Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa09750; 17 Mar 95 0:24 EST Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA26827; Thu, 16 Mar 95 19:52:10 CST Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA26821; Thu, 16 Mar 95 19:52:08 CST Date: Thu, 16 Mar 95 19:52:08 CST From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest (Patrick Townson)) Message-Id: <9503170152.AA26821@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V15 #151 TELECOM Digest Thu, 16 Mar 95 19:52:00 CST Volume 15 : Issue 151 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Delrina Primes Communications Software Market With Free Products (J Bzoza) Help Needed on Toll-Fraud/Hacking (Rick J. Dosky) Communications Software Help Needed (Arthur Anderson) AT&T Consent Decree Information Wanted (K. Camel) Telecom Professional Organizations and Magazines (Brian Smith) Magnet in Cell Phone Dangerous to Laptop? (Jeffrey A. Porten) Recommendations For Good Primer on Telecom Technologies (Jim Renzas) Telecom Analyst/Administrator Job Description (Robert Bleiler) Newstream Pager Information Wanted (Huang Zhengqian) Impact of Satellite on Indonesian Society (Olivier Vandeloo) Bandwidth Question (Martha Marin) GE Phone + SWBT = No Caller ID? (William E. Hope) Useful Community Service (Jerry Leichter) Telecommunication in China (Tom Dedecker) Looking For "Help Desk" System (Mark J. Sullivan) Caller ID Signaling in Europe (John W. Pan) Telephony Demand Estimates - Any Clues? (John Bachmann) Help with inverted phone book cd-rom (Carmen Oveissi) Information Wanted on Datacom Technologies Inc. (John Dearing) Optical Wave Analyzer (Bruce Roberts) Re: Last Laugh! Technology Notes (John J. Butz) 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 America On Line. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available 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: 500-677-1616 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. A suggested donation of twenty dollars per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above. 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: Jack Bzoza Subject: Delrina Primes Communications Software Market With Free Products Date: Thu, 16 Mar 95 10:06:00 PST Plans Distribution of WinComm LITE and Full-Featured FreeComm for DOS through 50,000 Bulletin Boards SAN JOSE, CA and TORONTO, ONT -- March 16, 1995 -- Delrina Corporation (NASDAQ:DENAF, TSE:DC), today announced a campaign to prime the market with free versions of its award winning on-line communications software for Windows and DOS. Delrina will distribute free versions of WinComm LITE for Windows and the full-featured FreeComm, an on-line communications package for DOS that competes with Datastorm+s Procomm Plus for DOS, to more than 50,000 bulletin boards (BBS) in North America. The product license grants users free unrestricted use of the software to introduce them to Delrina+s full-featured products: WinComm PRO and Communications Suite. Delrina is offering special upgrade pricing from either FreeComm or WinComm LITE to WinComm PRO for only $49.95 ($65.95 Cdn) or to Communications Suite for $89.95 ($119.95 Cdn). Both WinComm LITE and FreeComm are on-line communications software packages that enable users to connect to on-line services (such as CompuServe and MCI Mail) and bulletin board systems. They provide users with the facility to upload and download files using Xmodem, Ymodem, Zmodem, and CompuServe B+ protocols, and include support for the most common terminal emulations (VT52/100, ANSI, TTY and CompuServe). While WinComm LITE does not include all the features and capabilities of the retail product, WinComm PRO, it sports the same icon based graphical user interface that has set the standard for ease-of-use in Windows communications packages. FreeComm for DOS, on the other hand, is the full-featured product akin to WinComm PRO, which Delrina is licensing to users for free. "We are very enthusiastic about the products we have developed and we believe that users will share in that excitement once they try our software," said Marc Camm, general manager, Desktop Communications business unit at Delrina. "This promotion is designed to give the on-line community a risk-free sample of what we+re doing with our communications software, and to raise the level of awareness that Delrina is a serious long term player committed to this market. We+re confident that users will find these products extremely useful, and will feel encouraged to upgrade to our full-featured Windows communications product WinComm PRO," added Camm. WinComm LITE and FreeComm will both be immediately available for download through CRS Online at (416) 213-6002 or (416) 213-6003. Delrina recently acquired CRS Online, and the launch of WinComm LITE and FreeComm is the first promotion it is doing through the bulletin board service. Over the next few days Delrina will also place copies of the programs on its technical support BBS at (416) 441-2752, and its forum on CompuServe (GO DELRINA). Through the CRS Online connection, however, Delrina expects copies of the software to reach thousands of other BBS+s within several days. Since both WinComm LITE and FreeComm will be distributed freely through the on-line community -- a fairly sophisticated and computer literate group -- Delrina will not provide free technical support, but will encourage users to upgrade to one of the Windows products (WinComm PRO or Communications Suite) for which free technical support is provided. Delrina does not plan to upgrade FreeComm for DOS with further DOS versions. Delrina Corporation designs, develops, markets and supports innovative PC software products and services in the fax, data and voice communica- tions, electronic forms, and consumer software markets. Founded in 1988, the Company is ranked in sales among the top fifteen software publishers in North America and is recognized as the worldwide leader in PC fax and forms. Delrina employs more than 600 people with offices in Toronto and Ottawa, Canada; San Jose, CA; Kirkland, WA; Washington, DC; Lexington, MA; the United Kingdom; France; and Germany. Press Contact: Shelly Sofer, Delrina Corp. (416) 441-4702 Internet: shellys@delrina.com ------------------------------ From: rdosky@wis.com (Rick J. Dosky) Subject: Help Needed on Toll-Fraud/Hacking Date: 16 Mar 1995 17:39:17 GMT Organization: Wisconsin Internet Services I have recently been given the task of discovering ways to prevent toll-fraud/hacking. I need as much information as possible. I know that there are several different approaches. I am interestid in hearing about all of them. If any one can offer some helpful hints they will be appreciated! Thanks! Rick Dosky (rdosky@free.org) The Limited, Columbus, OH [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: This is an awfully large order. It can go on and on and on ... and has here in these columns many times in the past. In order to zero in intelligently on this, why not give us an idea of your particular application; *what kind* of system or network are you going to attempt to protect? Since we cannot save the whole world, however desirable that may or may not be, let's concentrate on protecting a part of it. Now you tell us what's needed. Are there any specifics, or are we just talking theories here? PAT] ------------------------------ From: aca3@netaxs.com (Arthur Anderson) Subject: Communications Software Help Wanted Date: 16 Mar 1995 17:39:18 GMT Organization: Philadlephia's Complete Internet Provider To help a friend make the leap into computers and internet, I recently dragged my old 8088 PC out of the closet and pluged in an old 2400 baud modem i had lying arround. The hardware is fine, but this prehistoric configuration doesn't have a hard drive and i cant find any communications software which works off the 5 1/4 inch floppy drives. If anyone knows of some no-frills communications software that might work in this environment, please-please-please e-mail me at aca3@netaxs.com (any help would be greatly appreciated). Thanks, Arthur ------------------------------ From: kcamel@aol.com (KCamel) Subject: AT&T Consent Decree Date: 16 Mar 1995 09:43:42 -0500 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) Reply-To: kcamel@aol.com (KCamel) I am looking for Internet access to the 1982 AT&T Consent Decree which divested MaBell and created the RBOCs. Please e-mail information to KCamel@aol.com. ------------------------------ From: SMITHB@nutra.monsanto.com (Brian Smith) Subject: Telecom Professional Organizations and Magazines Date: Wed, 15 Mar 1995 17:05:27 -0500 Organization: NSC Technologies Hello, I am new to the InterNet. I am looking for suggestions of professional telecommunication groups to join, newsgroups on the Net, and professional journals or magazines. I am a consultant working with AT&T PBX systems. Any help or suggestions would be great! [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Welcome to the net. You seem to have stumbled into the right place for telecom discussions, and I expect if you hang around you'll meet many telecom professionals here. PAT] ------------------------------ From: jporten@mail2.sas.upenn.edu (Jeffrey A. Porten) Subject: Magnet in Cell Phone Dangerous to Laptop? Date: 16 Mar 1995 01:11:30 GMT Organization: University of Pennsylvania First, thanks to all who answered my scanner question. Now, for number two: I finally broke down and got that cell phone today, a Motorola Microtac 550. The idea is to throw it into the shoulder bag and have it when I need it; it's a walk-around phone, since I don't have a car. So, having signed the contract, I read in the manual, "there's a magnet in the phone, so don't expose for long periods of time to magnetic media." Off I go to the 800 number, to ask how strong the magnet is. Their first response: "duhhhh..." Second response: "I talked to the tech people. It's a small magnet, about a quarter inch long. It's there to close the flip. The width of the phone and battery is enough to block the field, but of course we can't be sure." So ... I'm assuming that I'm not the first person in the world to throw the MicroTac into a laptop bag. I'm wondering if anyone has any information about whether this is dangerous in practice? I'll be keeping the phone in a pocket on the other side from the laptop, of course. Thanks again, Jeff ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 15 Mar 1995 17:23:12 -0800 From: suneater@ix.netcom.com (Jim Renzas) Subject: Recommendations For Good Primer on Telecom Technologies I need to get a copy of a good primer on emerging telecom technologies, so that I can get a basic explanation of what each telecom technology does and how it is used. I work in the real estate industry and often have to work with companies that are seeking access to specific technologies as a pre-requisite to the selection of a new location. If you or one of your correspondents could recommend a soure, I would appreciate it. ------------------------------ From: BobBlei@ix.netcom.com (Robert Bleiler) Subject: Telecom Analyst/Administrator Job Description Date: 16 Mar 1995 11:08:00 GMT Organization: Netcom A new job responsibility requires that I develop a description for a position that is presently filled, but needs the kind of direction that would be provided by an official job description. The job title is Telecom Administrator and involves, primarily, the design and implementation of Call Control Tables for our company-owned ACD (Aspect). Duties range from the previously mentioned responsibility for CCT's and general call routing to interfacing with the human element of the system (various project managers at one end and system users at the other) and satisfying, using the system's many capabilities, their communication needs. I am in the process of capturing, on paper, the duties presently performed by the individual filling the position, but could definately benefit from the help of any kind souls who have already accomplished the task. It sure would help to be able to compare what I come up with - a description of our reality - to other (accepted) realities! Any help, suggestions, or examples would be greatly appreciated! Bob Bleiler BobBlei@ix.netcom.com 206 728-1883 (FAX) ------------------------------ From: zqhuang@sunmp.csd.hku.hk (HUANG Zhengqian) Subject: Newstream Pager Information Wanted Organization: Department of Computer Science, The University of Hong Kong Date: Thu, 16 Mar 1995 13:27:04 GMT Hi, Does anybody know what is "Newstream Advanced Information Receiver" (pager)? Is it connected to computer? RS-232? HUANG Zhengqian ------------------------------ From: hw40095@vub.ac.be (VANDELOO OLIVIER) Subject: Impact of Satellite on Indonesian Society Date: 16 Mar 1995 13:42:50 GMT Organization: Brussels Free Universities (VUB/ULB), Belgium Hello, I'm looking for information about the impact of satellite technology on Indonesian society. Is the use of the Indonesian Satellite system (Palapa) a step forward for the rural development of Indonesia? If you have articles about this subject or other useful information, please let me know. Thank You! hw40095@is1.vub.ac.be (VANDELOO OLIVIER) Student Communicatiewetenschappen Vrije Universiteit Brussel ------------------------------ From: SAETEL@ix.netcom.com (MARTHA MARIN) Subject: Bandwidth Question Date: 16 Mar 1995 14:21:19 GMT Organization: Netcom Advice, suggestions and contacts most gratefully received. We are looking for the best option that would allow us to lease a specific bandwidth from a long distance carrier and increase it any time as needed for video conferencing in intermitent periods. We are looking for good performance at modic prices. Thanks and greetings, EdTepper.Saetel@ix.netcom.com ------------------------------ From: wehope@ews7.dseg.ti.com (William E. Hope) Subject: GE Phone + SWBT = No Caller ID? Date: 16 Mar 1995 14:39:20 GMT Organization: Texas Instruments, Inc. Dallas, TX Reply-To: wehope@ews7.dseg.ti.com Thanks to those who replied. I called the SWBT Service folks again and this time I got someone who was interested in helping me. She patiently listened to the whole story and decided to run a line test. After a few minutes she called back and told me that my line was crossed with another line and that the Caller Id was susceptible to line noise and problems. I suspect that my line was damaged by a lightning strike across the street a few years back that took out a couple of pieces of my equipment. Since the phone still worked, I didn't think to get it checked then. Thanks again. Bill Hope DSEG Software Automation Texas Instruments, Inc. email: wehope@ti.com voice: 214.995.5618 ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 15 Mar 95 08:27:19 EDT From: Jerry Leichter Subject: Useful Community Service An article in the {New York Times} a couple of weeks back contained an interesting story. MFS, an alternate dial-tone provider in New York City, has started a charitable program in which they provide voice mailboxes for homeless people. Quotes from some of the recipients indicate that they have found this an extremely valuable service: If you are looking for a job, not being able to give a phone number where you can be reached is a killer. Giving the phone number of the shelter where you are staying sounds great, but a call answered with "XYZ Shelter" pretty much kills your job prospects. At least for the people interviewed, the voice mailbox led to a job. [Given the atmosphere on the net: No one so far, least of all me, is suggesting that providing "lifeline voice mailboxes" should be a government program or a legal requirement. What MFS is doing is old-fashioned charity, and deserves nothing but praise.] Jerry ------------------------------ From: hw42276@vub.ac.be (DEDECKER TOM) Subject: Information Wanted About Telecommunications in China Date: 15 Mar 1995 14:32:50 GMT Organization: Brussels Free Universities (VUB/ULB), Belgium Hello, I am a student at the Free University of Brussels and I am writing a paper about telecommunication development in China. I need information about the Chinese policy and why it is important for them. If you know something about it please mail it to me. Thank you, hw42276@is1.vub.ac.be (DEDECKER TOM) Student Communicatiewetenschappen Vrije Universiteit Brussel ------------------------------ From: actmjs@hawk.depaul.edu (Mark J. Sullivan) Subject: Looking For "Help Desk" System Date: 15 Mar 1995 15:12:09 GMT Organization: DePaul University, Chicago Il. I am interested in a computer-based phone help-desk system to assist in the selling of a product. In general, I would like to support five phone attendants with voice mail and fax back capability. I would also like it to be expandable. I would like to deal with an integrator in the Chicago area or, alternatively, I would like to be able to observe the operations of a satisfied customer with a similar system in the Chicago area. I have more details on desired system features that I would be happy to email to anyone who thinks they may have a package that would meet my needs. I am currently preparing the budget. I won't be in a position to buy until June. Thank you, Mark Sullivan ACTMJ@HAWK.DEPAUL.EDU ------------------------------ From: johnwpan@aol.com (JohnWPan) Subject: Caller ID Signaling in Europe Date: 15 Mar 1995 11:02:19 -0500 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) Reply-To: johnwpan@aol.com (JohnWPan) >> Alexis Kasperavicius wrote: >> Caller ID is not sent as a DTMF string. >> In article <3jbuu3$1h3@hollywood.cinenet.net>, >> Yes, it is, in Sweden. > roodh@dds.nl (Hendrik Rood) > In article <3jnf17$74b@rtk.inregia.se>, ge@inregia.se (Goran Edvardsson) > wrote: > And also in the Netherlands :=) And also in Germany. At least some European countries choose DTMF as means to send Caller ID, rather than the U.S. standard of 1200 baud FSK. The advantage is that the DTMF coded Caller ID can be sent BEFORE the first ring. Thus the called party in those countries, unlike us, need not wait four more seconds for the Caller ID. The disadvantage is of course slower signaling speed, adequate for now but constraining if you want name and number. I have seen pizza parlor operators in the U.S. frustrated over having to wait for Caller ID before answering the phone or deal with crank calls. ------------------------------ From: jobachmann@aol.com (JOBACHMANN) Subject: Telephony Demand Estimates - Any Clues? Date: 15 Mar 1995 13:24:57 -0500 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) Reply-To: jobachmann@aol.com (JOBACHMANN) I am getting confused by the various demand estimates and suggestions I am reading. Take mobile/cellular/GSM services in high GDP counties: is the current Swedish statistic of 98 GSM subscribers per 1000 population the saturation point? Or is a full 80%, as BIS has suggested, which "is interested in wireless communication"? In lesser developed counties, both mobile and lines compete for the same market. China is generally described as a huge market, which over 15 companies/consortiums are currently addressing, so that the 1993 (e.g. Shanghai) penetration of 11 per 100 has gone to 25-plus per 100 now. The point that many future market estimate reports seem to miss is that the Asian targets 1) are currently being addressed and 2) will have competition from Beijing Marine Communications, Indosat, Inmarsat-P, etc etc, 3) are unstable, i.e. China and Indonesia could forbid certain foreign companies to operate within their borders. With this in mind, what will the real demand, both fulfilled and unfulfilled, will be like in 1998? I appreciate any thoughts, references or discussion on this. Regards, John Bachmann NY, NY JoBachmann@AOL.COM ------------------------------ From: Carmen Oveissi Subject: Help With Inverted Phone Book CD-Rom Organization: uva Date: Wed, 15 Mar 1995 20:01:58 GMT Hi, if you happen to have this CD-rom for residential numbers, please mail me. I need some help with something. Thanks a million for any input!!!! Carmen Oveissi * co2d@kelvin.seas.virginia.edu (v) 982-5440 * (f) 982-5473 ------------------------------ From: jdearing@netaxs.com (John Dearing) Subject: Information Wanted on Datacom Technologies Inc. Date: 15 Mar 1995 20:55:55 GMT Organization: Philadlephia's Complete Internet Provider I'm looking for the address or phone number (or E-mail address) of a company called: Datacom Technologies Inc. They manufacture data communications test equipment and I'm interested in one of their BERT sets. The only info I have is from a catalog and they won't give me the address or phone number of the manufacturer. 8-( E-mail or followups greatly appreciated. John Dearing jdearing@netaxs.com ------------------------------ From: bruce.roberts@greatesc.com (Bruce Roberts) Subject: Optical Wave Analyzer Date: Wed, 15 Mar 1995 18:15:00 GMT Organization: The Great Escape - Gardena, CA - (310) 676-3534 For some unknown reason our test equipment folks have decided that we need an optical wave analyzer as part of our field service kit. We don't think we need one and would appreciate comments, pro or con, to help resolve this. Thanks in advance, TTFN -br- Bruce Roberts, bruce.roberts@greatesc.