: Bell Canada Alex Videotex Service Officially Closing Organization: FidoNet Nameserver/Gateway Bell Canada received official approval to discontinue the controversial Alex videotex service. From a check of the list of new and deleted services on Alex itself, it appears no new services have been added since 1991, and services were being deleted, at least as of last fall. It seemed the home shopping and commerce offerings were few, and the chat/dating lines plenty (the latter being done with less cost and more finesse on the regional BBS scene). The most useful service left on Alex (IMO) is the electronic white pages, complete with an automated long distance call rate calculator. The following eulogy just arrived in the mail: [Bell Canada letter to Alex service customers follows ...] T.E. Graham T/Director - Business Planning, Bell Advanced Communications 160 Elgin Street, Floor 12, Ottawa, Ontario K1G 3J4 April 29, 1994 Dear Customer, Some five years ago, Bell Canada launched an innovative service that, after its initial trial run, logged more than a million calls from interested people like you. We then decided to go ahead and introduce this exciting, new concept to enable customers to access home-based interactive and transactional services. Though it was risky, we heard your call and answered it. The ALEX service was born. Our early success in Montreal eventually led us to expand into the Toronto Market and become a leader in the Canadian videotex industry. Although our role was primarily one of a carrier providing technical support, we helped our Service Providers develop applications -- from home shopping and personal banking to financial news and learning programs -- in order to keep you on the leading edge of the information explosion. However, while the ALEX service continued to grow and attract interest, the inconsistent rate of development of the videotex industry coupled with Canada's declining economic fortune has made the service difficult to justify. We are faced with having to drastically cut our costs, yet have resisted laying off employees or raising customer prices. So we have been forced to make a painful decision and terminate the ALEX service. This is a difficult decision, and one that must be weighed against the reality of today's tough economic climate. Quite simply, the ALEX network is not the right vehicle, nor the appropriate technology, at this time to deliver the information goods needed in our fast-paced society. We filed on December 30th, 1993 for the de-tariffing of the ALEX service with the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC), the federal telecommunications regulator. On April 18th we received their approval, and will discontinue the ALEX service effective June 3rd, 1994. The ALEXtel terminal will also be withdrawn from the marketplace and cease to be supported. Bell has always tried to meet the needs of its business and residential customers by offering the best and latest in communications technology. We will keep trying to bring you innovative telecommunications products and services that best fit your needs. As the pace of technology quickens and opportunities begin to unfold, we will be there again ... listening. We will also be ready to serve you, knowing full well that such advances must be balanced by your wishes. Thank you for doing business with Bell. If you have any questions about this matter, please call 1 (800) 267-8480. Sincerely, T.E. Graham ------------------------------ From: mbarrett@ida.org (Mitch Barrett) Subject: What is a T-10 Carrier? Date: 9 May 1994 19:12:25 GMT Organization: Defense Technical Information Center (DTIC), Alexandria, VA I am evaluating a government contract for my company, part of which is a telecommunications study. According to the statement of work we are to evaluate among other things T-1, T-10, ISDN ... I can't find any reference to a T-10 anything. Does anyone out there know what this might be and where I can get documentation on it? Thanks, M. Mitch Barrett CTA INCORPORATED 5670 Greenwood Plaza Bvd., Ste 200 Englewood, CO 80111 E-mail: mbarrett@ctaeng.com ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 10 May 1994 20:30:42 EDT From: DIMBIT@delphi.com Subject: New Call Centre Well I am hoping some of the telecom genius' can help me. Our company is looking at setting up a call centre in the United States. This centre will handle travel insurance, home insurance (eg: plumbing goes at 3am we find you a plumber), other call centre functions. We have been doing this for the last ten years in Australia, Canada, and Europe (the company has; I have been doing it for a year and a half!). The call centre will have between 50-70 agents. We have to choose from the following cities to locate the centre: 1. Austin Texas 2. Sacramento, C.A. 3. Salt Lake City, Utah 4. Pheonix, Arizona 5. Charlotte, N.C. I know very little about the U.S. But looks like I will have to move to one of the above (not the nicest but the cheapest for the business!). For argument sake lets say we choose AT&T. We expect our call distribution to be 50% from the East Coast, 25% from the West Coast and 25% from the rest of the States. In our business we have to compare inbound 800 costs as well as outgoing. Typically one inbound call requires three outbound calls to the originating city. I have lots of information on the different cities, courtesy of U.S. Economic Development and Trade. I don't have much information on rates, which in our business is the most important. Any insight or comparisons would be terrific. If anyone responding lives in the above cities I would really appreciate any tips (if we pick your city I will take you out for an imported Canadian beer!). Rates would also be great! Please respond via E-Mail to: dimbit@delphi.com Jeff Robertson, President, CTI Inc. Canada (416) 483-1270 (416)516-2210 Fax ------------------------------ Subject: Press Releases via Fax-on-Demand From: nigel.allen@canrem.com (Nigel Allen) Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 03:40:00 -0400 Organization: CRS Online (Toronto, Ontario) One good application for fax-on-demand services is the distribution of press releases to people other than journalists, typically investors who want current information about a company they're interested in. Some electronic press release distribution services make their press releases available through fax-on-demand. Press release distribution services such as PR Newswire use much the same technology as news agencies such as The Associated Press (computer networks today, but dedicated teletype circuits 20 years ago), but their business is the distribution of unedited press releases paid for by the companies issuing the press releases, rather than news paid for by the news media. (At one time, PR Newswire was owned by Western Union. I'm not sure who owns the company now.) While you can search the PR Newswire database for a fee through some online services (I'm not sure which ones), you can also have a list of currently-available press releases sent to your fax machine by calling 800-578-7888 and entering your fax machine's number using your telephone keypad. Once you have received the list, you can order up to three press releases at a time. There is no charge for this service, and it appears to be available anywhere in Canada and the United States. Similarly, Canada Newswire offers a fax-on-demand service for Canadian corporate press releases. Call 1-800-269-NEWS to request a menu of available stories. A third press release distribution service, U.S. Newswire, makes its press releases available through a BBS in Maryland, PR On-Line at (410) 363-0834. U.S. Newswire's clients include a lot of Washington- based lobby groups and government agencies, while PR Newswire's clients appear to be predominantly corporate. There is a peripheral family connection here. My late grandfather, Ralph Marven, was vice-president of a now-defunct public relations company in Montreal, Editorial Associates. I think that when Canada Newswire was originally established, it was a subsidiary of Editorial Associates. Nigel Allen, Toronto, Ontario, Canada nigel.allen@canrem.com ------------------------------ Date: 11 May 94 05:48:42 EDT From: Stewart Fist <100033.2145@CompuServe.COM> Subject: Phone Directory Technology I am looking for a wide range of information about software and hardware used in the preparation of telephone directories or contacts who I can talk to who might know this stuff. Apparently there are a couple of companies around the world who specialise in this area. I'd like to contact them, and beforehand I'd need to get some background. I'm also interested in the financial side of running directory services; the yellow page directories seem to be highly profitable. I'd also like to get some general history of the development of the Yellow Pages, and the role played by Edward H O'Brien and the famous "Fingers do the walking" slogan and logo. Does anyone know anything about this. It's a pretty narrow area of interest, so it may be best to contact me direct, rather than bore the rest of the TELECOM Digest readers. I'm a technical journalist trying to put together a general overview, using some Australian material. But I need to know more about the world scene, and the world experience. ------------------------------ From: dave@westmark.com (Dave Levenson) Subject: Junk Mail From US Sprint Organization: Westmark, Inc. Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 16:12:30 GMT The only thing worse than junk mail, IMHO, is junk mail delivered with postage due! Did anybody else receive a recent direct mail advertisement package from US Sprint with insufficient postage? Dave Levenson Internet: dave@westmark.com Westmark, Inc. UUCP: {uunet | rutgers | att}!westmark!dave Stirling, NJ, USA Voice: 908 647 0900 Fax: 908 647 6857 ------------------------------ From: Warren.Kwok@f488.n700.z6.ftn.air.org (Warren Kwok) Subject: In-Building Cabling For Different Operators Date: 11 May 1994 02:29:14 -0500 Organization: UTexas Mail-to-News Gateway Hello, all telecom people in the Net, This is the first time I post a message on Usenet through my Fidonet BBS. I am writing to seek kind assistance from people on Internet in soliciting some relevant information about telephone line arrangements in a commercial building from different local network operators. Up to the present moment, telephone service is still a monopoly in Hong Kong. All telephone cables from an exchange to a government building connecting to customer premises equipment is the property of Hongkong Telecom whereas sometimes the Government owns the wiring behind the customer premises equipment (e.g. keyline telephone systems and PABX systems). The present arrangement is that Hongkong Telecom provides lead-in cables terminated at an interconnection point which is usually a distribution frame for routing to our private switching equipment, in most cases, PABX system. Hong Kong will have three more telephone operators after June 1995. As I am working on a government PABX project, I need to devise a set of guidelines on how line facilities of the three new operators can be interconnected with Government owned customer premises equipment. The aim is to formulate a cabling plan arranged in a way to foster competition and at the same time to make sure that line provisioning is manageable on a non-discriminatory basis. I will be keen to learn the expereince of other network operators, governmment administrations regarding in-building cabling arrangements for different fixed telephone networks in a building. Any comments, information on the subject are welcome. also at whkwok@hk.net Maximus 2.00 Origin: HKIE BBS (6:700/488) ------------------------------ From: mhdykes@thinkage.on.ca (Maurice Dykes) Subject: Need Modem CID Strings Organization: Thinkage Ltd. Guest Account Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 02:43:57 GMT I'm in the process of writing a set of Caller ID utilities running under Windows. At first I based the software on a proprietary CID device made by Vive Synergies but now I would like to take advantage of several modems on the market that provide CID data. One problem is that some devices output data in different formats with start/end characters and different date formats, messages etc. I would really appreciate some help in acquiring sample strings delivered by the various modems. By this I mean the actual string data a terminal program would see and not formatted output. This way I can parse the data from several popular devices properly. Thanks in advance for any help forthcoming. mhdykes@Thinkage.On.Ca Maurice Dykes mhdykes@thinkage.on.ca mhdykes@thinkage.com !thinkage!mhdykes ------------------------------ From: John_Landwehr@NeXT.COM (John Landwehr) Date: Wed, 11 May 94 09:38:34 -0500 Subject: Correct Contact Information For CallerID-> Serial The correct contact info for the callerID box to serial is: Rochelle Communications Inc. 8906 Wall Street Suite 205 Austin, TX 78754 512-339-8188 They have a single line box with a DB25 connector for $100 (qty 1). They also have multiple line boxes available, too. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 94 16:06:37 GMT From: padmakar@cdotp.ernet.in (PADMAKAR) Subject: Help Needed With B-ISDN [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: This is something I received in the mail a few days ago if anyone would care to respond direct to the writer. Thanks. PAT] Dear Sir, I am working in CDOT New-Delhi organisation. My group is SYSTEMS & NETWORKS. I am interested in Telecommunication. So please sir,send me inforamation about B-ISDN . My EMAIL address is as below padmakar@cdotp.ernet.in So I am waiting for above info. Thanking you. Date : 4 th May 1994 Yours faithfully PADMAKAR JOGDANKAR ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 10:09:05 -0400 From: Monty Solomon Subject: Contact Representatives NOW to Help Sink Clipper Passed along FYI to the Digest: Begin forwarded message: Date: Fri, 6 May 1994 13:43:25 -0400 (EDT) From: Stanton McCandlish Subject: Contact Representatives NOW to help sink Clipper At the House hearings on Clipper and Digital Telephony, May 3, 1994, Chairman Rep. Valentine (D-NC), Rep. Morella (R-MD), and Rep. Rohrbacher (R-CA) indicated "reservations" about Clipper. Please contact these Representantives and encourage them. However, Rep. Dan Glickman (D-KS) indicated "cautious support" for Clipper, and espoused a 'more surveillance for law enforcement' viewpoint. It is essential that opinons like these be turned. Contact this Congressman by any means possible, especially if you are a direct constituent of Glickman. Show your disapproval of Clipper, politely but firmly. Congressfolk live on votes, and are not as hard to sway as you might think. There is little support in the Senate for Clipper. Let's make it unanimous by turning what little tide there is in the House. Don't just talk, ACT NOW. Stanton McCandlish * mech@eff.org * Electronic Frontier Found. OnlineActivist ------------------------------ From: callewis@netcom.com (David Scott Lewis) Subject: HOTT: Issue 940425, Part 1 of 3 on comp.ai Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 241-9760 guest) Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 12:33:17 GMT The full-text of the HOTT electronic magazine on VR, neural nets, PDAs, agent software, PCS, interactive media, nanotechnology, MPP, and other emergent telecomputing technologies is now (or will soon be) available on the comp.ai Usenet group. David Scott Lewis Editor-in-Chief and Book & Video Review Editor IEEE Engineering Management Review (the world's largest circulation "high tech" management journal) Internet address: d.s.lewis@ieee.org Tel: +1 714 662 7037 USPS mailing address: POB 18438 / IRVINE CA 92713-8438 USA ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 94 13:01 EST From: Al Cohan <0004526627@mcimail.com> Subject: Need Information on Complete PC I friend of mine is sending me a couple of voice cards manufactured by the Complete PC. Can anyone supply info on how to reach this company? Thanks in advance, Al Cohan ------------------------------ From: telemed@aol.com (Telemed) Subject: Need Help: Telecom Interface Date: 10 May 1994 17:37:05 -0400 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) I have designed a multimedia E-mail software package. Does it make sense to add either: A. An Internet interface; B. A point-to-point (modem) interface? It's for distributed work (telemedicine, etc.) Thanks in advance for any advice. Gerry Higgins (Dr.) [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Personally, Doctor, if you have the wherewithal and ability to add an internet and/or modem interface I don't see how you could go wrong by doing so. Email and the internet go almost hand in hand; ditto, a modem interface will make your product that much more valuable. My advice then is go with it. PAT] ------------------------------ From: pheel@panix.com (Mike Pollock) Subject: Sprint "Combined Billing" Error Date: 11 May 1994 10:28:08 -0400 Organization: PANIX Public Access Internet and Unix, NYC Sprint recently changed me over from direct billing to "combined billing" on my NYNEX local telephone bill. Simple, right? Wrong. My final direct-from-Sprint invoice was contained activity through 4/10/94. My first combined bill from NYNEX contained Sprint activity through 4/13/94. The proximity of these two billing dates meant I got a _three_day_ billing period for Sprint long distance service on the NYNEX bill. Now, I'm also a Sprint Select customer, which means I have a $6.85/month minimum. In a normal 30 day billing cycle, I easily meet that minimum. However, Sprint was nice enough to bill me $6.85 for this three day billing cycle because in those three days, I only made $1.20 worth of calls. Since this was less than the monthly minimum, the service charge was assessed. It took me several minutes of explaining before the Sprint representative understood what had happened, and I eventually got a credit, but I'm concerned that other Sprint/NYNEX customers might run into a similar problem and not catch it, and Sprint apparently has no desire to have their billing software check for this type of thing. Any suggestions? Mike ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V14 #210 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa17015; 11 May 94 17:59 EDT Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA07240; Wed, 11 May 94 14:03:10 CDT Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA07231; Wed, 11 May 94 14:03:08 CDT Date: Wed, 11 May 94 14:03:08 CDT From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Moderator) Message-Id: <9405111903.AA07231@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V14 #211 TELECOM Digest Wed, 11 May 94 14:03:00 CDT Volume 14 : Issue 211 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson BT Announces Dialing Code Changes (Ted Dupont) What is the Mercury Button? (John Perkins) EFF Summary: May 3 1994 Clipper / Digital Telephony Hearings (M. Solomon) 'NNX' Area Codes? I Think 'NXX' is More Appropriate (Paul Robinson) Pager Schematics and POCSAG/GOLAY Protocols? (Joseph Jesson) Nationwide Name and Address Service (George Thurman) Information on Seminar Wanted (kchok@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu) Re: Cellular Phone Abuse (John Gilbert) Re: Cellular Phone Abuse (Bob Wilson) Re: Cellular Phone Abuse (Steven H. Lichter) TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of public service systems and networks including Compuserve and GEnie. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available at no charge to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu * The Digest is edited, published and compilation-copyrighted by Patrick Townson of Skokie, Illinois USA. You can reach us by postal mail, fax or phone at: 9457-D Niles Center Road Skokie, IL USA 60076 Phone: 708-329-0571 Fax: 708-329-0572 ** Article submission address only: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu ** Our archives are located at lcs.mit.edu and are available by using anonymous ftp. The archives can also be accessed using our email information service. For a copy of a helpful file explaining how to use the information service, just ask. ************************************************************************* * TELECOM Digest is partially funded by a grant from the * * International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in Geneva, Switzerland * * under the aegis of its Telecom Information Exchange Services (TIES) * * project. Views expressed herein should not be construed as represent-* * ing views of the ITU. * ************************************************************************* Additionally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help is important and appreciated. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 11 May 94 14:28:04 EDT From: usbma9ne@ibmmail.COM (Ted Dupont) Subject: BT Announces Dialing Code Changes The following announcement was distributed to U.S. and Canadian news media on Apr. 28, 1994: Contact: Jim Barron BT Corporate Communications 100 Park Ave. New York NY 10017 USA 212-297-2724 Ted DuPont Burson-Marsteller 230 Park Ave. South New York NY 10003 USA 212-614-4562 Starting April, 1995, New Dialing Codes For Calls To The United Kingdom NEW YORK, Apr. 28 - Starting Apr. 16, 1995, the 100 million-plus phone calls made annually from North America to the United Kingdom will be affected by the biggest change in the U.K.'s telephone numbering system in more than 25 years. The changes will result in a tenfold increase in the U.K.'s telephone numbering capacity and will meet requirements for many years to come. U.S. businesses should begin planning now to accommodate these dialing changes, according to BT (British Telecommunications plc). Starting Apr. 16, 1995, callers to most numbers in the United Kingdom (England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales) will need to insert an additional "1" in the dialing code, directly after "44" (the U.K. country code). For example, a North American caller to London will dial "011-44-171" in front of the local number, instead of the current "011-44-71." (In the U.S., 011 is the international access code; 44 is the U. K. country code, and 71 is the London area code). All city codes, not just London, will have the number "1" added. In addition, also on Apr. 16, 1995, the following five British cities facing especially acute number shortages will be given completely new area codes: Current Area Code/Local Number Apr. 16, 1995 Leeds 532 XXXXXX 113 2XX-XXXX Sheffield 742 XXXXXX 114 2XX-XXXX Nottingham 602 XXXXXX 115 9XX-XXXX Leicester 533 XXXXXX 116 2XX-XXXX Bristol 272 XXXXXX 117 9XX-XXXX Starting Aug. 1, callers to the U.K. will have the choice of using the new dialing codes or the existing codes; that is, calls to the U.K. will go through whether or not the caller dials 1 after the U.K. country code (44). This "permissive" dialing phase will be in effect until Apr. 16, 1995, when all calls to the U.K. will require the additional 1. Callers in the U.S. can call 1-800-634-2485 for more information on the dialing code changes. Growing Need for New Numbers These dialing changes are needed to deal with a growing shortage of area codes caused by such new technologies as fax machines, computer data modems and the fact that there are now 150 licensed telephone operators in the U.K., said officials of BT, the U.K.'s largest telephone operator. The dialing changes will not affect calling rates. "It is important that U.S. businesses begin planning for these dialing code changes now," said James E. Graf, BT's vice president of regulatory affairs. "While these dialing changes may seem simple, they will actually require significant efforts by many companies to reconfigure automated dialing equipment, fax machines, telecommunica- tions software systems and PBX's -- in addition to changing signage and stationery." It will be especially critical to change preset numbers stored in phones or faxes, said Graf, because dialing of the old codes by automated dialing systems will mean that calls won't be connected after Apr. 16, 1995. Planning for these changes should begin now: Telecommunications equipment * Computer systems containing international phone codes * Phone numbers stored in any telephone or fax * Personnel records * Databases * Switchboard and PBX systems * Fax ID numbers Stationery and Signs * Business stationery, letterheads, invoices, business cards, address labels, etc. * Advertisements, sales literature, brochures, direct-mail pieces, new product information Phase-In of New Codes To provide ample time to make the transition, BT will be phasing in the new dialing codes according to this timetable: -- Until August, 1994: Current area code only (do not dial 1 after U.K. country code of 44). -- Aug. 1, 1994 through Apr. 15, 1995: Old or new code (users can make calls with or without 1 after U.K. country code). -- Apr. 16, 1995: New code only (1 must be dialed after U.K. country code). Calls dialed without the extra 1 will get a pre-recorded message informing callers of the change. The code changes will not affect cellular phone numbers or toll-free phone numbers; only geographic area codes will change. BT officials further noted that, on an international level, all European countries are moving towards a single international access code. In accordance with this change, the international access code from the U.K. will change from 010 to 00 -- like the other changes, on Apr. 16, 1995. BT is one of the leading global providers of telecommunications services. BT's main products and services are local and long-distance telephone services in the U.K., provision of telephone exchange lines to homes and businesses, international voice and data services to and from the U.K. and supplying telecommunications equipment to customer premises. BT's range of additional services includes private circuits, mobile communications and network outsourcing. ------------------------------ From: johnper@bunsen.rosemount.com (John Perkins) Subject: What is the Mercury Button? Organization: Rosemount, Inc. Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 15:47:23 GMT My parents in London (Chessington, actually) have just recently signed up with Mercury and have been persuaded (by Mercury, presumably) to have a Mercury phone set installed. This phone has a "Mercury button" on it to access the Mercury network. Will someone please tell me what the Mercury button is? I suspect that it simply sends out a hard-coded sequence of DTMF digits which accesses the Mercury network, and one could probably do this manually with any phone that generates DTMF if one knew what the sequence was. Am I right about this? And does anyone know what the access sequence for Mercury is? They have a perfectly good BT "Tribune" phone set that has some special attachments for the hearing impaired, but are under the impression that they can't use it if they want to use Mercury. (I have a feeling that they don't really need the Mercury phone set at all.) John Perkins ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 10:09:21 -0400 From: Monty Solomon Subject: EFF Summary: May 3 1994 Clipper / Digital Telephony Hearings Forwarded FYI to the Digest: Begin forwarded message: From: mech@eff.org (Stanton McCandlish) Newsgroups: comp.org.eff.news,talk.politics.misc Subject: EFF Summary of May 3 1994 Clipper and Digital Telephony Hearings Date: 4 May 1994 23:19:49 -0500 Organization: UTexas Mail-to-News Gateway EFF SUMMARIES ============= May 4, 1994 Contents: * Senate Subcommittee on Technology and the Law holds Clipper Hearing * House Subcommittee on Technology, Environment and Aviation holds hearing on Clipper and Digital Telephony proposals; EFF's Executive Director Jerry Berman and Board Member David Farber testify SENATE SUBCOMMITTEE HOLDS CLIPPER HEARING The Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Technology and the Law held a hearing on Tuesday (5/3) to examine the Administration's "Clipper Chip" Key Escrow Encryption proposal. Witnesses included Asst. Atty. Gen. Jo Ann Harris (Criminal Justice Division), NIST Deputy Director Raymond Kammer, Whitfield Diffie (of Sun Microsystems), Stephen Walker (President, Trusted Information Systems), and NSA director Vice Adm. J. M. McConnell. The discussion touched on a number of key issues, including the necessity of the Clipper proposal for law enforcement; the privacy interests of network users; the costs associated with implementing the Clipper scheme; export controls; and whether those intending to use communications networks to break the law would actually use Clipper as opposed to other encryption schemes. Although a variety of views were offered, few new developments emerged in this controversial debate. Assistant Attorney General Harris and NIST's Ray Kammer both stated that the Clipper Scheme and Key Escrow system would not provide law enforcement with any new surveillance abilities. Rather, Harris argued, Clipper is analogous to a translator. Harris stated, "All Clipper does is, after a court has authorized interceptions of communications, is that we get the ability to understand the content of legitimately intercepted communications". The Administration continues to maintain that the market would accept the Clipper standard based on the assumption that it is the strongest encryption scheme, regardless of who holds the keys. When pressed by Sen. Leahy on this issue, as well as on the question of whether criminals or terrorist organizations would be willing to use the Clipper standards, neither witness offered any assurances, and admitted that this is still an open question. Senator Leahy expressed skepticism: "I have serious questions about whether any sophisticated criminal or terrorist organization is going to use the one code endorsed by the U.S. Government and for which U.S. Government agents hold the decoding keys. There are a multitude of alternative encryption methods commercially available. If Clipper Chip does become the standard encryption method used by Americans, criminals may be forced to use Clipper to communicate with legitimate outsiders. But this is a big 'IF' ". In what may prove to be a significant development, NIST's Kammer conceded that additional fiscal authorization may be needed to fund the implementation of the Clipper proposal. If this is the case, Congress would be required to consider legislation to authorize funding, and at this point passage of such legislation is at best uncertain. EFF will continue to closely monitor this development, and will pass along information as it develops. Sun Microsystems Diffie urged a slow and careful approach to the Clipper issue, cautioning that a rush to implement Clipper may create a bureaucracy that would be difficult to dislodge at a later time. Diffie stressed the need for international for information security, and cautioned against attempts to use the power of technology to increase the power of government. Diffie added, "Integrity of political speech is the root of legitimate laws in a democratic society. We are in a position where if we do not make it a national priority to make privacy available", this integrity may be compromised. Steve Walker, of Trusted Information Systems, stressed the need for the removal of export control restrictions. He also countered the Administration's contention that very few foreign encryption alternatives exist; noting that his