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 16 Mar 95 09:45:25 EST From: jbutz@hogpa.ho.att.com (John J Butz) Subject: Re: Last Laugh! Technology Notes bellaire@iquest.net writes: > I keep wondering how my children will be affected by these changes. > Then my six year old nephew visited my parents. He found an old > typewriter, pulled it out and began typing... > LOAD "GAMES", 8,1 Wait a minute ... isn't this the syntax for the commodore "VIC 20" command line interpreter, circa 1981? Where device type=8 (cassette player) and device number = 1 (cassette number 1). I still have my Apple IIe (aka "Mr Chips"). It's amazing the magic accomplished by software developers of that era with only 64K of memory and the whopping horse power provided by the Motorola 6502. My 207 Meg drive has been rendered obsolete by MS Office, while ten years ago, AppleWorks provided a mouse driven, integrated word processor, database and spreadsheet using only 10 Megs. Does anyone remember "disk cracker," guaranteed to copy a disk in ten seconds or less? J Butz AT&T-GCCS Service SW Development jbutz@hogpa.att.com [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Sure I remember the VIC-20! We owners of OSI (Ohio Scientific, Inc) models C-1-P used to laugh at the VIC-20 guys. Then when I got my Apple ][+ I would laugh at the guys with the Radio Shack TRS-80 machines. And none of us had the vaguest notion where all this would get us ... ... the first BBS in the *world* was here in Chicago in 1979, operated by Randy Seuss and Ward Christianson. I used it a lot, as did all of the few people who had a modem. 110 baud ... ... that modem cost me a couple hundred dollars. Then Hayes came out with their 300 baud Smart Modem. I still have it around here somewhere. About the same time Bill Blue was putting together a BBS called "People's Message System" for Apple computers. I was the 'sysop' for the Chicago Public Library BBS, a book/movie review and social commentary system for about a year, and in the process developed a BBS of my own called Lakeshore Modem Magazine which was a social commentary/ discussion system with calendars of events for classical music programs in the area. I first had a membership in Compuserve in 1980 *before* they had the 'CB Simulator' program, let alone three different machines for it to handle the overflow on weekends ... ... in those days CIS actually thought people would pay $9 per hour to read the news and weather reports and use the Grolier's Encyclopedia on line. Then a guy working for CIS said how about let's experiment with a product where users can chat on line with other users. Everyone laughed at him; thought him quite the fool. They said no one would be interested in anything like that; they call in here to do research in the encyclopedia and to get the latest news and market updates, and to send email to our other subscribers (what few of them there were). But he persisted, and they decided to try 'CB Simulator' on a trial basis for a few months, if only so they could prove him wrong. Remember, we were just coming out of the 'real' Citizens Band rage, and they thought the name would be fitting. In a few months they had 50-75 people on there at a time on weekends, and the software bugs were aplenty: a backup machine was available and when 'CB would crash' and dump the whole congregation rudely off line and back their local nodes, within seconds you'd see the mob come back in and go to the standby machine. Then anywhere from a minute to thirty minutes later someone would announce 'CB is back up' and everyone would vanish from the overflow machine. One night -- I guess 1983 or so -- I was on the overflow machine (it was a lot quieter there all the time, none of the constant paging and the 'are you m/f how old?' questions on the other side. Just three or four of us sitting there chatting ... all of a sudden all kinds of people writing messages we see flowing past on the screen; a look at the user log shows ten people where there had been just three a couple minutes earlier. Another pass of the user log, seconds later showed about twenty people there ... what's going on, one of us asked; where are all these people coming from? "Oh," says one of the newcomers, "CB crashed again; the third time today; everyone is probably logging on over here until it gets back up." In those days the main CB machine was divided into channels like now, but as it got more crowded all the 'adult' channels eventually were moved to the standby machine and yet a third machine was put in for standby purposes. Now the standby machine is actually used as an adult overflow: last weekend at one point there were over a *thousand* people in chat all at one time on the three machines, with the teens having about 60 users on their 'channel' and the gay people with about 70 users on their channel. Routinely the adult machine reaches its maximum capacity early on Friday night and stays maxed out until Sunday night, with the late-comers going to the overflow machine. From Compuserve CB came all the imitators, the America OnLine Chat Rooms, IRC and all the others. We thought we were really hot stuff back in 1980 ... with our Apples and our VIC-20s and our TRS-80's from Radio Shack, aka 'Trash 80'. Who could have imagined all this? So when was the last time *you* logged into Compuserve to use the encyclopedia? PAT] ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V15 #151 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa20993; 17 Mar 95 15:45 EST Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA07659; Fri, 17 Mar 95 09:05:07 CST Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA07651; Fri, 17 Mar 95 09:05:04 CST Date: Fri, 17 Mar 95 09:05:04 CST From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest (Patrick Townson)) Message-Id: <9503171505.AA07651@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V15 #152 TELECOM Digest Fri, 17 Mar 95 09:05:00 CST Volume 15 : Issue 152 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson UCLA Short Course: "Fuzzy Logic, Chaos, and Neural Networks" (W. R. Goodin) GTE (GTD-5) ISDN is Coming (Lauren Weinstein) Wireless, Extra Phone Outlets (Morten Haugen) RFP for Telephone Switch Maintenance (Paul Sharp) Looking For Information on Automated Teller Machines (wwarshowsk1@vaxa) Conformance Testing of IS-54 IS-41 (Liqun Yang) Information Wanted on ITI/Oncor (mdesmon@aol.com) Re: Wanted: International Phone Directories (Ray Normandeau) Re: PBS Rumors and Innuendo: Any Truth? (Jim Vishoot) Re: PBS Rumors and Innuendo: Any Truth? (David Ofsevit) Re: Citizens in Support of Public Broadcasting (Matt Noah) Re: Number Assignment Psychology (Stan Schwartz) Re: Jake Baker Released on Bond Pending Trial (Atri Indiresan) Re: New NPA for Houston TX (Kyle Rhorer) Re: More on Hong Kong's Internet Debacle (rlance@escape.com) Re: More on Hong Kong (Henry Leininger) Re: Help: E Telco Step-by-Step Switch (Patton M. Turner) Re: Pair Gain Line Problem (Patton M. Turner) 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 America On Line. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available 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: 500-677-1616 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. A suggested donation of twenty dollars per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above. 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: BGOODIN@UNEX.UCLA.EDU (William R. Goodin) Subject: UCLA Short Course: "Fuzzy Logic, Chaos, and Neural Networks" Date: Thu, 16 Mar 1995 19:01:43 Organization: UCLA Extension On May 22-24, 1995, UCLA Extension will present the short course, "Fuzzy Logic, Chaos, and Neural Networks: Principles and Applications", on the UCLA campus in Los Angeles. The instructor is Harold Szu, PhD, Research Physicist, Washington, DC., and Past President of International Neural Network Society (INNS). This course presents the principles and applications of several different but related disciplines -- neural networks, fuzzy logic, chaos -- in the context of pattern recognition, control of engineering tolerance imprecision, and the prediction of fluctuating time series. Since research into these areas has contributed to the understanding of human intelligence, researchers have dramatically enhanced their understanding of fuzzy neural systems and in fact may have discovered the "Rosetta stone" to decipher and unify these intelligence functions. For example, complex neurodynamic patterns may be understood and modelled by Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) governed by fixed-point attractor dynamics in terms of a Hebbian learning matrix among bifurcated neurons. Each node generates a low-dimensional bifurcation cascade towards the chaos but together they form collective ambiguous outputs; e.g., a fuzzy set called the Fuzzy Membership Function (FMF). This feature becomes particularly powerful for real-world applications in signal processing, pattern recognition and/or prediction/control. The course delineates the difference between the classical sigmoidal squash function of the typical neuron threshold logic and the new N-shaped sigmoidal function having a "piecewise negative logic" that can generate a Feigenbaum cascade of bifurcation outputs of which the overall envelope is postulated to be the triangle FMF. The course also discusses applications of chaos and collective chaos for spatio-temporal information processing that has been embedded through an ANN bifurcation cascade of those collective chaotic outputs generated from piecewise negative logic neurons. These chaotic outputs learn the FMF triangle-shape with a different degree of fuzziness as defined by the scaling function of the multiresolution analysis (MRA) used often in wavelet transforms. Another advantage of this methodology is information processing in a synthetic nonlinear dynamical environment. For example, nonlinear ocean waves can be efficiently analyzed by nonlinear soliton dynamics, rather than traditional Fourier series. Implementation techniques in chaos ANN chips are given. The course covers essential ANN learning theory and the elementary mathematics of chaos such as the bifurcation cascade route to chaos and the rudimentary Fuzzy Logic (FL) for those interdisciplinary participants with only basic knowledge of the subject areas. Various applications in chaos, fuzzy logic, and neural net learning are illustrated in terms of spatiotemporal information processing, such as: --Signal/image de-noise --Control device/machine chaos --Communication coding --Chaotic heart and biomedical applications. For additional information and a complete course description, please contact Marcus Hennessy at: (310) 825-1047 (310) 206-2815 fax mhenness@unex.ucla.edu or Dr. Harold Szu directly for questions regarding course content: (301) 394-3097 (301) 392-3923 fax hszu@ulysses.nswc.navy.mil ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 16 Mar 95 18:52 PST From: lauren@vortex.com (Lauren Weinstein) Subject: GTE (GTD-5) ISDN is Coming Greetings. To my considerable surprise given previously available information, I've learned from the data folks at GTE California that widespread ISDN implementation in their GTD-5 service areas will be rolling out this year. This is surprising since previously I had been led to believe that not only would ISDN service not be supported directly through GTD-5 switches, but that no plans for backhauling ISDN into those areas had been made. Apparently, this has all changed. For example, parts of the West Los Angeles area served by GTD-5 switches are slated for ISDN on 9/1, including remote RSUs served by those switches. There seems to be a general (no pun intended) plan to widely provide ISDN in those areas through what GTE is calling "overlays". I also obtained the rate information. While I don't have the numbers here with me, it appears that ISDN will be between two and three times more expensive per month (though a similar cost to install) for GTE customers than for area Pacific Bell customers. *Roughly*, the monthly charges would seem to be in the $40-$50 range if the customer is within 14K feet of the CO, plus another $22/mo or so if past that distance (for additional equipment). I'm not sure if the interstate line access charge is included in those numbers or not. There is a small differential (about $5/mo) between residential and business ISDN monthly rates. Business ISDN calls would be charged at conventional rates for local calls (all are measured), while residential ISDN (apparently) will incur no charge for local calls. All this is based on what I learned from GTE over the last few days, and of course may be subject to change. Interested L.A. area GTE customers should call the main business office number and ask for the "Huntington Beach Data Desk". Asking the front line people about ISDN is likely to not be particularly fruitful, to say the least. --Lauren-- ------------------------------ From: Morten Haugen <100115.1641@CompuServe.COM> Subject: Wireless, Extra Phone Outlets Date: 17 Mar 1995 08:38:51 GMT Organization: WM-data Communication A/S I saw an advertisement in CompuServe magazine for General Electric, which described some equipment (a sender and a receiever) for wireless, extra phone outlets. In fact, the in-house AC power sockets/wiring was used as transmission medium. Do similar solutions exist for European (Norwegian) specifications? Morten Haugen Lier, Norway ------------------------------ From: PAUL SHARP Organization: Univ of Northern Colo Date: Wed, 15 Mar 1995 11:42:14 MST Subject: RFP For Telephone Switch Maintenance We are in the process of trying to write an RFP for yearly maintenance on our Northern Telecom SL1XT telephone switch. If anyone can help us or knows of anyone who has recently done this please contact me directly. Thanks in advance. Paul Sharp Information Services University of Northern Colorado Greeley, Colorado 80639 (303) 351-1455 psharp@mail.univnorthco.edu ------------------------------ From: wwarshowsk1@vaxa.hofstra.edu Subject: Looking For Information on Automated Teller Machines Date: 16 Mar 95 21:43:38 EST Organization: Hofstra University I am looking for some research material or advice on the current usage and future trends of Automated Teller Machines for a possible MBA thesis topic. I would appreciate any advice or comments. Thank you. ------------------------------ From: lyang@csi.UOttawa.CA (Liqun Yang) Subject: Conformance Testing of IS-54 IS-41 Date: 16 Mar 1995 20:00:49 GMT Organization: University of Ottawa Could anyone there talk about the conformance testing about IS-54 or IS-41 please? Activities, practices, theories, comments? Thanks, Liqun Yang e-mail: lyang@csi.uottawa.ca Department of Computer Sci University of Ottawa phone : (613) 565-1719 Ottawa, Canada K1N 6N5 ------------------------------ From: mdesmon@aol.com (MDesmon) Subject: Information Wanted on ITI/Oncor Date: 16 Mar 1995 22:31:44 -0500 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) Reply-To: mdesmon@aol.com (MDesmon) Does anybody know anything about a company called ITI/Oncor? Is it out of business? The last I heard, the company was in trouble and was being run by the same guy who ran Telesphere. ------------------------------ Subject: Re: Wanted: International Phone Directories From: ray.normandeau@factory.com (Ray Normandeau) Date: 17 Mar 95 18:04:00 GMT Organization: Invention Factory's BBS - New York NY - 212-274-8110 Reply-To: ray.normandeau@factory.com (Ray Normandeau) > Therefore I am asking the readers here if they would be interested in > helping me to increase my collection of phone directories. I collect > also yellow pages. Of course I will pay for the surface mail. I once worked for an advertising agency in New York City that ONLY handled Yellow Pages advertising. In our library was the Yellow Pages for everyplace in the USA. The library was about 20 feet by 20 feet and the four walls from floor to about six-seven feet high was yellow pages with whites when they were combined directories. Anyhow when the new books came in the old ones were thrown out. I recommend that you track down in your city an ad agency that handles yellow pages advertising and ask for their old books. ------------------------------ From: Jim.Vishoot@telematics.com (Jim Vishoot) Subject: Re: PBS Rumors and Innuendo: Any Truth? Date: 16 Mar 1995 22:04:16 GMT Organization: Telematics Intl. Inc., Ft. Lauderdale, FL. In article cogorno@netcom.com (Steve Cogorno) writes: > Barney and Big Bird would obviously have a life if Federal PBS funding > were axed. I'm not sure about the "for a fee, of course" phrase, > since we *already* pay a fee through our tax dollars. I, myself, > enjoy listening to Click & Clack on NPR's "Car Talk," but I would have > no problems cutting funding for left-leaning shows such as "Morning > Edition." There is *much* more to PBS than Sesame Street, boys and > girls. > "Your tax dollars" amounts to about $0.75 for PBS. THe federal > government only gives PBS $147 million a year. Did you know that > military marching bands cost over $250 million a year? Which would > you rather support? Congress gives the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) $300 million per year, not the relatively paltry $147 million cited above. And that probably measures only the direct subsidy. There's indirect subsidies and grants that go to local stations and other organizations, for example, and some of these funds end up back in CPB's pocket; the real number could be as high as $500 million per year. There's also the license fees from sales of program-related merchandise (e.g., $200 million per year for Sesame Street and $500 million per year for Barney). The CPB has just decided to demand a percentage of those fees (I wonder what made them do that?). The problem with public broadcasting really isn't so much *content* as it is *attitude*. Much of its entertainment and education programming would have little trouble finding sponsors in the private sector. Even some of its better propaganda, umm, opinion, programs would do okay. However, most of the public broadcasting money is controlled by a small elitist clique with narrow interests. These are the people who gave $20 million to one station in New York where the executives draw salaries of $200-400 thousand per year. You know the type, they wrap themselves in a cloak of public service while collecting taxpayer money and begging the public for contributions. And then there's the Children's Television Workshop (home of Big Bird et al.) who pays salaries of $400-600 thousand per year. Considering the fact that 75% of public broadcasting money is spent on overhead, not content, is it such a good deal? There are, and will increasingly be, all kinds of alternatives to public broadcasting. It's an industrial age solution to an information age problem. I'll let someone else address Steve's apparent dislike for military marching bands, although I wonder: is it the "military" part or the "marching band" part he dislikes so much? Judging by the fact that he doesn't think Morning Edition is "left-leaning" (see below), I think I know the answer. Have a Good Day. Jim Vishoot Telematics International, Inc. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 10 Mar 1995 10:01:44 -0500 From: ofsevit@nac.lkg.dec.com (David, TCP/IP Consulting, 508 486-7210) Subject: Re: PBS Rumors and Innuendo: Any Truth? TELECOM Digest Editor noted: > On a related note, did you see the report in the papers a couple days > ago where some little kid goes in the kitchen to get his mother? He > has been watching television and is crying. He says, "mama, Barney > says he has to go away and I won't be able to see him any more unless > you send him some money." I thought to myself, those #$$%# !! > Appealing to the little kids like that ... but the station which aired > that said later it was only coincidental that the plea to 'help save > public broacasting' went over the air at the time it did; they say > they are trying to keep the kids out of it. Sure they are ... they > know the success the commercial advertisers have each week on Saturday > morning advertising during the children's programs. The little brats > see the products advertised, then harrass their parents until they get > their way and have one (of whatever) of their own. PAT] You miss the point. Yes, given their current enormous popularity, the bird and the dinosaur would certainly survive in some form. BUT, without the seed money provided by the government's subsidy, would they ever have come to exist in the first place? Would Ken Burns have been able to make the Civil War series? Etc.? Also, you miss the difference between commercial TV using programming to hook kids into wanting products, vs. PBS using appeals during programming to insure continuation of that programming, as well as being able to product new programming. It's a sad indicatin of our cynicism that many people can't imagine anything but a pure profit motive, that they can't imagine doing something (and paying for it) because it's a good thing for other people and the society they live in. Does that make me a socialist? :-) :-) David Ofsevit ------------------------------ From: noah@rain.org (Matt Noah) Subject: Re: Citizens in Support of Public Broadcasting Date: Thu, 16 Mar 95 23:43:48 GMT In article , citcomp@essential.org ([Citizens' Committee for Public Broadcasting]) wrote: > National Citizens Organization forms in response to the threat of > drastic funding cuts to public broadcasting. > The Citizens Committee for Public Broadcasting is a nationwide > coalition of viewers, listeners, and organizations dedicated to > preserving the independence, integrity, and quality of America s > public broadcasting system. No, you want tax money to pay for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) which is PBS and NPR. You want the money because most of the liberal shows on PBS and NPR could not make it on their own if they had to solicit advertising. > CCPB is fighting efforts to eliminate the federal subsidies that > ensure the quality, diversity and availability of public broadcasting > for the American people. Annual subsidies -- which cost each American > about $1.09 each year -- provide funds for both programming and > station operating expenses, and are critical to the system s survival. The CPB budget is over $1 Billion per year. Counting everyone with a pulse shows that we, as individuals, pay about $4/person/year. For a family of four that is $16/year. > The House of Representatives has already proposed substantial cuts to > fiscal year 1996 and 1997. In order to preserve funding and quality > programming for 1998 we must act now. The committee is encouraging > additional local organizers and community groups to add their voice to the > campaign. CCPB can provide background information on public broadcasting, > congressional updates, and grassroots organizing expertise. If you think you could spend your money better than PBS and NPR, contact your local congressman and ask him to cut tax money to CPB. With over 150 channels to choose from, anything worthwhile on PBS or NPR will find a home elsewhere. It is called "free enterprise". ------------------------------ From: stans@panix.com (Stan Schwartz) Subject: Re: Number Assignment Psychology Date: 16 Mar 1995 23:01:49 -0500 Organization: PANIX Public Access Internet and Unix, NYC MSTRANDREW (mstrandrew@aol.com) wrote: > Considering the recent events with NPA assignment in Chicago, is anyone > familiar with any psychological studies regarding number assignment upon > individuals or communities? > Examples of interesting behaviors that I have found include: > --- a desire to have a prefix which has existed for some time or a prefix > that can be linked to historical use, e.g. current use of 873 and > historical use of TRinity 3 (which is the case in my family and the small > town where I grew up). There was a large uproar a few years ago when East Hampton Long Island (home of the beautiful people) introduced a new exchange. I believe the old one was 267 and the new ones are 324 and 329 (in the 516 NPA). (I may have that reversed). The point is, though, that people who for some reason had to be moved to the new exchange were demanding to retain their old numbers so that they wouldn't be looked down upon as 'newbies'. There were those people that DEMANDED to be in the old exchange for the same reason (even though there are only 10,000 possible slots available and East Enders tend to have more than one number assigned for a variety of reasons. Stan [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I am reminded of the staff announcer on radio station WFMT, a local joke here which refers to itself as Chicago's Fine Arts Station who for *years* after the switch to all number dialing refused to go along with it and continued to give out phone numbers by their original exchange name. Advertising copy from sponsors would include a seven digit phone number and he would read it as exchange name plus five digits. Given that most people have long since forgotten about the exchange names, many listeners did not know what phone number to call, and the sponsors beefed about it. He kept on doing it anyway. Now and again a telephone number has to be recited over the air which is a 'new' exchange and has no 'old name' translation. I suspect it annoys him greatly. PAT] ------------------------------ Subject: Re: Jake Baker Released on Bond Pending Trial Date: Fri, 17 Mar 1995 00:56:12 -0500 From: Atri Indiresan > The University of Michigan student arrested a month or so ago > accused of sending threatening communications over the > Internet as a result of his story in alt.sex dealing with the > torture rape of a classmate has been released on bond pending > trial. > 4) Regards the victim of his alleged actions, he must keep > his distance. No communications, telephone, written or > otherwise with the victim. Quite obviously, no threats, no > harassment, no contact. Whether or not he can write about it > on the Internet is a sort of grey area. The court did not > comment on this. Baker cannot be denied the right to speak > about his predicament and attempt to gather public sympathy > and assistance for his defense. According to The Michigan Daily (TMD) (Monday, March 13): Jake Baker released in $10K bond TMD> ... [Federal Judge Avery] Cohn ordered Baker's mother, TMD> Vilma, to take third-party custody of her son, and told Baker TMD> to report to Pretrial Services once or twice each week. Cohn TMD> also forbade Baker from entering Ann Arbor. TMD> "Mr. Baker should avoid Ann Arbor except to meet with his TMD> lawyer," Cohn said. "And he is not allowed to meet with any TMD> student of the University of Michigan or anyone else while in TMD> Ann Arbor. TMD> "He is also not allowed to upload any information to the TMD> Internet, but may (download) information as he wishes." This seems to answer your question. If the report is accurate, clearly, he is NOT allowed to either post to any newsgroup, or send e-mail, though he may read news and receive e-mail. PAT> Although the government continued to argue against Baker's PAT> release on bond, the court stated its opinion that justice PAT> would be best served by permitting Baker to be released so PAT> that he might continue his school work, and be in a better PAT> position to cooperate with his attorney in preparing his PAT> defense. He is not to leave the jurisdiction of the court or PAT> the immediate vicinity of the university, etc without the PAT> permission of his probation officer. This seems to contradict the second paragraph I have quoted. It seems like he is not allowed to visit Ann Arbor except under very restricted circumstances. It really looks like it will be a while before he gets back to academics at the U. of Michigan, if at all. Further: TMD> Cohn also asked Vilma Baker to report "any unusual activities" TMD> and that Baker "keep regular hours at night in his home in TMD> Boardman, Ohio." I know that the Fifth Amendment protects a person from being compelled to be witness against themselves, but can a mother be forced to testify against her son? Atri [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: There seems to be a conflict here. The version I got was originally he was told to stay out of Ann Arbor but an objection was raised because he wanted to go to school and the court took that under consideration. Since getting your message I have tried to verify this further and apparently you and the {Michigan Daily} are correct. Only husbands and wives are constitutionally protected against being required to testify against each other, and of course we do not have to testify against ourselves. We may remain silent if we wish to do so. There is no such provision for parents and children, or one relative versus another relative, etc. PAT] ------------------------------ From: rhorer@meow.kb5imo.ampr.org (Kyle Rhorer) Subject: Re: New NPA for Houston TX Date: 16 Mar 1995 19:54:06 GMT Organization: Phoenix Data Systems Reply-To: rhorer@phoenix.net Jeff Brielmaier (jeff.brielmaier@yob.com) wrote: > 281 is an overlay on top of the 713 area code. Until 03/01/96, SWBell > will assign "wireless" (pager, cellular, etc) callers to the new area > code. After 03/01/96, SWBell will begin assigning "normal" (wired) > users to the new area code. > Until 03/01/96, local calls w/i the 713 area code can be dialed as > seven-digits while all calls to the 281 AC will be 1 + 10D. After > 03/01/96, all calls will have to be dialed as 1 + 10D. That's how it's supposed to work in theory, but in practice things don't go quite so smoothly. I can pick up the phone in my Southwestern Bell service area and dial 713NXXXXXX and be connected, as long as the number being dialed is also in SWB's service area. Notice no "1+". When I try 713-534-0212 (the local time and temperature number, provided by GTE in their service area) I get a GTE intercept recording that my call could not be completed as dialed. If I dial it as seven digits, it goes through. If I dial 1-713-534-0212, I get SWB's intercept recording that it is not necessary to dial 1 or 0. If I go to my office in GTE's service area and try to dial 713-NXXXXXX I get an intercept, as with 1-713-NXXXXXX. Not that it surprises me (given GTE's track record) but it seems they are ignoring SWB and preventing their (GTE's) customers from calling legitimate numbers. For many, many years they had SWB's business office and repair numbers blocked (until SWB changed the numbers!) so I couldn't call from my office in GTEland to check on the status of my SWB orders and/or repairs. As if that will somehow convince me to give up SWB and move exclusively to GTE's area! It truly amazes me that GTE buys the latest in digital switches, has fiber running all over the place, etc. but chooses to have the lousiest customer service in the world. Maybe they are spending too much on good equipment and not enough on executives to run the company? ------------------------------ From: rlance@escape.com Subject: Re: More on Hong Kong's Internet Debacle Date: 16 Mar 1995 17:05:59 GMT Organization: Escape Internet Access (212-888-8780). Reply-To: rlance@escape.com In , robhall@hk.super.net writes: > From the March 8, 1995 {South China Morning Post}: > Police blame Internet raids on expansion > ======================================== What would be the appropriate form of public outcry in instances like these? Would an international outcry be helpful? There were insufficient facts presented to get a real feel for what exactly the problem or issue is. ray [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: The 'real problem' seems to be the businesses in particular did not obtain the appropriate licenses to do business there. If you feel that's worth a public outcry, then go ahead and cry. Me, I'll cry later, I am busy with other stuff today. I am not a big fan of business licenses, and fees to pay for same, but its the law over there, and since they are there they should have obeyed the law in that country. PAT] ------------------------------ From: hlein@dirac.scri.fsu.edu (Henry Leininger) Subject: Re: More on Hong Kong Date: 16 Mar 1995 23:18:42 GMT Organization: Florida State University Rich Greenberg (richgr@netcom.com) wrote: > still some confusion on why the police bothered to raid them over the > lack of a $96 (750 Hong Kong Dollars) license. > We have it easy in the States; SuperNet charges about $25/hour for > daytime use and about $12.50/hr. off-peak. The grounded competitors > offered services at a cheaper prices ranging from about $6-$8/hr. It should be noted that the above prices ($25/hour peak and $12.50/hour off-peak) are in Hong Kong dollars, roughly 1/8 of a USD. $3/hr peak and $1.50/hr nonpeak is still not cheap, but it's far less exorbitant than this makes it sound. Hank Leininger hlein@scri.fsu.edu ------------------------------ From: pturner@netcom.com (Patton M Turner) Subject: Re: Help: E Telco Step-by-Step Switch Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 261-4700 guest) Date: Thu, 16 Mar 1995 18:59:39 GMT jlundgre@kn.PacBell.COM (John Lundgren) writes: > Often the old equipment had a 'KS' or 'KSS' on it, and this meant that > the equipment maker was Kellogg Switch and Signal, I think the name > was. Just something that I remembered from my military days long ago. > I hope I'm not too far off. If so, there will probably be someone > correcting me in a followup. KS usually means a Bell System part number. Many manufacturers put the KS number on the all of the products on the Bell contract since the Bell System was such a large customer. Patton Turner KB4GRZ FAA Telecommunications pturner@netcom.com ------------------------------ From: pturner@netcom.com (Patton M Turner) Subject: Re: Pair Gain Line Problem Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 261-4700 guest) Date: Thu, 16 Mar 1995 19:05:02 GMT ssatchell@BIX.com (ssatchell on BIX) writes: > The problem is that most "pair-gain" systems use some form of ADPCM > (Adaptive Differential Pulse-Code Modulation) which reduces the > bitstream rate from the standard 64 kilobits/s to something smaller. I haven't found this to be true. DAMLs use the same PCM encoding as do CO switches. The same can be said for digital loop carrier (ie SLC-96, SLC-5), but ADPCM cards are available, just rarely used. Between fiber and HDSL, it's just not worth the agrivation to compress the audio. Analog pair-gain can cause problems, but nothing to do with ADPCM. Patton Turner KB4GRZ FAA Telecommunications pturner@netcom.com ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V15 #152 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa24175; 17 Mar 95 20:41 EST Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA19621; Fri, 17 Mar 95 15:41:11 CST Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA19615; Fri, 17 Mar 95 15:41:09 CST Date: Fri, 17 Mar 95 15:41:09 CST From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest (Patrick Townson)) Message-Id: <9503172141.AA19615@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V15 #153 TELECOM Digest Fri, 17 Mar 95 15:41:00 CST Volume 15 : Issue 153 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson 800 "Trademark" Rights (Jerry Leichter) U.S. 800 Users Alert (Judith Oppenheimer) Request For Bandwidth/Apps Info For Research Report (Hank H. Lim) Re: Pac Bell, Cal. PUC, and "Reasonable Level of Service" (John Higdon) Re: NYNEX: Idiocy in Pricing (Russell Blau) Re: T1 -> Modems (scottpcs@aol.com) Re: Last Laugh! Technology Notes (Tom Blog) 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 America On Line. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available 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: 500-677-1616 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. A suggested donation of twenty dollars per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above. 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: Fri, 17 Mar 95 10:30:35 EDT From: Jerry Leichter Subject: 800 "Trademark" Rights Judith Oppenheimer recently posted another in her series of messages trying to convince readers here -- as she and other professionals working for various large corporations are trying to convince various government agencies -- that those large corporations should be entitled to very broad rights in the 800 numbers they are using. I'd like to urge readers to think carefully before accepting her propaganda. What we have here is an attempt by some of the big players to get the government to help them do their marketing -- and, as is often the case, they are using reasonable-sounding arguments to try to get "grass roots" support. The law has traditionally recognized three kinds of property: real property (originally, just land), "tangible" property (most physical things), and "created" property (often called "intellectual property"). Of the three, tangible property is the easiest to understand. We all know what it means to own, say, a chair. The extent of the owner's rights in that chair are pretty clear to all of us. The government simply provides mechanisms for protecting those rights; the rights are inherent. Real property is more complex. For example, mineral rights can be separated off from the underlying property; zoning regulations may limit what you can do with land you own; and so on. But that's not relevent here. Intellectual property is the most subtle. Unlike the other kinds or property, it can exist only to the degree that government protects it. You can, at worst, arm yourself and keep people from walking off with your tangible property; but as a practical matter, you can't personally prevent someone from copying your copyrighted material. The US Constitution explicitly gives Congress the power "To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries", a power it has exercised through the creation of patents and copyright. Congress isn't given the power to protect tangible or real property -- it doesn't have to be, since ownership of such property was and is viewed as an inherent right. Trademarks are a separate example, with a distinct history that probably goes back to European guilds (and come into US law mainly through state laws). In all cases, the government creates intellectual property rights for the common good of the citizenry, not exclusively for the individual who might claim that right. Because of this, the rights are carefully defined and deliberately limited. The Constitution itself says that patents and copyrights should be for a limited time, for example; the recent Lamachia case centered on the issue of whether copyright violation was theft in the legal sense (it isn't). Trademarks are also restricted. You can only create a trademark by using it in trade, for example -- you can't tie up a possibly-useful trademark for years in the US (though recent changes in the law have allowed some short-term reservations), as you can in some other legal systems. You can't prevent someone from using your trademark except "in trade": Lawyers for Coca Cola periodically write to magazine editors complaining about articles that refer to "Coke" generically. Coca Cola would prefer that the magazines indicate that this is a trademark, but there is nothing, legally, they can do to require it. As a general rule, the more "meaningful" a trademark is, the weaker the trademark's holders rights are. No one can trademark the work "book" to refer to printed matter -- though Microsoft, a very aggressive litigator which is pushing the law in this area, has asserted a claim on "Bookshelf" to refer to CD-ROM's containing collections of printed matter. While Microsoft may be able to control the word "Bookshelf" for CD-ROM's, they can't prevent Radio Shack from selling "bookshelf" speaker systems. "Exxon", on the other hand, is a term with no meaning, and Exxon can control it for essentially all uses in trade. Now consider our favorite example, 1-800-FLOWERS. Ms. Oppenheimer would first have us believe whoever is using that has a property right in it because they've spent money on advertising. Wrong. The Supreme Court not long ago rejected the "sweat of the brow" theory -- if I worked hard on it, the government must protect my rights -- in the one area of law where many had claimed it existed, copyright law. (This was the case that rejected copyright protection for white pages listings.) Will Ms. Oppenheimer claim a right to make a profit on 1-800-FLOWERS because she's spent money advertising the concept of ordering flowers by telephone? Sorry, anyone can enter the competition for that market; such "concepts" can't be protected. Ms. Oppenheimer of course would like to protect customers from "confusion". That's the most common excuse given for getting the government to kill your competitors. If a restaurant moves out of a location, does Ms. Oppenheimer believe no other restaurant should be allowed to move in there because customers might be "confused" and go to the new one based on advertising for the old? Bet let's even grant Ms. Oppenheimer the right to protect "1-800-FLOWERS". Is she happy? No; she wants more. She wants "011-800-FLOWERS" as well. And, when the new toll-free number space opens up, "1-888-FLOWERS" - and, later, "1-877-FLOWERS" and all the rest of the proposed expansion spaces. Where the legal tradition construes created property rights narrowly, she wants her rights construed as broadly as possible. How would she feel is some local store in a small town somewhere, which has had local number "FLOWERS" for the last fifty years, asserted earlier rights to "1-800-FLOWERS" and all the rest? This kind of thing has happened -- NBC, after spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on its new stylized "N" symbol, found to its chagrin that a PBS station in the midwest had been using the same symbol for years. (NBC bought the rights.) Or perhaps there's WERS radio has been advertising "356-WERS" as their dial-in number for years. How about their claim? What if they want "1-888-356WERS" to capitalize on the recognition *they've* built up over the years? I can see the argument for allowing the *full* "1-800-FLOWERS" as a trademark. It uniquely identifies a particular number across a whole national market; it can be used in trade; it's only partially meaningful. I reject the attempt on Ms. Oppenheimer's part to broaden the claim to cover every variant she sees being proposed. If she wants "011-800-FLOWERS", or "1-888-FLOWERS" as well, let her apply for and use those -- along with "1-800-FLOWARS" for those who can't spell. I see no reason why we as citizens should give her any special rights to those variations. By the way, precedent being formed today is against her arguments. MCI owns 1-800-ATTCALL, and directs callers who dial it in place of 1-800-CALLATT to MCI. ATT has cut a deal with a small business who's 800 number is a minor variation of 1-800-COLLECT to add a prompt that directs callers to ATT if it's a collect call they are interested in making. As I recall, someone else has 1-800-KOLLECT. [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Ms. Oppenheimer is with us again this weekend, with another message on this topic, and hers follows next. PAT] ------------------------------ From: Judith Oppenheimer Date: Fri, 17 Mar 1995 13:49:29 -0500 Subject: U.S. 800 Users Alert Reprinted from {Digital Future Digest}, with permission from the author. This articles references a March 7th meeting; the next meeting is March 24th. Earl Barberly at the State Department can be faxed at 202 647-7407. Judith ----------------------- By John Hart Airlines, banks, car rental agencies, and other businesses in the toll-freephone business, would like one, worldwide toll-free number assigned to their companies. It would eliminate the myriad of numbers one has to maintain and advertise in Europe, for example, due to the complexity of the freephone service overseas. It seems a new proposal has been put forth to the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) called the Universal International Freephone Service (UIFS), which simply put, means a business can specify that when a freephone number is dialed in Europe, it rings in an office in the U.S. On the surface, this sounds like additional revenue for U.S. businesses, right? You're in Paris, and you want to re-book your flight, so you call 00-800-123-4567, and bingo, you've got your airline reservation desk in Tooele, Utah. It sounds like a good plan. Then why is Ben Levitan, who represents Aeronautical Radio, Inc. (ARINC), acting as the technical rep for the airline industry, an unhappy man? It seems, according to Mr. Levitan, that protecting existing U.S. freephone numbers is being ignored, and the idea that some company in Europe could easily grab the same digits as one of the airlines, is causing him headaches. Sure the Europeans must dial 00-800 plus seven digits, but the next seven digits may be the same as an existing airline, or a car rental agency, or any business with freephone service, or it may not. Of course, if you don't sign up for UIFS service, you're kissing off any possibility of ever getting your seven digits protected in Europe. But then, if you do sign up for UIFS service, you stand a good chance of not getting the same seven digits. The ITU says there is no guarantee even if you do sign up, you will get the same 800 number outside the U.S. The ITU has in mind a quick 30-day window where everyone faxes an application. Get real. Do the math. If every one of the four to five million U.S. businesses that want to keep their valuable toll-free numbers protected from ambitious European businesses, starts faxing, 24-hours a day, for 30-days, that's only 30,000 faxes in a month! And you'd better read the fine print before you file an application for UIFS. It clearly states in paragraph (g) "subscribers have no legal or proprietary claim to any UIFS number." In other words, your friendly common carrier will want you to declare that you have no claim whatsoever to the number. Never mind the thousands of dollars invested in marketing, not to mention trademarks. ARINC has been working hard on behalf of all U.S. 800 number users -- for example, they gathered the impressive ranks of such users as American Express, EDS and the Ford Motor Company to draft and present the "Users' Statement of Principles Regarding Universal International Freephone Service -- but according to Mr. Levitan, the Chairman conducting the ITU Study Group II meeting last December wouldn't even allow the introduction of any new proposal, let alone a discussion. "The clear answer is two country codes," Mr. Levitan told me. "But the comeback from the common carriers is 'we have a scarcity of numbers'. If that is the case, then our proposal is a new seven-digit code, but they're in a big hurry and want this UIFS service online now," he said. "The assignor of country codes is the ITU in Geneva, and they just don't seem interested in the two country code idea, either." What's the reason for pushing this UIFS deal down your throats? Profit, plain and simple. The U.S. common carriers stand to make a ton of money on all UIFS calls. That's an increase of a ton they aren't making now. And they want to power this paperwork through without you raising your telephone receiver to question their motives and objectives. Hello? Anybody out there? There's a public open meeting this March 7 and 8, in the Bellcore offices, Washington, DC, to discuss the status of the U.S. part of the UIFS proposal. Then, the ITU Study Group II meets in April, Tokyo, to decide if the present baseline document -- the one all U.S. common carriers love -- is acceptable and should be blessed with what they refer to as "accelerated procedures." 163 ITU member countries must approve the document. Only one U.S. representative has the power to stop it. His name is Earl Barberly, U.S. State Department. He can vote "yes," "no," or "six weeks delay," come April. Your 800 toll-free business is in his hands. His phone number, along with some other folks who should hear from you, is listed below. Good luck. State Department: Dick Beaird 202-647-5832 (Head of International) Earl Barberly 202-647-0197 (Head of International - Telecom) FCC: Payton Wynn (Common Carrier Complaints) 202-418-0942 Tom Walsh (International) 202-418-0420 Fred Geachter, Bellcore, The North American numbering plan administrator (201) 740-4596, Chairman of ITU Q.2 Steve Engleman (214) 918-5166 MCI Chairman of International Freephone Service; Michele Zelazny, MCI product manager 800 service: (914) 934 6303. ---------------------- J. Oppenheimer, Producer@Pipeline.com Interactive CallBrand(TM) The Brand: Awareness -> Image The CallBrand(TM): Awareness -> Interaction -> Revenue [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: See a response from Jerry Leichter to the efforts of Ms. Oppenheimer earlier, as the first message in this issue. PAT] ------------------------------ From: ep689@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Hank H. Lim) Subject: Request For Bandwidth/Apps Info For Research Report Date: 17 Mar 1995 15:36:48 GMT Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio (USA) Hi Gang, As per the subject line, I was wondering if someone could refer me to tabulated data on the bandwidth requirements for the different kinds of electronic media, i.e. text-1.2kb to ?, voice-?, ... multimedia-?, virtual reality-? anything more creative and less obvious? And also the bandwidth capability of the various physical media: air, twisted pair, shielded coax, optical fiber, etc.I tried Partridge's "Gigabit Networks" but had no luck and some other sources. on-line would be great but a journal or text reference would be fine (I think I still know how to use a library at this point). Thanks in advance, Hank Lim Tel: (208) 368-4946 hlim@micron1.micron.com Fax: (208) 368-2514 ------------------------------ Organization: Green Hills and Cows Date: Thu, 16 Mar 1995 21:33:29 -0800 From: john@bovine.ati.com (John Higdon) Subject: Re: Pac Bell, Cal. PUC, and "Reasonable Level of Service" TELECOM Digest Editor noted: > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Well, I am no big fan of T-1. That is, I > can take it or leave it, I worked in this business for so many years before > T-1 came around that to me, thousands of 'those tiny little wires' is > where its at. As someone who has been in this business for just about the same amount of time, I have to differ somewhat with that view. For high-volume applications, T1 is the answer to prayers. Besides being able to carry twenty-four conversations on two copper pairs, it does so with perfect transmission quality. One mile or ten, if the circuit is functioning, the audio quality is identical either way. Additionally, splits can be made so that high speed data can be carried on the bandwidth unoccupied by DS0 channels. > In some cases also, the many thousands of 'tiny little wires' are > easier for the person on location to repair and maintain. Lose a T-1 > for whatever reason and bunches of lines go out; lose a single wire > and its not that big of a hassle to start tracing the problem and fix > it. Because of its alarm reporting systems and loopback capability, it is frequently unnecessary to even send someone out, unless physical equipment needs replacement. Yes, the loss of a T1 takes twenty-four lines out of service. Because of that, telco responds accordingly. Response committments are in minutes, not hours or days. Rather than have a trunk with an annoying ground or some crackling sounds linger for a couple of days, restoration of the T1 span is usually accomplished in an hour or so. Sophisticated equipment can pinpoint T1 trouble in seconds. > Even if your demarc is a mess -- and I have seen some *messy* ones > with nothing tagged, wires in a jumble, etc, you can still put your > sounder or noise maker on the wire where it terminates (at the modem, > or phone or whatever) then 'ring out the line' back to the demarc, > find it there by listening and repair, replace or remove it or > whatever. Ten lines or ten thousand lines, no matter. T1 requires none of this. Also, digitally delivered service is free from inadvertant difficulty from sloppy cable splicers. There is no worry about half-taps, bridge-taps, crossed connections, or even installers "borrowing" your dial tone. There is something very reassuring to know that your 1.54 MBS circuit goes directly to a digital port on the serving 5ESS. If there is a fault on a T1 circuit, it is instantly detected and alarms are issued. More and more service is going to be delivered digitally in the future, if not by the RBOCs, then by their competitors in the dial tone market. In the SF Bay Area, Pac*Bell falls all over itself to deliver dial tone via T1. One of my spans currently has only four active channels. Digital "last mile" transport is neater, cleaner, and superior in every way to the method developed in the 1800s. As a side note, Netcom's headquarters are in the building in which I have a client. Every last bit of service is delivered digitally from the AXminster office in Santa Clara. The last of the analog service was just turned off this month. Naturally, the line quality is perfect. This is to be contrasted with my client's analog circuits in the same building that actually required MTM buildout. They squeal just before dial tone acquisition, sound hollow, and are otherwise substandard. Without conditioning, the level is unusably low. Needless to say, we are seriously discussing digital entrance facilities. John Higdon | P.O. Box 7648 | +1 408 264 4115 | FAX: john@ati.com | San Jose, CA 95150 | +1 500 FOR-A-MOO | +1 408 264 4407 [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Well, as always, John raises some very valid points. I suppose my main objection -- if you can call it that -- is being 'set in my ways'. You do things a certain way for a long time and often feel most comfortable simply continuing it. I have no real gripes with T-1; its time has come and as John points out in many instances it is a lot easier to maintain. Really, I guess it would be an applications thing and if I were working with someone who wanted to go that way on a large installation I'd be hard-pressed to find any valid technical obj- ection. PAT] ------------------------------ Subject: Re: NYNEX: Idiocy in Pricing From: rblau@neteast.com (RUSSELL BLAU) Date: Fri, 17 Mar 95 10:02:00 -0500 Organization: Online Technologies, Inc. - 301-738-0001 Reply-To: rblau@neteast.com (RUSSELL BLAU) In a recent article, Chris Labatt-Simon (labatt@disaster.com) wrote: > Can anyone tell me the rationale in the following? > Two "FlexPath" T1s composed of 48 DIDs total cost ~$3500/month > (FlexPath is based on mileage and the location is ~2 miles from the > closest switch). > 48 standard individual business lines will cost about $1,200/month. > Now, I'd like to know (sarcastically speaking of course) which is more > difficult to install and maintain?? 2 Ts or 48 individual jacks/lines? Personally, I never thought I would find myself in the position of defending anything that NYNEX does ... however, look at what you are comparing. Flexpath is a DID trunk service. Therefore, you should compare it to the price of 48 analog DID trunks, not 48 individual measured business lines. Russell Blau Swidler & Berlin, Chtd. Washington, D.C. ------------------------------ From: scottpcs@aol.com (ScottPCS) Subject: Re: T1 -> Modems Date: 17 Mar 1995 10:42:13 -0500 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) Reply-To: scottpcs@aol.com (ScottPCS) I originally wrote: >> I need to bring in a T1 line to 24 1200 baud modems for my company. >> It seems like an inefficient solution to run the T1 into a channel >> bank to end up with 24 phone lines and then plug in 24 modems plugged >> into 24 serial ports. Is there any type of hardware that can handle >> this T1 / modem problem better? Preferrably something PC based >> (Windows NT) and cheap . Bill Grenoble responded: > I have seen a T1 rack mount modem (V.Fast I think), but it cost more > than a channel bank and a rackmount modem. Try Penril in Rockville MD > (I think) or Racal/Vadic. What type modems? 212? And why sooo s l o w? > My 2400 modem cost $19 and came with FAX software! And it is s l o w! Unfortunately the originator is a Verifone credit card terminal and only has a 1200 baud modem. It is not possible at this time to get a 2400 or faster. But the call length is only a few seconds and a faster speed would not significantly shorten the call. ------------------------------ From: tblog@eagle.ais.net (Tom Blog) Subject: Re: Last Laugh! Technology Notes Date: Fri, 17 Mar 1995 04:56:15 GMT bellaire@iquest.net writes: > I keep wondering how my children will be affected by these changes. > Then my six year old nephew visited my parents. He found an old > typewriter, pulled it out and began typing... > LOAD "GAMES", 8,1 TELECOM Digest Editor donated two cent's worth: > We thought we were really hot stuff back in 1980 ... with our Apples and > our VIC-20s and our TRS-80's from Radio Shack, aka 'Trash 80'. Who could > have imagined all this? So when was the last time *you* logged into > Compuserve to use the encyclopedia? PAT] I was in high school when "Electronics" ?? magazine ran the "TV-TYPWRITER" project. I salivated. Then, I think a few months later, an advertisement for the ALTAIR computer was run. Damned if the address of the company wasn't in my major home town of Albuquerque, NM. I took the bus to their office, a small dump near the fairgrounds off Central Avenue (RT66). They (both of them) were friendly, and pointed to a box with toggle switches, an 8008 (the 8080 was an upgrade!) and yes, 256 bytes (the K was NOT left out!). It was playing a crude rendition of "Fool on the Hill" into a nearby radio by using RF generated by the clocking of diferent instructions! Bill Gates had not yet flown in from Boston with his Basic on paper tape! I later met the former financial officer of the company (MITS) - he had quit a few months before the advertisement had run because "they had no money and he was tired of lying to suppliers". Their local bank (ANB) was going to shut them down, but the founders begged enough money to run the advertisement (very risky for the bank -- New Mexico was (is) not noted for Venture Capital!). They said the Post Office brought $100K (the K is correct, in this case) in orders in one day! They (the founders) cashed out later (I forget who bought them). The fin- ancial guy who quit early is still working 9-5 ... [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Ah yes, the Altair. I never had one myself but read about them. My first machine was the OSI-C1P. It had 4K (yes 4000, or more correctly 4096) bytes of memory. The 'Basic in RAM' took up about 700 bytes, leaving about 3300 bytes to program with, using Microsoft BASIC, aka "eginner's ll-purpose ymbolic nstruction ode" is what that meant. And you know what? You could run a whole bookkeeping system on it. That's how I first learned any programming at all. With such limited space of course, you crammed all those instructions in there as many to a line as you could get, remembering not to get trapped in the middle of a line with an 'if/then' thing that might keep you from getting to the end of the line ... Then one day the company announced a major improvement: they had a new chip which had 8K (yes, 8192) bytes of RAM. Wow ... what were we gonna do with all that extra space? Not only that, by installing this chip you could now use both UPPER and lower case; both would work. I sent away for the chip and spent a couple hours one evening removing the old one and soldering in the new one. My Apple ][+ had 48K, with slots where you could install various things including a 'language card', or an additional 16K of RAM if desired. I had that thing loaded -- every slot taken -- with the language card, a printer card, modem card, two disk controller cards to operate four floppy disk drives, and a clock card from the Thunderclock Company (remember them?) My thing was writing programs to do rather elegant art on the screen and music, which played through the speaker in the Apple which I replaced with a much larger speaker. I had all kinds of hardware mods on that thing also including a 'lower case adapter'. If you opened it up and looked in back by the slots, the bus had all these solder traces that had been cut and re-jumpered and whatever. Those machines were *so much fun*. Apple used Microsoft BASIC with a few minor changes and they sold their package under the name Applesoft BASIC. Along the way, I picked up a couple of the 'black apples'. Most were in cream/white colored cases, but at one point Apple had a special run they manufactured for the Bell and Howell Company, and those were in black cases with the Bell and Howell logo on the front along with the Apple logo; thus the nickname for them of 'black apples'. One day I had been invited to give a demonstration of my artwork to a computer class at the Lawson YMCA. I showed them a little program I had written called 'Bach Squares'; it drew boxes on the screen in various colors which would explode into larger and smaller boxes, etc, while the speaker played (or rather honked, in a nasal sounding way) portions of the Gigue Fugue of Johann Sebastian Bach. All the folks in this computer class had books on 'Basic Programming Style'; you know, the books that told you how to indent your loops, add a liberal quantity of REM statements and put each instruction on its own line, etc. "How did you make it draw those colorful boxes and play that music," they wanted to know. I told them, the first thing you do, you take all those books on BASIC programming style and dump 'em all in the trash! You can't program in the space of 4 or 8K and neatly indent all your loops and if/then's and document it all besides. You take that code and you cram it and shove it and squeeze it in. Not only that, I told them, (looking them squarely in the eye in a stern way) *real men know how to program in machine (6502) code* ... ... have you mastered the op-codes and operands yet? The book's author was also there that night, apparently trying to hawk his books on programming style and I thought he was going to hit me over the head with one of them. Such great little machines, the Apples. I ran my BBS on one for about three years. They named today 'St. Patrick's Day' in honor of me; I'm the one who drove all the snakes out of Usenet. Have a nice weekend, all. PAT] ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V15 #153 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa02307; 18 Mar 95 12:39 EST Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA04198; Sat, 18 Mar 95 08:06:27 CST Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA04192; Sat, 18 Mar 95 08:06:25 CST Date: Sat, 18 Mar 95 08:06:25 CST From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest (Patrick Townson)) Message-Id: <9503181406.AA04192@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V15 #154 TELECOM Digest Sat, 18 Mar 95 08:06:00 CST Volume 15 : Issue 154 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson MTP; Ericsson, Northern, or Other (Steve Bunning) AT&T 500 Service Outside the USA (reb@xyzzy.com) Help Needed With PBX at Remote Location (Carol Garbacik) Apartment Entry System (Charles Gimon) Trying to Locate Recommendation E.123 (Christopher Wolf) Summary: Interface Computer Audio to Phone Line (Jeff C. Glover) DS-3 Inverse Mux (Chris Radicke) Information Wanted on SuiteTalker Voicemail (raymondg@talktech.co.nz) Help on Wireless LAN Products (Robert Mark Prudhomme) Re: T1 -> Modems (Steve Cogorno) Re: Using Live Radio With Automated Attendant (Gerald Serviss) Re: Using Live Radio With Automated Attendant (Gary Breuckman) Re: Using Live Radio With Automated Attendant (Patton M Turner) Re: Using Live Radio With Automa (johndc7@aol.com) Re: Pac Bell, Cal. PUC, and etc. (Peter Lamasney) Re: Help: E Telco Step-by-Step Switch (Richard Kevin) Re: Optical Wave Analyzer (Wally Ritchie) 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 America On Line. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available 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: 500-677-1616 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. A suggested donation of twenty dollars per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above. 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: Fri, 17 Mar 1995 16:49:39 -0500 From: bunning@acec.com (Steve Bunning) Subject: MTP; Ericsson, Northern, or Other Both Ericsson and Northern Telecom switches allow the transfer of call detail records over X.25 networks. The higher layer used for this transfer is MTP or Message Transfer Protocol. As these two different switch manufacturers use the identical protocol for transferring CDRs, it's my conjecture that the protocol originated somewhere else. Does anyone know the origin of the Message Transfer Protocol? Is it a mainframe protocol or was it developed by one switch manufacturer and copied by others? Steve Bunning | American Computer and Elec. Corp.