company had found over 340. Walker displayed several of these applications, and noted that because of export controls U.S. manufactures of encryption technology face a significant disadvantage on the world market. Although the Senate Hearing did not produce many new developments, it is significant to note that no members of the Subcommittee expressed outright support for the Clipper Chip proposal. Chairman Leahy, the most vocal panel member at Tuesday's hearing, was also the most skeptical, and as such the fate Clipper proposal is still very much in doubt. HOUSE PANEL CONSIDERS CLIPPER AND DIGITAL TELEPHONY PROPOSALS Tuesday proved to be a busy day for Clipper on the Hill, as the House Science, Space and Technology Subcommittee on Technology, Environment and Aviation also considered the Clipper and Digital Telephony proposals. Witnesses on the panel included James Kallstrom of the FBI, NSA's Clinton Brooks, NIST Deputy Director Ray Kammer, Dr. Dorothy Denning, Dr. David Faber, EFF Executive Director Jerry Berman (on behalf of DPSWG), and Chmn. Willis Ware of the Congress/NIST System Security and Privacy Advisory Board. The discussion centered mainly on the Clipper issue. Unlike the Senate panel, there seemed to be some support for the Clipper proposal on the House Subcommittee. Rep. Dan Glickman (D-KS), Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, declared his "cautious support", for the proposal, and stressed law enforcement's need for strong surveillance abilities. Subcommittee Chairman Valentine (D-NC), as well as Reps. Morella (R-MD) and Rohrabacher (R-CA) all expressed reservations. James Kallstrom urged full support of both the Clipper and Digital Telephony proposals on behalf of all law enforcement, citing the need to counter the increasing sophistication of digital communications technologies. Kallstrom painted a picture of a network populated by criminals, terrorists, and drug dealers which would pose a great danger to public safety, unless law enforcement is given the ability to intercept illegal communications. EFF's Jerry Berman countered this assertion by arguing that Clipper would only solve law enforcement's problems if criminals use it. The only way to do this, Berman added, would be to mandate the Clipper standard, something which the Administration does not claim to want to do. The only solution is for Congress to deny appropriation for Clipper and send the Administration back to the drawing board, Berman argued. Dr. Farber, appearing as an expert witness, stated that solutions to the Clipper issue will not come easily and will not come in one big step. Rather, a carefully considered and open approach is required. While stressing the need for encryption standards on communications networks, Dr. Farber cautioned against "smoke-filled-room standards" of encryption which are, in his view, likely to bead mistrust. Dr. Farber also argued for the removal of export controls on encryption technology. NSA's Clinton Brooks expressed support for Congressional Consideration of the Clipper issue. He argued that Clipper is a sound technological solution to a legitimate law enforcement and National Security dilemma, and that a public debate on its merits would eventually remove the misinformation and mistrust of government, and would prove Clipper to be in the public interest. Dr. Farber offered a strong caution to this, expressing the concern that a future administration may find it necessary to mandate the Clipper standard. Dr. Farber suggested that at the very least Congress weld into law a guarantee that Clipper remain voluntary, that the Judiciary be an escrow holder. He cautioned, in the words of Benjamin Franklin, "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety" *************** Written testimony & documents from the hearings are available as: ftp.eff.org, /pub/EFF/Policy/Crypto/Clipper/[filename] gopher.eff.org, 1/EFF/Policy/Crypto/Clipper, [filename] gopher://gopher.eff.org/11/EFF/Policy/Crypto/Clipper, [filename] http://www.eff.org/pub/EFF/Policy/Crypto/Clipper/[filename] where [filename] is: berman_eff_clip-dt.testimony - House testimony of Jerry Berman (EFF) brooks_nsa_clip-dt.testimony - House testimony of Clint Brooks (NSA) denning_clip-dt.testimony - House testimony of Dorothy Denning farber_clip-dt.testimony - House testimony of David Farber kallstrom_fbi_clip-dt.testimony - House testimony of James Kallstrom (FBI) kammer_nist_clip-dt.testimony - House testimony of Ray Kammer (NIST) ware_csspab_clip-dt.testimony - House testimony of Willis Ware (CSSPAB) clip-dt_hearings.docs - charter, witness list, diagrams. * Senate testimony and spoken testimony from both hearings will be made available from in the same directory when obtained. This material will also be available from the EFF BBS within a day or so, at +1 202 638 6120. Stanton McCandlish * mech@eff.org * Electronic Frontier Found. OnlineActivist ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 05:39:19 EDT From: Paul Robinson Reply-To: Paul Robinson Subject: 'NNX' Area Codes? I Think 'NXX' is More Appropriate Organization: Tansin A. Darcos & Company, Silver Spring, MD USA In some prior articles, the term 'NNX' has been used to refer to the new format for area codes debuting in International Dialing Zone 1 on January 15, 1995. While this is the format that is being added to the current area code system is technically correct with respect to the additions, I think that this term is wrong and misleading. In area codes and prefixes, the term 'N' is used to refer to a digit space that permits any number from 2 through 9. 'X' is used to refer to an 'any digit' field which allows 0 and 1. Area codes currently permit 0 and 1 (and ONLY 0 AND 1) as the second digit. As of the above date, they will allow any digit for the last two digits of the area code. The first digit of an area code will remain required to be 2 through 9. Based on this, references to the new area codes should say 'NXX' area codes, and not 'NNX' area codes, as it might indicate that the old area codes with 0 and 1 as the middle digit are being replaced by the new area codes, which is not the case. ------------------------------ From: joe@netcom.com (Joseph Jesson) Subject: Pager Schematics and POCSAG/GOLAY Protocols? Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 241-9760 guest) Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 13:58:27 GMT At a Dayton flea market, I picked up several NEC and Motorola pagers in various non-working condition. I was impressed when you consider the sensitivity and selectivity is such a small space (the antenna loops are approx -20db when compared to a diople antenna). It has potential for a single channel 152 (approximately) or 932 Mhz receiver. Any idea where I can get a schematic for the Motorola Bravo, Sensar, or NEC pager? Also, has anyone built a capcode programmer or fully decoded all pager codes (Pocsag / Golay / Flex - 512/1200/2400/6400 rates)? Universal Shortwave, in Ohio, sells a M400 which only decodes POCSAG or GOLAY at 512 bps ... Joseph Jesson joe@netcom.com Day (312) 856-3645 Eve (708) 356-6817 21414 W. Honey Lane, Lake Villa, IL, 60046 ------------------------------ From: gst@gagme.wwa.com (George Thurman) Subject: Nationwide Name and Address Service Date: 11 May 1994 00:48:34 -0500 Organization: WorldWide Access - Chicago Area Internet Services 312-282-8605 I had a 900 number that if you called it and gave them a telephone number, they would give you the name and address of the person who had that telephone number. (In most cases) The 900 number, 1-900-884-1212 has been disconnected, and I think that the company that provided the service has gone belly-up. Does anyone know of any other 900 numbers that provide this same kind of service? GEORGE S. THURMAN (312) 509-6308 gst@gagme.wwa.com ------------------------------ From: KCHOK@KUHUB.CC.UKANS.EDU Subject: Information on Seminar Wanted Date: 11 May 94 10:26:01 CDT Organization: University of Kansas Academic Computing Services Hello out there, I am an exchange student graduating in December. As a part of my program I shall be paid to attend a seminar in the continental United States. I want to attend a seminar on data trasmissions/telephone networks sometime in the first week of August in New York City. If anyone out there knows of any such seminars please write to me at "ldorji@weber.ece.ukans.edu". Thanks for your time. ------------------------------ From: johng@ecs.comm.mot.com (John Gilbert) Subject: Re: Cellular Phone Abuse Organization: Motorola, LMPS Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 11:04:06 -0500 In article , jharan@cwa.com (Jeff Haran) wrote: > Maybe I'm missing something, but it seems like an obvious solution to > an obvious problem. The thing that I can't understand is why this > service abuse wasn't anticipated by the cellular telephone founders. > Does anybody have any insights as to why it doesn't work this way > today? The VHF and UHF IMTS radiotelephones that were widely used prior to the introduction of cellular were much less secure than what we have today. These were programmed by opening the radio up and using wire jumpers to set the area code and last four digits of the phone number (only 10,000 phones were allowed per area code -- no exchange code was in the phone). These phones didn't have any electronic serial number. Signaling of phone addressing and calling numbers was by a ten pulse-per-second tone; so slow you could easily decode it with a tape recorder, if not by ear. As far as I know, IMTS wasn't widely abused. The planners would not have anticipated that the much more secure AMPS system would not have had adequate protection to deal with the threat which, at the time, was probably considered minimal. It is fairly clear that the designers of AMPS underestimated the sophistication of their adversaries, the availability of inexpensive test and programing equipment, and the advantages to the criminal underground of using altered phones. John Gilbert johng@ecs.comm.mot.com ------------------------------ From: bwilson@netcom.com (Bob Wilson) Subject: Re: Cellular Phone Abuse Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 241-9760 guest) Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 11:27:17 GMT John R Levine (johnl@iecc.com) wrote: >> Does anybody have any insights as to why it doesn't work this way >> [with per-phone challenge-response passwords] today? > The AMPS system in use in the U.S. was designed over a decade ago, and > has become much more popular than even the most optimistic forecasts > predicted. There's a balance between cost and function, and ten years > ago the cost of adding the security features would have been quite > high, and the advantage, given the relatively modest popularity they > expected, low. Its my understanding that the reason better security measures were not implemented was because they were deemed "too secure" and instead the industry decided to wait until it would actually become a problem. I'm not so sure that the cost/function rational really applied. > On the other hand, if the next round of cell phones (CDMA or TDMA) > don't include effective security features, that's just stupid. Indeed. ------------------------------ From: co057@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Steven H. Lichter) Subject: Re: Cellular Phone Abuse Date: 11 May 1994 08:51:22 GMT Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio (USA) Air ouch (PacTel Cellular) has been testing a system that looks at the telephones finger like prints beside the EIN. That should slow things down, but also it can cause a problem when you have a loaner phone with your number since the way it operates will be different from you regular phone. I have not heard anything about the tests in sometime so maybe they are finished and being used or not. Sysop: Apple Elite II -=- an Ogg-Net Hub BBS (909) 359-5338 12/24/96/14.4 V32/V42bis ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V14 #211 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa17484; 11 May 94 19:03 EDT Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA10382; Wed, 11 May 94 15:41:03 CDT Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA10371; Wed, 11 May 94 15:41:01 CDT Date: Wed, 11 May 94 15:41:01 CDT From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Moderator) Message-Id: <9405112041.AA10371@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V14 #212 TELECOM Digest Wed, 11 May 94 15:41:00 CDT Volume 14 : Issue 212 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson USPS & IRS Mull National ID Cards, Clinton to Sign Orders (Monty Solomon) Book Review: Police Call / Beyond Police Call (TELECOM Digest Editor) Re: Cellular Call Forwarding (Matthew Scott Weisberg) Re: Cellular Call Forwarding (Kevin Bluml) Re: Internet White Pages (Lenny Charnoff) Re: Internet White Pages (John R. Levine) Re: Let Your Fingers do the Walking on the Internet (Seth Breidbart) Re: Let Your Fingers do the Walking on the Internet (Nevin Liber) TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of public service systems and networks including Compuserve and GEnie. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available at no charge to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu * The Digest is edited, published and compilation-copyrighted by Patrick Townson of Skokie, Illinois USA. You can reach us by postal mail, fax or phone at: 9457-D Niles Center Road Skokie, IL USA 60076 Phone: 708-329-0571 Fax: 708-329-0572 ** Article submission address only: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu ** Our archives are located at lcs.mit.edu and are available by using anonymous ftp. The archives can also be accessed using our email information service. For a copy of a helpful file explaining how to use the information service, just ask. ************************************************************************* * TELECOM Digest is partially funded by a grant from the * * International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in Geneva, Switzerland * * under the aegis of its Telecom Information Exchange Services (TIES) * * project. Views expressed herein should not be construed as represent-* * ing views of the ITU. * ************************************************************************* Additionally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help is important and appreciated. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 01:41:06 -0400 From: Monty Solomon Subject: USPS & IRS Mull National Identity Cards, Clinton to Sign Orders Excerpt from EFFector Online 07.08 From: Mitch Ratcliffe Date: Thu, 5 May 1994 07:43:22 -0700 (PDT) Ever Feel Like You're Being Watched? You Will... Digital Media has learned that the Clinton administration is debating not if, but how, to create a card that every American will need in order to interact with any federal government agency. Combined with two potential executive orders and the Postal Service's designs on putting its stamp on personal and business electronic transactions, the card could open a window on every nuance of American personal and business life. The wrangling among the administration, the U.S. Postal Service, the Internal Revenue Service and Department of Defense, emerged into the public eye at this April's CardTech/SecureTech Conference. The gathering of security experts was convened to discuss applications for smart card and PCMCIA memory card technologies in business and government. The Postal Service, at the conference presented a proposal for a "general purpose U.S. services smartcard," which individuals and companies would use to authenticate their identities when sending and receiving electronic mail, transferring funds and interacting with government agencies, such as the I.R.S., Veterans Administration and the Department of Health and Human Services. President Clinton is also considering signing two executive orders that would greatly expand the government's access to personal records, including an order that would allow the I.R.S. to monitor individual bank accounts and automatically collect taxes based on the results, said sources close to the White House. The collection service will be presented as a convenient way to avoid filling out a tax return. The White House did not respond to requests for comments about this report. The Post Office: We deliver for you. The Postal Service's U.S. Card would be designed to use either smart cards (plastic cards with an embedded microprocessor carrying a unique number that can be read by a electromagnetic scanner and linked to computerized records stored on a network) or PCMCIA cards, which can contain megabytes of personal information. (You've probably seen this type card in AT&T's "You Will" ad campaign, which shows a doctor inserting a woman's card in a reader in order to access a recording of a sonogram). The Postal Service said it is considering AT&T and other companies' smart card technologies. In a slide presentation at the conference, Postal representative Chuck Chamberlain outlined how an individual's U.S. Card would be automatically connected with the Department of Health and Human Services, the U.S. Treasury, the I.R.S., the banking system, and a central database of digital signatures for use in authenticating electronic mail and transactions. The U.S. Card is only a proposal, Chamberlain insists. Yet the Postal Service is prepared to put more than a hundred million of the cards in citizens' pockets within months of administration approval, he said. "We've been trying to convince people [in the different agencies] to do just one card, otherwise, we're going to end up with two or three cards," said Chamberlain. He said in addition to the healthcare card proposed by President Clinton last year, various government agencies are forwarding plans for a personal records card and a transactions (or "e-purse") card. Chamberlain said the I.R.S in particular is pursuing plans for an identity card for taxpayers. Don't leave home without it. Though he did not name the U.S. Card at the time, Postmaster General Marvin Runyon suggested that the Postal Service offer electronic mail certification services during testimony before the Senate Governmental Affairs Subcommittee in March. The proposal is clearly intended as a way to sustain the Postal Service's national role in the information age, since it would give the agency a role in virtually every legally-binding electronic transaction made by U.S. citizens. For instance: * When sending or receiving electronic mail, U.S. Card users would be able to check the authenticity of a digital signature to screen out impostors. * Banking transactions (notably credit card purchases) that depend on authentication of the participants identities and an audit trail, would be registered in Postal Service systems. * Veterans, or for that matter college students and welfare recipients, could check their federal benefits using the identification data on their U.S. Cards. * Visitors to an emergency room would have instant access to medical records at other hospitals, as well as their health insurance information. These examples may seem benign separately, but collectively they paint a picture of a citizen's or business's existence that could be meddlesome at best and downright totalitarian at worst. Will buying a book at a gay bookstore with a credit card that authenticates the transaction through the Postal Service open a Naval officer up to court marshall? If you have lunch with a business associate on a Saturday at a family restaurant, will the IRS rule the expense non-deductible before you can even claim it? "There won't be anything you do in business that won't be collected and analyzed by the government," said William Murray, an information system security consultant to Deloitte and Touche who saw Chamberlain's presentation. "This [National Information Infrastructure] is a better surveillance mechanism than Orwell or the government could have imagined. This goddamned thing is so pervasive and the propensity to connect to it is so great that it's unstoppable." Deep Roots; Deep Pockets; Long History. Chamberlain said the Postal Service has been working for "a couple years" on the information system to back up the U.S. Card. He said the project was initiated by the Department of Defense, which wanted a civilian agency to create a national electronic communications certification authority that could be connected to its Defense Messaging System. Chamberlain said the Postal Service has also consulted with the National Security Agency, proponents of the Clipper encryption chip which hides the contents of messages from all but government agencies, like law enforcement. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Ames Research Laboratories in Mountain View, Calif. carried out the research and development work for Clipper. "We're designing a national framework for supporting business-quality authentication," said John Yin, the engineer heading up the U.S. Card- related research for NASA Ames' advanced networking applications group. "This is not specifically with just the Postal Service. We'll be offering services to other agencies and to third-party commercial companies that want to build other services on the card." For example, VISA or American Express could link their credit services to the U.S. Card. Yin, who works on Defense Messaging Systems applications, said his group has collaborated with "elements of Department of Defense" for the past year, but would not confirm the participation of the National Security Agency, a Department of Defense agency. The NSA is specifically prohibited from creating public encryption systems by the Computer Security Act of 1987. Yin also would not comment on the budget for the project, which other sources said was quite large and has spanned more than two years. A false sense of security? According to Yin, the cards would allow individuals or businesses to choose any encryption technology. "It's not our approach to say, 'Here's the standard, take it or leave it,'" he said. "We're not trying to create a monopoly, rather it's an infrastructure for interoperability on which a whole variety of services can be built." Yet, NASA, which is a participant in the CommerceNet electric marketplace consortium will "suggest" to its partners that they adopt the U.S. Card certification infrastructure, he said. The reality is that government agencies' buying power usually drives the market to adopt a particular technology -- not unlike the way the Texas Board of Education, the largest single purchaser of textbooks in the U.S., sets the standard for the content of American classroom curricula. Since, the administration has already mandated use of Clipper and its data-oriented sibling, the Tesserae chip, in federal systems it's fairly certain that the law enforcement-endorsed chips will find their way into most, if not all, U.S. Cards. Even in the unlikely event that one government agency should weather the pressure and pass on the Clipper chip, it's still possible to trace the source, destination, duration and time of transactions conducted between Clippered and non-Clippered devices. "Most of this shift [in privacy policy] is apparently being done by executive order at the initiative of bureaucracy, and without any Congressional oversight or Congressional concurrence, " Murray said. "They are not likely to fail. You know, Orwell said that bureaucrats, simply doing what bureaucrats do, without motivation or intent, will use technology to enslave the people." EDITOR'S NOTE: Digital Media has filed a Freedom of Information Act request for Clinton and Bush Administration, Postal Service, NSA, Department of Defense, NASA, I.R.S. and other documents related to the creation of the U.S. Card proposal. Mitch Ratcliffe Copyright 1994 by Mitch Ratcliffe and Seybold Publications. Mitch Ratcliffe Editor in Chief Digital Media: A Seybold Report 444 De Haro St., Ste. 128 San Francisco, Calif. 94107 415.575.3775 office godsdog@netcom.com ------------------- [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Don'tcha just *luv* our resident president now in power? If the above is true -- and honestly, I don't know what to think about some of the stuff EFF churns out from one day to the next; they seem to have their own axes to grind -- then I think Clinton has gained a few more enemies. Given the tremendous amount of heat on him now in the conservative media -- and even the mainstream liberal press has been unable to totally avoid Paula Corbin Jones, Whitewater and all the rest of it -- I strongly believe Clinton will be out of office in the next six to nine months. I think the scenario will be another Richard Nixon: when it is at the point that Congress is ready to impeach him (literally within a day or two in Nixon's case) he'll resign and split rather than go on the books as being impeached ... same as Nixon. And don't think for one minute that Hillary does not have him nailed down firmly in place. She has so much dirt on him yet unrevealed that he wouldn't dare double-cross her. I think before long they will have a marital spat and she will spill her guts on several topics including Vince Foster just to spite her husband. She's very dangerous. PAT] ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 94 14:50:50 CDT From: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest Editor) Subject: Book Reviews: Police Call / Beyond Police Call Most readers of the Digest who are scanner enthusiasts are already familiar with POLICE CALL, a multi-volume set of reference books giving the frequencies for public safety radio communications throughout the USA, along with quite a bit of other useful information relating to the use of scanners. Broken down into volumes based on geography, each volume of POLICE CALL serves various parts of the USA. For example Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky and Wisconsin make up volume 4, which is the portion I get each year. Published annually since sometime in the early 1960's, the 1994 edition includes numerous miscellaneous listings including some federal government entries, railroads, and aircraft. In addition to an alphabetical listing of license holders by state, a cross reference by frequency makes it easy to find out who is occupying a given spot when all you have is the frequency you are listening to without a name or location. Gene Hughes has been the editor of POLICE CALL since its inception. Published by Hollins Radio Data of Los Angeles, the book (or rather, the volume of the book relevant to your geographic location) is a very fine and comprehensive publication. In April, the first new publication from Hollins was released, and it also is proving to be a valuable reference tool for scanner enthusiasts. Entitled BEYOND POLICE CALL, the first (of what is promised to be annual editions) covers all sorts of other listings of license holders. Unlike the original, BEYOND POLICE CALL is a single volume publication covering the entire United States. Unlike the original, this new book only has an alphabetical listing of license holders, broken down first by state, then by type of service, the finally by license holder within the state and service categories. There is no cross-reference by frequency in this book, and that is its major drawback in my opinion. Richard Barnett, known to many people on the east coast for his scanner reference guides, collaborated with Gene Huges on this new book. Barnett is shown as the editor with Hughes as the publisher. According to Barnett and Hughes, nearly two years was spent gathering the information for the new book, and revisions are planned annually, apparently in the spring of each year. The original POLICE CALL usually comes out in the fall. Because it is a consolidated USA listing, the new book runs about 430 pages, (POLICE CALL tends to run about 200+ pages) and my suggestion to the authors would be that subsequent revisions need to be broken down geographically like the original, and most definitly a cross- reference by frequency needs to be included. The kinds of listings you will find in BEYOND POLICE CALL include: -- frequencies used at sports events -- frequencies used by public utilities (here to some extent it gets ridiculous; the authors apparently just did a dump of FCC records; the listings for 'Ameritech' and 'Illinois Bell' go on for better than a page of small type as do the listings for 'Commonwealth Edison') -- amusement parks -- resorts and casinos -- school districts -- newspapers, television and radio news departments -- shopping mall security forces (naturally, living a block and a half from Skokie's 'Old Orchard Mall' I put that one in my scanner right away) -- movie crews -- colleges and universities (their security departments, etc) -- stadiums -- hospitals -- hotels -- taxicab dispatching -- towing services for disabled and/or illegally parked cars -- ski resorts -- race crews -- state fairs -- conventions -- public transportation -- farm cooperatives -- private investigators -- neighborhood watch groups Some of the above makes for very interesting listening, as any scanner enthusiast will tell you. The thing with public safety radio is that it makes up only a small percentage of what is out there. Many people buy a scanner only to listen to the police and unwittingly they miss huge amounts of very good stuff they might miss otherwise. Where to get your copy: I got both of mine (RADIO CALL 1994 Edition Volume 4 and BEYOND RADIO CALL) at the local Radio Shack store here in Skokie. They are $9.99 each and go by RS 'part number' 62-1040 (Beyond) and 62-104x (POLICE CALL) where 'x' runs from 1 to 8 I think for the various regional editions. Our local Radio Shack had a dozen of the BEYOND books two days ago, now the manager is down to just a couple copies left so it is apparently going pretty fast and you may want to get your copy ASAP. I guess you could also order directly from the publisher, but be sure and specify *which state* you live in (or want listings for) if you order POLICE CALL so they know which one to send you. Hollins Radio Data PO Box 35002 Los Angeles, CA 90035 They don't list a phone number, 800 or otherwise, so my assumption is they prefer not to deal with phone call orders or inquiries. They do stress writing to them with suggestions and comments at their address shown above. I suggest just getting your copies from Radio Shack or some other book dealer. ------------------ On the same train of thought, whatever happened to that fellow out of Indianapolis, IN somewhere who published the NORTH AMERICAN RADIO AND TV GUIDE? It came out on a more or less annual basis for many years listing all the callsigns and frequencies of AM/FM radio and television stations in the USA, Canada and Mexico. I've not seen a fresh copy of it for many years now, and the last one I have is Volume 13. Is he still around? I think Sams published it. Patrick Townson ------------------------------ From: moodyblu@umcc.umcc.umich.edu (Matthew Scott Weisberg) Subject: Re: Cellular Call Forwarding Date: 11 May 1994 13:34:40 -0400 Organization: UMCC, Ann Arbor, MI amg@panix.com (Alan M. Gallatin) writes: > In a previous article, bruce.mchollan@keystone.keystone.fl.us (Bruce > Mchollan) wrote: >> A person I work with has a cellular phone with call forwarding. When >> he forwards his calls to another number and then calls his own >> cellular number he is not charged for the call ($0!). This works even >> when he forwards his calls to a number within our LATA that would >> invoke toll charges if dialed by land line. He takes advantage to >> save the toll charges. Is this legal? > Legal? Yes. Believable? No. > I've seen a couple of different ways cell companies handle the > forwarding charges. Basically, they don't like to give unlimited > forwarding for free 'cause of the scenerio you described above. This is completely believable ... you do this in the Detroit Metro area. I have cellular service with Cellular One. I have call forwarding on my phone ($1.95 per month plus approx. 