| (301) 258-9850 (voice) Product Manager | 209 Perry Parkway | (301) 921-0434 (fax) TEL*COMM Division | Gathersburg, MD 20877 | bunning@acec.com ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 17 Mar 1995 17:51:49 -0500 From: Phydeaux's PC Subject: AT&T 500 Service Outside the USA Hi! I was interested in AT&T's 500 service. It is advertised as something that lets your calls follow you wherever you go. But, after some research, I wonder about that. AT&T boasts that you can have your calls follow you to any most any phone on the planet, and that a 500 number is useful because it is portable. My problem is that I need to be able to receive calls from outside the USA and have the calls find me or my cellphone or my office wherever I am. 500 service sounded like it was the thing to get. So, I had a friend in the UK call another friend's 500 number to see what would happen outside of the USA. Unfortunately, the call would not go through. This led me to wonder how the 500 database is set up. After numerous calls, someone at AT&T was finally able to tell me that overseas callers should use USA Direct. That is not exactly the most convenient way to have people reach you, nor is it the most cost effective for my customers. Any thoughts on 500 service and how it is being implemented would be welcomed. reb reb@xyzzy.com PS: Call forwarding my cellphone is not an option. [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I got a call via my 500 number the other day from someone at British Telecom who was experimenting with the service trying to get it to work from the UK. Then the next day I got a call from someone at AT&T who had been working with that person at BT. They did not tell me what they had decided, or what action was taken, if any. PAT] ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 17 Mar 1995 15:51:05 PST From: Carol Garbacik Subject: Help Needed With PBX at Remote Location I'm a relative neophyte at telephony (other job duties as may become required), working for a Federal Gov't agency. A couple of years ago we were forced to install our own PABX (Mitel SX200 Digital). Our location includes several buildings relatively close to each other, and one remote location (about 5 miles away). At this time I am facing armed insurrection (not really, just a flurry of really nasty memos) from the folks at the remote location. The situation is this: *We are colocated on a University campus. *The University is the POP for telecom services, therefore: our lines are dropped off at the University's phone room, and shipped out to us via unconditioned house cable. Calls then run out over our house cable to our buildings. The quality is adequate. *The remote location's calls are processed by our PABX then sent out (again via University cable) to the local Telco via OPX lines to the remote location. At the remote location they have an old 1A2 system with six button phones. There is a lot of line loss on the lines to the remote location. We have added amplifiers which help to some degree, but have also resulted in 'clipping'. The local Telco (since we are Gov't) won't provide any advice. The folks are so upset out at the remote location that every time the system burps (like all are CO lines are busy), they throw a hissy fit. Can we do anything to improve the service to the remote location? What? Help! Please! E-mail address:garbacic@ucs.orst.edu ------------------------------ From: gimonca@skypoint.com (Charles Gimon) Subject: Apartment Entry System Date: 18 Mar 1995 03:45:12 GMT Organization: SkyPoint Communications, Inc. A couple of months ago the landlord in my building installed a DOOR KING brand apartment entry system. You dial in a code, the outside box rings the apartment you want. Inside that apartment, the phone rings, or there's a "call-waiting" style beep. We're supposed to hit "9" then to open the door. My problem is that there's no way to suppress the "call-waiting" beep. Apparently the thing is wired directly into my private phone line, and doesn't go through the central phone company switch. This is extremely annoying, as it causes my modem to hang up on a connection like this one. I've been learning a lot about the unix kill command, getting rid of those wayward processes after I log back on. Anyway, because this apartment entry box was wired directly into my private phone line, I've been told by various people that this is a violation of the law. Is this so? I never gave permission for anybody to do anything to my phone line -- certainly nothing disruptive like this. I'd appreciate serious replies. Thanks. gimonca@skypoint.com Minneapolis MN USA Last Call Junior >>> 612-861-7094 <<< A cyber-rumpus-room [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: It was attached directly to the 'house pairs' on the apartment building side of the telco demarc. This means you can change your phone number -- or not have phone service at all from telco -- and as long as there is a phone instrument in your apartment the front door system will cause the phone to ring (or give the call waiting tone). If you are on a call when someone comes to the front door, then the system tests the line for a busy condition, puts the central office call on hold and lets you talk to the caller at the front door. They're not bad deals; I have been set up that way in the past at a place where I lived a few years ago. Our version was actually from Illinois Bell called Enterphone. It is not against the law for the simple reason the landlord owns the wiring inside your building. About the only way around this is to see whether or not you have a *second pair* coming to your apartment. In most newer constrcution, there will be two or three pairs to each apartment. If there is a second pair, then either ask telco to move your actual phone line to the second pair, or ask the person maintaining the front door system to move your front door intercom service to the second pair. In either event you will then need a second actual phone instrument (or a two line phone) to handle front door calls. I don't think when Enterphone (and its variants by whatever trade name) was developed, anyone gave any thought to ways of suspending the call waiting tone for lines handling modem communications. Using *70 will of course suspend call waiting from the telco; it won't do a thing where the front door is concerned. Sorry about that. PAT] ------------------------------ From: Wolf Subject: Trying to Locate Recommendation E.123 Date: Fri, 17 Mar 1995 17:06:52 EST Reply-To: cmwolf@mtu.edu It was mentioned in TELECOM Digest that one "might wish to access the PostScript format files available from the ITU" for the E.123 recommendation. How does one access ITU? I searched the Digest header, but there was no mention of ITU's location, and the only other reference I can find is to itu.edu, which does not have direct ftp access. Any suggestions? Christopher Wolf, consumer of time, occupier of space. http://www.cs.mtu.edu/grads/Wolf/Home.html ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 17 Mar 95 18:27:48 -0800 From: jeffg@freya.sunnyvale.ca.us (Jeff C. Glover) Subject: Summary: Interface Computer Audio to Phone Line In a previous edition of the telecom digest I asked about hardware to interface a computer's audio ports to a phone line with RS-232 control over things like hook, touch-tones, etc. Here's a summary of the responses: ===================================================================== Digital Storefront, a Macintosh-based voice mail system, uses a custom built phone interface. The box is has a serial din-8 interface for status, ring detect, control, dtmf equivalents (etc), and audio in/out (along with mic and speaker pass thrus) ports to hook into a unix box with mic and speaker. Full-duplex audio available thru the hardware, sampling done by the host platform. No unix software or driver. Product information available at 800-73-STARS. ===================================================================== The device you described is the model T311 manufactured by Teltone. It is a DTMF/RS-232C interface, and is a reliable unit. It's fairly cheap, at $399 retail. Unfortunately, I don't have the phone #, but you could try an old NAB directory, or the Bill Daniels guide. AMX also has the AXC-DTMF interface card, but unless you already have an AXCESS system, the T311 is the path of least resistance, from a hardware/software/greenware standpoint. Teltone, Electronic Equipment & Supplies, Kirkland, WA 800 426-3926 ===================================================================== The best device that I have seen/used that does this is a device called the Computerphone III made by Suncoast Systems, Inc. It is about the size of a standard external modem. It has exactly the the things you listed in your email. Plus it has its own programming language in 'C' (and maybe other languages) that lets you program it via application control. I used to use one as an answering machine for my Unix computer, messages where stored on my hard disk. Apparently the product has been around for a while. I understand J.C. Penney used to use them in their catalog department for computer controlling and accounting their phone calls. Suncoast Systems can be reached at: Suncoast Systems, Inc. 3100 McCormick St., Box 22 Pensacola, FL 32514 (904)478-6477 ===================================================================== I went with the Digital Storefront; it has some problems that I'm working through. Essentially it's audio connection to the computer is a microphone level and it is incompatible with my computer's microphone port. Since I have a line-level input, I'll simply buy a microphone to line-level black-box and use that. Right now my "software" consists of a shell script that echos characters to the serial port. Works great. I decided on the Digital Storefront since they were the only vendor to answer technical questions. Jeff jeffg@freya.sunnyvale.ca.us ------------------------------ From: ingo@primenet.com (Chris Radicke) Subject: DS-3 Inverse Mux Date: Fri, 17 Mar 1995 19:14:24 MST Organization: Primenet Anybody used any Digital Link inverse mux units?? I have a DL-3000 and it apears to have some problems looking for some info on problems incounter if you have one.. Also I've been told some Telco's are using them. Any information would be good. Thanks in advance, Chris Radicke ingo@primenet.com ------------------------------ From: news@news.midland.co.nz Subject: Information Wanted on SuiteTalker Voicemail Date: Fri, 17 Mar 1995 17:28:12 GMT Organization: Midland Internet Limited Networks, Hamilton, NZ Anybody out there had experiences either good or bad with a Voicemail product called Suitetalker? It comes from a company called Demosource. Please email me at raymondg@talktech.co.nz. Thanks. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 17 Mar 1995 10:43:58 MST From: PRUDHOMME ROBERT MARK Subject: Help on Wireless LAN Products I am a graduate student writing my thesis on Wireless LANs, and I am looking for any information on Wireless LAN products that support telephony applications. Most of my research so far as only uncovered products which essentially serve as a wireless extension to the wired LAN. I am interested to find out if anyone knows of any products that will support the IEEE 802.9 ISLAN standard, or proprietary developments that will support voice. Any leads would be greatly appreciated. Please respond directly to my email address. Sincerely, Robert M. Prudhomme University of Colorado, Boulder prudhomr@rtt.colorado.edu ------------------------------ From: cogorno@netcom.com (Steve Cogorno) Subject: Re: T1 -> Modems Date: Fri, 17 Mar 1995 18:14:23 PST ScottPCS (scottpcs@aol.com) wrote: > I need to bring in a T1 line to 24 1200 baud modems for my company. > It seems like an inefficient solution to run the T1 into a channel > bank to end up with 24 phone lines and then plug in 24 modems plugged > into 24 serial ports. Is there any type of hardware that can handle > this T1 / modem problem better? Preferrably something PC based > (Windows NT) and cheap . Scott, What are you going to be using the lines for? It sounds like this might be a very good application for a packet-switched network. ISDN may handle thisE nicely for much less than a T-1. This is from PacBell's ISDN User's Guide: "A signle B channel of ISDN can support hundreds of user X.25 connections to a bulliten board, information service, database, or transaction host system. And while user transmissions can originate through either dialed modem links or through permanent ISDN D-channel connections, a host system's permanent, fully digital B-channel link to the packet network totally eliminates the need for modems at the host site." You might also want to keep in mind that D-Channel packets have under 1 second setup time, whereas a modem takes upto 30 seconds to negotiate. Most ISDN phones have PAD (packet assembler-disassembler) built in. Rates in the Pacific Bell Service area for data packets are: .05 CENTS for transaction setup .005 CENTS per octet of data Steve cogorno@netcom.com ------------------------------ From: serviss@tazdevil.cig.mot.com (Gerald Serviss) Subject: Re: Using Live Radio With Automated Attendant Date: 17 Mar 1995 15:21:48 GMT Organization: Cellular Infrastructure Group, Motorola Ward Larkin wrote: > It's not that big a deal to use audio CD, or a tape deck, I simply > want to know what specific FCC regulations (if any) prohibit use of > live radio on telephony systems. I don't know about the FCC rules but, I am aware of the fact that ASCP (American Society of Composers & Publishers - I think) sues people who play the radio in public places like restaurants, stores elevators. The rational behind this is that they (the artists) are not receiving the royalty payment that they are due for use of a copyrighted work. Jerry Serviss Motorola Inc serviss@cig.mot.com ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 17 Mar 1995 18:16:24 PST From: Gary Breuckman Subject: Re: Using Live Radio With Automated Attendant On Tue, 14 Mar 1995, Ward Larkin wrote: > I'm fairly new to telephony, but I have installed a couple smaller > automated attendant, fax-on-demand, voice mail systems. I was > recently told that it is technically against FCC regulations to use > live radio broadcasts for when people are placed on hold (or choose to > be placed on hold). A number of places that I call, where there is radio on hold, seem to pick the news-radio or all-talk stations. I understood that the reason behind this was that if they picked a station with music, they would then owe royalties to the copyright holders of the music. > It's not that big a deal to use audio CD, or a tape deck, I simply > want to know what specific FCC regulations (if any) prohibit use of > live radio on telephony systems. I'm sure you would run into the same situation with CD or tape, unless you purchase something that includes the rights for this type of use. There are hold devices that play random musical tunes while on hold, boring. Have you heard that these music license folks have been going into places that play a radio in the background and demanding license fees? I believe in fairly compensating the artists but this seems a bit overboard. puma@netcom.com ------------------------------ From: pturner@netcom.com (Patton M Turner) Subject: Re: Using Live Radio With Automated Attendant Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 261-4700 guest) Date: Sat, 18 Mar 1995 03:29:12 GMT adelante@sccsi.com (Ward Larkin) writes: > I'm fairly new to telephony, but I have installed a couple smaller > automated attendant, fax-on-demand, voice mail systems. I was > recently told that it is technically against FCC regulations to use > live radio broadcasts for when people are placed on hold (or choose to > be placed on hold). Never heard of this, but you may not retransmit audio w/o the radio stations OK. A payment to ASCAP/MBI may be required as well. Most everybody does it anyway. I got caught once and had to stop. > It's not that big a deal to use audio CD, or a tape deck, I simply > want to know what specific FCC regulations (if any) prohibit use of > live radio on telephony systems. Copyrighted material may not be publicly used w/o paying ASCAP or BMI. Public domain recordings are OK. Patton Turner KB4GRZ pturner@netcom.com FAA Telecommunications ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 17 Mar 1995 02:58:05 -0500 From: JohndC7@aol.com Subject: Re: Using Live Radio With Automa I was faced with the same problem. We were able to negotiate a "Site License" with a local recording company. They were so happy to get our money up front that they allowed us to use the music at all of our sites. We saved the company a ton of money, made ourselves legal, and improoved the quality of our music on hold. ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 18 Mar 1995 00:31:58 CST From: Peter Lamasney Subject: Re: Pac Bell, Cal. PUC, and "Reasonable Level of Service" jtara@cts.com (Jon Tara) wrote: > The provider claims that they are trying to provide good service, but > that Pac Bell and the PUC block them at every step. I'm wondering how > true these claims may be, and how others manage to get this many lines They manage to get the lines by ordering them! Remembering my experiences in Pac Bell land, when we had 100+ lines coming in and growing, it seemed that T1s would be a better route. So I called them to chat about it, and they got all excited -- thought it was a great idea, sent over a couple of tech types to look around, talk the idea up and all. When I explored the cost "savings," it turned out that the cost for the T1 was *in addition to* the normal cost for 24 POTS lines! It went: "Let's see, the monthly cost for T1 is (I forget), plus each T1 carries 24 POTS lines at $21.80" (or so; I still forget, but it was the same as POTS via the tiny wires we both were trying to avoid). The bottom line was that I should write them a *much* larger check each month for the privilege of saving them money. When I pointed out that this didn't make any sense, they played the tape that goes "Our hands are tied ... PUC Tariff ... there's nothing we can do." It did no good to play my tape that goes "Let's see if I understand this: Your salaried employees craft a tariff, type it using machines you own, submit it for approval. Instead of saying there's nothing you can do, why don't you type it differently?" I'd expect your provider has walked this path also. If the pipe in from the street is full, it takes time (if not, it just takes an order). Here in GTE-land, we moved into a building that would was almost maxed out after we installed a bunch of lines. One day they showed up (we hadn't asked them; they hadn't asked us), dug a 180 foot trench, and installed 200 more pair in the building. "Just in case." (It's still lousy service) > (I keep urging them to co-locate, both for better avilability of lines > and for better quality on modem connections.) I don't believe this is something that you can force on them. It implies that they rent space to you, and that you have physical access to your equipment (within their boundaries). Neither is something that they are anxious to do. Pete plamasne@bigcat.missouri.edu ------------------------------ From: rkevin@indirect.com (Richard Kevin) Subject: Re: Help: E Telco Step-by-Step Switch Organization: Internet Direct, indirect.com Date: Sat, 18 Mar 1995 12:41:54 GMT In article pturner@netcom.com (Patton M Turner) writes: > jlundgre@kn.PacBell.COM (John Lundgren) writes: >> Often the old equipment had a 'KS' or 'KSS' on it, and this meant that >> the equipment maker was Kellogg Switch and Signal, I think the name >> was. Just something that I remembered from my military days long ago. >> I hope I'm not too far off. If so, there will probably be someone >> correcting me in a followup. > KS usually means a Bell System part number. Many manufacturers put > the KS number on the all of the products on the Bell contract since > the Bell System was such a large customer. Regarding the "KS" designation, someone told me a long time ago that it stood for "Kearny Standard", in reference to the Western Electric facility in New Jersey. Richard Kevin U S WEST Communications rkevin@indirect.com ------------------------------ From: writchie@gate.net Subject: Re: Optical Wave Analyzer Date: 17 Mar 1995 06:21:21 GMT Reply-To: writchie@gate.net In , bruce.roberts@greatesc.com (Bruce Roberts) writes: > For some unknown reason our test equipment folks have decided that we > need an optical wave analyzer as part of our field service kit. We > don't think we need one and would appreciate comments, pro or con, to > help resolve this. Thanks in advance, If you fix cars you don't need one. If you swap boards you don't need one. If you're a Maytag repairman you don't need one. But if you work with FO cable ... ;-) Wally Ritchie Ft. Lauderdale, Florida ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V15 #154 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa29900; 20 Mar 95 17:12 EST Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA06101; Mon, 20 Mar 95 10:44:18 CST Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA06094; Mon, 20 Mar 95 10:44:15 CST Date: Mon, 20 Mar 95 10:44:15 CST From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest (Patrick Townson)) Message-Id: <9503201644.AA06094@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V15 #155 TELECOM Digest Mon, 20 Mar 95 10:44:00 CST Volume 15 : Issue 155 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson ESS'95 1st Call for Papers (Philippe Geril) Book Review: "Internet Anywhere" by MKS/Gardner (Rob Slade) Re: PCS Auction Results and Analysis (Bob Keller) The ITU in Gopherspace (Rishab Aiyer Ghosh) X.25/ISDN Prices; Global Information Wanted (Again) (Rishab Aiyer Ghosh) New Bell Atlantic Service (Washington Post via Chris J. Cartwright) Cellular Fraud in the News Again (TELECOM Digest Editor) 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 America On Line. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available 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: 500-677-1616 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. A suggested donation of twenty dollars per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above. 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: phil@hobbes.rug.ac.be (Philippe Geril) Subject: ESS'95 1st Call For Papers Date: 20 Mar 1995 12:39:49 GMT Organization: University of Ghent, Belgium 7th EUROPEAN SIMULATION SYMPOSIUM ESS 95 Erlangen - Nuremberg October 26 - 28, 1995 Hosted by Friedrich-Alexander-University CALL FOR PAPERS TOPICS SIMULATION METHODOLOGY AND APPLICATIONS COMPUTER AND TELECOMMUNICATION SYSTEMS DEPENDABILITY EVALUATION ANALYTICAL AND NUMERICAL MODELLING TECHNIQUES SIMULATION IN AUTOMATION SIMULATION IN BUSINESS SYMPOSIUM: MISSION EARTH Organized and Sponsored by : SCSI The Society for Computer Simulation International SiE Simulation In Europe CONFERENCE COMMITTEE Conference Chairmen Mario DalCin University of Erlangen-Nuremberg Department of Computer Science Chair of Computer Architecture Martensstrasse 3 91058 Erlangen, Germany Tel.: +49.9131.857003 Fax: +49.9131.39388 e-mail: dalcin@immd5.informatik.uni-erlangen.de Ulrich Herzog University of Erlangen-Nuremberg Department of Computer Science Chair of Computer Architecture and Performance Evaluation Martensstrasse 3 91058 Erlangen, Germany Tel.: +49.9131.857041 Fax: +49.9131.39388 e-mail: herzog@immd7.informatik.uni-erlangen.de Conference Program Chairmen Gunter Bolch University of Erlangen-Nuremberg Department Computer Science Chair of Operating Systems Martensstrasse 1 91058 Erlangen, Germany Tel.: +49.9131.857903 Fax: +49.9131.39388 e-mail: bolch@informatik.uni-erlangen.de Ali Riza Kaylan Bogazici University Department of Industry-Engineering 80815 Bebek Istanbul,Turkey Tel.: +90.212.263.1540 / 2072 Fax: +90.212.2651800 e-mail:kaylan@trboun.bitnet Finance Chairman and Conference - Coordination Rainer Rimane University of Erlangen-Nuremberg Department of Computer Science Chair of Operating Systems Martensstrasse 1 91058 Erlangen, Germany Tel.: +49.9131.66247 Fax: +49.9131.66247 e-mail: rimane@informatik.uni-erlangen.de Local Organizing Committee Juerg Dittrich, Wolfgang Hohl, Walter Henning, Elke Stief, Roya Ulrich University of Erlangen-Nuremberg IPC - International Program Committee: Amborski, K. (PL) Balbo, G. (I) Beilner, H. (D) Biethahn J. (D) BoHuLi (Tj) Borutzky, W (D) Boxma, O. (NL) Breitenecker, F. (A) Courtois, P.-J. (B) Crosbie, R. (USA) Eschenbacher, P. (D) Forster, H. (D) Giambiasi, N. (F) Guasch, A. (E) Hahn, W. (D) Halin, J. (CH) Hanschke, T. (D) Haring, G. (A) Houbak, N. (DK) Huntsinger, R. (USA) Iazeolla, I. (D) Irmscher, K. (D) Iyer, R. (USA) Jones, A. (USA) Kerckhoffs, E. (NL) Kleijnen, J. (NL) Krug, W. (D) Kuehn, P. (D) Lehmann, A. (D) Lehmann, F. (D) Lehnert, R. (D) Marie, R. (F) Meisinger, R. (D) Meisen, P. (USA) Merkuryev, Y. (LV) Molnar, I. (H) Mosekilde, E. (DK) Vren, T. (CAN) Pataricza, A. (H) Schmidt, B. (D) Strunz, H. (D) Szczerbicka, H. (D) Tanir, O. (CAN) Tripathi, S. (USA) Trivedi, K. (USA) Tucci, S. (I) van As, H. (CH) Verbraeck, A. (NL) Walke, B. (D) Witte, Th. (D) Wittmann, J. (D) Zobel, R. (GB) Scientific Program: The 1995 SCSI European Simulation Symposium is structured around the following major themes. A track will be devoted to each of the topics in parallel. The Conference Language is English. Simulation Methodology and Application Coordination: Prof. Dr. Andras Javor, Hungary -Simulation Languages, -Engineering Applications, -Knowledge Based Simulation Tools, -Distributed and Parallel System Simulation, -Graphical Model Editors Computer and Telecommunications Systems Coordination: Winfried Dulz, Germany -Electronic Circuits and Components, - Parallel and Distributed Systems, -High Speed Networks ISDN and ATM Communications, -Multimedia Systems Dependability Evaluation Coordination: G. Horton, United Kingdom -Reliability and Availability Assurance, -Fault Forecasting, -Safety and Security, -Fault Tolerance Analytical and Numerical Modelling Techniques Coordination: Hermann de Meer, The Netherlands -Queuing Networks, -Stochastic Petri Nets, -Markov Models, -Optimization Simulation in Automation Coordination: Klaus Feldmann, Germany -Scheduling, -Manufacturing, -System Optimization, -Applications Simulation in Business Coordination: Peter Mertens, Germany -Production Planning -Logistics, -Risk-Analysis, -Combination of Simulation and AI-Techniques SYMPOSIUM: MISSION EARTH Coordination: Alfred Jones, USA Mission Earth is an Activity of the Society for Computer Simulation International. Its purpose is the identification and dissemination of the unique benefits of World Simulation as the prime tool for use in planning and monitoring a sustainable future for the World System. Keynote Speakers: A. Alan B. Pritsker, Ph.D. Pritsker Corporation, President and CEO New Roles for Simulation in Industry Prof. Dr. Hansjoerg Fromm IBM Deutschland Produktion GmbH Workflow Management and the Simulation of Business Processes Invited Speakers Focusing on the main tracks of the Conference, invited speakers will give special in-depth presentations in plenary sessions, which will be included in the Proceedings of the Conference. Best Paper Awards The 1995 European Simulation Symposium will award the best papers, one in each track. From these papers the best overall paper will be chosen. The awarded papers will be published in an International Journal, if necessary after incorporating modifications to the paper. Deadlines and Requirements: Extended Abstracts (two or three pages for full, one page for short papers typewritten without drawings and tables) are due to arrive in quadruplicate at the European Simulation Office. Philippe Geril The Society for Computer Simulation International European Simulation Office University of Ghent, Coupure Links 653, B-9000 Ghent, Belgium Tel. (Office) : +32.9.2337790 Tel.+Fax (Private): +32.59.800.804 Fax: +32.9.2234941 e-mail: philippe.geril@ rug.ac.be before April 26, 1995 Only original papers, written in English, which have not previously been published elsewhere will be accepted. In case you want to organize a panel discussion, please contact the Program Chairmen. Authors are expected to register early (at a reduced fee) and to attend the Conference at their own expense to present the accepted papers. If early registration and payment are not made, the paper will not be published in the Conference Proceedings. In the case of multiple authors, one author should be identified as the person who will act as the correspondent for the paper. Abstracts will be reviewed by three members of the International Program Committee for full papers and one member for short papers. Notification of acceptance or rejection will be sent by June 1, 1995. An author kit with complete instructions for preparing a camera-ready copy for the Proceedings will be sent to authors of accepted abstracts. The camera-ready copy of the papers must be in by August 31, 1995. Only the full papers, which are expected to be five pages long, will be published in the Conference Proceedings. In order to guarantee a high-quality Conference, the full papers will be reviewed as well, to check whether the suggestions of the program committee have been incorporated. The nominees for the best paper awards will be selected as well. Submission Deadline: April 28, 1995 Acceptance Notification: June 1, 1995 Camera-Ready Copies: August 31, 1995 Conference Information The ESS series (organized by SCSI, the Society for Computer Simulation International) is now in its seventh year. SCSI is an International non-profit organization founded in 1952. On a yearly basis SCSI organizes six Simulation Conferences worldwide, cooperates in two others, and publishes the monthly magazine "Simulation", a quarterly "Transactions", and books. For more information, please tick the appropriate box on the reply-card Exhibits An exhibition will be held in the area, where the participants are having coffee during the breaks. There will be a special exhibition section for universities and non-profit organizations, and a special section for publishers and commercial stands. If you would like to participate in the exhibition, please contact the European Office. Venue Erlangen is a city with 100.000 inhabitants 10 miles away from Nuremberg. Erlangen hosts the SIEMENS Research Center and a well known university with ca. 36.000 students. The Symposium will be held at the university in one of the buildings directly in the center of the city. The International airport of Nuremberg is only 6 miles away from the center of Erlangen. Registration before August 31, 1995 Author SCSI - members and members Other participants of the sponsoring societies BF 16000 BF 16000 ECU 450 ECU 400 ECU 400 BF 18000 Registration after August 31,1995 Preregistration BF 18000 BF 20000 required ECU 450 ECU 500 The registration fee includes, one copy of the Conference Proceedings, three Lunches, Refreshments during the breaks, a Welcome Cocktail and the Conference Dinner. Correspondence Address: Philippe Geril The Society for Computer Simulation International European Simulation Office University of Ghent, Coupure Links 653, B-9000 Ghent, Belgium Tel. (Office) : +32.9.2337790 Fax (Office): +32.9.2234941 Tel.+Fax (Private): +32.59.800.804 e-mail: philippe.geril@rug.ac.be Further information on the 1995 ESS Symposium can be found on WWW at: http://faui30t.informatik.uni-erlangen.de:1200/Misc/ESS95.html Philippe Geril SCS European Simulation Office University of Gent phone : +32 (9) 233 77 90 Department for Applied Mathematics fax : +32 (9) 223 49 41 Biometrics and Process Control e-mail: Philippe.Geril@rug.ac.be Coupure Links 653, 9000 Gent Belgium Carpe Diem ! ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 18 Mar 1995 20:33:25 EST From: Rob Slade Subject: Book Review: "Internet Anywhere" by MKS/Gardner BKINTANW.RVW 950209 %A James Gardner %C 113 Sylvan Avenue, Englewood Cliffs, NJ 07632 %D 1995 %G 0-13-185612-X %I Prentice Hall PTR %O U$29.95/C$39.95 (515) 284-6751 FAX (515) 284-2607 beth_hespe@prenhall.com %P 430 %T "Internet Anywhere" "Internet Anywhere", MKS Inc., 1995, 0-13-185612-X, U$29.95/C$39.95 This is *not* the Internet anywhere. This is a 30 day test kit for email (maybe) and news, in the US and Canada, under Windows. What is really included here is a crippleware demo version of the MKS mail and newsreader software for Windows. Arrangements have been made with The Rabbit Network Inc. for thirty days' free access through an "800" number. At the end of thirty days, the demo will stop working, but you can contact MKS and get an "upgrade" for fifty bucks more (sixty, in Canada), and contact Rabbit for a proper account. (Alternate arrangements have been made with Portal. This "30 days free" is valid for only the first five hours, and requires a credit card number for validation.) The book is basically documentation of the MKS software, although about a quarter of it is taken up with an extensive Internet provider list. For those who want a taste of email and news, this might be a handy start. I'll have to review the software to comment further on it. copyright Robert M. Slade, 1995 BKINTANW.RVW 950209. Distribution permitted in TELECOM Digest and associated publications. Rob Slade's book reviews are a regular feature in the Digest. 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 Author "Robert Slade's Guide to Computer Viruses" 0-387-94311-0/3-540-94311-0 ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 19 Mar 1995 01:41:03 EST From: Bob Keller Subject: Re: PCS Auction Results and Analysis The ranking of the comparative value of the MTAs (which was part of the PCS Auction analysis that I posted last week) had one rather significant error. In aggregating the block A and B winning bids for each market, New Orleans was somehow skipped, with the result that it was listed twice, but both times at an extremely understated value. Below is a revised version of the list which corrects this error and makes some other changes: ========================================================================== Comparative Value of the MTAs ========================================================================== The following tabulation shows the comparative value of each MTA, calculated and ranked on the basis of dollars bid per pop. The winning bids on each of the two licenses in each MTA were combined, except in Washington, Los Angeles, and New York where only one license was auctioned due to the previous pioneer's preference grants. Each of those three markets is shown twice in the tabulation below, once including only the winning bid for the Block B (w/o pp), and once including both the Block B winning bid plus the Block A pioneer's preference revenue (w/pp). MTA# Market Name Population $/Pop High Bid ---- ---------------------------------- ---------- ------ ------------ 01 M010 Washington-Baltimore (w/o pp)Rank 7,777,875 $54.45 $211,771,000 02 M002 Los Angeles-San Diego (w/o pp) 19,145,232 $51.55 $493,500,000 * M010 Washington-Baltimore (w/ pp) 7,777,875 $40.39 $314,114,539 * M002 Los Angeles-San Diego (w/ pp) 19,145,232 $38.93 $745,418,526 03 M017 New Orleans-Baton Rouge 4,925,269 $37.24 $183,424,485 04 M001 New York (w/o pp) 26,410,597 $33.53 $442,712,000 05 M003 Chicago 12,069,700 $30.88 $372,750,000 * M001 New York (w/ pp) 26,410,597 $29.92 $790,230,309 06 M011 Atlanta 6,942,084 $28.58 $198,411,000 07 M024 Seattle (Excluding Alaska) 3,827,175 $27.79 $106,355,002 08 M015 Miami-Fort Lauderdale 5,136,581 $25.64 $131,723,000 09 M019 St. Louis 4,663,926 $25.48 $118,836,000 10 M031 Indianapolis 3,017,475 $23.34 $70,433,000 11 M027 Phoenix 3,510,140 $22.32 $78,347,000 12 M037 Jacksonville 2,274,933 $20.22 $46,000,000 13 M047 Honolulu 1,108,229 $20.18 $22,361,030 14 M020 Milwaukee 4,541,432 $18.73 $85,043,289 15 M033 San Antonio 2,986,524 $18.21 $54,394,123 16 M036 Salt Lake City 2,573,372 $17.82 $45,847,030 17 M016 Cleveland 4,945,749 $17.59 $87,000,000 18 M004 San Francisco-Oakland-San Jose 11,891,177 $17.37 $206,500,000 19 M022 Denver 3,880,637 $16.60 $64,436,000 20 M013 Tampa-St. Petersburg-Orlando 5,417,788 $16.57 $89,786,837 21 M014 Houston 5,190,849 $16.16 $83,888,837 22 M048 Tulsa 1,096,396 $16.02 $17,562,369 23 M025 Puerto Rico-U.S. Virgin Islands 3,623,846 $15.70 $56,899,000 24 M026 Louisville-Lexington-Evansville 3,556,648 $13.85 $49,262,000 25 M008 Boston-Providence 9,452,712 $12.87 $121,660,000 26 M028 Memphis-Jackson 3,465,226 $12.46 $43,169,000 27 M030 Portland 3,059,948 $11.16 $34,155,030 28 M029 Birmingham 3,244,076 $10.97 $35,597,000 29 M038 Columbus 2,145,561 $10.39 $22,290,000 30 M043 Nashville 1,767,391 $9.26 $16,374,000 31 M009 Philadelphia 8,927,748 $9.07 $80,951,000 32 M007 Dallas-Fort Worth 9,694,157 $9.03 $87,500,578 33 M018 Cincinnati-Dayton 4,716,665 $8.89 $41,932,000 34 M023 Richmond-Norfolk 3,846,210 $8.75 $33,652,000 35 M005 Detroit 10,001,009 $8.12 $81,177,000 36 M034 Kansas City 2,913,304 $8.11 $23,619,168 37 M032 Des Moines-Quad Cities 3,006,139 $7.35 $22,100,031 38 M021 Pittsburgh 4,102,766 $7.00 $28,719,362 39 M006 Charlotte-Greensboro-Greenville-Ral 9,752,317 $6.83 $66,616,000 40 M035 Buffalo-Rochester 2,777,046 $6.80 $18,893,000 41 M012 Minneapolis-St. Paul 5,986,039 $6.63 $39,674,673 42 M040 Little Rock 2,051,667 $6.21 $12,732,501 43 M044 Knoxville 1,721,911 $6.18 $10,635,000 44 M041 Oklahoma City 1,877,478 $5.92 $11,111,111 45 M051 American Samoa 47,000 $4.57 $214,555 46 M039 El Paso-Albuquerque 2,113,890 $4.08 $8,634,030 47 M046 Wichita 1,124,174 $3.91 $4,393,000 48 M042 Spokane-Billings 1,863,335 $3.05 $5,688,000 49 M045 Omaha 1,659,273 $2.80 $4,647,000 50 M049 Alaska 550,043 $1.82 $1,000,000 51 M050 Guam-Northern Mariana Islands 176,000 $0.61 $107,000 Bob Keller (KY3R) Email: rjk@telcomlaw.com Law Office of Robert J. Keller, P.C. Telephone: 301.229.5208 Federal Telecommunications Law Facsimile: 301.229.6875 ------------------------------ Subject: The ITU in Gopherspace From: rishab@dxm.ernet.in (Rishab Aiyer Ghosh) Date: Sat, 18 Mar 95 23:38:22 IST Organization: Deus X Machina Someone asked for info on the ITU's net.location. Try gopher info.itu.ch. Rishab Aiyer Ghosh For Electric Dreams subscriptions rishab@dxm.ernet.in and back issues, send a mail to rishab@arbornet.org rishab@arbornet.org with Vox +91 11 6853410 Voxmail 3760335 'help' in lower case, without H 34C Saket, New Delhi 110017, INDIA the quotes, as the Subject. ------------------------------ Subject: X.25/ISDN prices; Global Information Wanted (Again) From: rishab@dxm.ernet.in (Rishab Aiyer Ghosh) Date: Sat, 18 Mar 95 23:44:53 IST Organization: Deus X Machina Someone wrote: [on X.25 over ISDN]: > Rates in the Pacific Bell Service area for data packets are: > .05 CENTS for transaction setup > .005 CENTS per octet of data That works out to about $52 per Mb - is that _cheap_? BTW I posted last week a request for telecom/datacom rates and licences in various countries, similar to the info I provided on India. Though I asked specifically for info on Asian/developing countries, I only got replies from the US, UK and Malaysia. I intend to collate this data and repost to the Digest, so stop being lazy and help! In case you missed my table on India, and volunteer to provide similar data for your country, ask me for a copy of that post. Rishab Aiyer Ghosh For Electric Dreams subscriptions rishab@dxm.ernet.in and back issues, send a mail to rishab@arbornet.org rishab@arbornet.org with Vox +91 11 6853410 Voxmail 3760335 'help' in lower case, without H 34C Saket, New Delhi 110017, INDIA the quotes, as the Subject. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 20 Mar 1995 09:52:29 EST From: Chris J. Cartwright - ELF Subject: New Bell Atlantic Service From the {Washington Post} Friday, March 17, 1995: (all typos are mine) ***** Montgomery to Get Phone Message Service ***** Bell Atlantic's Residential 'T-Mail' Experiment is First in Country -------------------------------------------- By Mike Mills / Washington Post Staff Writer -------------------------------------------- Beginning next week, Montogomery County residents may notice something different when they pick up their telephones: three quick beeps before they hear a dial tone. It will mean that they have a "T-Mail" message waiting. "T-Mail" is a new service that Bell Atlantic Corp. is trying out among its 400,000 customers in the county, with plans to expand the service area-wide if it's popular. The first such residential service in the country, it is designed to let a community group distribute messages to members, or a daughter to get information to a parent who isn't home. Unlike Bell Atlantic's Answer Call voice mail service, T-mail does not take messages when people don't answer their phones. It's more like the voice mail that many offices now have. Callers in Montgomery County will be able to pick up their phones and dictate messages that Bell Atlantic computers will record and then send on to the phones of an individual or group of people who have the service. The phones will not ring to alert the recipient. Instead they will hear the beeps before the dial tone when the phone is picked up, or a light will blink (of the customers own newer models of telephones equipped with message lights). To retrieve messages, customers will dial a special number and enter their private passcode, and then listen to, delete or forward messages to others who have the service. T-mail will allow customers to leave a message for someone who's not home and doesn't have an answering machine. Or, the same message could go to a large number of people: A soccer coach could update team members on practice schedules or a teacher could notify parents about homework assignments. T-mail will be free from next Monday until May 30, after which customers will pay 25 cents for each message they send or copy. Listening to messages will remain free of charge. Customers who subscribe to Answer Call will pay 15 cents per message. The service is part of larger efforts by Bell Atlantic and other local phone companies to increase their revenue by making their networks "intelligent". They see services such as this as prime opportunities for new revenue from basic residential phone service, which is only marginally profitable. Bell Atlantic is also trying to enhance the value of it's own offerings as new competitors threaten to offer competing local phone service. Bell Atlantic officials say the service won't be a new opening for telemarketers. Junk-mail callers will be dissuaded from stuffing mail boxes with messages, they predict, because of per message cost and because mass messages can only be sent to as many as three groups of 25 recipients each. People who don't want the service can call 1-800-870-0000 to have it disconnected. The service also will further Bell Atlantics's efforts to take business away from the answering machine industry. Answer Call voice mail service already reaches 1.4 million residential customers, according to Bell Atlantic, more than any other U.S. local phone company. But nationwide, about 54 percent of U.S. telephone users still have an answering machine, or more than 125 million people, according to the Electronic Industries Association. ------------------------------- I posted this because in addition to being a "new" service, it hits on several topics discussed here of late. One is phones that detect stutter tone or some other message waiting data that lets the phone know there is a message (any bets only the RBOC's sell this little gem). And "Junk-mail callers will be dissuaded...", would you pay $60,000 dollars to reach 400,000 people? Not to mention that its **FREE** for the next ten weeks to the everyone including telemarketers! I grant you that it make take some doing but I'll bet some replacement window company, or credit card insurance marketer has already paid the overtime to cash in on the free advertising to all of Montgomery County. Plus I thought any phone number with seven zero's