8 cents per forwarded call) ... I live in Novi, MI (in the new 810 area code). My girlfriend lives in Southgate (35 miles away, in 313). I simply forwarded my cell phone to her number, call my cell phone, and get untimed calls for 8 cents a call to her. Saved me over $35 on the last phone bill. Now, my question is, when the cut over to 810 becomes mandatory in August, will this no longer work? My cell phone has an 810 number. Is this a factor? One of my main motivations for getting the phone was for the call forwarding purpose (although, now that I have it, I can't imagine being without.. heh!). Matt Weisberg, CNE MILLIWAYS - Computer and Network Consulting PP-ASEL 21650 West Eleven Mile Road #202 Amateur Radio: KF8OH Southfield, MI 48076 Internet: moodyblu@umcc.umich.edu (810)350-0503 Fax:(810)350-0504 ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 94 06:41:03 CDT From: kevin@gath.cray.com (Kevin Bluml) Subject: Re: Cellular Call Forwarding > In article amg@panix.com (Alan M. > Gallatin) writes: > In a previous article, bruce.mchollan@keystone.keystone.fl.us (Bruce > Mchollan) wrote: >> A person I work with has a cellular phone with call forwarding. When >> he forwards his calls to another number and then calls his own >> cellular number he is not charged for the call ($0!). This works even > Legal? Yes. Believable? No. > What company is it that doesn't charge anything on the forwarded call? Well, I can name two. US West and Cellular One in the Minneapolis/St. Paul calling area of Minnesota. Neither charge any air time for forwarded calls of either type, N/A or immediate. My bill will typically be three or four pages, half of which are forwarded calls with $0.00 as the cost. Also, when travelling to Wisconsin, I can still reach the home area (Non-roaming) for 20 miles in to WI. There is no toll charge for these calls, even though the last tower is supposedly IN Wisconsin. When I called 911 once 15 miles into WI for a stalled car, the bill showed a WI phone number and I reached the county sheriff in WI rather than the MN state patrol as I would on the MN side. (I was on the home system, and NOT roaming at the time). Kevin V. Bluml - Cray Research Inc. 612-683-3036 USmail - 655 - Lone Oak Drive, Eagan, MN 55121 Internet - kevin.bluml@cray.com UUCP - uunet!cray!kevin ------------------------------ From: charnoff@netcom.com (Lenny Charnoff) Subject: Re: Internet White Pages Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 241-9760 guest) Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 02:50:24 GMT Jan Richert (jrichert@krefcom.GUN.de) wrote: > Could anyone email me the exact title of the Internet White Pages, > publisher and ISBN number? Publisher IDG Books ISBN # 1-56884-300-3 Lenny Charnoff Information Odyssey-Newsletter and Online Service BBS- 503-650-2992 charnoff@netcom.com ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 10 May 94 12:33 EDT From: johnl@iecc.com (John R Levine) Subject: Re: Internet White Pages Organization: I.E.C.C., Cambridge, Mass. > Could anyone email me the exact title of the Internet White Pages, > publisher and ISBN number? Seth Godin and James S. McBride, "The 1994 Internet White Pages", IDG Books, 1994, US$29.95, C$39.95, UKL26.99. ISBN 1-56884-300-3. It's distributed in Europe by Transword Publishers Ltd. For info on availability outside the U.S., contact Christina Turner, +1 415 312 0633. Regards, John Levine, johnl@iecc.com, jlevine@delphi.com, 1037498@mcimail.com Claimer: IDG has published several of my books, but I wasn't involved with this one, even though on the last page of it there's a nice ad for "The Internet for Dummies". ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 21:10:17 -0400 From: Seth Breidbart Subject: Re: Let Your Fingers do the Walking on the Internet Organization: Society for the Promulgation of Cruelty to the Clueless In article andrsonj@rtsg.mot.com writes: > andrsonj@rtsg.mot.com (John Anderson) writes: >> mail mail-server@pit-manager.mit.edu > I have learned that to use the above service, it is preferable to mail > to: > "mail-server@rtfm.mit.edu" > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Just my curiosity -- why is it better or > preferable to write to the one address instead of the other? PAT] Because the name pit-manager may go away some time in the future; rtfm is the new official name. Seth ------------------------------ From: nevin@cs.arizona.edu (Nevin Liber) Subject: Re: Let Your Fingers do the Walking on the Internet Date: 11 May 1994 02:23:11 -0700 Organization: University of Arizona CS Department, Tucson AZ In article , John Anderson wrote: >> mail mail-server@pit-manager.mit.edu > I have learned that to use the above service, it is preferable to mail > to: > "mail-server@rtfm.mit.edu" > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Just my curiosity -- why is it better or > preferable to write to the one address instead of the other? PAT] My guess would be that this would allow MIT to change the machine the service is on at will, without having to change the outside email address. For instance: my email address is nevin@cs.arizona.edu, yet I never send email from that machine (I don't even have an account on the machine). I'm planning on changing the machine I get email on later this month, yet I won't have to tell anybody that I'm doing it, since I'll still have the same external address (and the internal machines know to route mail to the right machine). (Actually, if I wanted to be even more generic, nevin@arizona.edu works; it is set up as an alias to nevin@cs.arizona.edu. Now if I could just figure out how to get nevin@edu to work ... :-)) Nevin ":-)" Liber nevin@cs.arizona.edu (602) 293-2799 +++(520) after 3/95 office: (602) 621-1685 ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V14 #212 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa18297; 11 May 94 21:48 EDT Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA14081; Wed, 11 May 94 17:49:41 CDT Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA14071; Wed, 11 May 94 17:49:39 CDT Date: Wed, 11 May 94 17:49:39 CDT From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Moderator) Message-Id: <9405112249.AA14071@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V14 #213 TELECOM Digest Wed, 11 May 94 17:49:00 CDT Volume 14 : Issue 213 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Re: Black Magic! Telecom Design Tricks (Terry Hardie) Re: FAX Mailbox Services (Jack Bzoza) Re: ZMODEM - Proprietary? (John R. Levine) Re: AT&T Divestiture Comments Wanted (John R. Levine) Re: Switch 56 Service (Keith Luca) Re: Broadband ISDN (Junaid Islam) Re: Government Regulates Modem Redial Attempts (John Harris) Re: Cellular Privacy (Jason Williams) Meeks Defense Fund (Mark Boolootian) Books from Telecom Library Inc. (Nigel Allen) Replace POST-MAIL by FAX (Fred Hess) Searching For a Specific Telephone! (Karim Farrag) Calling 1-800-COLLECT from Canada (Hugh Pritchard) Call Display From New York (Tony Harminc) Looking For FAX *System* Information (Rich Osman) Break-Even Point For Orange Card (Carl Moore) Looking For List of 800 Providers (Joel Fedorko) TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of public service systems and networks including Compuserve and GEnie. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available at no charge to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu * The Digest is edited, published and compilation-copyrighted by Patrick Townson of Skokie, Illinois USA. You can reach us by postal mail, fax or phone at: 9457-D Niles Center Road Skokie, IL USA 60076 Phone: 708-329-0571 Fax: 708-329-0572 ** Article submission address only: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu ** Our archives are located at lcs.mit.edu and are available by using anonymous ftp. The archives can also be accessed using our email information service. For a copy of a helpful file explaining how to use the information service, just ask. ************************************************************************* * TELECOM Digest is partially funded by a grant from the * * International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in Geneva, Switzerland * * under the aegis of its Telecom Information Exchange Services (TIES) * * project. Views expressed herein should not be construed as represent-* * ing views of the ITU. * ************************************************************************* Additionally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help is important and appreciated. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 06:58:13 NZST From: python@bytes.kiwi.gen.nz (Terry Hardie) Subject: Re: Black Magic! Telecom Design Tricks - Free Book For Digest Readers Organization: Computer Bytes BBS, Auckland, N.Z. (+64-9-537-5190) wu/O=JEFFREY_RACE/DD.ELN=62075697@mhs.attmail.com writes: > The manual is free upon request to readers of TELECOM Digest. > Generous-spirited readers are requested to provide suggestions for > corrections or improvements to subsequent revisions of the manual. > Any who make it to the last page and still want more such paper in > their in-baskets from possible survivors of future design projects are > respectfully encouraged to submit the form at the rear of the manual > for future technical mailings (if we survive this one). > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: When you write to Dr. Race to request your > free copy of the manual, please mention reading about it in TELECOM Digest. > Thanks. PAT] Not sure which one of you I need to send this to, but please could you send me one. Is it on paper or electronic? Terry [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: You would write to Dr. Race to receive your copy of the book. I am reprinting this as a reminder since several people have written *me* asking for a copy. I can't help you! Write to the author at the address shown for him at the top of this message. PAT] ------------------------------ From: Jack Bzoza Subject: Re: FAX Mailbox Services Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 11:18:00 -0400 Clarence Gold wrote: > Jack Bzoza (JackB@delrina.com) wrote: >> Delrina (the makers of WinFax and PerForm) has just announced a fax >> mailbox service exactly as you describe. It will ship (i.e. be >> available) in about two weeks time. >> It is currently the ONLY way to retrieve a fax sent to your fax >> mailbox directly to your hotel room with your laptop. > Nice idea, but "the ONLY way"? Hardly. Please inform us of any other solution that you are aware of that permits you to retrieve faxes to your laptop into your hotel room. Note I did NOT say "have faxes sent to your hotel room". The PBX in most hotels does not permit you to receive a call directly from an outside line. The way the existing fax mailbox services work is that you have to call in from a voice line, enter your PIN, then enter a fax phone number for the system to send your faxes. You then hang up the phone and the fax mailbox sends your faxes to the number you entered. This is the method sold by folks like A T & T, SkyFax, etc. There are no other fax mailbox RETRIEVAL solutions available which can receive the fax on the same call out to the best of my knowledge. > Expensive? yes. Yes it is but then this a very specialized service for the traveller. If you need it, then it's worth it. Don't forget you can also get voicemail options, pager notification (i.e. beep me whenever a fax arrives in my Fax MailBox), etc. Long distance is expensive as well. Since access to the MailBox is via your own personal 1-800 number you don't pay any additional connect charges (i.e. they're built in to the cost). If you don't need the service too often, simply use WinFax PRO 4.0's REMOTE RETRIEVAL capability. Yes, Delrina also gives you the ability to use WinFax PRO as your fax mailbox. If you don't mind leaving your PC on all the time receiving faxes, then WinFax PRO 4.0 can be set up for REMOTE RETRIEVAL. In other words, you can dial in to your WinFax PRO 4.0, (provided it's properly set up) enter a password and initiate a retrieval to your present location. This feature was delayed in the initial product shipment but is now shipping in all commercial versions of WinFax PRO 4.0. In fact, WinFax PRO 4.0 becomes the Delrina Fax MailBox principal competitor. Delrina believes that the WinFax PRO user should be empowered individually to control her/his fax communications in whatever manner suits them. > Offered by Delrina? I think not. Looks that way. I believe it is > offered by MCI. Sorry, but once again, you're mistaken. MCI has no such service available. MCI is the supplier of Delrina's Fax Broadcast service. Delrina has integrated WinFax PRO 4.0 into MCI's Fax Broadcast platform to enable WinFax PRO 4.0 users to prepare a fax for broadcast to multiple users (up to 500 per list) at their desktop with their standard Windows software and then to send it via WinFax PRO 4.0 (using the phonebooks and groups already in your WinFax) on a single phone call to a 1-800 telephone number. Delrina's strategic partner and supplier of the Fax MailBox platform is Pacific Bell. Since Delrina is building its own Communications Services Division and not simply reselling other companies products Delrina has selected strategic partners to supply the various components of its business with an eye to providing the very best technology and service in each segment of this venture. > WinFax 4.0 _requires_ a class 1 Faxmodem for mailbox retrieval. > The Class 2 faxmodem that I have cannot be used. Yes. you're right. That is a technical limitation of the hardware as it elates to the fax protocols. You also need a computer capable of running Windows. I guess you won't be able to use it until you spring for $100 for a new modem. > If you want a cheaper alternative, that has been in use for some time, > call 1-800-audiofax, and ask for the name of a "travel mailbox" dealer in > your area. I believe you're wrong again. My understanding is that Audiofax has no product that does direct retrieval on the same call. Yes, you can have your fax sent anywhere you want (in North America). Delrina's Fax MailBox does all that too but that's not the power of the system. We didn't want to simply do a "me too" service but rather tried to do it in a way that leveraged our strengths. > I must admit that the integration into WinFax is kind of cool. That is the entire focus of the service and the product!!! As I said above, there are dozens of services that will store your fax for you in a mailbox and send it to a number that you specify. To the best of my knowledge, only Delrina WinFax PRO 4.0 and the Delrina Communications Services can deliver this type of functionality in a Fax MailBox at this time. > I use WinFax to retrieve faxmail to my machine now, from an Audiofax system. Please see my comments above about RETRIEVAL versus having faxes sent to your location on a second telephone call. I'd be very interested to know how you can do that with a class 2 faxmodem !!! Thanks for your interest. jackb@delrina.com ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 94 10:44 EDT From: johnl@iecc.com (John R Levine) Subject: Re: ZMODEM - Proprietary? Organization: I.E.C.C., Cambridge, Mass. > As I understand the situation, zmodem is indeed a proprietary > protocol. Its use on hosts is only free under certain restricted > contexts, academic use being one of them. Clients, on the other hand, > are free to incorporate zmodem protocols, since a host is required to > use them. My understanding is that Chuck Forsberg developed ZMODEM under a contract to Telenet (now Sprintnet) and they released the spec to the public. Anyone can implement ZMODEM without legal restriction, which is why most comm programs now support it. Forsberg, doing business as Omen Technology, wrote several widely used implementations of it, including DSZ, Pro-YAM, sz and rz. DSZ is a DOS ZMODEM upload and download utility intended to be run from a comm program that doesn't have built-in ZMODEM support, and is shareware. Pro-YAM is a commercial Unix comm program, with a junior shareware version. Sz and rz are tiny zmodem send and recive programs, are free for personal use and in connection with other Omen products, and are shareware for other uses. Regards, John Levine, johnl@iecc.com, jlevine@delphi.com, 1037498@mcimail.com ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 94 10:50 EDT From: johnl@iecc.com (John R Levine) Subject: Re: AT&T Divestiture Comments Wanted Organization: I.E.C.C., Cambridge, Mass. > They considered and later acted on the opportunity to offload the higher > cost, less efficient local operating groups, and concentrate on LD. That was certainly the plan, but if you look at how much more money the RBOCs have made than AT&T in the past decade, the crystal ball was kind of cloudy. The breakup has certainly been good news for sophisticated users, since there are all sorts of swell new services that the old Bell System would never have gotten around to providing. The cost shift from long distance to monthly service is a purely political thing, and really has nothing to do with the breakup. If regulators wanted to, they could still mandate a surcharge on LD calls (independent of IXC) and use that to subsidize local service. This could easily be done by cranking up the per-minute rates charged for FG B and FG D connections. But they haven't -- they've moved charges closer to costs, which should be more economically effecient, albeit at the cost of making POTS service less universally available than before. All telcos have some sort of low cost "lifeline" service available for under $10/mo, but I can believe that people are embarassed to ask for it. Regards, John Levine, johnl@iecc.com, jlevine@delphi.com, 1037498@mcimail.com ------------------------------ From: kluca@pipeline.com (Keith Luca) Subject: Re: Switch 56 Service Date: 11 May 1994 11:27:16 -0400 Organization: The Pipeline My organization is reviewing switch-56 service which will will be used to back up a dedicated 56 circuit. We have received proposals form NYNEX and Sprint. The cost difference is not an issue. We are leaning towards Sprint because we feel they will be more responsive then NYNEX. This is based on our experience with NYNEX and the level of bureaucracy that at times makes NYNEX ineffective. MCI has provided this service to us in the past and has demonstrated that they are unreliable. If you have any pro or con comments about NYNEX or Sprint please let me know. Thanks, Keith M. Luca ------------------------------ From: JUNAID ISLAM Subject: Re: Broadband ISDN Date: Wed, 11 May 94 03:14:14 -0500 Organization: Delphi (info@delphi.com email, 800-695-4005 voice) Try reading "ISDN in Perspective" by Fred Goldstein (Addison Wesley, 1992). It is both readible and highly informative. Best regards, Junaid@Delphi [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: As a matter of fact, Fred is a regular participant in this Digest although I haven't heard much from him lately. PAT] ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 94 02:04 WET From: joharris@io.org (John Harris) Subject: Re: Government Regulates Modem Redial Attempts Quoting Tdgilman@iris-1.ce.berkel: > I was trying out new modem software yesterday, and under the option > where one can specify the number of redial attempts before giving up, > somthing like the following reads: "Governement regulations may limit > you to 10 redials maximum." > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: That has been the case in Canada for > quite a few years and I think it is true here in the USA also now. My understanding is that the Canadian requirement (CS-03) is 10 redial attempts, the American (FCC Part 68) requirement is 15 redial attempts; and the harmonized requirement coming out of the Free Trade Agreement will be two redial attempts. There have been complaints about fax machines that call in the middle of the night, i.e. during cheap rate times, and won't stop. The rules apply to any telephone device, fax or modem. The TIA should be petitioning the FCC for adoption of the new Part 68/CS-03 any time now. John Harris, Mississauga, ON, Canada (905) 828-1002 Blue Wave/QWK v2.12 ------------------------------ From: streak@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Streak) Subject: Re: Cellular Privacy? Date: 11 May 1994 11:31:54 -0500 Organization: The University of Texas - Austin In article , > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: However the court ruling to which you > refer is a very grey area. The FCC thinks otherwise, as do the federal > courts in some jurisdictions. Best not listen to cellular calls. PAT] Speaking of which, has anyone actually been caught, tried, and convicted of listening to cellular phone calls? (You have to be pretty stupid to turn on your scanner to the cellular band when a cop pulls you over ... and even then, the chances are unlikely that they will do anything.) Another thing ... suppose I heard some illegal activity on cellular or even cordless? Do I have any legal rights to report it? (didn't the Nancy Kerrigan case get blown up because someone listened to the phone lines?) email: streak@mail.utexas.edu * Jason Williams -- Austin, Tx. main-> streak@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu * University of Texas at Austin streak@underg.ucf.org * Electrical and Computer Engineering [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Forget about cordless. Listen to whatever you want there; just don't repeat it or benefit from what you heard since that rule has existed independently for years. There is no law against listening to cordless phones. A police officer who pulls you over with spare time on his hands *could* make a referral to the appropriate federal agency if he wanted to do so; he probably would not. For your information however, at least one major retailer of scanners (Tandy/Radio Shack) has instructed its employees that they may no longer sell scanners to any customer who indicates the scanner will be used illegally to receive cellular signals. If you ask a Radio Shack employee something to the effect of 'which of your scanners can be modified to pick up cellular calls?', he is supposed to refuse any further conversation with you and *** refuse to sell you any scanners at all ***. Tandy has recently instructed its employees that in the event a scanner purchased from Radio Shack is used in the commission of a crime and it is discovered that the selling employee ** knew or should have known ** that the purchaser intended to make illegal modifications to the radio that the selling employee can be charged with 'aiding and abetting in the commission of a crime'. That may be all just theory, and it may never happen, but at least in this neck of the woods, many RS employees will not talk to you about 'cellular' and 'scanner' in the same sentence. All that despite the fact that the pocket tone dialer Tandy sells can be easily converted -- with a crystal sold at Radio Shack! -- to make the tone caused by a 25 cent coin put in pay phones. But that is also a verbotin topic at 'the shack' ... PAT] ------------------------------ From: booloo@framsparc.ocf.llnl.gov (Mark Boolootian) Subject: Meeks Defense Fund Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 13:38:30 -0400 Forwarded FYI to the Digest: From: Meeks Defense Fund Dear Net Citizen: How do you put a price on free and open dialogue on the Net? How much are you willing to spend to preserve the concept of roboust and open debate that have become a part of the Internet's culture? $100? $50? $20? What if the cost of helping to preserve an open and robust Net was no more than $1.29? That's right, less than the cost of a fast food hamburger. Freedom on the Internet for only $1.29 ... cheap at twice the price. A joke? Hardly. The free and open speech, indeed the First Amendment rights of the Internet -- rights we've all enjoyed for decades -- are now being challenged in court. CyberWire Dispatch, the well-respected online newswire written and developed for the Internet community by journalist Brock Meeks, is the subject of a libel suit. CyberWire Dispatch has been at the forefront of bringing the Net community timely and insightful articles. This suit was highlighted in a {Wall St. Journal} article (April 22, page B1). The subject of a Dispatch investigation is suing Meeks for simply doing what journalists in the traditional print medium have done since the founding of newspapers: Print the facts and let the public decide the outcome. Brock and the Cyperwire Dispatch are examples of the "bottom up" journalism that charachterizes the Net, where anyone with a modem can compete with the traditional press. Of course, most of us don't come to the Net with a lawyer in tow, or the resources to defend a legal action taken against us in courts located hundreds of miles from our homes. This libel action is one of the earliest cases of libel involving alleged defamatory statements published over a computer network. It raises the extremely important legal and policy issues. It's impact may well determine how and to what extent anyone feels free to express strong opinions on the Net, wihtout being put at risk of legal action. It is crucial that Brock have a strong defense and that the principles that come out of this case provide the maximum protection to the exercise of free and open speech as possible. CyberWire Dispatch is unique because it's distributed solely in electronic form. A service for the Net community at large. And all CyberWire Dispatch articles are free. Meeks neither charges anyone for receiving them; he gets paid nothing to write them. For all these efforts, he's being sued. And being sued by a company with a large financial backing. Meeks, on the other hand, has no such resources. His attorney, Bruce Sanford of Baker & Hostetler is arguably the finest First Amendment lawyer in the U.S. And although he has agreed to represent Meeks at a reduced rate, the cost of defending against this unmerited suit will not be cheap. We have formed this committee to lend our support in helping him raise money for his legal defense. And all we're asking you to send is $1.29. That's it. Why that price? The math is easy: $1 in an envelope with a 29 cent stamp applied. Who can't afford $1.29 to help save the great freedoms we all enjoy here today? Can you send more? Of course. Any contributions will be welcomed and accepted. Tax deductible donations also are possible by following the instructions below. All money sent for Meeks' legal defense fund will be go to that purpose. All the administrative services for administering the fund are being donated; 100% of your money goes to defer the legal costs of this case. You are encouraged to repost this message. But please, we urge you to keep proper Net protocol in mind when reposting or cross posting this message. Thanks for your time. On behalf of Brock and for future generations of electronic journalists, we appreciate your contributions and support. Sincerely, Samuel A. Simon President, Issue Dynmics, Inc.* ssimon@idi.net Mitch Kapor Chair, Electronic Frontier Foundation* Kapor@eff.org David Farber The Alfred Fitler Moore Professor of Telecommunications Systems University of Pennsylvania* farber@central.cis.upenn.edu Philip Elmer-DeWitt Senior Writer TIME Magazine* ped@panix.com Marc Rotenberg Electronic Infomation Privacy Center* epic@cpsr.org Nicholas Johnson Former FCC Commissoner* 103-5393@mcimail.com Jerry Berman Electronic Frontier Foundation* jbeman@eff.org Mike Godwin Electronic Frontier Foundation* mnemonic@eff.org *AFFILIATION IS FOR INDENTIFICATION PURPOSE ONLY For Tax Deductible Donations: Make Checks out to "Point Foundation" and clearly annotate on the check: "For Legal Defense Fund." Send those checks to: Meeks Defense Fund c/o Point Foundation 27 Gate Five Road Sausalito, CA 94965 For those who don't care about the tax deductible status, send contributions to: Meeks Defense Fund c/o IDI 901 15th St. NW Suite 230 Washington, DC 20005 Meeks Defense Fund Internet: fund@idi.net c/o IDI c/o Point Foundation 901 15th St. NW 27 Gate Five Road Suite 230 Sausalito, CA 9465 Washington, DC 20005 -------------------- [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I think based on the signatories to the letter shown above, we are safe in waiving the usual comments about making sure something is bonafide before sending money through the mail. I believe all the gentlemen listed above are honest; there are no scams being pulled. By all means, if you wish, send what you can. But first, as they say, a word from the sponsor: Nowhere in the above report is any mention given of whether or not libel did occur. Note that the article seems to skirt that (to me) very basic premise ... instead, the writers complain of how the accused has very little money, is doing all this for free out of sense of volunteer- ism, and how the plaintiff is a big company with lots of money -- as though those facts alone meant anything. Big corporations have rights also; even AT&T is entitled to the protection of the law, the same as you or I. (Note: I use AT&T as an example only, I do not know who is suing him.) Ditto, the fact that you are a poor, underpaid (if paid at all) moderator, working out of the goodness of your heart (or as some people on Usenet like to say about me, to feed my ego-trip) gives one no franchise to violate the law. The law says no libeling, period. Big corporation, little company, single individual, no matter. Newspapers have a little more freedom in this respect and all of us have a bit more freedom where politicians and 'public figures' are concerned, but no one can deliberatly libel another without paying the consequences. Now, that's *if* Cyberwire Dispatch and or its publisher Meeks did in fact publish libelous commentary. I do not know if he did or did not; I do not evaluate the work of other moderators or e-journals. A judge will detirmine the facts. But my point is their argument of 'we are the net, we are something different, the regular rules should not apply to us on account of how we are just volunteers and un-(or under)paid workers; the plaintiff is a big bully with lots of money to hire lawyers,' etc is not applicable. On the one hand, some of these guys want legitimacy for the net. They want, and I agree with them, to have our e-journals treated like any other media. Most of us are damn sick and tired of having our efforts treated like they mean nothing merely because we have no paper editions. Most of us are sick and tired of having the government thumb its nose in our face where our free speech rights are concerned -- getting away with things they would never dare try to pull on the {Washington Post}'s of the world -- merely because they are print media and we are not. So you want legitimacy for e-journals? Fine, then live the life! If the {Washington Post} libeled you, then you would have every right in the world to go after them for it. But you can't have it both ways. If you want to claim the rights afforded you by the constitution and claim the rights given to the media -- I claim all those rights!! -- then can the crap about how 'we are just little private individuals who should not have to be hassled in this way' or words to that effect. Note the article on the one hand calls Cyberwire Dispatch 'the well respected online newswire' then almost immediatly reverses itself. Well hey, the {New York Times} is a well-respected publication also, and there are no doubt times in its long-ago history *it* had cash flow problems and poorly paid help. Its been sued a few times also; that's the price for not watching your tongue in print. So please guys, fight the battle on the merits of the alleged libel, not on the basis of 'I am little and you are big so therefore I am right and you are wrong.' Inform the net of your situation and plead for funds, but do not give us the bit about how the net is so different and special. Now I repeat: it seems a worthy cause otherwise. Lots of netters have come to my rescue in the past and I am glad to bring this latest need to the attention of our generous readers. PAT] ------------------------------ Subject: Books from Telecom Library Inc. From: nigel.allen@canrem.com (Nigel Allen) Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 12:17:00 -0400 Organization: CRS Online (Toronto, Ontario) If you would like to receive a catalog of Telecom Library's publications, or would like to receive a sample copy of any of the company's magazines (Teleconnect, Call Center or Imaging), contact: Telecom Library Inc. 12 West 21 Street New York NY 10010 U.S.A. telephone 212-691-8215 or 1-800-LIBRARY fax 212-691-1191 Harry Newton is president of Telecom Library, I think. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 17:23:47 +0200 From: hess@elde1.epfl.ch Subject: Replace POST-MAIL by FAX Organization: Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne I am currently studying the possibility to replace our POST-MAIL (Internal, National and International) by FAX'ing documents. By "our POST-MAIL" I mean all the traditional mail (NOT confidential) like letters, convocations, informations, ... It's just a question of cost/send. I'll be very happy if you could answer (EMAIL) to any questions below : 1) Have you heard about any experience like that in a school, organisation, or enterprise ? Could you send me any report ? Someone to contact ? 2) FAX sending time: where could I find a report talking about the time I need to send a FAX? What are the speeds used? Quantity of information to be sent (average)? 3) Future of FAXs: What about the sending speed of the next FAX generation? And with the high-speed numerical services? 4) Progression of FAX in enterprises (ten last years)? (In the world). 5) Any suggestions about this experience? 6) Where could I post this message to get more information? Other Newsgroup? You could forward this message anywhere! This experience is a simple research, not a real project, for the EPFL (Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology). Thanks in advance, Fred Email: hess@elde.epfl.ch Sorry for my poor English ! ------------------------------ From: farrag@isis.rz.uni-duesseldorf.de (Karim.Farrag) Subject: Searching For a Specific Telephone Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 15:25:08 GMT Organization: Universitaetsrechenzentrum, Heinrich-Heine-Universitaet Duesseldorf Hi Everybody, For quite a while now I'am searching for a specific telephone probably manufactured by AT&T.Specific features: narrow receiver, the speech unit of the receiver is bent almost 90 degrees; the receiver is shaped like an L , wire phone, mostly seen in black colour.I suppose it most be a very common model in the US , because I saw in many different movies (ex. In the Line of Fire ,Last Action Hero, etc.). Unfortunaly AT&T here in Europe wasn't as cooperative as I thought. Now I am hoping that someone knows which phone I am talking about (telephone manufactor, model number) or maybe the main address of AT&T in the US. Many thanks in advance. E-Mail: farrag@mail.rz.uni-duesseldorf.de ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 94 13:29 EST From: Hugh Pritchard <0006348214@mcimail.com> Subject: Calling 1-800-COLLECT From Canada [This is from the BRIEFLY column in the May 9, 1994 {MCI This Week}. I'm no MCI employee; I benefit not one whit whether you use 1-800-COLLECT or not. -- HP] CALLING 1-800-COLLECT FROM CANADA Beginning May 10, 1-800-COLLECT (sm), America's favorite way to call collect, will be available in Canada. Canada becomes the first country from which 1-800-COLLECT calls can be made back to the United States. The connection between Canada and the U.S. is made possible through a joint effort between MCI and Canada's Stentor, part of an alliance between the nine major telephone companies of Canada. The 1-800-COLLECT from Canada marks the first joint offering the companies have launched in the consumer marketplace. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 94 14:09:36 EDT From: Tony Harminc Subject: Call Display From New York A colleague left a message on my machine here in Toronto while he was waiting for a plane at JFK airport in New York. To my surprise, the Call Display data was not 'out of area' as it usually is for calls from the USA, but the rather unlikely number 212 210-0000. I don't know exactly where he placed the call from (other than that he had cleared security at the time) or how he paid for it. I haven't tried calling the number, but it seems very unlikely to be the actual number on the payphone. I don't know which US carrier he used either - perhaps they are just early in implementing the new FCC requirements ;-) Assuming that the 0000 is fake, who would be setting the number that way? The LEC (implying that the IXC doesn't get the real data)? The IXC making some privacy assumptions of its own? The payphone owner (COCOT)? Tony Harminc ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 94 11:55:53 CDT From: ROsman@swri.edu Subject: Looking For FAX *System* Information I'm looking for information on fax systems. My brother's business has grown to the point where their single fax is a problem. He also needs to add fax-back capability. Ideally the system would meet the following criteria: PC based Use a range of fax boards Support 3rd number and pickup faxback calls support printing incoming faxes to a laser printer interface cleanly with a network (probably Novell, but TBD) support off peak queuing (for outgoing) support multiple lines (at least three) be easily expandable (add cards, drive space, etc.) Oz@SwRI.edu (Rich Osman) SwRI didn't say it, I did. (210) 522-5050 (w) (210) 699-1302 (h;v/msg/fax) ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 94 17:03:39 EDT From: Carl Moore Subject: Break-Even Point For Orange Card I have a phone bill with a 15-minute AT&T calling card call from Aberdeen (Md.) to Philadelphia, and it cost $4.70 before Federal tax rate of 3% was applied. This ran a little better than 30 cents a minute, which despite the fifteen minutes still was more expensive than the Orange Card, which would have billed 25 cents per minute plus tax. (PAT's earlier estimate was about ten minutes for break-even point; the longer the call, the more time for spreading out the relatively-high initial charge of other calling cards.) ------------------------------ From: jfedorko@ncsa.uiuc.edu (Joel Fedorko) Subject: Looking For List of 800 Providers Date: 11 May 1994 20:50:33 GMT Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana The subject pretty much says it. I'm looking for info on 800 providers and rates. Thanks, Joel jfedorko@ncsa.uiuc.edu ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V14 #213 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa21196; 12 May 94 12:46 EDT Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA23615; Thu, 12 May 94 08:39:06 CDT Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA23606; Thu, 12 May 94 08:39:03 CDT Date: Thu, 12 May 94 08:39:03 CDT From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Moderator) Message-Id: <9405121339.AA23606@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V14 #214 TELECOM Digest Thu, 12 May 94 08:39:00 CDT Volume 14 : Issue 214 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson NPA Readiness For 1995 (Gregory P. Monti) Emerging Cellular Systems (U. Ezechuk) ID Card Stories -- Reality Check (Lauren Weinstein) Cell One/NY Rates For DC and Boston (Doug Reuben) Help Needed With Speech Recognition..."Word Processing" (Peter Flower) 3270 Emulation (Windows) (Michael Anderson) TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of public service systems and networks including Compuserve and GEnie. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available at no charge to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu * The Digest is edited, published and compilation-copyrighted by Patrick Townson of Skokie, Illinois USA. You can reach us by postal mail, fax or phone at: 9457-D Niles Center Road Skokie, IL USA 60076 Phone: 708-329-0571 Fax: 708-329-0572 ** Article submission address only: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu ** Our archives are located at lcs.mit.edu and are available by using anonymous ftp. The archives can also be accessed using our email information service. For a copy of a helpful file explaining how to use the information service, just ask. ************************************************************************* * TELECOM Digest is partially funded by a grant from the * * International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in Geneva, Switzerland * * under the aegis of its Telecom Information Exchange Services (TIES) * * project. Views expressed herein should not be construed as represent-* * ing views of the ITU. * ************************************************************************* Additionally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help is important and appreciated. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 07:13:53 EDT From: Gregory P. Monti Subject: NPA Readiness for 1995 North America's Countdown to NPA Interchangeability in 1995 Interchangeable Codes Day is January 15, 1995, which is a Sunday! (Does Hallmark have a line of cards out for it yet?) For purposes of this table, "toll calls" are calls that are *individually itemized* on your local or long distance company phone bill. "Message unit" or "Zone Unit Measurement" or "Extended Area" calls are not individually itemized on bills and I don't consider them "toll" even though they cost something over and above local service. If the local telco doesn't force you to dial them differently, and doesn't bill them individually, then they are treating them like local calls and so will I. Premium calls like 976 are mentioned if I know about them. Otherwise, consider this table to be unreliable as to 976, etc., calls. The "Ready for 1/95" column states whether the NPA has eliminated a dialing plan that won't work once NPAs 281, 334, 360, 520, 563 and 630 come on line. There could be multiple interpretations of what "yes" and "no" could mean, so I took these shortcuts: no 1995 plan announced = no new plan announced, don't know if implemented = yes new plan announced, definitely not implemented = no new plan now implemented, but not mandatory; old one still permitted = yes new plan now implemented and is mandatory = yes I have removed the interchangeable NPAs that will begin 1/95. They will always be "ready for 1/95". NPA Stat Toll Ready Notes Prov calls for within 1/95? NPA dialed as 201 NJ 7 yes 202 DC not applicable yes there are no toll calls within 202 203 CT 1+7 no 204 MB 1+10 yes 1+10D to be mandatory 9/94 205 AL 1+10 yes 1+10D mandatory 1990 206 WA 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 1991, mandatory 1992 207 ME 7 yes 7D announced 1992 208 ID 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 1993 all US West states 209 CA 7 yes 210 TX 1+10 yes has always been 1+10D toll 212 NY not applicable yes there are no toll calls within 212, 540 & 976 premium services are 7D 213 CA 7 yes has always been 7D for toll 214 TX 1+10 yes 215 PA 7 yes "no 1" campaign ran in 1992, when 1+7D eliminated 216 OH 1+10D yes 1+10D mandatory 1/1/95 217 IL 7 yes Urbana book mentions "10D" without "1", which won't work unless local calls within 217 are also 10D; later Bellcore source says 7D, which I consider more reliable 218 MN 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 12/93, mandatory late 1994 219 IN 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 8/93 301 MD 1+10 yes 302 DE 1+10 yes 1+10D permitted 4/1/94, mandatory 1/7/95 303 CO 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 1993, mandatory 2/27/94 304 WV 7 yes 305 FL 1+10 yes 1+10D announced early 93 306 SK 1+10 yes 1+10D to be mandatory 9/94 307 WY 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 1993 all US West states 308 NE 1+10 yes 1+10D announced for all US West states 12/93 309 IL 7 yes per Bellcore source from varney@uscbu.att.com 310 CA 7 yes 312 IL not applicable yes there are no toll calls within 312 313 MI 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 1993 (was to be 7D) 314 MO 1+7 no 315 NY 7 yes per Bellcore source from varney@uscbu.att.com 316 KS 1+7 no 317 IN 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 8/93, mandatory 12/1/93 318 LA 1+7 no 319 IA 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 12/93 all US West states 401 RI 1+10 yes 7D announced 1992, but 1+10D announced 1/94 to become mandatory 402 NE 1+10 yes 1+10D announced for all US West states 12/93; Lincoln Tel portion 1+10D mandatory late 94 403 AB,NT,YT 1+10 yes 1+10D to be mandatory 9/94 404 GA 1+10 yes 1+10D implemented 1989 405 OK 1+7 no 406 MT 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 1993 all US West states 407 FL 1+10 yes 1+10D announced early 93 408 CA 7 no inter-NPA calls are 10D, must change to 1+10D 409 TX 1+7 no 410 MD 1+10 yes 412 PA 7 yes not sure if 7D announced 9/93 later Bellcore source from alan.leon.varney@att.com says 7D 413 MA 1+10 yes originally to be 7D; Mass DPU was thought to have ordered 1+10D in 10/93, but J. Covert reports no such order exists; bill stuffer reported here confirms 1+10 is correct; becomes mandatory 6/1/94 414 WI 1+10 yes 415 CA 7 yes has always been 7D toll 416 ON 1+10 yes there are no toll calls within 416 except 976, which are dialed 1 416 976-XXXX 417 MO 1+7 no 418 QC 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 10/93 419 OH 1+10D yes 1+10D mandatory 1/1/95 501 AR 1+7 no 502 KY 1+7 no 503 OR 1+10 yes 1+10D announced mid 1992 504 LA 1+7 no 505 NM 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 1993 all US West states 506 NB 1+10 yes 1+10D to be mandatory 9/94 507 MN 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 12/93, mandatory late 1994 508 MA 1+10 yes see note under 413 509 WA 1+10 yes 1+10D permitted 5/15/94, mandatory 9/17/94 510 CA 7 yes has always been 7D for toll 512 TX 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 1991 513 OH 1+10D yes 1+10D mandatory 1/1/95 514 QC 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 10/93 515 IA 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 1993 all US West states 516 NY 7 yes inter-NPA calls to be forced to 1+10D; 540 & 976 premium services are 7D 517 MI 1+7 no 518 NY 7 yes per Bellcore source from varney@uscbu.att.com 519 ON 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 10/93 601 MS 1+10 yes 1+10D mandatory 12/93 602 AZ 1+10 yes 1+10D mandatory 1990 603 NH 7 yes 7D announced 1992; but per-line blocking to be available to subs who don't want 7D toll; they will be forced to dial 1+10D 604 BC,NT,AK 1+10 yes 1+10D intra-NPA toll to be mandatory 9/94; Hyder, AK, is in 604 per previous postings here 605 SD 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 12/93 606 KY 1+7 no 607 NY 7 yes per Bellcore source from varney@uscbu.att.com 608 WI 1+10 yes 609 NJ 7 yes 1+7 disallowed beginning 9/93 per bill stuffer 610 PA 1+10 yes 1+10D mandatory 12/93 (was to inherit 7D from 215) 612 MN 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 12/93, mandatory late 1994 613 ON 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 10/93 614 OH 1+10D yes 1+10D mandatory 1/1/95 615 TN 1+10 yes 1+10D posted on pay phones 9/93 616 MI 1+7 no 617 MA 1+10 yes see note under 413 618 IL 7 yes per Bellcore source from varney@uscbu.att.com 619 CA 7 yes 7D toll announced 9/93 701 ND 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 12/93 702 NV 1+7 no 703 VA 1+10 yes 1+10D mandatory 1987 704 NC 1+10 yes 1+10D mandatory 1990 705 ON 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 10/93 706 GA 1+10 yes inherited 1+10D from 404 707 CA 7 yes 7D announced 10/93 708 IL not applicable yes there are no toll calls within 708 709 NF,NT 1+10 yes 1+10D to be mandatory 9/94 712 IA 1+10 yes 1+10D announced for all US West states 12/93 713 TX 1+10 yes 1+10D mandatory 12/7/91 714 CA 7 yes 7D toll began in early 1980s 715 WI 1+10 yes 716 NY 7 yes Rochester LATA, per Telecom Digest 787; matches Bellcore source from varney@uscbu.att.com 717 PA 7 yes 7D announced 11/93 718 NY not applicable yes there are no toll calls within 718, 540 & 976 premium services are 7D 719 CO 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 1993, mandatory 2/27/94 801 UT 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 1993 all US West states 802 VT 1+10 yes 7D announced 1992; but 1+10D announced 2/94 to become mandatory 803 SC 1+10 yes 1+10D posted on pay phones 9/93 804 VA 1+7 no 805 CA 7 yes 1+7D still allowed in Pac Bell portion, for now 806 TX 1+7 no 807 ON 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 10/93 808 HI 1+7 no 809 Caribbean 1+7 no 810 MI 1+10 yes 812 IN 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 8/93 813 FL 1+10 yes 1+10D announced early 93 814 PA 7 yes not sure if 7D announced 9/93; later Bellcore source from alan.leon.varney@att.com says 7D 815 IL 7 yes per Bellcore source from varney@uscbu.att.com 816 MO 1+7 no 817 TX 1+10 yes 1+10D currently mandatory 818 CA 7 yes has always been 7D toll 819 QC 1+10 yes 1+10D announced 10/93 901 TN 1+10 yes 1+10D posted on pay phones 9/93 902 NS,PE 1+10 yes 1+10D to be mandatory 9/94 903 TX 1+10 yes has always been 1+10D toll 904 FL 1+10 yes 1+10D announced early 93 905 ON 1+10 yes has always been 1+10D toll 906 MI 1+7 no 907 AK 1+7 no 908 NJ 7 yes has always been 7D toll 909 CA 7 yes 910 NC 1+10 yes 912 GA 1+10 yes 1+10D mandatory 8/92 913 KS 1+7 no 914 NY 7 no inter-NPA calls are 10D, must change to 1+10D; 540 & 976 premium services are 7D 915 TX 1+7 no 916 CA 7 yes 7D announced 9/93 917 NY not applicable yes there are no toll calls within 917; however, since all outbound calls from 917 are cellular, there is a premium airtime charge on all of them 918 OK 1+7 no 919 NC 1+10 yes 1+10D mandatory 1990 143 Total NANP NPAs 117 NPAs ready for 1995 26 NPAs not ready for 1995 31 ready NPAs using 7D solution so far 80 ready NPAs using 1+10D solution so far 6 ready NPAs not requiring a solution (no intra-NPA tolls) 2 non-ready NPAs using 7D but still 10D for inter-NPA 24 non-ready NPAs still using 1+7D Corrections are welcomed. Mail to me, I'll re-post summary. Thanks to Bob Goudreau for suggesting the more detailed breakout. Greg Monti Arlington, Virginia, USA gmonti@cap.gwu.edu ------------------------------ From: uezechuk@mlsma.att.com Date: 12 May 94 10:29:00 GMT Subject: Emerging Cellular Systems Hi, I am compiling material on new generation cellular systems, and would appreciate any help. I will post the summary of responses if there is enough interest. My questions are: 1) What is PCS, PCN, with relevance to cellular systems? 2) What advantages do digital cellular systems have over analog? 3) For a cellular operator, what are the ideal frequencies to operate in and why? 4) What impact does the frequency in #3 above have on operational costs, equipment costs, etc? 5) What are the impacts of operating in the higher reaches of the spectrum, e.g. at GHz levels? What are the impacts of low power systems and their advantages? 5) What are the advantages of CDMA over TDMA radio access technologies? What are the relative costs of these technologies? 6) Any ideas on how to obtain the QUALCOMM CDMA specs? 7) What impact will emerging cellular systems like Steinbrechers Minicell systems have on the cellular operator in terms of cost, operation and equipment? Note: The minicell is based on technology whereby a base station can handle different radio access methods (CDMA, TDMA) as opposed to the traditional approach of hard wired access methods. 8) Does anyone have any ideas of names and addresses (email?) of manufac- turers of Cellular base stations, switching equipment etc? What are the technological merits and demerits of these equipment? Thanks, U Ezechukwu Network Sys UK. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 94 20:31 PDT From: lauren@vortex.com (Lauren Weinstein) Subject: ID Card Stories -- Reality Check Greetings. As moderator of the Internet PRIVACY Forum Digest, I'm of course interested in the privacy issues surrounding ID cards, information access and related issues. However, the current round of stories regarding supposed plans for national "smart" ID cards, database tie-ins, etc. seem to have taken on a life of their own, escalating with (as far as I can tell) little real new information to drive them. In other words, there are signs that at least part of these stories are tied to rumors that may have been expanded in the telling. For example, PRIVACY Forum received a message a few days ago that was a first hand report of some comments made by a career government official at a conference, where they were apparently sort of "blue-skying" about the possibilities for increasingly simplified tax collection through various sorts of data tie-ins. There was no sign that these ideas had been incorporated into any sort of formal plan. In a similar vein, a story from the recent past had the U.S. Postal Service talking about the ability to issue millions of smart cards on short order for universal identification purposes. Once again, the impression I got from that piece was of talking about the possibilities for use of such technology -- not that such a plan was about to be implemented in some sort of surprise move! Next I saw items where the messages' authors seemed to be combining the two prior stories into some sort of integrated plan, and were now claiming that "President Clinton is considering signing executive orders to implement parts of these plans." Then the message escalation got even more pronounced -- a message in TELECOM claiming that President Clinton was about to sign such orders. It seems that the entire sequence of messages escalated with little if any real new information being added. One can't help but wonder if we might be looking at a classic case of rumors gone wild. Obviously, these are important issues worthy of widespread discussion and debate. I have no special knowledge of any possible underlying realities to these stories, one way or another. But it did appear that the items seemed to be spreading around the net feeding upon themselves, becoming more dramatic with each iteration. I thought it was worth raising a warning that it might be prudent to not rush to judgment about the validity or veracity of these stories until more specific information, drawn from sources other than the same items that have been circulating the net, become available. Lauren [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Well Lauren, the story which appeared here was from that fellow via the EFF. The main reason I ran it was because I tend to use EFF stuff when it is sent to me even though I personally have to wonder about their motives from time to time. The story I had here was in the EFFector recently. Maybe I will start being more careful about printing some of their news releases. PAT] ------------------------------ From: dreuben@netcom.com (Cid Technologies) Subject: Cell One/NY rates for DC and Boston Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 14:12:51 PDT I noted about a month ago that Cell One/NY implemented new roaming rates for a large area surrounding the CO/NY system. Specifically, these systems were Metro Mobile (Bell Atlantic)/CT (00119) and Litchfield Cellular (now McCaw), Dutchess County-Poughkeepsie NY/(00479?), ComCast/NJ-DE-PA (00173, 00575, 01487, 00123, 00029), the small Newton, NJ-based Ericsson system (forgot the SID), and the Atlantic City (ComCast?) and Ocean County, NJ systems. In each of these systems (most of which also have automatic call delivery), CO/NY customers pay their home airtime rates, and no daily roam charges. Additionally, in Northern and Central NJ and Fairfield County, CT, you pay only *local* rates (6 cents per minute) to reach anyone from Fairfield County, CT, all the way down to Central NJ, and the airtime charges for these calls are applied to whatever pre-paid airtime allotment you may have, if any. However, I believe I incorrectly mentioned that the Baltimore-Washington (00013) system was $.99 per minute, whereas in actuality it is ALSO included in CO/NY's plan! Thus, you pay your home peak/off-peak rates when roaming in Baltimore/DC. Additionally, the SW Bell/Boston system (00007), Metro Mobile/RI (00119), and the insidious Franklin County, Mass "Let's sit on out fat roam charges and do nothing" system are also included in CO/NY's plan. (The Franklin County system is also SID 119, and is owned by a company called Boston Communications, (617) 247-1112. They have been very intransigent in dealing with other Cell Co's which have tried to set up low-cost roaming there, especially Cell One/Boston, which is trying to set up "New England Network" rates (.44 peak/.29 off-peak) there. The insidious thing about these guys is that they are operated by Metro Mobile [no, that's not that worst part! :) ], and have the same 00119 SID. So roamers, especially those with New England Network rates, have no idea when they place and receive calls that rather than $.44 peak or $.29 off-peak they will instead pay $3 day/$.99 per minute!.This makes me very cautious when using my phone anywhere near their system, since in their vicinity, you simply CAN'T TELL what you will be paying! :( I hope that McCaw's market power convinced Boston Comm to modify rates for NY customers, and not that McCaw is just eating the roam charge and handing them over to those greedy little dweebs and Boston Comm. I tried calling Paul Tobin at Boston Comm about this a number of times, needless to say he never returned my calls.) Thus, CO/NY customers pay home peak and off-peak rates in ALL of Mass, ALL of RI, ALL of CT, ALL of New Jersey, the Metrophone 00029 system in PA, all of Delaware, the Baltimore-DC SW Bell system, and Dutchess County, NY. Moreover, auto call delivery will soon be available (next month?) to Boston and Rhode Island. Note that CO/NY, unlike SW Bell/Boston, does not charge any "home airtime" for calls delivered to you while roaming. SW Bell/Boston has this (IMHO) really cheap policy of charging their OWN customers home airtime rates in addition to roaming rates [and let us not forget the $2 Roam-Department-Christmas-Party Fund ... err ... I mean of course "roamer administrative fee"]. For a company with generally enlightened roaming policies, these charges are a throwback to "soak-the-roamer" practices, except that this time the roamers are also their own customers. Convenient for SW Bell, eh? Pretty cheap and petty, really ... As a result of the above, an account with Cell One/NY suddenly emerges as the preferred roaming method for frequent Northeast Corridor travelers. With no daily charges from Mass to northern Virginia, airtime-free call delivery throughout most of the area, and the use of the (overpriced yet better than the B side) NACN in areas outside of the Northeast, CO/NY stands clearly above its sister "A" carriers in the region, and positions itself substantially ahead of NYNEX (the B side carrier). NYNEX/NY offers, at best, 75-cent per minute roaming in CT, 99-cent per minute roaming in BAMS (Philly and DC), 75 or 99 cent in Boston/RI and Maine, and may still be billing $3 daily charges (incorrectly) for incoming calls to Baltimore/DC. Additionally, I am *still* not sure what their policy is for outgoing calls in "Mobilreach" call delivery areas, as I think some (most?) areas will bill you a $3 daily fee for outgoing calls. And of course, these is still that problem where roamers in DC can not turn call delivery off, so calls can't go back to voicemail -- I only mentioned it to them six months ago, so let's give them another year to finish their squabble with Bell Atlantic -- who cares if the customers can't use it in the meanwhile..:( NYNEX does offer auto-call delivery to both Orange and Dutchess Counties, lower Delaware, Litchfield, CT, and Ocean County, NJ (CO/NY doesn't deliver to these areas, and no Nationlink either), so they do come out ahead of CO/NY in some roaming areas. The also have somewhat better and cheaper rate plans, and don't seem to need to do as much switch work so their system is up more often at night. However, if you intend to do any degree of roaming in the Northeast Corridor, CO/NY is the way to go now, without question. BTW, CO/NY also has voicemail calls bounce back from ComCast/NJ now. Thus, if you receive a call in SIDs 00173/00575/01487, and don't answer it, it WILL go back to voicemail. Previously, outside of the NY system, only Philly and Delaware featured this, using IS-41 RevA. I think this was also placed in service now for ComCast/NJ, as cell delivery in NJ behaves similarly to the IS-41 RevA regime inn Philly and DE. (And no, Call-Waiting will STILL not work in ANY of the Motorola EMX-based switches connected to NY or the NACN, so if you are on the phone, calls will go to voicemail without you being aware of it. Why is it so hard for ComCast and Metro Mobile -- not to mention Pac*Tel in CA -- to get the appropriate software upgrade from Motorola or do whatever is necessary to get this fixed? It seems like other customers may care about this deficiency, not to mention the fact that they can use this to get out of their annual service contracts!) Overall, though, a very impressive roaming package from CO/NY, which is miles ahead of what anyone else -- especially NYNEX -- is offering. And none of thos silly "Please hold on, your party is being located" messages which NYNEX and SNET use for auto-call delivery. I can see why I get so many hangup calls when roaming -- no one wants to wait! :) Doug CID Tech (203) 499-5221 [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Doug, you have written to the Digest on many occassions over the past few years on cellular systems and their various shortcomings. Do any of the cell companies *ever* respond to your articles here, or your inquiries of them and make the desired changes? Have any of them ever corrected their problems after you gave them notice? PAT] ------------------------------ From: pbflower@uts.EDU.AU (-s89432566-p.bflower-ele-500-) Subject: Help Needed With Speech Recognition ..."Word Processing" Date: 11 May 1994 23:56:40 GMT Organization: University of Technology, Sydney I'm looking for info on "Word Spotting". I'm doing a report on it and need some of the latest available information. I'm hoping to advance a HMM model program to do this. I'd most appreciate any information on Word Spotting or even speech recognition. Thanking you in advance, Peter ------------------------------ From: ssi@winternet.com (Stillwater Systems) Subject: 3270 Emulation (Windows) Date: 12 May 1994 00:17:58 GMT Organization: StarNet Communications, Inc I'm looking for a good Shareware 3270 Emulator for Windows. I do a great deal of work in the VAX/VMS environment and use WRQ's Reflection 2 for Windows, however, this is not suited for the IBM mainframe environment. If you know of any 3270 Emulators for Windows, could you please provide me with the information I need to obtain them. Thank You, Michael E. Anderson ssi@winternet.com ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V14 #214 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa21828; 12 May 94 13:23 EDT Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA25736; Thu, 12 May 94 09:45:08 CDT Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA25727; Thu, 12 May 94 09:45:06 CDT Date: Thu, 12 May 94 09:45:06 CDT From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Moderator) Message-Id: <9405121445.AA25727@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V14 #215 TELECOM Digest Thu, 12 May 94 09:45:00 CDT Volume 14 : Issue 215 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Cable Management (Michael G. Kochanek) Getting Phone Number From Address Only (Derrick Sharpe) Calling Card Comparisons (Jakob Kellenberger) Need Call Screener (Narayan Bhagavatula) Local Competition -- Outside Plant vs Dialtone (Randall Gellens) Automated Response Systems (Clive D.W. Feather) How Much of AT&T's Network is Fiber? (Brandon Whichard) Pre-Paid Long-Distance Calling Cards (Larry Gonzales) Email Address Wanted For NTIA Asst. Secy Larry Irving (Robert Jacobson) Re: Cellular Call Forwarding (Mark W. Earle) Re: Cellular Call Forwarding (Carl Jones) Re: Cellular Call Forwarding (John Musselman) Re: NPA Optional in 818 - it Works! (Andrew Laurence) Re: NPA Optional in 818 - it Works! (Gregory P. Monti) Digital Technology Conference in Paradise (J. D. Wilson) TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of public service systems and networks including Compuserve and GEnie. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available at no charge to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu * The Digest is edited, published and compilation-copyrighted by Patrick Townson of Skokie, Illinois USA. You can reach us by postal mail, fax or phone at: 9457-D Niles Center Road Skokie, IL USA 60076 Phone: 708-329-0571 Fax: 708-329-0572 ** Article submission address only: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu ** Our archives are located at lcs.mit.edu and are available by using anonymous ftp. The archives can also be accessed using our email information service. For a copy of a helpful file explaining how to use the information service, just ask. ************************************************************************* * TELECOM Digest is partially funded by a grant from the * * International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in Geneva, Switzerland * * under the aegis of its Telecom Information Exchange Services (TIES) * * project. Views expressed herein should not be construed as represent-* * ing views of the ITU. * ************************************************************************* Additionally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help is important and appreciated. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: mikochan@gamera.syr.edu (Michael G. Kochanek) Subject: Cable Management Organization: Syracuse University, Syracuse, New York Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 13:40:42 GMT I am interested in getting info on cable management software either shareware or commercialy available. We are in the starting stages of rewiring one of our buildings for both data and voice circuits. We are going to follow the TIA-606 standards and it would be much more manageable to have all info in sometype of database. We have around 500 voice circuits and 750 data circuits. The software should be able document all circuits, cables, X connects, and closets. Any help with this would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance, Mike Kochanek SUNY College of ESF Syracuse N.Y. ------------------------------ From: bptech@picard.infonet.net (Broadcast Partners) Subject: Getting Phone Number From Address Only Date: 11 May 1994 22:01:06 GMT Organization: INS Info Services I am trying to find a way to get someone's telephone number if I already have their address. This is for tele-marketing purposes. We often get references to people, but don't get telephone numbers along with them. Is there a way to get this information? It would be preferable to be able to do it in some type of batch mode also. Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Derrick Sharpe bptech@picard.infonet.net [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I assume you are saying that a routine check of the telephone directory under that name and address has not produced a number, nor has a call to directory assistance. You might try one of the various cross-reference directories which (in one section of the book) list names and addresses in numerical order by telephone number and (in the other section) in order by street address. Looking up the street address in that section, then finding the person's name within that address will give you a number. You can get these reference books both in printed form as well as online from various sources. PAT] ------------------------------ From: KELLENBER_J@EZINFO.VMSMAIL.ETHZ.CH (KELLENBERGER,JAKOB) Subject: Calling Card Comparisons Date: 11 May 1994 12:59:58 GMT Organization: ETH ZUERICH Hi there ! I'm looking forward to order an calling card, from AT&T, MCI, Sprint or any other US-phone company, my problem is, that I can't get any good information about the prices for the services, about the services and so on. I ordered some information but the companies didn't react, so it's quite difficult for me ( living in switzerland ) to evaluate which calling card has the best conditions, which company has the cheapest prices for their services and on and on ... So please, if you have any information about prices (calling country to country and reaching the US from Europe), the quality of the services, the reliability of the services and other information, write me in email at the following address: kellenber_j@ezinfo.vmsmail.ethz.ch Thanks very much for your help! Jakob ------------------------------ From: narayan@Sunlight.Sunlight.COM (Narayan Bhagavatula) Subject: Need Call Screener Date: 11 May 1994 23:41:24 -0700 Organization: SRW Hi Everybody: I am interested in purchasing a low cost ($30-$60) Call screener which connects to my phone. Typically I expect it to block the ringing of the incoming call on my phone unless the caller presses in a security code using his/her DTMF phones. I know somebody makes them. I will appreciate any information on it. Thanks in advance, Narayan Bhagavatula (narayan@sunlight.sunlight.com) [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Whatever happened to the little Privcode device from several years ago? Is it still being manufactured? PAT] ------------------------------ From: RANDY@MPA15AB.mv-oc.Unisys.COM Date: 12 MAY 94 00:17:00 GMT Subject: Local Competition -- Outside Plant vs Dialtone With the recent discussion about local (dialtone) competition, and the problems associated with possible duplication of local loop facilities, portability of local numbers (and associated problems with database size and access times, etc.), etc., it occurs to me that it might perhaps be interesting to consider splitting the LEC functions into an outside plant company, and (any number of) dial tone providers. Any dial tone provider would have to co-locate their switches at the local loop termination point, or have a POP there. The outside plant company would maintain the local loops, and have a static switch that associated each local loop with one dial tone provider's switch. There would be no need for a global database of local number assignments, since each local number prefix would continue to map to one CO. At the CO, the mapping between local loops and dial tone switches would be done. The outside plant company could be owned by the dial tone providers jointly, or could bill separately. This would allow for the continuance of the natural monopoly on local loops and other outside plant, while allowing different companies to compete in providing dial tone and features. Comments? Randall Gellens randy@mv-oc.unisys.com Net**2 656-6350 (Please forward bounces to Mail Stop MV 237 rgellens@mcimail.com) ------------------------------ Subject: Automated Response Systems Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 12:13:51 GMT From: Clive D.W. Feather The following appeared in a newsletter I receive. Names deleted to protect the guilty: We call technical support. XXXXXX has one of those automated phone support services where you navigate through cascading menus by pressing numbers on the phone. You know the kind. For software support press 1, for hardware support press 2. Press 1 if your machine is a XXXXXX, press 2 if it is a XXXXXX. If you are a non-smoker who likes long walks on the beach and quiet evenings in front of a fire, press 1; if your name is Phil, hang up. You get the basic idea. The problem is, none of the cascading choices seem to apply to our case. So we press the numbers that play "Mary Had a Little Lamb" and hope to wind up with someone who can fix our problem. Clive D.W. Feather Santa Cruz Operation clive@sco.com Croxley Centre Phone: +44 923 816 344 Hatters Lane, Watford Fax: +44 923 210 352 WD1 8YN, United Kingdom ------------------------------ From: whichard@seas.smu.edu (Brandon Whichard) Subject: How Much of AT&T's Network is Fiber? Organization: SMU - School of Engineering and Applied Science Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 12:01:09 GMT I have heard that AT&T's network consists mostly of Digital Radio Equipment. Does anyone know how much of AT&T's network is Fiber? Some of AT&T's major competitors seem to imply that AT&T is slow in updating it's network to more advanced equipment. I am just curious about what the truth really is. Can anyone shed some light on this subject? Brandon whichard@seas.smu.edu ------------------------------ From: strategic@aol.com (Strategic) Subject: Pre-Paid Long-Distance Calling Cards Date: 12 May 1994 08:16:03 -0400 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) I am doing a comparative study on the packaging of pre-paid long distance calling card services for both business and residential subscribers. I am interested in price points and unique selling benefits, package naming, hidden disadvantages. If anyone else is interested I will be happy to e-mail compiled information or post it here if applicable. Please respond via e-mail to strategic@aol.com. Thanks for any assistance. Larry Gonzales strategic@aol.com ------------------------------ From: cyberoid@u.washington.edu (Robert Jacobson) Subject: Email Address Wanted For NTIA Asst. Secy Larry Irving Date: 12 May 1994 06:57:17 GMT Organization: WORLDESIGN, Seattle If there is an NTIA host or one in Commerce Department, and Larry has an address at one or the other, I would appreciate learning of it. He's an old friend from congressional days. Thanks. Please use email to me. Bob Jacobson ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 09:00:41 -0700 From: mwearle@netcom.com (Mark W. Earle) Subject: Re: Cellular Call Forwarding I'm in the process of closing out my cellular account with Southwestern Bell Mobile Systems of Corpus Christi, TX. In the last bill was an insert sheet (yellow) indicating that starting with the July bill, calls forwarded would incur full airtime for the duration of each forwarded call. Presumably, the set up "star" code call to activate and deactivate forwarding will now cost a minute also. This is a significant change -- previously, there was no call to set up the forwarding (or turn it off) and no charge for the forwarded calls. Many folks used this as a super local area extender ... forward your phone, dial your cell phone number, and talk free for a long time to an area that was a LD/Toll call from the regular phone. Combined with the .02/min "access charge" implemented last year, it seems the cellular providers are slowly charging for more and more things. It should be noted that some roaming costs, though, have dropped in the last five months. The per minute charge is lower, and the daily fee is not charged. But this is not "universal" you still have to check where you intend to roam with the carrier and find out the up to the minute info. Of course the roam rate and daily fees (or lack thereof) influence greately how and how much the phone is used while out of town. Mark Earle mwearle@netcom.com ------------------------------ From: uswnvg!uswnvg.com!cajones@uunet.UU.NET (Carl Jones) Subject: Re: Cellular Call Forwarding Date: 12 May 94 01:06:07 GMT In response to the question of which cellular company doesn't charge for forwarded calls, I can answer that US West Cellular does not charge for airtime on any calls forwarded from a cell phone or for the actual call to forward the phone itself. I speak for everyone in a twenty mile radius around me. Any questions? E-Mail cajones@uswnvg.com ------------------------------ From: jcm@frank.nccom.com (John Musselman) Subject: Re: Cellular Call Forwarding Date: 12 May 1994 00:56:19 -0700 Organization: North County Communications, San Diego, California In amg@panix.com (Alan M. Gallatin) writes: > What company is it that doesn't charge anything on the forwarded call? U.S. West Cellular (in Both San Diego and Phoenix) jcm@nccom.com John C. Musselman Software Developer/System Analyst ------------------------------ From: laurence@netcom.com (Andrew Laurence) Subject: Re: NPA Optional in 818 - it Works! Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 241-9760 guest) Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 07:51:08 GMT wdh@netcom.com (Bill Hofmann) writes: > This has been the case in 510 since October. I wish I had known that then. I tried it when I saw the initial posting on this thread, and it worked like a charm. I'm CONSTANTLY screwing up, as I travel between 415 and 510 several times a week, and I always forget when calling my girlfriend from my house that I don't have to dial 1-510. Now I can, and it makes no difference. Cool! Andrew Laurence Oakland, California USA laurence@netcom.com Pacific Daylight Time (GMT-7) ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 06:59:56 EDT From: Gregory P. Monti Subject: Re: NPA Optional in 818 - it Works! On Thu, 5 May 1994 14:59:35, Alan.Leon.Varney@att.com wrote: >> "NPA 703 in Virginia will allow 7D Inter-NPA local calls, except >> when calling INTO the Washington metro area. Both 10D and 1+10D >> will work for ALL local calls from NPA 703." > The distinction I gather from Bellcore's table is that 7D local calls > to other NPAs will work from 703, so long as the destination is not > the Metro area -- for example, into NPA 804. The actual term they use > for the 7D-not-permitted is Foreign NPA Local calls to the "WMEA". So > what is WMEA? I'll bet it's the Washington Metropolitan E_____ Area," whatever "E__" stands for. I've hard it referred to as, "Washington Metropolitan Calling Area," "Wash Met," or just "The Met." It's a land area roughly 15 to 18 miles in radius from the White House within which all calls are charged at the local rate regardless of state or area code. Nobody has *just* this smallish area as their local calling area. The local calling area from any phone with a 202 area code consists of the Wash Met, *plus* seven additional rate areas in Virginia, *plus* three additional rate areas in Maryland. The additional rate areas in Virginia are Engleside (Bell Atlantic Virginia), Lorton (GTE Virginia), Lorton Metro (GTE), Braddock (BA), Herndon (BA), Dulles (GTE) and Dulles Metro (GTE). The additional rate areas in Maryland are Gaithersburg, Ashton and Laurel. Rate areas may contain more than one central office and more than one prefix and may serve towns not named in their names. > Is all of NPA 301 in WMEA from 703's perspective? No. From area 703's perspective, only the Wash Met portion of 301 can ever be a local call -- and that only occurs if the originating 703 phone is *also* a Wash Met phone. Don't let LATAs confuse this. The Washington LATA is larger than the 202 local calling area which is, in turn, larger than the Wash Met. > What about 410? From anywhere in 703, all calls to 410 are inter-LATA, inter-state, toll calls. None of 410 is local to 703. Actually, from DC (202), all of 410 is also an inter-LATA, inter-state, toll call. Curiously, the local calling area from DC does not extend any further east into Maryland than it does from a Wash Met 703 number. Obviously, all these little rules apply only to *landline* phones, not cellular, whose local calling areas span multiple states and LATAs. Also, these rules apply to the rate area associated with the area code and prefix. Due to the heavy use of foreign exchange service, many peoples' phones are served by a distant prefix that would not serve their land area unless they ordered and paid extra for it. Greg Monti Arlington, Virginia, USA gmonti@cap.gwu.edu ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 21:16:53 HST From: NetSurfer Reply-To: NetSurfer Subject: Digital Technology Conference in Paradise - E Komo Mai (Come Join Us) " PNC - People, Networks & Communication '94 " " Turning 21 - A Journey to Maturity " __________________________________ Topic: The Emergence of Application, Information Technology & Policy for the 21st Century. Venue: Mid-Pacific Conference Center, Hilton Hawaiian Village Resort. Dates: October 11 - 14, 1994. Sponsored by The Pacific Network Consortium Limited. The Pacific Network Consortium Ltd., an EMERGING Not-for-Profit Regional Network Services Provider, invites you to enjoy our hospitality and join us in Hawaii for PNC - People, Networks and Communication '94. PNC '94 will facilitate a close exploration to the Building of the Information Super-Highway and examine the essential ingredients to one being a members among a larger; responsible and informed participant citizenry in a Global Informatic Society. This Conference will lay focus to the various concerns as it relates to participation, management, policy, operations, security and factors of collaboration within and through the NII-National Information Infrastructure; here in the United States, and the similar structures in forming - elsewhere in the World. A TASTE of subject areas that will be featured ... O- What will NII mean to me? O- When will it really be here? O- Who will fund the NII? O- Who will be the large stakeholders? O- What role will & must the Government have in developing the NII? O- What does NII mean in terms of Global Citizenry, Fueling Competitiveness in Industry and Education? O- How must the Educational culture evolve to practically react with existing and emerging informatic technology? O- What are some of the problems associated with the youthfulness in the deployment of Networked Information Systems and their use? O- What is the driving force behind the large scale proliferation of information systems? O- What are the benefits of Networking and Inter-Networking? O- How can companies benefit from connectivity to Global Networks? O- What is the promise of an Electronic Government? O- What is Community Computing; is it an EQUALIZING force for citizenry within the NII? ( MYTH & REALITY ) O- How will information services be structured in the 21st Century? O- How will public libraries of the 21st Century service their patrons? O- What is the need for Law & Order on the Information Super-Highway? O- Who & What, will govern the authenticity of information? Confirmed Speakers who have agreed to present as of 04/12/1994. Ms. Gale Warshawsky - Coordinator; Computer Security Awareness Education & the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) Computer Security Outreach Program. Mr. Charlie Atterbury - Ret., Dir.: Information, Computer & Network Security; The Eastman Kodak Company. Dr. Vinton G. Cerf - Senior Vice-President; Data Architecture, MCI. Dr. William Washburn - Executive Director; CIX - The Commercial Internet EXchange. Mr. Thomas Kappock - Vice-Chairman; Bancorp Hawaii, Inc. Bancorp Hawaii, Inc., is the largest Financial Institution in the PACIFIC Region with Assets exceeding U.S $12.5 Billion. Ms. Linda Delzeit - Administrator; Academy One Educational Network, NPTN - National Public Telecomputing Network. Mr. H. Leonard Fisher - Ret. Manager; Specialized Libraries of LLNL and Senior Adjunct Professor of Telecomunications Management; School of Technology & Industry, Golden Gate University. Mr. Scott Charney, Esq. - United States Attorney-in-Charge; Computer Crime Unit, United States Department of Justice. Dr. Thomas Saka - Information Specialist; State of Hawaii - Department of Education: IRM - Information Resource Management Division. Dr. Hank Becker - College of Education, University of California at Irvine. Mr. Christopher Baker - Consultant; IAEA - International Atomic Energy Agency, Network & Systems Administration: DEP - Department of Educational Programs, Argonne National Laboratory. Mr. Michael Higgins - Chief; Office of Counter Measures, DISA - Defense Information Systems Agency. Ms. Gail Thackeray, Esq. - Special Prosecutor; Maricopa County - Phoenix, Arizona Prosecutor's Office & The Organized Crime Division. Mr. James Lewis - Liaison Officer; NIIT - The National Information Infrastructure Testbed Consortia. Mr. Bruce Nelson - Novell Inc. Mr. Kenneth Van Wyk - Administrator; Computer Security, Incident Handling & Interdiction, DISA - Defense Information Systems Agency. Dr. Richard Smith - Director of Instructional Technology, Huston Independent School District; Huston, Texas. Mr. Walter Pioli - Director; National Network Services, GTE. Mr. William Cook Esq. - Villian, Brinks, Olds, Hofer, Gilson & Lione. (Mr. Cook is a former United States Attorney; now practicing in the area of Information technology and evolving policies within, and associated with, the NII - National Information Infrastructure. Ms. Bonnie Bracey - Member: Presidential Advisory Council for the development of the United States - National Information Infrastructure. Invitations Forward: Mr. Stanley Young - Officer; Office of Counter Intelligence, DIA - Defense Intelligence Agency. CONFERENCE REGISTRATION TEMPLATE: ___________________________________ Mr./Mrs./Ms./Miss: ______________________________________________________ Preferred Name on Name Tag: _____________________________________________ Organization Name: ______________________________________________________ Postal Address (Line 1): ________________________________________________ Postal Address (Line 2): ________________________________________________ Province/State: _________________________________________________________ Country & Postal/Zip Code: ______________________________________________ Title: __________________________________________________________________ Telephone & Telecopier Numbers: _________________________________________ Electronic Mail Address: ________________________________________________ Form of Payment: [ ] CHEQUE [ ] BANK DRAFT [ ] MONEY ORDER. All Financial Instruments MUST be made Payable, and can be sent to: The Pacific Network Consortium Ltd. ___________________________________ Suite 814 415 Nahua Street Honolulu, Hawaii 96815. United States of America. ------------------------- ADVANCE REGISTRATION FEES: (Registration MUST be received; on, or before AUGUST 5, 1994) _______________________________ FULL - 3 1/2 Day Conference. GENERAL ADMISSION. : U.S.$ 690.00 (*) Members of Non-Profit & Educational Organizations. : U.S.$ 490.00 (*,%) Students. (U.S.$ 20.00 / Day) : U.S.$ 70.00 (%) ( Fees reflect the cost of conference sessions ONLY. Food & Beverage Services within Conference Sessions, and External Tours and Functions are NOT included ) Members of the K-12 Community - for K-12 Sessions ONLY. : U.S.$ 150.00 (*,%) -- SEE below, for conditions regarding (*) and (%) -- LATE REGISTRATION FEES: (after AUGUST 5, 1994) _____________________________ FULL - 3 1/2 Day Conference. GENERAL ADMISSION. : U.S.$ 890.00 (*) Members of Non-Profit & Educational Organizations. : U.S.$ 790.00 (*,%) Students. (U.S.$ 20.00 / Day) : U.S.$ 70.00 (%) ( Fees reflect the cost of conference sessions ONLY. Food & Beverage Services within Conference Sessions, and External Tours and Functions are NOT included ) Members of the K-12 Community - for K-12 Sessions ONLY. : U.S.$ 250.00 (*,%) Please NOTE Conditions: _______________________ * 1) Food & Beverage Services within Conference Sessions are included. 2) External Tours and Functions are NOT included. % 1) Proof of Affiliation is Required - for rate determination. Accomodations: ______________ For your convenience - The Pacific Network Consortium Ltd., have made available, through special arrangements with HILTON HOTELS, quality and spacious accomodations. The Hilton Hawaiian Village sports fine accomodations within our Island Paradise, at a GREAT value. To receive the Special Rate Extension, Please call 1-800-445-8667 & REFER to: "PNC - People, Networks & Communications '94 ". The rates are as follows: PNC '94: Current Rates: Garden View U.S.$ 140.00 + Tax U.S.$ 225.00 Partial Ocean View U.S.$ 155.00 + Tax U.S.$ 250.00 Ocean View U.S.$ 170.00 + Tax U.S.$ 275.00 Travel. _______ United Airlines has been chosen as the OFFICIAL CARRIER for " PNC - People, Networks & Communication '94. United Airlines, is pleased to offer a 5% discount off the LOWEST applicable fare, including 1st (FIRST) class, or 10% Discount off the UNRESTRICTED BUA COACH fare; through a special arrangement with The Pacific Network Consortium Ltd., Help support PNC - People, Networks & Communications '94. Secure your reservations with United Airlines; offering you the MOST in convenience & flexibility with the LARGEST number of seats (5100) PER DAY to HONOLULU. To obtain the best fares or schedule Inform- ation, please call UNITED AIRLINES Specialized Meeting Reservation Center at 1-800-521-4041. Reservation Specialists are on duty 7 days a week, from 7:00 A.m. to 10:00 P.m., Eastern Time (U.S.) Please be sure to REFERRENCE I.D. number " 548NY ". As a UNITED Meeting Attendee, You WILL qualify for special discounts on HERTZ Rental Cars. Mileage Plus members will receive FULL credit for all miles flown to HONOLULU. For your convenience, United will mail your tickets or you can pick up your tickets at your travel agent's desk or an United Airlines ticket office. Contact Information: ____________________ Conference Chairman: Dr. Ernest Kho, Jr. Steering Committee Chairman: Mr. Robert Mathews. Telephone: 808.921.2097 E.mail: bm189@po.cwru.edu ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V14 #215 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa24078; 12 May 94 15:42 EDT Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA29031; Thu, 12 May 94 11:52:06 CDT Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA29022; Thu, 12 May 94 11:52:04 CDT Date: Thu, 12 May 94 11:52:04 CDT From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Moderator) Message-Id: <9405121652.AA29022@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V14 #216 TELECOM Digest Thu, 12 May 94 11:52:00 CDT Volume 14 : Issue 216 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Re: What is the Mercury Button? (Stefek Zaba) Re: What is the Mercury Button? (Keith McNeill) Re: Searching For a Specific Telephone (Fran Menzel) Re: Searching For a Specific Telephone (K.M. Peterson) Re: Radio Frequency Interference on Residential Phone Line (Bennett Kobb) Re: Radio Frequency Interference on Residential Phone Line (Mike Sullivan) Re: Help Needed Contacting 1-800 Numbers (Paul Robinson) Re: McCaw Cellular One (NYC) Introduces Anti-Fraud Program (C. McGuinness) Re: McCaw Cellular One (NYC) Introduces Anti-Fraud Program (Rich Osman) Re: McCaw Cellular One (NYC) Introduces Anti-Fraud Program (Bob Wilson) Re: GSM and Airbags (Ben Burch) Re: Government Regulates Number of Modem Redial Atttempts? (Jon Sreekanth) Re: NANP and Switches (James Slupsky) Re: Can Residential Voltage (?) Drop? (balcroan@netcom.com) Re: Ricky Finds Old Phone (Dave Thompsoni) Re: Ricky Finds Old Phone (David Breneman) TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of public service systems and networks including Compuserve and GEnie. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available at no charge to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu * The Digest is edited, published and compilation-copyrighted by Patrick Townson of Skokie, Illinois USA. You can reach us by postal mail, fax or phone at: 9457-D Niles Center Road Skokie, IL USA 60076 Phone: 708-329-0571 Fax: 708-329-0572 ** Article submission address only: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu ** Our archives are located at lcs.mit.edu and are available by using anonymous ftp. The archives can also be accessed using our email information service. For a copy of a helpful file explaining how to use the information service, just ask. ************************************************************************* * TELECOM Digest is partially funded by a grant from the * * International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in Geneva, Switzerland * * under the aegis of its Telecom Information Exchange Services (TIES) * * project. Views expressed herein should not be construed as represent-* * ing views of the ITU. * ************************************************************************* Additionally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help is important and appreciated. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: sjmz@hplb.hpl.hp.com (Stefek Zaba) Subject: Re: What is the Mercury Button? Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 12:28:25 GMT Organization: Hewlett-Packard Laboratories, Bristol, England John Perkins (johnper@bunsen.rosemount.com) wrote: > Will someone please tell me what the Mercury button is? I suspect > that it simply sends out a hard-coded sequence of DTMF digits which > accesses the Mercury network, and one could probably do this manually > with any phone that generates DTMF if one knew what the sequence was. You're exactly right, with the tweak of needing a "pause" in there. The access string goes: 131 Your-individual-ten-digit-Mercury-Access-number followed by the full ten (soon to be 11) digit phone number (no "local", i.e. codeless, dialing supported). Hence, a "Mercury-compatible" phone is one which can be programmed with a 13-digit-plus-embedded-pause string on a button, and with a deep enough memory so that pressing the button and going straight on to dial a phone number (possibly with an international access code), and possibly stored on another memory button, won't overflow the internal dialstring memory. The BT Relate (?) phone/speakerphone/answerphone combo we have meets these criteria. Mercury themselves gave me more or less the above description when I called on their helpline. All a "Mercury button" gives you is a nice blue-labelled memory button, and it MIGHT be sensible enough to do a wait-for-new-dialtone after the initial 131 instead of using a fixed-length pause. (I find on my local exchange that a single 0.75s(?) pause works reliably. Your mileage may differ). > Am I right about this? And does anyone know what the access sequence > for Mercury is? Yes, and yes. :-) > They have a perfectly good BT "Tribune" phone set that has some > special attachments for the hearing impaired, but are under the > impression that they can't use it if they want to use Mercury. (I have > a feeling that they don't really need the Mercury phone set at all.) Strictly speaking, ANY DTMF phone is Mercury-compatible, since you can always do the 131, pause, personal-code thing manually; however a memory-buttoned, dial-pausable, deep-enuff-memory phone is needed to be "Mercury-friendly". Stefek ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 12 May 94 10:36:44 EDT From: mcneill@ngt.sungard.com (Keith McNeill) Subject: Re: What is the Mercury Button? > My parents in London (Chessington, actually) have just recently signed > up with Mercury and have been persuaded (by Mercury, presumably) to > have a Mercury phone set installed. This phone has a "Mercury button" > on it to access the Mercury network. To Access Mercury what you need to do is dial (ALL in DMTF) 1310123456789 where 131 is the mercury access number, kinda like the US 10XXX Long distance access numbers. where 0123456789 ... is your mercury access code. What you need is a phone that you can store the above sequence with the pause. The trick is the pause as not all phones with memory allow you to store a pause. I used my US phone over there with Mercury as I could store a pause in the memory. So, to make a long story short ... a Mercury Button Phone is little more than a phone that you can store a pause in it's memory. Keith D. McNeill SunGard Capital Markets +1 212 371 1116 560 Lexington Ave, 10th Floor mcneill@ngt.sungard.com New York, NY, 10022 USA ------------------------------ From: f.s.menzel Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 09:45:41 -0400 Subject: Re: Searching For a Specific Telephone The phones you're looking for were sold to AT&T business customers for use with its PBX and Key telephone systems. The distinctive handset, called the "R" handset, was used on several models, including both digital and analog. With their futuristic look, these phones became very popular with movie makers, but did not find universal acceptance with everyday users. As they are no longer in our product line, I suggest you contact a reseller (other postings here have provided information as to where the resellers advertize). Unless you're planning to put the phone behind an AT&T system, you probably want to be sure that you stick with the low power analog version (model 7102), as the digital version speaks a proprietary protocol. Fran Menzel 908-957-5615 AT&T Global Communications Systems ------------------------------ From: kmp@tiac.net (K. M. Peterson) Subject: Re: Searching For a Specific Telephone Date: 12 May 1994 14:48:40 GMT Organization: KMPeterson/Boston In article farrag@isis.rz.uni-duesseldorf. de (Karim.Farrag) writes: > Specific features: narrow receiver, the speech unit of the receiver > is bent almost 90 degrees; the receiver is shaped like an L , wire > phone, mostly seen in black colour. Sounds like the AT&T 7101 set. No longer manufactured by AT&T; I posted a query here about three months ago asking if anyone had any idea who still carried them, but no responses. Note that the 7101 is a "standard" set. Very similar, sharing many of the same characteristics is the AT&T Merlin phone system. K. M. Peterson email: KMP@TIAC.NET phone: +1 617 731 6177 voice +1 617 730 5969 fax ------------------------------ From: bkobb@newsignals.com (Bennett Z. Kobb) Subject: Re: Radio Frequency Interference on Residential Organization: New Signals Research Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 13:59:20 GMT The FCC has been very clear on its position about telephone interference. The agency says that "filters cannot be relied upon to eliminate tele- phone interference." They recommend only two products: phones from TCE Laboratories of Canyon Lake, TX (210 899 4575) and Pro Distributors of Lubbock TX (800 658 2027). These are what the FCC informally calls the "bullet-proof" phones. ------------------------------ From: mds@access.digex.net (Michael D. Sullivan) Subject: Re: Radio Frequency Interference on Residential Telephone Line Date: 12 May 1994 01:50:54 -0400 Organization: Express Access Online Communications, Greenbelt, MD USA paulb@coho.halcyon.com (Paul N. Bates) writes: > In article , wrote: >> My home is wired for two residential telephone lines. Because of my >> proximity to an am radio transmitter (am 1550khz), many of my audio >> and telephone devices suffer from "radio noise", from that one station >> only though. Some days it is worse than others, some days there is no >> interference at all. This is apparently an increasingly common occurrence, prompting the FCC to issue an information sheet that lists two phones that have tested as being highly resistant to RF interference. I don't have the info at hand, but it might be available on ftp.fcc.gov. Michael D. Sullivan INTERNET E-MAIL TO: also: avogadro@well.sf.ca.us Washington, D.C. mds@access.digex.net 74160.1134@compuserve.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 15:43:12 EDT From: Paul Robinson Reply-To: Paul Robinson Subject: Re: Help Needed Contacting 1-800 Numbers Organization: Tansin A. Darcos & Company, Silver Spring, MD USA > I have been given the 1-800-xxx-xxxx numbers of four companies in the > US that I need to contact -- unfortunately I do not have any other > number for them, and was hoping that someone in the US could tell me > either the normal number or a fax number for them. I called the numbers and asked them, explaining that "a customer of mine in the U.K. wanted a dialable number for them." All of them gave out their local voice number right away: Your number Number I got by calling them > Smart Micro : 1-800-ROM-BIOS NO ANSWER > Bios Upgrades: 1-800-800-2467 +1 508 686 6468 > Cmos Solutions: 1-800-266-7462 +1 818 880 2136 > Rom Bios Upgrades: 1-800-541-1943 +1 805 650 2030 > (All I do know is that they are supposed to be in the CA phone books!! > -- not a lot of help in the UK ! ) Note that the second entry is a Massacusetts number, not California and might not be locatable in California. Also, 818 is in Los Angeles, while 805 is about 100 miles away towards Santa Barbara. Also "being in the CA phone books" is a tall order; there are probably 50 or 60 volumes if all the phone books in California are included. I hope this helps you. Paul Robinson - Paul@TDR.COM ------------------------------ From: marks!charles@jyacc.jyacc.com (Charles McGuinness) Date: Thu, 12 May 94 10:11:00 EDT Subject: Re: McCaw Cellular One (NYC) Introduces Anti-Fraud Program > In an effort to thwart would-be counterfeit phone users, Cellular One > just started up an anti-fraud program. My wife's cellphone was cloned recently. She was more or less required to join the PIN before you call program when getting her phone reactivated (after they detected the fraud and deactivated). > Apparently, many (though not all) roaming areas work with this fraud > protection program. When she was roaming in CT, she could call away without activating her PIN. So, when 50 miles from home, the fraud protection program was useless. > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Are we to assume then ... > that when one starts out each morning it is necessary to use the > *560 unlock thing as part of making the first call of the day? PAT] That is correct. In fact, every time you wait more than the time out between making calls, you have to unlock. Given that my wife was strong armed into signing up, I would expect all customers to be forced to PIN before they dial before too long. The users of the system are getting to share the inconvenince of the cell system's inherent design flaws :-(. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 12 May 94 00:38:53 CDT From: ROsman@swri.edu Subject: Re: McCaw Cellular One (NYC) Introduces Anti-Fraud Program Somebody (I forget who) wrote: > Yes ... according to Cell One, once you turn on the phone, you need to > dial the unlock code -- *560 + PIN (SND) -- before making your first > call. In that this only needs to be done before the first call and > since this can be simplified greatly via most phones' speed dialing, > Cellular One tries to convince us that this isn't really an inconvenience. > I'm apt to agree. I see two problems with this scheme. 1) If a significant number of people store the access code in their phone, stolen phones are a valuable commodity. 2) If I time out every twenty minutes, the required occurance of pin transmissions is quite high. All I need to do is snatch a PIN transmission and I get everything I need to defraud (esn/pin/min). Yeah I know, not *every* transmission contains the ESN, but how much you want to lay on the fact that the ESN will be transmitted in this initial call. Many systems set their customer phones to transmit it by default. On the whole, it seems to introduce substantial customer inconvenience without adding a lot of security. I *do* think it's a good idea for compromise MIN/ESN pairs, though. Oz@SwRI.edu (Rich Osman) SwRI didn't say it, I did. (210) 522-5050 (w) (210) 699-1302 (h;v/msg/fax) ------------------------------ From: bwilson@netcom.com (Bob Wilson) Subject: Re: McCaw Cellular One (NYC) Introduces Anti-Fraud Program Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 241-9760 guest) Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 13:24:53 GMT Alan M. Gallatin (amg@panix.com) wrote: > Here's a new one ... saw a brochure for this at a Cellular One center > on Long Island yesterday. > In an effort to thwart would-be counterfeit phone users, Cellular One > just started up an anti-fraud program. A customer participating will > simply pick a four digit PIN. Usage is something like this: > If you dial *56 + PIN (SND) the fraud protection is turned on. > Cellular One will refuse to complete any calls from that phone EXCEPT > 611 and 911. Incoming calls, however, still work. Dialing *560 + PIN > (SND) releases the phone and allows it to make calls. This is, of > course, distinct from the lock feature of the phone, itself. I fail to see how this is going to stop fraudulent use of cellular phones. Everything that the phone does to communicate to its carrier is done over the air. It would be safe to assume that the steps needed to be taken to 'clone' a phone would require only one more step. Instead of grabbing just the ESN/NAM pairs, it seems possible to grab the 'fraud protection' sequence as well. Unless there is some method of encryption, this seems no more helpful than adding another lock on your door that can be picked anyway. ------------------------------ From: Ben Burch Subject: Re: GSM and Airbags Organization: Motorola, Inc. Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 10:01:59 GMT In article Bill Tighe, bill@noller.com writes: > ... Some Audis in the early 80s would respond to RF by having the > cruise control go to full throttle while the ABS disabled the brakes! Ah, Bill, do you have any pointers to documentation on this? I believe that the causes of the (fatal) Audi "unintended acceleration" events have always been in considerable doubt. Audi claims that it is "driver error", since one can always override the throttle with the brakes, but since I have seen other cars have a simultaneous brake and throttle failure, I have always wondered. Ben Burch Motorola Wireless Data Group: Ben_Burch@wes.mot.com Makers of the Envoy(R) Personal Wireless Communicator ------------------------------ From: jon_sree@world.std.com (Jon Sreekanth) Subject: Re: Government Regulates Number of Modem Redial Atttempts? Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 10:26:12 GMT In article TELECOM Digest Editor noted: > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: That has been the case in Canada for quite ... > speaker turned off all the time and as a result don't even realize they > are connecting to a live person in errror instead of another modem. I > would rather have seen a rule saying that if voice was detected instead > of carrier, the speaker would automatically turn on regardless of its > setting and play the intercept message (or bewildered human saying 'hello' Or the modem should detect voice and put out a AT-command like response ("VOICE") which would cause the comm software to cease, just like a "NO ANSWER" timeout. Shouldn't be hard for the DSP to detect voice. Do common modems provide any such voice indication? Jon Sreekanth Assabet Valley Microsystems, Inc. Fax and PC products 5 Walden St #3, Cambridge, MA 02140 (617) 876-8019 jon_sree@world.std.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 00:48:36 +0700 From: jslupsky@pwss.gov.ab.ca (James Slupsky) Subject: Re: NANP and Switches Paul A. Lee wrote in his article: > Different software routines, larger tables, more memory, and more > processor power are going to be needed in many PBXs to handle the > complexity left by the destruction of those assumptions. _Exactly_ how > that complexity affects a particular model of PBX at a particular > location is the crucial question. The answers will vary widely, and > will be accurately determined only with careful, individual analysis. My comments were directed specifically for Northern Telecom Meridian PBX's, and are based on information directly from the folks at Northern Telecom. The Meridian switch does no further processing of digits when "9" is dialed (unless you have specified this as your NARS access code), except to determine if the call should be toll restricted, or if it should output the call record to the CDR port. That determination is made based the presence of a "1" or "0" as the first OR second digit. Mr. Lee also writes: > CO codes in the N0/1X range have been around for some time, especially > in dense metropolitan NPAs, such as 212, 213, 312, 415, 202, etc.. I don't believe this. The whole purpose of the new NANP was to change from NNX to NXX, and to allow NXX type NPA's. All switch routing software was designed to recognize that an NPA was N0X or N1X, and the CO code was NNX. In the original post, it was specified that the system had DOD and DID trunks, but did not have a tie-trunk network, or any other low-cost trunking. Thus, why would they have LCR? Regards, James Slupsky, P.Eng. (jslupsky@pwss.gov.ab.ca) (403) 427-0896 [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Oh yes, indeed, there have been exchanges like N0X around here in Chicago for several years now. For example, 312-508 and 312-407 are both exchanges I call on a fairly regular basis. I don't know about smaller, less populated areas, but Chicago and Los Angeles have had these for a long time. PAT] ------------------------------ From: balcroan@netcom.com Subject: Re: Can Residential Voltage (?) Drop? Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 241-9760 guest) Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 09:02:12 GMT Jay Hennigan (jay@coyote.rain.org) wrote: > In article djo7613@u.washington.edu > (Dick O'Connor) writes: >> Strange thing happened recently on my second of two residential lines. >> Suddenly one day the voice mail card stopped answering on that line, >> but when I switched lines it worked fine. Handsets that ring just fine >> on our first line stopped ringing on our second line in tests. Yet, >> if I called the second line from the first, I hear the "ring", and if >> my kid picks up a phone attached to the second line, it answers and we >> can talk. >> Is voltage somehow involved in "ringing" so that a decrease would >> cause to small a *something* for devices like modem cards and handsets >> to respond to? Where does this happen, and what's the fix? > Ringing is a low-frequency AC signal applied to the line (Typically 90 > volts at 20 Hertz). Tell the repair desk that "ringing voltage is not > being applied". They will likely find the problem to be the line > equipment (printed circuit card in modern exchanges) feeding your > line. If the above call to the local TELCO doesn't work please submit private e-mail and I will give you the answer you can then decide if you want to make it public after it is tried ... BTW if it is what I suspect it is be prepared for the other line to have the same problem shortly .... Butch alias balcroan@netcom.com [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Do tell us more! PAT] ------------------------------ From: Thompson, Dave Subject: Re: Ricky Finds Old Phone Date: Thu, 12 May 94 02:02:00 PDT > (Reminds you of the recent incident of someone not knowing how > to use a rotary phone.) Probably the Mar 31 post by Bob Frankston about his 11-year-old son encountering a rotary dial for the first time, described as an example of cultural dependence in user interface design. In TELECOM Digest 14.158 and RISKS Digest 15.72. I have another problem and wonder if it's common: I've "learned" some frequently-used #s by the pattern of my fingers on a DTMF pad, like touch-typing. Once when stuck at a rotary-dial payphone, I had to imagine a 3x4 grid and "dial" on it to redetermine the number! I've also had co-workers be unable to give me a number they call daily, because they put it in their PBX speed-dial lists and then forgot, and we can't find any "display speed-dial" feature (ATT Sys75 g1). Presumably users of telco abbreviated dialing features or (some?) cell or convenience phones etc. could have the same "problem". > ... When did the suggestion about 555-xxxx come in? ... As I recall, all-digit exchange codes came in around 1970 and I remember hearing non-555 numbers in movies/TV for several years after that; I would guess 1975. Somewhat related to which, in TELECOM Digest 14.185 (Apr 27), PAT described Enterprise service as largely obsoleted by INWATS/800. I recall some Enterprise numbers being heavily advertised about 1980 in the St Louis metropolitan or "bi-state" MO/IL area; possibly because this spans a state, LATA, and RBOC boundary, it was more difficult to get 800 coverage of *only* the nearby parts of these two states? Although the pre-breakup RBOCs were *supposed* to cooperate closely . Dave Thompson, davet@fpg.logica.com Logica North America, +1 617-890-7730 ------------------------------ From: daveb@jaws (David Breneman) Subject: Re: Ricky Finds Old Phone Date: 12 May 94 10:12:18 GMT Organization: Digital Systems International, Redmond WA|Yq > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: This episode is another one available > in the series from Columbia Video. Lucille Ball once noted that even > had her child been a girl (in those days, pre-birth sex detirmination > had not been developed as a medical technique) they had decided to go > ahead with a boy on the show. The airing of that show was timed in > such a way that Ms. Ball gave birth an hour or so before the pre-recorded > show (usually "Lucy" was done live, before an audience, but not that > night) was aired. Red Skelton's comedy show came on CBS right after > "Lucy" each week, and that night as the show started, Skelton announced > that Ms. Ball had successfully given birth about two hours earlier. Not quite true, Pat. Actually, although I Love Lucy was *filmed* in front of a live studio audience, the show itself was never actually broadcast live. This was in fact Desi Arnaz' major contribution to the Television Art (not as oxymoronic a phrase in the 50s as it is today :-) ). Three synchronized 35mm cameras recorded each scene, covering different shots just like in a television production. Then, the film was cut to produce the finished show. This offered several advantages. First, it allowed the director and editor to pick their shots in the relatively relaxed atmosphere of the cutting room not the control room. It allowed retakes for blown lines. It allowed tighter timing. And, it allowed a much improved picture and sound quality over the only other means of recording for television, kinescopes (the VTR wasn't introduced until 1956). Just compare the quality of an I Love Lucy show with one of it's kinescoped live contemporaries, such as Your Show of Shows or Milton Burle. When Paramount bought out Desilu in the late 60s, they adopted Arnaz' live-to-film concept for many of their own shows, such as The Odd Couple, Happy Days, and much later, Cheers. (Mary Tyler Moore also made use of Anraz' technique in many of the programs her production company produced.) He may have been Cuban Pete, King of the Rhumba Beat to most viewers, but Desi Arnaz also knew a lot about televison, and was one of its unsung pioneers. David Breneman Email: daveb@jaws.engineering.dgtl.com System Administrator, Voice: 206 881-7544 Fax: 206 556-8033 Product Development Platforms Digital Systems International, Inc. Redmond, Washington, U. S. o' A. [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Yeah, but she did give birth at almost the same time the show was being aired on which she was in the hospital giving birth. And not knowing for sure what to say about the new baby in the show that aired that night, they elected to make it a boy. After debating whether or not in subsequent shows (had it actually been a girl) to just ignore that inconsistency and change the newborn to a girl in future episodes of "Lucy" their decision finally was to keep a boy in future shows regardless of the real outcome. Yes, television was entirely different in the 1950-60 era than it is now. So many of the old, very good radio shows were converted to television productions in those days, sometimes keeping the radio version going as well. One remark by Eve Arden sticks in my mind: She did 'Our Miss Brooks' on radio for quite a few years before it went to television. For the younger readers, Miss Brooks was a high school English teacher at a place called Madison High School. She was secretly in love with the Biology teacher, Mr. Boynton. The school principal was Mr. Osgood Conklin. The show was a weekly comedy and very much a period piece from the high schools of America in the 1940's era. Anyhow, Ms. Arden commented that when they would do the radio show each week they would just do one run-through of the lines from their scripts, usually an hour or so before the broadcast, or maybe a second one if they needed it. Then when it was time to do the show, they went in the studio, sat down and read the scripts out loud over the air. You must remember that in the days when radio carried all those programs since the participants were *heard but not seen* (you, the audience listening on the radio had to make your own mental images) all they did was sit around a table with microphones and read their scripts. No costumes needed, no background scenery, no memorizing of lines, etc. Everyone would just sit around the table, reading as it was their turn to do so with the 'sound man' dropping in the appropriate noises from time to time (doorbell or phone ringing, automobile starting, etc). When the shows began getting cut over to television about 1948-50, all of a sudden everyone had to clean up their act in more ways than one. Now they had to actually memorize their lines, dress appropriately for the scene, walk back and forth across a stage, etc. Eve Arden pointed out that some of the old timers did not like television for the extra work that it caused them in preparing their shows each week; plus the fact that many of them thought television was never going to take off anyway. Miss Arden said that when 'Miss Brooks' was moved from radio to television she got fan letters from people who had listened to the show for years and actually saw her (and the other cast members) for the first time who said stuff like, " ... I never knew that is what you looked like! .." Radio, you see, required some imagination on the part of the listener. Everyone 'knew' in their own mind what the stars of the show looked like, and 'knew' in their own mind what Madison High School looked like. The conversion of the old shows from radio to television changed all that. 'I Love Lucy' never was a radio show however, as best I can recall. It had its beginning on television. Are there *any* of the old radio shows which moved to television in 1948-50 still around actively being shown? I know Lucy re-runs are still on, what about 'Father Knows Best' or Stu Erwin or any of those? PAT] ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V14 #216 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa24988; 12 May 94 16:34 EDT Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA01079; Thu, 12 May 94 12:51:20 CDT Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA01070; Thu, 12 May 94 12:51:18 CDT Date: Thu, 12 May 94 12:51:18 CDT From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Moderator) Message-Id: <9405121751.AA01070@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V14 #217 TELECOM Digest Thu, 12 May 94 12:51:00 CDT Volume 14 : Issue 217 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson New Members Appointed to Network Reliability Council (Bob Keller) FCC Releases Semiannual Study on Telephone Trends (Bob Keller) Sprint Frame Relay Information Wanted (0003436453@mcimail.com) Re: Can You Record Phone Conversations on Hard Disk Media? (Paul Robinson) Re: I Have Some Basic Telecom Questions: HELP! (William H. Sohl) Re: Connect a Card Reader to a Cell Phone? (Ras Tafar) Re: Connect a Card Reader to a Cell Phone? (Drew Dean) Re: CallerID With Serial Port - Where? (Willard Dawson) Re: CallerID With Serial Port - Where? (John Harris) Re: CallerID With Serial Port - Where? (Don Davis) Re: Government Regulates Number of Modem Redial Attempts? (Mark Brader) Re: Government Regulates Number of Modem Redial Attempts? (allen0@delphi) TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of public service systems and networks including Compuserve and GEnie. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available at no charge to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu * The Digest is edited, published and compilation-copyrighted by Patrick Townson of Skokie, Illinois USA. You can reach us by postal mail, fax or phone at: 9457-D Niles Center Road Skokie, IL USA 60076 Phone: 708-329-0571 Fax: 708-329-0572 ** Article submission address only: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu ** Our archives are located at lcs.mit.edu and are available by using anonymous ftp. The archives can also be accessed using our email information service. For a copy of a helpful file explaining how to use the information service, just ask. ************************************************************************* * TELECOM Digest is partially funded by a grant from the * * International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in Geneva, Switzerland * * under the aegis of its Telecom Information Exchange Services (TIES) * * project. Views expressed herein should not be construed as represent-* * ing views of the ITU. * ************************************************************************* Additionally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help is important and appreciated. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 12:01:31 EDT From: Bob Keller Subject: New Memebers Appointed to Network Reliability Council May 12, 1994 NEW MEMBERS APPOINTED TO THE NETWORK RELIABILITY COUNCIL FCC Chairman Reed E. Hundt today announced revisions in the membership of the Commission's Federal Advisory Committee, the Network Reliability Council and named Richard C. Notebaert, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Ameritech Corporation, as the new Chairman of the Council. He thanked retiring Chairman, Paul Henson, for his service and said "Dick Notebaert will provide continued excellence in leading the Council to consensus solutions to the issues we face." The Council was established in 1992 in response to a number of large scale outages of the public switched telephone network. In letters to existing and new members, Chairman Hundt explained he, Commissioner Quello and Commissioner Barrett found it necessary to continue the Council, but to modify its charter and its membership. Hundt congratulated the Council on its accomplishments to date, particularly the publication of its study, "Network Reliability: A Report to the Nation," and the establishment of an ongoing reliability monitoring group within the Alliance for Telecommunications Industry Solutions. He found that continued expert advice was needed to assess industry efforts to improve network reliability. He also stressed the need for advice as to whether changes in the industry could threaten reliability. The revised charter calls on the Council to evaluate the reliability of network services in the United States on a local and regional basis; to evaluate potential new risks from new interconnection arrangements and changing technologies; to evaluate access to emergency services during network outages; and to collect data on whether network outages have disproportionate impact on certain geographic areas or certain demographic groups. The Council is asked to assemble data and information, perform analysis and provide advice to the industry and to the Commission on these topics. Reflecting the Council's broader mission and its accomplishments to date, several changes were made in the Council's membership. In particular, representatives were added from the cable television industry, the satellite industry, and the emerging personal communications industry. Chairman Hundt thanked those members who no longer would be serving and asked for their continued support. For further information, contact Jim Keegan at 202/634-1867 1994-1996 NETWORK RELIABILITY COUNCIL (NRC) =========================================== Richard C. Notebaert, Ameritech, NRC Chairman Members Robert E. Allen, AT&T Decker Anstrom, National Cable Television Association Morton Bahr, Communications Workers of America Alex B. Best, Cable Labs Ron Binz, National Assoc. of State Utilities Consumer Advocates Ronald L. Bittner, Rochester Telephone John L. Clendenin, BellSouth Steven Dorfman, Hughes Space and Communications Stephen Effros, Cable Telecommunications Association William T. Esrey, Sprint William Ferguson, NYNEX Mathew Flanigan, Telecommunications Industry Association Heather Gold, Association for Local Telecommunications Services George H. Heilmeier, Bellcore Stephen O. Hewlett, NARUC Gerald F. James, International Communications Association Charles R. Lee, GTE Daniel J. Miglio, United States Telephone Association Richard D. McCormick, US West Barbara O'Connor, Alliance for Public Technology C. Alan Peyser, Competitive Telecommunications Association Philip J. Quigley, Pacific Telesis Bert C. Roberts, Jr., MCI John Rose, Organization for the Advancement and Protection of Small Telephone Companies Selby A. Shaver, Ad Hoc Telecommunications Users Group LTG Alonzo E. Short, Jr., National Communications System, U.S. Dept. of Defense Casimir S. Skrzypczak, Alliance for Telecommunications Industry Solutions Raymond W. Smith, Bell Atlantic Mark Golden, Personal Communications Industry Association Thomas Wheeler, Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association Edward Whitacre, Southwestern Bell Observers Larry Irving, National Telecommunications and Information Administration, U.S. Dept. of Commerce Dr. John H. Gibbons, Office of Science and Technology Policy, White House -FCC- Bob Keller Robert J. Keller, P.C. Tel +1 301.229.5208 A.R.S. KY3R Federal Telecommunications Law Fax +1 301.229.6875 rjk@telcomlaw.com finger me for FCC Daily Digest CompuServe 76100,3333 ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 12:04:06 EDT From: Bob Keller Subject: FCC Releases Semiannual Study on Telephone Trends FCC RELEASES SEMIANNUAL STUDY ON TELEPHONE TRENDS The FCC has released a semiannual report on Trends in Telephone Service. The report is a summary of information collected by the Commission in much more detailed reports. This report is available for reference in the Industry Analysis Division Reference Room, Common Carrier Bureau, 1250 23rd Street, N.W., Plaza Level. Copies may be purchased by calling International Transcription Services, Inc. (ITS) at (202) 857-3800. The report can also be downloaded from the FCC-State Link computer bulletin board at (202) 632-1361. For further information, contact the Industry Analysis Division, Common Carrier Bureau, at (202) 632-0745. -FCC- Bob Keller Robert J. Keller, P.C. Tel +1 301.229.5208 A.R.S. KY3R Federal Telecommunications Law Fax +1 301.229.6875 rjk@telcomlaw.com finger me for FCC Daily Digest CompuServe 76100,3333 ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 11 May 94 12:07 EST From: Hardwire <0003436453@mcimail.com> Subject: Sprint Frame Relay Information Wanted Our company is looking at Sprint Frame Relay. Does anyone have any information on it. I know of a gopher at Indiana where I pull vendor information for equipment, but does anyone know of any for long distance carrier information on frame relay? Thanks! 3436453@mcimail.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 12:51:27 EDT From: Paul Robinson Reply-To: Paul Robinson Subject: Re: Can You Record Phone Conversations on Hard Disk Media? Organization: Tansin A. Darcos & Company, Silver Spring, MD USA The short answer is yes. The long answer is you need equipment, primarily equivalent to a voice-mail card on a PC. Tai Duong , writes: > [My employer wants] to organize "projects" which can contain documents, > faxes, and stored phone conversations all on hard disk media. I know > voice recordings take up lots of disk space but they are willing to buy > many gigabytes of disk space if necessary. Money to implement this > is not really an issue. Faxes are not too bad, taking probably about 40K per page. Whether voice takes up "lots" of space is another question. Carl Malamud's Internet Talk Radio does 30-minute transmissions that take about 15 meg, or about 1/2 megabyte per minute of speech. This is about right, as the estimates I have are 4-16K per second, depending on how much fidelity you want and whether the background is important. At 8K per second, which I believe is virtually local telephone call quality speech, one minute would take 480K. I have personally just purchased a Maxtor 540MB (actual capacity 505MB, or 527,000,000 characters) hard disk for $399, which, for example, could easily hold six hours of speech data. It might be possible to use this to index material, then store it long-term on tape with indexes being kept around locally, which might be more cost-effective if huge volumes of sound information are going to be stored long-term. > Taking it one step further ... they want to be able to play back the > recorded messages for any particular project to update others on the > progress of deals. An advance feature would be to be able to search > the many recordings from hard disk for words or patterns (eg. for all > recordings that contain a particular name) If you will be going into huge volumes and/or long-term holding of speech, you would be better off to consider something akin to indexing of information and then storing speech information on 8MM tape with indexes. An 8MM tape can hold 2.5 GB of uncompressed data, and costs about $8. The drive is about $1500. If the information on the tape was indexed, then finding the data is not that difficult. A jukebox holding 1,000 8MM tapes can be purchased for about $80,000. The average access time for a file on a tape in a jukebox (including time for robot search) is about three minutes, allowing fairly quick access. One $8 tape would then hold perhaps 90 hours of voice information with indexes. However, if you need instantaneous access to lots of voice data, then they will have to go with more expensive hard disks. But a combined disk-tape system may be possible if near-line access is acceptable as opposed to immediate access. And it will hold several thousand times as much information at a fraction of the cost. Paul Robinson - Paul@TDR.COM ------------------------------ From: whs70@cc.bellcore.com (sohl,william h) Subject: Re: I Have Some Basic Telecom Questions: HELP! Date: 12 May 1994 11:19:22 -0400 Organization: Bell Communications Research (Bellcore) In article , wrote: > I recently posted a message requesting help with Telecom ACRONYMS. > The response to my message was huge and I thank everyone who responded > with suggestions. > I am still researching the area of Telecom and have learned a lot in > the past few weeks. I obtained Newton's Telecom Dictionary which is a > BIG help. I still am having trouble with a few topics. I am aware of > what many are but do not know enough about Telecomm to understand many > of the technical descriptions. > 1.) Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN) concept and the basic (2B+D) > service. For this and other questions on ISDN, contact the Bellcore NISDN Hotline: 1-800-992-ISDN. We have a free info package we'll send you and we can answer questions personally. Live coverage is between 8:00am and 5pm EDST, weekdays. Also consider subscribing to the comp.dcom.isdn newsgroup. That newsgroup has a very detailed FAQ that is posted bi-weekly. Lastly, try FTP to info.bellcore.com and browse some of the material available in the subdirectory: /pub/isdn > 6.) Instead of using a bridge to connect two identical networks, why don't > system developers just create one larger network? Often because the two networks are owned by different entities, different companies, etc. > In return, I am going to create a FAQ of all basic questions that I > answer or get answers to. It will hopefully lessen the amount of > questions asked. > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: You may want to check out the FAQ for > this group. The telecom Frequently Asked Questions file is sent out > automatically to each new subscriber to the mailing list and is also > posted on comp.dcom.telecom from time to time. In addition you can > get a copy from the Telecom Archives at lcs.mit.edu by anonymous ftp > or email server. PAT] Ditto Pat's comments, plus my earlier comment about the FAQ in comp.dcom.isdn Bill Sohl (K2UNK) BELLCORE (Bell Communications Research, Inc.) Morristown, NJ email via UUCP bcr!cc!whs70 201-829-2879 Weekdays email via Internet whs70@cc.bellcore.com [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Don't forget also the glossaries on file in the Telecom Archives. These are obtainable using anonymous ftp like the other files there, but they are also searchable on an interactive basis using email. Ask me for a copy of the Telecom Archives Email In- formation Service help file to learn how. Essentially, you use the command GLOSSARY within your letter to the archives, followed by the term you want explained. The results are returned by email. PAT] ------------------------------ From: Ras Tafar I Subject: Re: Connect a Card Reader to a Cell Phone? Organization: Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago Date: Thu, 12 May 94 13:50:33 GMT > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Yes it is illegal, and yes people listen > illegally to cellular calls. However there is very little risk of fraud > by passing credit card numbers in this way. One, there has to be someone > listening to a scanner which is in the proximity of the tower from which > the message is being transmitted. Two, they have to have their scanner > land on the channel (out of 832 such channels) during the five seconds > or so that the card number is being read. Third, credit card verification > involves reading the number, the expiration date and the amount of the > sale -- not the name and address of the card holder. Fourth, without having > physical possession of the card they cannot make purchases in stores. > Fifth, with only the number but no name or address to go with it they > cannot very easily engage in mail order fraud. Sixth, without having actual > possession of the card they cannot see who the issuer of it was -- unless > they have the list of four digit (starting with three for AMEX, four > for VISA, five for MC or six for DISCOVER) codes telling which bank > (or credit grantor) issued the card -- thus no calls can be made to > customer service putting in bogus inquiries or name/address changes. > In short, a non-issue here. > If I were going to rip off credit card numbers, PINS and related data, I > would find it far easier to tap the phone line used by an ATM machine > and put some kind of data capture device on that instead ... yet people > use ATMs quite willingly. So what's the beef about cellular phones and > credit card numbers? On the one in a million chance someone *might* > happen to hear your credit card number read, what is it gonna get them? All you need to commit credit card fraud is the number and the expiration. That's all it takes to order merchandise by phone. I wouldn't risk giving my number over cellular. People can make up a name and vendors won't check to make sure the card number and name match. As for physical cards, a card reader/encoder could put my number on a library card and someone could go to town at those automated cashiers like they have at gas stations. Since I've had my Discover card number used fraudulently at gas stations for two separate accounts, I know a number is all they need. I admit, though, the odds are slim any one would happen to be listening in my area at the exact time I give out my number. [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Plus which, without the name and address or something to document the transaction via mail order, that sale will be charged back to the dealer. You the person whose number was used are not out anything. PAT] ------------------------------ From: ddean@robadome.com (Drew Dean) Subject: Re: Connect a Card Reader to a Cell Phone? Date: 12 May 1994 12:32:55 -0700 Organization: ROLM - A Siemens Company > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Yes it is illegal, and yes people listen > illegally to cellular calls. However there is very little risk of fraud > by passing credit card numbers in this way. [deleted] > Third, credit card verification > involves reading the number, the expiration date and the amount of the > sale -- not the name and address of the card holder. Fourth, without having > physical possession of the card they cannot make purchases in stores. Not true -- someone, with only a name, card number, and expiration date managed to charge over $4000 of tires, purchased at a retail store, to my father's Citibank-issued card. (I forget whether it was a Visa or MasterCard). You could see the card number hand written into the charge slip, along with a signature that looked nothing like the authorized one. Getting the charge removed took a fair bit of correspondence with Citibank. I never heard if they found the crook, or whether the merchant was in on the scam. (Would you accept a $4000 charge from someone who "forgot" his card ?) Drew Dean (408) 492-5524 ddean@robadome.com ROLM, a Siemens company [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: But the point is, the charge was removed. I'm sorry to hear Citibank's customer service is slow at things. The credit card agreement merchants have to sign with the card issuers says in effect, yes, we will accept handwritten charge tickets and attempt to bill them, and yes, we will accept cards that have expired and attempt to bill them. The emphasis is also on good service to merchants and the card issuer will always attempt to bill/collect from the card holder even in irregular circumstances. But as a worst case scenario if the number is not *imprinted* on the card, if the expiration date has passed, or if the charge ticket is not signed with the signature of the legitimate card holder then the merchant eats it. Those collectors at the credit card processing office don't care who pays; they are not proud. They want it off their case load -- off the credit card office's ledgers. If the card holder won't pay, you bet they examine that charge ticket for any irregularities in the hopes of charging it back to the merchant as a violation of his contract. The trouble people have is not so much getting 'stuck' with fraud charges as it is working through the paper mill at the credit card office. PAT] ------------------------------ From: gatech!willard.atl.ga.us!wdawson@uunet.UU.NET (Willard Dawson) Subject: Re: CallerID With Serial Port - Where? Organization: Willard's House Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 01:02:55 GMT > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: In the electronics department at Venture > they had one from BellSouth I believe. I don't think buying a modem > for 'such a purpose' would necessarily be a waste. If the modem had > Caller-ID built into it and all you needed was to get that data over > to your computer for whatever reason, then such a modem would be a > fine investment. Who else sells CID boxes with serial ports? PAT] You might not want the BellSouth product. I had the opportunity to view one out of the box; the serial port is of the RJ-11 variety. Unless you happen to already have an RJ-11 ==> RS-232 cable... I made the mistake of buying a couple of BellSouth phones through our employee discount program (did I mention that I am a BellSouth employee?). The BellSouth phones are poor. One of mine was very noisy. The other, a two-line speaker phone, exhibits bleed-over from one line to another, and the speaker drops out (seeming just as the remote party says something interesting). Altogether, a lousy deal to foist on loyal employees. Of course, BellSouth does not actually manufacture anything, given the current MFJ restrictions. "Made in Malaysia" says it all, IMHO. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 12 May 94 19:16 WET From: joharris@io.org (John Harris) Subject: Re: Caller ID with Serial Port - Where? Quoting John_landwehr@next.com: > Although several TELECOM Digest articles have mentioned caller ID > boxes with serial ports, I have never seen a reference to a model > number, manufacturer or distributor. > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: In the electronics department at > Venture they had one from BellSouth I believe. Try contacting Vive Synergies Inc., 30 West Beaver Creek Road, Unit 2, Richmond Hill, Ontario L4B 3K1 (905) 882-6107 Fax (905) 882-6238 This manufacturer advertises in the local paper as having a "CALL EDITOR II" for $199.00 and a "CALL EDITOR RSA" for $119.00 which will integrate Caller ID with any DOS or Windows application, particularly ACT! for Windows. From the pictures, the "II" is a typical caller ID unit with a display, the "RSA" looks like a 25 pin D-shell connector with a telephone jack on the back. John Harris, BEL-Tronics Ltd, Mississauga, ON L5L 1J9 (905) 828-1002 Fax (905) 828-2951 ------------------------------ From: dgdhome!ddavis@meaddata.com (Don Davis) Subject: Re: CallerID With Serial Port - Where? Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 08:15:12 EDT Organization: The Dayton Home for the Chronically Strange >> So the question remains: Where can I purchase a caller ID box with >> serial port? > I have a (rather expensive) Caller ID communications device from > Rochelle Communications, but I believe they have cheaper (single line) > units, too. Or you could try: Zeus Phonestuff 404-263-7111 Atlanta, GA 800-240-4637 Their product costs $99 (they discounted it by 20% for me when I ordered up four of 'em). Has 2 RJ-11 phone jacks, and several neat features: 1. the unit does *not* pass the first ring through to any telephone plugged into the phone jack -- first, it delivers the Caller*ID info out the serial port, then you have the option (under software control) to let the phone number determine whether you want subsequent rings passed through or not. 2. the unit can provide the Caller*ID data in several formats. A checksum feature indicates whether the data received is valid. 3. the unit can store up to about 30 sets of call info in case your system goes offline for a while. 4. software for PC-compatibles is included -- caller database and key macro TSR that'll lurk in the background and hit whatever keys you please depending upon the Caller*ID info. 5. straightforward hardware interface with good documentation -- I wrote my own little application in a couple of hours (I wanted to do some things that went beyond their software). Best wishes, Don Davis Internet: dgdhome!ddavis@meaddata.com | Tel: 513-235-0096 ------------------------------ From: msb@sq.sq.com (Mark Brader) Subject: Re: Government Regulates Number of Modem Redial Atttempts? Organization: SoftQuad Inc., Toronto, Canada Date: Thu, 12 May 94 18:11:06 GMT > ... Some people, you see, leave the speaker turned off all the time > and as a result don't even realize they are connecting to a live > person in errror instead of another modem. I would rather have seen a > rule saying that if voice was detected instead of carrier, the speaker > would automatically turn on ... One might bear in mind that even when a modem is being controlled directly by a person, it may not be within earshot. For instance, I can initiate a modem call from my desk at work, but the modem I'd be using is in the computer room -- about 100 feet away and behind a locked door. Mark Brader, msb@sq.com, SoftQuad Inc., Toronto ------------------------------ From: allen0@news.delphi.com (ALLEN0@DELPHI.COM) Subject: Re: Government Regulates Number of Modem Redial Attempts? Date: 12 May 1994 01:33:32 -0000 Organization: Delphi Internet Services Corporation dwn@dwn.ccd.bnl.gov (Dave Niebuhr) writes: >> That has been the case in Canada for quite >> a few years and I think it is true here in the USA also now. The reason is >> a modem has no way of knowing it is dialing a wrong number and being >> offensive to the human victim at the other end ... and some owners of >> modems could care less : > Text deleted for brevity. >> But the way they have it now with limits on the redial attempts is >> the next best solution. PAT] > With my modem, which has a ten memory location, I could easily > misoprogram the unit and not know it unless I caught it during a > dialing sequence. Looking away or being otherwise occupied during the > dialing, I would not be aware of a misdail and just call up the > number's location. > Granted, there are problems with these types of calls. I sure > wouldn't want to be the recipient of them and hopefully won't in the > future. In my city, they just offered a new feature that allows you to enter a number that is busy, and have it redial that number for up to 30 minutes. When it finally gets thru, your phone rings. This is great for making calls but I can see this as a problem for modem users because they have to initiate the call to be connected. Also, I have redialed many times consecutively and have never had any problems. Regards, Allen [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: That feature is called Busy Number Redial in most places where it is offered. For a laugh sometime, try dialing your own number and getting a busy signal, then asking BNR to deal with it. A few seconds after you hang up, BNR will find the number to be free and call you back to so inform you and make the connection. You'll answer the phone, have a moment or two of silence from the other end and then be informed that, 'the number you were trying to reach *was* available, but it has become busy again! ...' :) It was misprogrammed here in Chicago for awhile and this would go on for the full thirty minutes of attempts. Hang up, get called back, be told 'it has become busy again'. Repeat above every minute or so for the full period. It has since been fixed here. PAT] ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V14 #217 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa26187; 12 May 94 17:45 EDT Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA02691; Thu, 12 May 94 13:48:07 CDT Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA02682; Thu, 12 May 94 13:48:05 CDT Date: Thu, 12 May 94 13:48:05 CDT From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Moderator) Message-Id: <9405121848.AA02682@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V14 #218 TELECOM Digest Thu, 12 May 94 13:48:00 CDT Volume 14 : Issue 218 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Re: McCaw Cellular One (NYC) Introduces Anti-Fraud Program (Toby Nixon) Re: McCaw Cellular One (NYC) Introduces Anti-Fraud Program (Alan Gallatin) Re: Any Modem Decode DTMF? (Michael Moore) Re: Fax Cited in Numbers Bust (Alan T. Furman) Re: IXC Timing Problem (Alan Leon Varney) Re: Can the FCC be Reached by FTP? (Kelley Boan) Re: Can the FCC be Reached by FTP? (John R. Levine) Re: Worldwide Telecom Information (Robert Shaw) Re: Toll-Free Prank Calls (Carl Jones) Re: CO's and Disasters (Kevin W. Williams) Re: Motorola "Advisor" Pager Information Wanted (Rob Lockhart) Re: Bell Atlantic Gets Maryland Competition (John R. Levine) Re: NPA Optional in 818 - it Works! (Carl Moore) TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of public service systems and networks including Compuserve and GEnie. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available at no charge to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu * The Digest is edited, published and compilation-copyrighted by Patrick Townson of Skokie, Illinois USA. You can reach us by postal mail, fax or phone at: 9457-D Niles Center Road Skokie, IL USA 60076 Phone: 708-329-0571 Fax: 708-329-0572 ** Article submission address only: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu ** Our archives are located at lcs.mit.edu and are available by using anonymous ftp. The archives can also be accessed using our email information service. For a copy of a helpful file explaining how to use the information service, just ask. ************************************************************************* * TELECOM Digest is partially funded by a grant from the * * International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in Geneva, Switzerland * * under the aegis of its Telecom Information Exchange Services (TIES) * * project. Views expressed herein should not be construed as represent-* * ing views of the ITU. * ************************************************************************* Additionally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help is important and appreciated. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: tnixon@microsoft.com (Toby Nixon) Subject: Re: McCaw Cellular One (NYC) Introduces Anti-Fraud Program Organization: Microsoft Corporation, Redmond WA, USA Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 17:38:21 GMT In article amg@panix.com wrote: > If you dial *56 + PIN (SND) the fraud protection is turned on. > Cellular One will refuse to complete any calls from that phone EXCEPT > 611 and 911. Incoming calls, however, still work. Dialing *560 + PIN > (SND) releases the phone and allows it to make calls. This is, of > course, distinct from the lock feature of the phone, itself. Something sounds fishy about this to me. Criminals today can capture mobile numbers and ESNs off the air. What's to stop them from also capturing the PINs? All they have to do is set their scanners to look for the "*560####" messages that thousands of people will be sending all the time to unlock their phones, and then generate their own "*560####" message to "unlock" the number. Pretty bogus security, if you ask me. Certainly gives customers the _feeling_ that something is being done about the problem, but all it really seems to do is make everyone enter a few more digits every time they want to make a call. This problem is not going to be solved until there are secure encryption keys and a challenge-based system that never sends the keys over the air. Toby ------------------------------ From: amg@panix.com (Alan M. Gallatin) Subject: Re: McCaw Cellular One (NYC) Introduces Anti-Fraud Program Date: 12 May 1994 13:22:36 -0400 Organization: PANIX Public Access Internet and Unix, NYC In a previous article, ROsman@swri.edu wrote: > Somebody (I forget who) wrote: (That would be me...) >> Yes ... according to Cell One, once you turn on the phone, you need to >> dial the unlock code -- *560 + PIN (SND) -- before making your first >> call. > 1) If a significant number of people store the access code in their phone, > stolen phones are a valuable commodity. Well, stolen phones are a valuable commodity to begin with. However, this program is to counter cloning. Physical theft of phones is a wholly separate problem. Look at it this way: If I'm walking on the streets of NY and someone scans my phone, when will I (or Cell One) ever find out about it? After tons of calls have been made on my bill and I go to Cellular One to get a new NAM and convince them to take thousands off of my bill. Inconvenience for me, major $$$ loss for them. If someone rips off my actual phone, when will I know about it? Presumably immediately. After calling Cellular One and reporting the theft, the phone will be rendered inoperable. The phone will no longer be useable on its ESN and, therefore, having the unlock code that goes with that ESN and NAM is completely useless. > 2) If I time out every twenty minutes, the required occurance of pin > transmissions is quite high. That's 20 minutes of your phone being off, not 20 minutes of non-usage. If your phone is powered on (in the service area) for a week non-stop, then you only need to unlock it ONCE during that whole week -- that unlock would come before the first call. > All I need to do is snatch a PIN > transmission and I get everything I need to defraud (esn/pin/min). > Yeah I know, not *every* transmission contains the ESN, but how much > you want to lay on the fact that the ESN will be transmitted in this > initial call. There's nothing special about this call, 'cept that you need to make it before any billable call. If the ESN doesn't go out on every call, there's no reason to assume it will necessarily go out on the *560 call either. > On the whole, it seems to introduce substantial customer inconvenience > without adding a lot of security. For the moment, there is a convenient alternative; just don't use it. Alan M. Gallatin amg@panix.com amg@israel.nysernet.org amg@jerusalem1.datasrv.co.il ------------------------------ From: moorem@iia.org (michael moore) Subject: Re: Any Modem Decode DTMF? Date: 12 May 1994 12:05:17 -0400 Organization: International Internet Association. William C. Fenner (fenner@cmf.nrl.navy.mil) wrote: > In article , mark boylan org> wrote: >> Is there a modem that can accept and decode DTMF tones after it's >> answered an incoming call? And also, how can I send the output of a >> SoundBlaster card over the same phone line? > You can solve both problems at once with a ZyXEL modem. Not only will > it decode DTMF tones, but it will also play audio directly to the > phone line. If you convert your WAV files to, say, 3-bit ZyXEL ADPCM, > you can probably use one of the many shareware packages out there and > get up and running very quickly. Could you elaborate on the "many shareware packages out there". I am looking for information on how to set up a voice response system for employee dial in of information. Also, are there any comercial packages available for PC's. Thanks, Email to moorem@iia.org ------------------------------ From: atfurman@cup.portal.com Subject: Re: Fax Cited in Numbers Bust Date: Thu, 12 May 94 04:55:08 PDT The {New York Times}, as quoted by Dave Thompson: > For 30 years, Raymond Marquez was a thorn to law-enforcement > agencies and a legend to countless gamblers in Harlem and East Harlem... > But the authorities said yesterday that they had arrested Mr. > Marquez, 64, and his wife, Alice, 63, on felony gambling charges and > had raided and closed 56 gambling parlors and backroom offices .... > The Manhattan District Attorney, Robert M. Morgenthau, said a > large part of the case against Mr. Marquez stemmed from one mistake: > his use of a fax to get daily reports on his illegal gambling profits > from Manhattan to his vacation retreat in Fort Lauderdale. > Mr. Morgenthau, who announced the arrests ..., said the faxes, > which were intercepted under a court order, included the names of > gambling sites, accounts over the last month of profits at each site > and the payrolls for more than 100 people employed by Mr. Marquez in > one of the city's largest illegal gambling rings... Those whose business it is to mind everyone else's business will insist that the struggle against "numbers" cannot be won unless Raymond Marquez's successor is prevented from using effective encryption (that is, something other than Clipper). They are right. Raymond Marquez's interactions with his customers and employees were essentially voluntary. There was no "victim" to complain. The busybodies of the "Public Morals" squad had to invade his affairs to gather evidence. This is -- and always will be -- true of every attempt to criminalize consensual behavior among adults such as gambling, prostitution, pornography, and politically incorrect drugs and sexual positions. But even if all right-wingers were to disappear, one victimless crime would remain -- one whose staggering volume of fines depends on how thoroughly its enforcement bureaucracy does its job. And that, in turn, depends on the tools they have: immense databases, warrantless access to personal banking records, warrantless eavesdropping on cordless phones, etc. I refer to the crime of making a living. If you don't believe me, read the income tax code. ------------------------------ From: Alan.Leon.Varney@att.com Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 15:32:32 +0600 Subject: Re: IXC Timing Problem Organization: AT&T Network Systems In article sspak@seas.gwu.edu (Steven L. Spak) writes: > I'm fairly certain that Bellcore does work on IXC/LEC interconnect > standards. They probably have some TR's or TA's on signalling and > timing for IXC/LEC handoffs. Bellcore documents LEC requirements; for "Calling Card Service - Prompt Tone", they document 60 ms of 941+1477 HZ at -10dBm0, then 940 ms of 440+350 Hz decayed exponentially from -10 dBm0. Unfortunately, documenting a requirement and having it actually be implemented everywhere are two different things. Admitting this, Bellcore states in various issues of "Notes on the Network": "There is no specific requirement for any tone." That's it; an admission that tones are not required to be offered at specific events, with specific volume or frequencies or duration. In other words, the POTS line is a human interface, not a machine interface. On top of that, Bellcore cannot require IXCs to use specific tones WITHIN their network. Believe me, we've had lots of arguements in industry groups. But the upshot is that an IXC can intercept calls in any way it wants (assuming customers are happy with the result). They are even permitted to have a LIVE OPERATOR answer your Calling Card calls!! But there is one alternative: the industry group responsible for achieving "consensus" in IXC/LEC interactions is the ICCF (Industry Carriers Compatibility Forum). This is an open forum -- you can attend meetings or send letters. Dawne Drake on 201 740-4657 is the sectetary, last I knew. Remember that compliance is voluntary, and your request should be phrased in a way that indicates why a "bong standard" for all IXCs would be of benefit to the IXCs (and the country). In article Linda Slovick writes: > I've been testing a product that must redial inter-LATA calls using > the same IXC as the original call. .... > So far, testing this product has been a nightmare. .... > At this point, I had to call a halt to testing and go back to basics. > From reading the Bellcore literature on the subject, I'm getting the > strong impression that we're going about this all wrong. Bellcore > specifically mentions that timing is NOT guaranteed after the call is > handed off to the IXC. Arrgh! As I mentioned above, the telephone system is not designed to interact with machines, except for a few well-specified interfaces. Calling Card entry is not one of them. > Much as I might like to just exclude the oddballs, this is NOT > an option for this project (sigh...). > Questions: > 1.) This whole thing is sounding a bit like the old problems folks used > to have trying to thread FGB calls. The solution to that was to > hook in to SS7ness and dump all this inband listening for > signalling stuff. Is there something tariffed in SS7land that I > could hook my machine through to get signalling that all the IXCs > would have to respect? Nope -- SS7 does not indicate when the IXC is ready for Calling Card digits (however, it should let you know when the IXC has indicated cut-through in the forward direction is required). On top of that, SS7 isn't quite ready for generic handling of all operator calls, so the timing/handling can vary (coin phones are probably non-SS7, PBX calls may get special treatment, prison calls even more special treatment, etc.). Worst of all, an IXC could have live operators handling Calling Card calls -- no bong, no DTMF input. >3.) Anybody have any other ideas on how to approach solving this > problem? Two ideas: 1) Make the calls without calling cards -- use an AOS to validate the card numbers and bill for the calls. In effect, you will be acting like some COCOTs. If you can't handle the Calling Card #, "splash" the call via the real IXC and have a human enter the number.... 2) Deal with the IXCs -- offer to provide the system at an interface they define, and provide them the Card Numbers correlated with the call times on some machine-readable media. Given that some IXCs already provide this service themselves, the smaller ones may be willing to negotiate. Al Varney - just my opinion ------------------------------ From: kboan@BIX.com (kboan on BIX) Subject: Re: Can the FCC be Reached by FTP? Date: 12 May 94 16:35:45 GMT Organization: Delphi Internet Services Corporation breit@MR.Net writes: > Does anyone know if the FCC maintains a public ftp site? > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Why yes, in fact recently the FCC can > be reached via FTP. We've touched on it here recently and perhaps one > of our readers will be so kind as to send you the help file showing > how it is done. PAT] I'd like a copy of that help file as well, thanks. Kelley Boan, kboan@bix.com [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Will someone help Kelley please? PAT] ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 12 May 94 17:36 EDT From: johnl@iecc.com (John R Levine) Subject: Re: Can the FCC be Reached by FTP? Organization: I.E.C.C., Cambridge, Mass. > Does anyone know if the FCC maintains a public ftp site? That's the easy part. FTP to fcc.gov and look around. You can also get there via Gopher, although they don't update the Gopher menus anywhere near as often as the FCC files. > I would like to research more information on "Tariff 12" pricing for > long distance services. Tariff 12 is a regulatory hack through which AT&T can offer special deals to large customers. Basically, they custom craft a special package for a customer at a special price, and publish that as part of tariff 12. If someone else happened to want exactly the same combination of features, AT&T would provide it at the same price. I didn't see any tariffs at all on the FTP server, 12 or otherwise. I'd think that if your business were large enough to be worth a tariff 12 filing, your AT&T account reps would be able to figure that out. Regards, John Levine, johnl@iecc.com, jlevine@delphi.com, 1037498@mcimail.com ------------------------------ Date: 12 May 1994 12:14:25 CET From: SHAW +41 22 730 5338 Subject: Re: Worldwide Telecom Information > I am looking for information about the current telephony > infrastructure in each country around the world. Is there such a > source anywhere? You might want to get a copy of the recently published (March 1994) World Telecommunication Development Report. This has lots of information on the current world telephony structure including the world telecom indicators (there's an electronic version of the indicators available too). The report is around 200 pages long. Ordering information is available from: International Telecommunication Union General Secretariat - Sales Section Place des Nations, CH-1211 Geneva 20 (Switzerland) Tf: + 41 22 730 5285 Tlx: 421 000 uit ch Fax: + 41 22 730 5194 Tg: Burinterna Geneva Robert Shaw Information Services Department International Telecommunication Union Place des Nations 1211 Geneva 20, Switzerland TEL: +41 22 730 5338/5554 FAX: +41 22 730 5337 X.400:G=robert;S=shaw;A=arcom;P=itu;C=ch Internet: shaw@itu.ch [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I want to make just a brief mention of the role the ITU has accepted with TELECOM Digest. This Digest is partially funded by a very generous monthly grant from the International Telecomm- unication Union, as part of their information exchange. In order to insure the continued publication of this Digest -- now in its 13th year on the net -- addtional support is needed from corporate sponsors and individuals. ITU has set the pace, please follow if you can. Thanks. PAT] ------------------------------ From: uswnvg!uswnvg.com!cajones@uunet.UU.NET (Carl Jones) Subject: Re: Toll-Free Prank Calls Date: 12 May 94 00:32:36 GMT Out of curiousity, What statues were used to charge this guy for calling a 1-800 repeatedly? I speak for everyone in a twenty mile radius around me. Any questions? E-Mail cajones@uswnvg.com [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: There are various laws depending on the state, but a very common one has to do with 'causing a telephone to ring for the purpose of harrassment'. Another reader noted in a private comment to me that he thought the CO handling the call would create an exception report listing numbers which make excessive 800 calls. They probably do, but the place receiving the calls would still have to know where to look to find *which* CO was shoving all that garbage at them. I think in Falwell's case once they identified the problem as coming at them from outside their own phone system then they started backtracking to the CO in question. PAT] ------------------------------ From: williamsk@agcs.com (Kevin W. Williams) Subject: Re: CO's and Disasters Date: 12 May 1994 10:21:11 -0700 In article , tsw@cypher.apple.com (Tom Watson) writes: > In article , Thomas Tengdin > wrote: >> The telephone company computers will connect some customers >> at a higher priority that others. >> Is there something in CO Class of Service? or other programming that >> gives "priority" service to a select class of lines? > Yes, they DO exist. Will the local operating company tell you if you are > one of the selected few, NO! > The reason for this is that they want some traffic to get through. In > addition, they will usually pick out one house in a block and give it > the "good" treatment. The object here is to at least let some people > get out. This load-leveling (there is a snazzy term for it, but I [ remainder deleted ] I would be very surprised if anyone was using a "one house on the block" type of assignment scheme. On the GTD-5, line can be marked as class A or class B (the default). Class A lines are scanned regardless of overload conditions, while class B lines are scanned only under non overload conditions. Class A is usually assigned only to police, hospitals, etc. This is a simplification: some queuing techniques are applied to keep the switch from oscillating between overload and zero traffic due to the overload condition. All modern switches have some variation on this scheme, although different designs have different details and terminology. Abuse of the feature by overassigning priority lines results in a switch that cannot optimally handle an overload situation. I would be surprised if any operating company used any kind of random assignment technique for the priorities. Kevin Wayne Williams williamsk@agcs.com ------------------------------ From: rlockhart@aol.com (RLockhart) Subject: Re: Motorola "Advisor" Pager Information Wanted Date: 12 May 1994 08:40:02 -0400 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) In article , Pat_Barron@transarc.com writes: > Does anyone have technical info on the Motorola "Advisor" alphanumeric > pager? Specifically, any sort of configuration or status report > modes, All depends on what you want to do, Pat. Some of the programming information is given in the 'tic' book you received when you bought your Advisor and the rest is only accessable from your carrier's Advisor programming fixture. > and/or what one can do with the serial port that seems to be on > the bottom of the unit. These three pins are used to both program the device for cap code, OOR indicator, alert on bad data, and a host of others and to allow dumping of messages to a host mobile computer (through a program called PrintPal) or just to a printer. SkyTel and some others have used this ability to link up paging to laptops et al to send email via paging. However, in almost *all* cases, they've had to develop a cable that would handle holding the Advisor to the spring loaded connection pins and provide the level shifting needed to link to the laptop's RS232 port. The preferable solution for linking a pager-like device to a portable computer is through another family of products of ours called wireless data receivers (e.g., NewsStream and NewsCard .. serial interface and PCMCIA device, respectively). In article , tmb1@SanDiegoCA.NCR.COM (Thomas Baird) writes: > Also has Motorola published the interface information for accessing > the "advisor" from an IBM PC? I talked to a salesman and his only > knowledge was it could be accesed from a PC and the maximum message > size was 2000 characters per message. Tom, we've not published the Advisor interface. We *have* published, though, the software interface for both our NewsStream and NewsCard Wireless Data Receivers (serial and PCMCIA devices, respectively) that will work on the same services as the Advisor. In fact, they may be found on line on some of the commercial services (e.g., CIS, AOL, AppleLink) in Stuffed MacWord 5.1 format. If these interest you, but you don't have access to the commercial services, give me a shout and I'll see what I can do for you. Rob Lockhart, Resource Manager, Interactive Data Systems Paging Products Group, Motorola, Inc. Desktop I'net: lockhart-epag06_rob@email.mot.com Wireless I'net (<32K characters): rob_lockhart-erl003e@email.mot.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 12 May 94 02:40 EDT From: johnl@iecc.com (John R Levine) Subject: Re: Bell Atlantic Gets Maryland Competition Organization: I.E.C.C., Cambridge, Mass. Carl Moore wrote: > How would local telephone directories' lists of prefixes, calling > areas, etc. be affected? and Greg Monti responded: > This is one of many issues that were not mentioned in the story I > summarized. Didn't the state mandate number portability? Portability means that any number can be assigned to any carrier, as is currently the case with 800 numbers. Portability is clearly in the works, but as I noted in an earlier message it'll be an enormous project involving billions of dollars of retrofit to the network to look up every single call in a carrier database to know who to route it to. I'd be very surprised to see portability working before the year 2000. In the meantime, I expect that competitive access providers will either do what cellular carriers do, which is to hook up like a PBX and get blocks of numbers which may or may not be full prefixes, or more likely hook up like an independent telco with its own set of prefixes. Their prices will certainly not be the same as the RBOCs, so deaveraged pricing (i.e. calling A->B doesn't cost the same as B->A) which is now relatively uncommon will become the rule. One thing I can definitely promise is massive confusion before it's all sorted out. Expect a lot of really stupid proposals, e.g. assigning each CAP a couple of area codes, or adding yet more digits to be dialed as a prefix to the subscriber's number. Regards, John Levine, johnl@iecc.com, jlevine@delphi.com, 1037498@mcimail.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 12 May 94 13:33:45 EDT From: Carl Moore Subject: Re: NPA Optional in 818 - it Works! Since I update history.of.area.splits from time to time, I have some questions for Al Varney: If, in your message, "Home NPA Toll calls ... require 1+ for Toll", do you mean: 1. 1+NPA+7D must be used? (I know this applies to Maryland and area 703 in Virginia; no information yet for 804 in Va.) 2. 1+7D can still be used? (I have not received information about Nevada, Wisconsin, or area 804 in Va. requiring 1+NPA+7D for long distance within area code.) And where do you arrive at 7D being allowed for intra-NPA toll calls in West Virginia? That would be new information for me. > NPA 703 in Virginia will > permit 7D or 10D or 1+10D local calls, except into the Washington > metro area, where 10D or 1+10D is required. NPA 703 in Virginia does allow 7D for local calls into the Washington metro area WITHIN AN AREA CODE, with the "10D or 1+10D is required" kicking in if calling different area code. > Illinois is the ONE state that REQUIRES 7D dialing for all Home NPA > calls, even Toll calls (i.e., does not PERMIT 1 + 10D for such calls). Old area 312 never had 1+ for long distance until it needed N0X/N1X prefixes, and at that time it got 1+ for long distance to other area codes. Are you saying the rest of Illinois is dropping the leading 1 for intra-NPA if it was still publishing 1+7D for such? WMEA means Washington Metropolitan Exchange Area, and would include all of 202 plus parts of 301 and 703. 301 extends beyond the WMEA to include southern and western Maryland. In Maryland, you are in 301 (not 410) if you are local to Washington; the 301/410 split was along LATA lines. What do you gather from Bellcore's table regarding local calls from Maryland? Here is what I know from other sources regarding Maryland: local calls to other area codes are just 7D EXCEPT for: 1. local calls to DC and Va. suburbs; 2. across the 301/410 border; some exchanges, such as Silver Spring, are local to all or part of 4 area codes (202,301,410,703). (By the way, 804 in Virginia is too far from the DC area to have local service into it from the DC area.) ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V14 #218 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa26714; 12 May 94 18:20 EDT Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA04288; Thu, 12 May 94 14:49:04 CDT Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA04279; Thu, 12 May 94 14:49:01 CDT Date: Thu, 12 May 94 14:49:01 CDT From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Moderator) Message-Id: <9405121949.AA04279@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V14 #219 TELECOM Digest Thu, 12 May 94 14:49:00 CDT Volume 14 : Issue 219 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Re: Cellular Phone Abuse (Butch Croan) Re: Cellular Phone Abuse (Jon Steel) Re: Unwelcome AT&T "Feature" (Brian Bebeau) Re: Can You Record Phone Conversations on Hard Disk Media? (Paul Lee) Re: Need Criteria for Choosing a Phone Number (Ross Oliver) Re: Need Criteria for Choosing a Phone Number (Hugh Pritchard) Re: PEP Pager Protocol Software Information Wanted (Rob Lockhart) Re: Getting Phone Bills Over the Internet (Robert J. Woodhead) Re: Using Call Forwarding to Avoid Tolls (Randy Gellens) Re: "Howdy Mail"? Scrawl-Like Writing Device (Kevin W. Reed) Re: "Howdy Mail"? Scrawl-Like Writing Device (Paul Robinson) Re: FAX Mailbox Services (Clarence Dold) Re: Bulk Call Display (Vance Shipley) TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of public service systems and networks including Compuserve and GEnie. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available at no charge to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu * The Digest is edited, published and compilation-copyrighted by Patrick Townson of Skokie, Illinois USA. You can reach us by postal mail, fax or phone at: 9457-D Niles Center Road Skokie, IL USA 60076 Phone: 708-329-0571 Fax: 708-329-0572 ** Article submission address only: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu ** Our archives are located at lcs.mit.edu and are available by using anonymous ftp. The archives can also be accessed using our email information service. For a copy of a helpful file explaining how to use the information service, just ask. ************************************************************************* * TELECOM Digest is partially funded by a grant from the * * International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in Geneva, Switzerland * * under the aegis of its Telecom Information Exchange Services (TIES) * * project. Views expressed herein should not be construed as represent-* * ing views of the ITU. * ************************************************************************* Additionally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help is important and appreciated. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: balcroan@netcom.com (Butch lcroan/.nameBalcroan Lilli) Subject: Re: Cellular Phone Abuse Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 261-4700 guest) Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 09:02:02 GMT Aamer Soomro (asoomro@bass.gmu.edu) wrote: > In article jharan@cwa.com writes: >> ... but why don't the cellular providers use a more robust >> authentication service. Your cellular phone would contain an >> encription key that would also be known to the cellular provider. When >> your phone went off hook, it would send its telephone number. The >> provider would look up your number to get your key and send you some >> random sequence of digits which would vary from call to call. Your >> phone would take the sequence of digits, use its key to encode them >> and return them to the provider. Since the provider has your key, it >> can perform the same encription. If the encoded data that was returned >> doesn't match what the provider's copy of the key encripts, then its >> because the calling phone doesn't have the right key and the call is >> dropped. The key is never transmitted so the crook would have to >> steal the physical phone to steal the service. > To me this seems hitting pretty close to the Clipper Chip controversy. > All the service providers and cell phone manufactures would have to > conform to a standard encryption, so that the cell phones could be > used with any carrier service. > The encryption keys analogous to the phone numbers would be another > database to be maintained by the service providers. > Would it be feasable to complicate the registeration process by > introducing two encryption steps and a comparison step along with two > steps for digit transmission? I am not sure if you have access to the QUALCOMM CDMA spec's or the GSM TDMA , but I suggest you try and attain a copy and read about the encryption process and the authectication processes as they are already in the spec and are probably more secure than you would imagine. In addition to that CDMA is also spread spectrum using a PN sequence. The system I worked on in the military are slightly different in all important way to make them quite secure, but even the PN or PuesdoRandom Noice syetm used in commerical spread spectrum will make any demodulating device not inpossesion of the current PN sequence number of which there are several that change from phone to phone and call to call so even if you got one part you might miss the next until that PN key is used again ... Oh YA ... I think you might of guessed that timing is very important a GPS is at every tower and broadcasting a GPS derived " system time " in the overhead. I WOULD BE SURPRISED IF IT WORKS AT ALL given that they will be attempting it will low-end consumer units bounced around in cars ... HArdly the MIL-SPEC stuff we used in the NAVY! Butch Croan email balcroan@netcom.com ------------------------------ From: steelj@mercury.swindon.rtsg.mot.com (jon steel) Subject: Re: Cellular Phone Abuse Date: 12 May 1994 11:35:43 GMT Organization: Motorola Ltd., European Cellular Infrastructure Division In article jharan@cwa.com writes: > ... but why don't the cellular providers use a more robust > authentication service. Your cellular phone would contain an > encription key that would also be known to the cellular provider. When > your phone went off hook, it would send its telephone number. The > provider would look up your number to get your key and send you some > random sequence of digits which would vary from call to call. Your > phone would take the sequence of digits, use its key to encode them > and return them to the provider. Since the provider has your key, it > can perform the same encription. If the encoded data that was returned > doesn't match what the provider's copy of the key encripts, then its > because the calling phone doesn't have the right key and the call is > dropped. The key is never transmitted so the crook would have to > steal the physical phone to steal the service. In the UK there is a similar system to the one you have described above. This feature is known as `TACS Authentication'. It is implemented using a 16-digit PIN code, known only to the subscriber and the service provider. When the subscriber goes `off-hook' his 16-digit PIN code is sent in encrypted form, this is then received at the MSC and decrypted. It is then compared with the subscriber record in the database, and if it does not match, you ain't talking to nobody! Although the PIN is transmitted, it is in encrypted form, so to get round this you will have to know the encryption algorithm. Oh, one more point. The PIN is never encrytped the same way twice (at least not for a long time). I've probably got some functional specs somewhere if anybody is really interested ... Jon Steel. Motorola ECID Ltd, Swindon, UK Tel: +44 793 545281 Fax: +44 793 480120 Email: steelj@zeus.swindon.rtsg.mot.com ------------------------------ From: brian@porky.cb.att.com (Brian Bebeau) Subject: Re: Unwelcome AT&T "Feature" Organization: AT&T Date: Thu, 12 May 1994 14:13:02 GMT In regard to the AT&T feature of cutting people off after a few rings: Someone in an AT&T internal newsletter complained about the same thing recently (his mother is hard of hearing and takes a while to answer the phone). Since a public relations person replied, I don't think I'll be divulging company secrets to repeat the reply. What was said, was that, when the message is being played about leaving a message, the phone is still ringing, and it still rings after the message is finished playing. If you want to let it keep ringing, just hang on (don't leave a message and don't hang up), it'll keep on ringing. Whether it actually works if you just hang on I don't know, but that's what they said. Brian Bebeau Interactive Systems (a Systemhouse company) brian@cblph.att.com at AT&T Network Systems ------------------------------ From: Paul A. Lee ORGANIZATION: Woolworth Corporation Date: Thu 12 May 1994 15:00:00 GMT Subject: Re: Can You Record Phone Conversations on Hard Disk Media? In a recent {TELECOM Digest}, Tai Duong wrote: > Can anyone give me ... a way to record phone conversations on hard > disk...? Current voice mail technology is based on the process of digitizing (recording) phone signals (conversations), storing them on disk, and retrieving them from the stored database for decoding and playback. The technology has also been adapted to phone logging and retrieval systems. Several manufacturers provide the basic hardware components for such systems to hundreds of system integrators, VARs, and developers. Those manufacturers might be a good starting point for tracking down a source that can provide a logging system, as well as a means of integrating it with a document image storage and retrieval system. Some voice, FAX, and switching board manufacturers are: Amtelco 800-356-9148 Bicom 800-766-3573 203 268-4484 Brooktrout Technology 617 449-4100 Dialogic 800-755-4444 201 334-8450 Dianatel 408 428-1000 Exacom 603 228-0706 Excel, Inc. 508 833-1144 Intervoice 214 497-8862 214 669-3988 Natural Microsystems 800-533-6120 508 650-1300 New Voice 703 448-0570 PCBX Systems Inc. 800-755-7229 714 668-1180 Pika Technologies 613 591-1555 Rhetorex, Inc. 408 370-0881 Teleliaison 514 333-5333 Voice Technologies 716 689-6700 For telephone-quality voice, there are digitization/compression techniques that can greatly reduce the storage required, compared to high fidelity formats like WAV. If you need long-term archival storage with the ability to retrieve at random, you'll want to explore WORM or magneto-optical storage. This type of storage would also work well with image storage. There are bound to be developers out there who have already created something like the application you need. Finding the right developer -- one that knows the technology, understands your application, and works cooperatively -- can be the toughest part of the project. Doing that part well, though, helps to ensure the success of the overall project. Please contact me with more specifics about the application and processing volume if you need more information or assistance. Paul A. Lee Voice 414 357-1409 Telecommunications Analyst FAX 414 357-1450 Woolworth Corporation CompuServe 70353,566 INTERNET ------------------------------ From: ross@ncd.com (Ross Oliver) Subject: Re: Need Criteria for Choosing a Phone Number Date: 12 May 1994 19:09:33 GMT Organization: Network Computing Devices In article , barry.s.rein@jpl.nasa.gov (Barry S. Rein) writes: > We're moving soon and we'll have to get a new phone number. For > $10.00 Pacific Bell will let me choose any phone number with the right > prefix as long as it's not already taken. > I'm looking for criteria on what makes a telephone number easy to > remember. Restaurants are supposedly willing to kill for a memorable > phone number, so I wonder if there is any research or recommendations > on how to select one, ie what combinations are remembered; what > combinations are most often mis-dialled, etc. > Incidentally, our exchange prefixes are 398, 791, 794, 797, and 798 -- 818 > area code. I chose xxx-ROSS for my home phone number, on the assumption that it would be easier for freinds and relatives to remember than xxx-7677. It does help, but I'm not sure whether it is because the letters are easier to remember than the numbers, or because not many people have their name embedded in their phone number. I personally dislike lettered phone numbers. I don't like having to translate on the telephone keypad, and it makes modem dialing VERY difficult (1-800-CHK-DUAT for example). I seem to have a more visually-oriented memory, and I remember many phone numbers by picturing the connect-the-dots pattern the numbers form on the keypad. I worked in Silicon Graphics tech support for a while. The incoming tech support number is 1-800-800-4SGI. The double 800 confused a lot of people when I would leave the number in a phone message. I settled on speaking it as "eight hundred, eight zero zero..." This helped some, but I still had to repeat it two or three times on occassion. I recently moved also, but in the same area, so I was able to keep my phone number. Pac Bell charged me the $10.00 AGAIN to keep my "personalized" number. Nothing like a monopoly, eh? Ross Oliver ross@ncd.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 12 May 94 09:54 EST From: Hugh Pritchard <0006348214@mcimail.com> Subject: Re: Need Criteria for Choosing a Phone Number barry.s.rein@jpl.nasa.gov (Barry S. Rein) writes: > .... I'm looking for criteria on what makes a telephone number easy to > remember. .... I can't speak to the mnemonicity of phone numbers. However, since you can specify your new phone number, be warned that repeating digits increase the chances of people dialing your number by accident. Some people tend to double a digit by mistake when they're dialing. The doubled digit may make the dialed number into YOUR number. I have a phone number of the form -xxyz. People trying to dial -xyzt sometimes, "mysteriously," find they've dialed me instead. Hugh Pritchard, Smoke N' Mirrors, Inc. Hugh_Pritchard@MCImail.com -or- hugh@snm.com ------------------------------ From: rlockhart@aol.com (RLockhart) Subject: Re: PEP Pager Protocol Software Information Wanted Date: 12 May 1994 14:53:02 -0400 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) In article , mathias@solomon.technet.sg (Mathias Koerber) writes: > Where can I get info/src about the pep protocol for pagers? I > couldn't find a FAQ. To my knowledge, there's no PEP protocol, but there is an alpha paging protocol that's sounds similar. It's called PET (Page Entry Terminal) protocol and is the predecessor of TAP (Telocator Alpha Paging .. PET and IXO are different names for the same alpha paging) protocol. The only formal source for TAP is PCIA (Personal Communications Industry Association ... formerly Telocator) in Washington, DC, in the US at 1.202.467.4770. If you'd like to take a look at the more commonly implemented portions of TAP, I've a thread culled from our now-out-of- print Programmer's Guide to PET (used by Telocator as the basis for TAP) that covers these. Your tag indicates a Singapore origin. Telecoms' multitude of paging systems (some of which were mine [buffing nails] ) include a number of alpha entry mechanisms not found in other systems (in addition to TAP). These have included, at times, a DTMF entry method and a Telex one. If you are interested in these, as well (assuming you're really looking for alpha entry at *all* ), I'd be happy to help you get in contact with our paging people in Shaw Towers. Rob Lockhart, Resource Manager, Interactive Data Systems Paging Products Group, Motorola, Inc. Desktop I'net: lockhart-epag06_rob@email.mot.com Wireless I'net (<32K characters): rob_lockhart-erl003e@email.mot.com ------------------------------ From: trebor@foretune.co.jp (Robert J Woodhead) Subject: Re: Getting Phone Bills Over the Internet Date: 12 May 1994 01:06:48 GMT Organization: Foretune Co., Ltd. In cogorno@netcom.com (Steve Cogorno) writes: > That wouldn't be that big of a deal; the telco could encrypt using the > calling card (main one I guess) number. Let's hope no one else as > that! Practically anybody can get calling car