in it was worth mention. I'll try to keep you posted. If I'm not too busy listening to all my new T-Mail ... Chris Cartwright, Technical Engineer Mail dsc3cjc@imc220.med.navy.mil [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Please let us know your early experiences with this new service ... or is it a disservice? PAT] ------------------------------ From: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest Editor) Subject: Cellular Fraud in the News Again Date: Mon, 20 Mar 1995 10:30:00 CST Over the weekend in the {Chicago Tribune} writer Kathy O'Malley offered an interesting article on cellular fraud, primarily discussing how phones are cloned and then abused. The thing which caught my eye, and which I discussed with her briefly on the phone Monday morning was her tossing around of the figures given to her by some industry people: $1.3 million per day in fraud; and that this represented four percent of the industry's annual traffic. By my calculations, 1.3 million per day comes to about $454 million per year, and that figure is four percent of what astronomical amount? I know we have had discussions on this here before and many of you contend losses due to fraud -- while a significant problem -- are substantially less that the dollar amounts quoted on a routine basis in the media and by industry representatives. Ms. O'Malley asked me, if $1.3 million per day is *not* correct, then what amount is correct or more realistic? I'd like to forward her some more accurate data if that is possible. Can anyone provide anything? She said to me she was prompted to write the article based on her own unfortunate experiences of being cloned twice in the past year. I told her I could easily see and understand her feelings, but that overstating the amount in question did not benefit anyone ... some of you here explained that to me the last time this topic came up. She is at the {Chicago Tribune}, 435 North Michigan Avenue, Chicago 60611 if you care to provide rebuttal, although it might be best if you send it to me and I will pass it along. Thanks, Patrick Townson ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V15 #155 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa04963; 21 Mar 95 0:04 EST Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA18682; Mon, 20 Mar 95 19:19:11 CST Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA18676; Mon, 20 Mar 95 19:19:09 CST Date: Mon, 20 Mar 95 19:19:09 CST From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest (Patrick Townson)) Message-Id: <9503210119.AA18676@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V15 #156 TELECOM Digest Mon, 20 Mar 95 19:19:00 CST Volume 15 : Issue 156 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Book Review: "The Downloader's Companion for Windows" (Rob Slade) Consuming Ourselves Into Oblivion (Kevin Martin) French "MCI Friends and Family" System (Romain Fournols) T3 Framing and Connection (Phillip Schuman) PABX Signalling Protocols (Ronald A. Smit) Research on Dual Mode Terminals (Joerg Kuehne) Why Doesn't Zmodem Work? (David Burns) Looking For Small, Used, CHEAP, PBX/Key System (Seng-Poh Lee) Re: Looking For "Help Desk" System (Jim Wenzel) Re: 800 "Trademark" Rights (Jim Wenzel) Telephone Cost Research (Rafael Rivera) Re: Caller ID in CA (John Navas) 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 America On Line. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available 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: 500-677-1616 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. A suggested donation of twenty dollars per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above. 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: Mon, 20 Mar 1995 17:16:39 EST From: Rob Slade Subject: Book Review: "The Downloader's Companion for Windows" BKDNLCMP.RVW 950208 "The Downloader's Companion for Windows", Scott Meyers/Catherine Pinch, 1995, 0-13-342254-2, U$19.95/C$26.95 %A Scott Meyers download@prenhall.com %A Catherine Pinch download@prenhall.com %C 113 Sylvan Avenue, Englewood Cliffs, NJ 07632 %D 1995 %G 0-13-342254-2 %I Prentice Hall PTR %O U$19.95/C$26.95 (515) 284-6751 FAX (515) 284-2607 beth_hespe@prenhall.com %P 178 %T "The Downloader's Companion for Windows" Those who are promoting the advantages of the online world often cite the enormous volume of programs, utilities, graphics, sound bytes and other files available on BBSes, commercial services, and the net. They seldom mention the necessity for learning cryptic one- to three-letter codes that indicate which of a bewildering variety of archival, compression, encoding, viewing, and other programs need to be brought to bear on a given file, in order to make it yield up its secrets. The promoters often stress that much of this stuff is free (or ridiculously cheap), but don't stress the fact that, for that very reason, most of what you need simply cannot be found at the local "Computers-R-Us". This slim volume is an excellent starter for newbies who want to begin downloading. The network cognoscenti will find nothing fresh here, but it is pitched exactly right for the newcomer. It covers the concepts of freeware and shareware (though not, interestingly, public domain); the basics of downloading; compression, archiving and encoding; media files; and some resources and filename explanations. The material is not exhaustive, but does cover the important points--including how to read version numbers. An included disk provides the basic archiving, compression, encoding and viewing tools that the Windows user will need to get started. There are a few points one might want to argue. (There is also a script font, used for headers, which is very difficult to read.) By and large, however, there is nothing to block the value of this work for the new user. For such a small book, the price might seem excessive. However, the fact that this book, and an hour or two of study, can get a neophyte online, would make it well worth the cost. copyright Robert M. Slade, 1995 BKDNLCMP.RVW 950208. Distribution permitted in TELECOM Digest and associated publications. Rob Slade's book reviews are a regular feature in the Digest. Vancouver ROBERTS@decus.ca Institute for Robert_Slade@sfu.ca Research into rslade@cue.bc.ca User p1@CyberStore.ca Security Canada V7K 2G6 ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 20 Mar 1995 16:31:50 -0600 From: kmzzz@Mailbox.mcs.com (Kevin Martin) Subject: Consuming Ourselves Into Oblivion In the 1600's monks slaved over reprinting letter by letter then famous works like the Bible. When Guttenberg "revolutionized" communication with the printing press an understanding emerged that things would be different. New communication would forever alter human interaction. When Marconi and radio transmission came along the same "revolutionary" mindset emerged. Finally and ultimately national governments would be held accountable for all their actions. Television, the last media/communication "revolution" re-inspired, albeit only fleetingly, the human belief in control of their personal intellectual destinies and re-invigorated the government watchdog mentality. We surf, now, on the most recent technologically induced media revolution but, nevertheless, allow it, even in its relative youth to go the path of humanities other communication "revolutions." Neil Postman talks of, Americans in particular, informing ourselves to death. Coinciding with that concept is the consuming ourselves into oblivion argument that I wish to describe. Often unbeknownst to ourselves we are constantly, both subtly and blatantly, force fed consumerism. In its dramatic form, television commercials are now as hyped, constructed, debated and created as detail oriented and cost (un) effective as feature films. TV commercial consumption and viewing is, personally, dramatically more entertaining/ dumbing than the actual programs they interrupt. One need only mention particular campaigns to fathom the country's familiarity with thirty second "buy something" commands that now pass as pure entertainment. The IBM nuns, the AT&T/MCI wars, "Where's the Beef," etc. Although the shows are by no means free from this consumptive mindset. Whether its the mind-boggling, seemingly constant cross promotion of television shows (In particular on the upstart Fox network programs) or the nonchalant product placement within your favorite show's star's apartment or hand, or the subtle programming differences that slide you from one program to another commercial free; We constantly have the "consume" command brow beaten into our minds. Every television millisecond is a command to buy something. Intertwined in PBS programs, live sports coverage, even Presidential address' complete with network logo in bottom right corner and pre/post, book-selling, anchor persons and analyst response is the "run out and charge something" message. So avoid your television. Kill your television! The escape and "freedom" is only minimal. Movie product placement, action figure sales, sequel contracts etc. promote constant consumption within the movie industry. The entertainment conglomerates, in general, have a strangle hold on all of our often unearned dollars. Freedom and the great communications "revolution" of the Internet is relative mini-seconds away from the same mind-numbing, content-guiding path of the almighty advertising dollar. Much needs to be said both in support of and against the publishing industries role in guiding the Internet. The atomized publishing industry of books, periodicals and newspapers seems to be "getting back at" or "standing tall in light of" the digital/digitized hype surrounding technological innovations such as the Internet which, often self-described, spell the decline and fall of the traditional written word and its format. One need only look at the shelf-space dedicated to computer how-to manuals in their favorite bookstore to get a grasp on the publishing industries success. Even Nicholas Negroponte's book "Being Digital" has entered the best sellers list. A new non-fiction is emerging from the computer how-to publishing market and it indicates a course for the Internet itself that needs addressing. In promoting the further stupefaction and status quoness of the race to digitize the planet, the infrastructure ownership, mainstreaming, non-technical understanding, user-friendly access learning usage curve and the ever growing plethora of related literature is focused on privatized, commercialized, consumer based and driven stupefacation. "How to make a million on the Internet," "Winning cyber-friends and influencing the non-cyber to buy your goods," the list of real and shockingly possible concepts for usage of the Internet in the public domain promoted by the atom publishing industry show nothing other than the same social ills that plague all current mediums. The Hacker, the one true friend of the common good on the Internet, is being lambasted, tracked down, arrested and eliminated from access in the name of some cyber justice that helps clear the way for the great revolution of key-stroke credit card purchases envisioned by the well funded, government supported, retail industry. Where the WWW and Internet could take human connectedness and communication is unimaginable. The course seems well laid out to take this revolution down the same path the worlds other technological driven communications revolts have gone: Into our consumer washed brain and out our overstrectched personal and national credit line. Thanks for your consideration and peace, Kevin Martin [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Thank you for your comments today. Perhaps they will the root of an interesting discussion thread. The address by Neil Postman to which you refer was printed here in the Digest some time ago; perhaps a reprint for our newer readers would be a good idea. PAT] ------------------------------ Date: 19 Mar 95 17:22:52 EST From: ROMAIN FOURNOLS <100431.1672@compuserve.com> Subject: French "MCI Friends and Family" System Starting last week, France Telecom proposed a new service (the same as the MCI F&F system): For 15FF per month fee, you choose three favorite numbers and you get a 15% discount on your phone bill only on those three numbers communications. This service is called "PRIMALISTE" Romain FOURNOLS Compuserve : 100431,1672 Email : 100431.1672@compuserve.com Fax : +33 61 22 85 84 ------------------------------ From: Phillip Schuman <72510.1164@CompuServe.COM> Subject: T3 Framing and Connection Date: 19 Mar 1995 05:36:24 GMT Organization: via CompuServe Information Service I'm looking for some brief explanation of the two kinds of framing on T3 - M13 and C-parity. I'm pretty familiar with D4/SF and ESF. Also -- on a picture of the Digital Link T3 mux -- there are two BNC connectors; are both used, or in/out or what? How does this work in connecting to a fiber based system like T3 -- is there another interface box between the telco and the CPE? ------------------------------ From: Ronald A. Smit Date: Mon, 20 Mar 1995 14:21:53 MET Subject: PABX Signalling Protocols Please can anyone tell me were I can get technical specifications and the facilities of the following PABX signalling protocols: - CAILHO - CEPT L1 - R2 - E&M - DPNSS (Digital Private Network Signalling System) - APNSS (Analogue Private Network Signalling System) - Q.sig Thanks, Ronald A. Smit ------------------------------ From: jk14@irz301.inf.tu-dresden.de (Joerg Kuehne) Subject: Research on Dual Mode Terminals Date: 20 Mar 1995 15:34:20 +0100 Organization: Dept. of Electrical Engineering, TU Dresden, Germany Hi, I'm a research assistant at the endowed chair for mobile communications systems at Dresden University of Technology and I'm looking for useful books or other information about the american mobile communications standards: AMPS, IS 54/136 and IS 95. Please send any info/hints to me at: kuehnej@ifn.et.tu-dresden.de Thanks, Joerg Kuehne Endowed Chair for Mobile Communications Systems Department of Electrical Engineering Dresden University of Technology ------------------------------ From: saclib@garnet.msen.com (David Burns) Subject: Why Doesn't Zmodem Work? Date: 20 Mar 1995 16:17:09 GMT Organization: Msen, Inc. -- Ann Arbor, MI (account info: +1 313 998-4562) I am using a shell account to access the Internet, and most of the time I get there via MichNet, which is a local call. The trouble is that none of the fast protocols, e.g., Zmodem, work when I'm dialed in this way. Kermit works, but it is slow and not absolutely trustworthy. If I dial in via direct line, bypassing MichNet, Zmodem works fine, but then I am paying a toll call. Can anyone supply any answers/solutions/confirmations? David J. Burns saclib@mail.msen.com Technical Services Librarian (517) 750-6443 Spring Arbor College ------------------------------ From: lee@gdc.com (Seng-Poh Lee) Subject: Looking For Small, Used, CHEAP, PBX/Key System Date: Mon, 20 Mar 1995 14:06:46 EST Organization: General DataComm Ind. Inc., Middlebury, CT Can anyone point me towards a source of used and inexpensive PBXs and key systems? I'm looking for one for my home, and it only needs to support two lines and no more than ten extensions. It doesn't have to be state of the art, but needs to be low cost. If anyone has just upgraded their old PBX/Key system and wants to get rid of it, drop me a line! I'm in Connecticut. Seng-Poh Lee | Internet: Work: splee@gdc.com Technology Center, | Alt : splee@pd.org General DataComm Ind. Inc. | URL: http://www.sandbox.org/ Middlebury, CT, USA | Finger splee@noel.pd.org for PGP Pub Key ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 19 Mar 1995 12:43:00 -0500 From: jim.wenzel@grapevine.lrk.ar.us (Jim Wenzel) Subject: Re: Looking For "Help Desk" System Reply-To: jim.wenzel@grapevine.lrk.ar.us (Jim Wenzel) Organization: Ferret BBS *** N. Little Rock, AR *** (501) 791-0124 > I am interested in a computer-based phone help-desk system to assist > in the selling of a product. In general, I would like to support fi > phone attendants with voice mail and fax back capability. I would > also like it to be expandable. I would like to deal with an integra > in the Chicago area or, alternatively, I would like to be able to ob > the operations of a satisfied customer with a similar system in the > area. I have more details on desired system features that I would b > happy to email to anyone who thinks they may have a package that wou > meet my needs. I am currently preparing the budget. I won't be in > position to buy until June. I don't represent anybody but me. I researched help desk software not to long ago. I suggest you contact the Help Desk Institute (a users group for Help Desk sites). They can provide you with all the resources that you need. Particularly along the area of vendors. IBM has a nice product out that I heard was demonstrated out in California at the recent convention. No phone is actually at the desk but, the attendant plugs directly into the PC. All routing is done via software controls. This particular product may fit your needs. There are over a 100 vendors in the Help Desk software market right now. (Buyer Beware). I don't have the phone number handy (It's at work) but, would be glad to get it if your interested. A common problem for new help desks is that most folks don't realize the resource potential they will eventually become. The data our helpdesk collects is used in a variety of ways that were not even conceived when first put into place. The database has become so important to the daily operations that we are currently working to mirror it on the mainframe. This is to allow greater access to our 250+ sites. Email me privately if you would like. This is an area I know a little bit about . However discussion kind of falls outside the scope of the Digest. (at Pat's discretion.) jim.wenzel@grapevine.lrk.ar.us * Sometimes, you just have to dust * * yourself off, and start again * The Ferret Bulletin Board System (501) 791-0124 North Little Rock, Arkansas Carrying RIME, Throbnet, UN'I, and Usenet ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 19 Mar 1995 12:43:00 -0500 From: jim.wenzel@grapevine.lrk.ar.us (Jim Wenzel) Subject: Re: 800 "Trademark" Rights Reply-To: jim.wenzel@grapevine.lrk.ar.us (Jim Wenzel) Organization: Ferret BBS *** N. Little Rock, AR *** (501) 791-0124 > Airlines, banks, car rental agencies, and other businesses in the > toll-freephone business, would like one, worldwide toll-free number > assigned to their companies. It would eliminate the myriad of number > one has to maintain and advertise in Europe, for example, due to the > complexity of the freephone service overseas. A thought, with the world of business getting smaller, it seems to me a simple solution of providing a 'international country code' which could be used exclusively for world-based businesses. Written guarantees outlining the use of this new country code could be put into place that would/could satisfy both the telco's and customers. I've always felt (in concept) that the 800 number is a national business exchange. To try to place international restrictions against it interferes with national business interests. I do not necessarily apply this to US business interests but, the investments of businesses who have toll free numbers in any country. A 'toll-free' country code would open a new market for the telco's and provide a elegant solution to the corporations that have the need for these services. Surely, I'm not the only person who has thought of this. jim.wenzel@grapevine.lrk.ar.us The Ferret Bulletin Board System (501) 791-0124 North Little Rock, Arkansas Carrying RIME, Throbnet, UN'I, and Usenet ------------------------------ From: Rrivera@spin.com.mx (Rafael Rivera) Subject: Telephone Cost Research Date: 20 Mar 1995 03:10:43 GMT Organization: SERCOFIN I am doing a research on the cost/benefit of telecommunications with special focus on telephony. I will appreciate all the help you could give me, telling me about books and articles on this topic. Does anyone could tell me how can I get the book: The telephone Cost Reduction Encyclopedia, by Jordan. Alan H. I know is out of print, It is possible to get a copy? Where? How? Thanks from Mexico City, Rfael Rivera ------------------------------ From: jnavas@netcom.com (John Navas) Subject: Re: Caller ID in CA Organization: The Navas Group, Dublin, CA Date: Mon, 20 Mar 1995 18:53:08 GMT Drew McEachern (drew@nbn.com) wrote: > Does anyone out there have the latest info on Caller ID in CA? It's my > understanding that it's any week now. Is this true? I'd love to have it. For those interested in the real thing rather than second-hand annecdotal reports, it is available on the 'net at: http://fcc.gov:70/0/News_Releases/Common_Carrier/nrcc4002.txt ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Report No. DC-2571 ACTION IN DOCKET CASE March 8, 1994 (CC DOCKET 91-281) CALLER ID TO BE AVAILABLE NATIONWIDE; FCC ADOPTS FEDERAL POLICIES FOR REGULATION More importantly, the proposed new rules (contrary to some claims it isn't all over but the shouting) are available at: http://fcc.gov:70/0/Orders/Common_Carrier/orcc4001.txt IN THE MATTER OF ) Rules and Policies Regarding ) CC Docket No. 91-281 Calling Number Identification ) Service - Caller ID ) REPORT AND ORDER AND FURTHER NOTICE OF PROPOSED RULEMAKING Comments due: May 18, 1994 Replies due: June 21, 1994 Adopted: March 8, 1994 Released: March 29, 1994 If you object (as I do) to the proposed prohibition on per-line blocking that you will find in the proposed rules as another unwarranted and unconstitutional intrusion of the fedreal government into our private lives, be sure to register your objection in the appropriate manner, as spelled out in this excerpt: ---cut-here--- 76. Comment Dates Pursuant to applicable procedures set forth in Sections 1.415 and 1.419 of the Commission's rules, 47 C.F.R. '' 1.415 and 1.419, interested parties may file comments on or before May 18, 1994 and reply comments on or before June 21, 1994. To file formally in this proceeding, interested parties must file an original and four copies of all comments, reply comments, and supporting documents with the reference number "CC Docket 91-281" on each document. If interested parties want each Commissioner to receive a personal copy of comments, interested parties must file an original plus nine copies. Interested parties should send comments and reply comments to the Office of the Secretary, Federal Communications Commission, Washington, DC 20554. Comments and reply comments will be available for public inspection during regular business hours in the FCC Reference Center, Room 239, Federal Communications Commission, 1919 M Street, N.W., Washington, DC. Copies of comments and reply comments are available through the Commission's duplicating contractor: International Transcription Service, Inc. (ITS, Inc.), 2100 M Street, N.W., Suite 140, Washington, DC 20037, (202) 857-3800. ---cut-here--- Otherwise we'll all just have to pray for the Contract with America's freeze on new regulations. David Sternlight (strnlght@netcom.com) wrote: > In article , John Navas > wrote: >> What is at issue here is per line blocking. Per call blocking is too >> annoying to be practical, which is why industry supports it over per line >> blocking. > Relax, John. You can't keep a good technologist down, and according to > another post here, Hello Direct is already selling a little box that will > provide you with per-line blocking. It seems to be the ideal solution, since > it is unfair to impose the costs of per-line blocking on every other phone > user. Per-line blockers should pay the costs of that, just as Caller ID > readers should pay the costs of that. Letting the costs fall on the user of > each capability is correct public policy in such matters. Any such device would undoubtedly be unduly expensive and problematic. No thanks. Regardless, there are no such carrier costs. The FCC "found" that per-call blocking has "no significant additional SS7 costs" and should be free. Per-line blocking is clearly less expensive for the telco. The argument against per-line blocking is that it reduces the "value" of Caller ID to the callee, and therefore would reduce callee revenue to the telco. In other words, the concern is that people might actually use it. Which is my point. Needless to say, I am not impressed by this argument. ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V15 #156 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa08900; 21 Mar 95 5:09 EST Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA23253; Mon, 20 Mar 95 23:10:15 CST Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA23246; Mon, 20 Mar 95 23:10:12 CST Date: Mon, 20 Mar 95 23:10:12 CST From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest (Patrick Townson)) Message-Id: <9503210510.AA23246@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V15 #157 TELECOM Digest Mon, 20 Mar 95 23:10:00 CST Volume 15 : Issue 157 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Re: Globalstar, Odyssey, Aries (John Bachmann) Re: Credit Checking on Cellular Customers (Alan Dahl) Re: Magnet in Cell Phone Dangerous to Laptop? (Michael Berlant) Re: Denver International Airport (Emerson Schwartzkopf) Re: Wireless Modems? (now FreeWave Tech Modems) (John Foust) Re: Trying to Locate Recommendation E.123 (Roy A. Mccrory) Re: GTE (GTD-5) ISDN is Coming (Matt Holdrege) Re: T1->10BaseT: How? (Mike Harpe) Re: T1 -> Modems (Mike Stump) Re: NYNEX: Idiocy in Pricing (Russell Blau) Re: Callback System Hardware and Software? (Douglas Frank) Call Screen, aka *60 (Chris Farrar) Gray Associates WEB Site Up and Running (Mike Rehmus) Re: Reinvention Team Dials in on U.S. Federal Phone Improvements (Levenson) Re: AT&T 500 Service Outside the USA (Richard Cox) Telecommunications on Demand Reseller Package (Sharon Ziebert) 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 America On Line. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available 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: 500-677-1616 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. A suggested donation of twenty dollars per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above. 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: jobachmann@aol.com (JOBACHMANN) Subject: Re: Globalstar, Odyssey, Aries Date: 20 Mar 1995 10:10:51 -0500 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) Reply-To: jobachmann@aol.com (JOBACHMANN) > I would appreciate if someone tells me where to get information on > Globalstar, Odyssey, Aries. To answer your general question, I found a good overview in: Eastern European & Former Soviet Telecom Report July 1, 1994 SECTION: No. 7, Vol. 5; ISSN: 1054-6499 LENGTH: 2937 words HEADLINE: SPECIAL REPORT: Big LEO Systems - Global Voice and Data Service Providers What are you interested in? More detailed articles are available -- I have been finding fair info in Dialog and Lexus/Nexus. I am currently doing research myself on this all, and am particularly interested in market demand forecasts for PCSS / GSM-type services. Do you have any references for me? Regards John Bachmann NY, NY JoBachmann@AOL.COM ------------------------------ From: Alan Dahl Date: Wed, 15 Mar 95 16:06:39 -0800 Subject: Re: Credit Checking on Cellular Customers Mfrere writes: >> When I applied with RochesterTel Mobile, they wanted a $250 deposit. >> Since I am a college student, I don't usually have that much money >> lining my wallet, anxious to sit in someone else's pocket. :) It seems >> that since I haven't had residential telephone service for three >> continuous years (time on the campus CBX doesn't count), they think >> I'm a risk. > The Cellular carrier I work for, on average, was writing off at least > 10% of it's revenue due to bad credit! With tighter credit checks, > it's down below 3%. > This might give you something to think about. > Cellular is a business, not a right. > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: You are correct it is a business, and not > a 'right'; in the sense that landline telco is regulated and must accept > all customers, and even the landline telco has the right to require a > deposit or advance payment from customers it thinks will default on the > bill. > One thing cellular companies might do however to decrease their risks > while encouraging new customers with credit which is not the best to > subscribe is make adaptations in their switches so that credit limits > could be set and honored. For example, John Doe has poor credit, but > wants a cell phone. Why can't the carrier turn on his account and set > it up so that he has a fifty dollar per month (as an example) limit then > cut him off at that point? Why require a thousand dollar deposit that > John Doe cannot raise? The callback services all do this. The customer > and the company mutually agree on a credit limit; at that point the > service gets turned off until payment is received. Would that be so > hard for a cellular carrier to accomplish? PAT] Cellular companies _are_ working on systems like that and in fact there are several already out there, most notably one called _Hotwatch_ by a former employeer of mine, Cellular Techinal Services of Seattle, Washington. However, this sort of usage-level monitoring requires real-time rating of calls and remote call delivery of roaming calls (this is important since most cloners are roamers), neither of which is trival or inexpensive. Believe it or not most calls are rated via batch tapes and not as they happen. This technology is available in some of the high-fraud markets now and will be available everywhere in the next few years but it's going to take a while. IMHO, I think it's funny that people with poor credit won't complain about failing to qualify for a new car loan but will complain because a cellular carrier won't take a risk that they'll skip after generating tens of thousands of dollars (retail, let's not start that argument again) worth of cellular service. A cell phone is no different than having a Visa card with a $10,000 limit so it's not surprising that they won't give them to just anyone. No insult intended towards college students but they should know how hard it is to get credit for anything. Alan Dahl | alan.dahl@mccaw.com Analysts International Co. | (NeXTMail OK) -or- 10655 N.E. 4th St. Suite 804 | adahl@eskimo.com Bellevue, WA 98004 | PH: (206) 803-4496 http://www.eskimo.com/~adahl/personal.html | FAX: (206) 803-7406 [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Well Alan, your mention of 'after the fact billing' and credit limits, and how hard it is to enforce credit limits without some input right at the time of the transaction reminds me of the bad joke that 'credit limits' used to be in the very early days of credit cards as we know them today. Throughout the 1960's as BankAmericard (now it is known as VISA) first got established, and member banks signed up to offer it, they had to write off huge amounts of bad debt -- many millions of dollars annually -- due to poorly planned administration of their program and the virtual impossibility of holding users to pre-established limits. Credit limits in those days basically relied on the customer being on the 'honor system' although the customers were never told that for good reason. Everything was done on manual, paper tickets where the merchants were concerned, and these paper tickets would flood into the credit card processing office by the hundreds of thousands daily. It was only at either the 'cycle billing' (what went in the mail to the customer) or the 'interim billing' (an in-house report used by the collectors) that the credit card office got wise to someone over their limit. If you knew you were getting close to your limit and you went on a *big* one day shopping spree for instance, all those charge tickets would come crashing in at the same time, and if they missed the billing cutoff by even a day they'd sit in the vault until the next billing. 'Smart shoppers' knew just what day to shop if it was their intention to abuse that VISA, American Express or Diner's Club card. Naturally the office would see it and the card would be blacklisted in the next (weekly) issue of their 'bad cards list' that went out to the merchants. By then, the customer was way past any reasonable amount of debt. The credit card people finally got the idea of doing 'sales author- ization' where the merchants had to call in and get approval for the sale. There had to be a happy medium somewhere so the merchant was not inconven- ienced (they were still trying to sign up merchants to accept BankAmericard) and they did not want to annoy the card holders too much either, so they set 'floor limits' for sales. Amounts over that had to be called in for approval and sales under that did not have to be called in. Exceptions were restaurants which seldom had floor limits, and electronics stores or jewelry stores which always had to call everything in. If a merchant was suspected of being friendly to fraud users, the credit card office would make him call in every sale. Since there was no such thing as online terminals at every desk, the people who did the sales authorizations worked from ledger cards printed out showing the customer's last billed balance, and they had to pencil in the new sales on that card. Another authorizer the next day would see the hand written notation in the book that the customer had been approved for a hundred dollar sale the day before and he would not allow any more sales on that card. Since in the early days VISA (BankAmericard) had 'only' about a million customers (Diner's Club on the other hand had about three million as did American Express in the 1960's) that required about 150 people to staff the phones in a large room. Rack after rack and row after row of customer ledger cards; the authorizers wearing headsets with very long cords on them; walking around the room looking for the customer's ledger card to jot down the latest purchase. On any given day several thousand cards would be missing because the bookkeepers had come and taken them away to do the billing for that cycle, so if no card could be found for the customer then the authorizer just automatically approved the sale unless he saw the card listed in the 'hot card bulletin'. Since the bookkeepers *always* had priority over anything/everything else in the office, the authorizer could walk up to one of the stacks, start to pull the drawer out to get that customer's card and a bookkeeper with a push cart would come along, yank the drawer with a couple thousand customer ledger cards out right in front of him, set it on the push cart and walk away with the whole thing while he was still looking for the desired ledger card. Other times the phones would get so incredibly clogged and backed up with calls the supervisor of the authorizers would 'raise the floor limit' (typically in those days I think it was anything above twenty dollars) to thirty or forty dollars. To clear the backlogged phone queue, the authorizers were told to approve anything and everything up to forty dollars without bothering to look at anything or write anything down; just give an approval code number and disconnect, move on to the next call. Once they got the phones under control again, the floor limit would be reduced to what the merchants and customers expected it to be. Diner's and American Express went from *completely manual* billing on credit cards to semi-computerized systems in the early 1960's. VISA started out semi-computerized; all of them had gotten almost totally automated by 1980. My experience was with the Diner's/ Amoco Credit Card Office in Chicago during the period 1967-74; the sales authorizers finally got 'on line' about 1973 with terminals to look at rather than cabinets full of ledger cards but customer bills were printed by computer beginning about 1965. Now, everything is done at 'point of sale' terminals; your card is swiped and the transaction posted to your account; you reach your limit and that is that. Even though the cellular companies still do 'billing by the batch' after the fact, you'd think there would be a way the towers could transmit some sort of 'memo billing' information to the carrier. It wouldn't be perfect, but it would give the carriers a good idea of what any given customer's bill was going to be like that month. That, plus interim reports to the collectors at the mid-way point in the billing cycle with what had been posted to that date would allow some rather good controls. The collector would then, based on the customer's history, decide to either pull the plug, or contact the customer by phone to ask for money, or what- ever. PAT] ------------------------------ From: lnjptyo1.mberla01@eds.com (Michael Berlant) Subject: Re: Magnet in Cell Phone Dangerous to Laptop? Date: 20 Mar 1995 06:06:31 GMT Organization: EDS Japan In article , jporten@mail2.sas.upenn.edu says... > I read in the manual, "there's a magnet in the phone, so don't > expose for long periods of time to magnetic media." Well, it doesn't exactly "close the flip". It is indeed about a quarter inch long, located in the flip approximately below the END button at the right edge, and it activates a reed switch which is your secondary SND/END key which automatically answers the ringing phone and ends a conversation when you open or close the flip. Is it dangerous? Not likely, but who knows. I guess you ought to get your galvanometer out of retirement and check it out! ------------------------------ From: eschwa@csn.net (Emerson Schwartzkopf) Subject: Re: Denver International Airport Date: 20 Mar 1995 15:07:36 GMT Organization: Colorado Supernet Another amusing tidbit: While the airport opened a year-and-a-half late, there still isn't full looping of all the concourses for cellular service. Cell phones will work in the main Jeppesen Terminal, but not in the three concourses. So, if you're flying through Denver and want to use your cell phone, you need to ride a little subway train back to the main terminal, out to the non-secured area, and into a fairly noisy building that kinda looks like a spiffy shopping mall. One good point on DIA and pay phones -- a bank of eight is placed between every two gates in the passenger waiting areas. Emerson Schwartzkopf Gunnison, Colorado eschwa@csn.org A warm spot in a cold place [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Emerson, I am curious: are you related to either the General or to Elizabeth? PAT] ------------------------------ From: syndesis@beta.inc.net (John Foust) Subject: Re: Wireless Modems? (now FreeWave Tech modems) Date: 20 Mar 1995 20:47:01 GMT Organization: Syndesis Corporation In article <3k3m4u$r0n@pandora.sdsu.edu>, larryr@saturn.sdsu.edu (Larry Riedel) says: > What are my choices for wireless modems with a range of a few km > and at least 112/128kbps throughput? Someone told me about: >> Ah, you're thinking of a FreeWave Technologies wireless, frequency-hopping, >> spread-spectrum modem, which operates at 115.2 kbps uncompressed throughput. >> There are links up to 20 miles, the modems are expensive ($1,250), but no >> license is required. Call FreeWave at +1.303/444-3862 to get more info. I'd love to hear from users of this product. Even at $1250, it sounds cheaper than an install of switched 56 or frame relay, not to mention the monthly charge for a haul of 20 miles. Great for jumping LATAs, too, or a home-office link. So what kind of data connection is on the back of this box? ------------------------------ From: Roy A. Mccrory Subject: Re: Trying to Locate Recommendation E.123 Date: Sun, 19 Mar 1995 20:50:17 MST Wolf wrote: > It was mentioned in TELECOM Digest that one "might wish to access the > PostScript format files available from the ITU" for the E.123 > recommendation. > How does one access ITU? I searched the Digest header, but there was > no mention of ITU's location, and the only other reference I can find > is to itu.edu, which does not have direct ftp access. I believe that they have a gopher -- gopher://gopher.itu.ch/. I have tried their www server without success. I get the dreaded "cannot access" message and my mail to Mr. Shaw at itu.ch bounces. Roy A.& URL http://192.149.217.20/ ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 20 Mar 1995 16:48:41 EST Subject: Re: GTE (GTD-5) ISDN is Coming Organization: Digital Equipment Computer Users Society From: holdrege@eisner.decus.org (Matt Holdrege) In article , lauren@vortex.com (Lauren Weinstein) writes ... > Greetings. To my considerable surprise given previously available > information, I've learned from the data folks at GTE California that > widespread ISDN implementation in their GTD-5 service areas will be > rolling out this year. This is surprising since previously I had been > led to believe that not only would ISDN service not be supported > directly through GTD-5 switches, but that no plans for backhauling > ISDN into those areas had been made. Actually, GTE has been providing ISDN to GTD-5 offices via overlay for some time now. Additionally, GTE started rolling out PRI on the GTD-5 a few months ago. > Apparently, this has all changed. For example, parts of the West Los > Angeles area served by GTD-5 switches are slated for ISDN on 9/1, > including remote RSUs served by those switches. There seems to be a > general (no pun intended) plan to widely provide ISDN in those areas > through what GTE is calling "overlays". Most of the GTD-5's in the LA area now have ISDN served by the overlay network. Matt holdrege@eisner.decus.org ------------------------------ From: mike@hermes.louisville.edu (Mike Harpe) Subject: Re: T1->10BaseT: How? Date: 20 Mar 1995 15:34:45 -0500 Organization: University of Louisville, Louisville KY USA Get the two networks running, buy a Cisco 2501 for each end and connect them together via a leased T-1 with your favorite SDLC CSU/DSU on each end. We do it several places here at U of L. The other guy was right. Call your Cisco rep. They'll tell you all about it. Michael Harpe, Communications Analyst III Information Technology Internet: mike@hermes.louisville.edu University of Louisville (502) 852-5542 (Voice) (502) 852-1400 (FAX) Louisville, Ky. 40292 ------------------------------ From: Mike Stump Subject: Re: T1 -> Modems Organization: Kithrup Enterprises, Ltd. Date: Mon, 20 Mar 1995 20:22:00 GMT In article , Steve Cogorno wrote: > ScottPCS (scottpcs@aol.com) wrote: > Rates in the Pacific Bell Service area for data packets are: > .05 CENTS for transaction setup > .005 CENTS per octet of data At $900/minute for a connection, you might seriously consider something else, anything else. (Compared to a v.34 modem call, 100% utilization.) ------------------------------ Subject: Re: NYNEX: Idiocy in pricing From: rblau@neteast.com (RUSSELL BLAU) Date: Mon, 13 Mar 95 00:18:00 -0500 Organization: Online Technologies, Inc. - 301-738-0001 Reply-To: rblau@neteast.com (RUSSELL BLAU) In a recent article, Chris Labatt-Simon (labatt@disaster.com) wrote: > Can anyone tell me the rationale in the following? > Two "FlexPath" T1s composed of 48 DIDs total cost ~$3500/month > (FlexPath is based on mileage and the location is ~2 miles from the > closest switch). > 48 standard individual business lines will cost about $1,200/month. > Now, I'd like to know (sarcastically speaking of course) which is more > difficult to install and maintain?? 2 Ts or 48 individual jacks/lines? Personally, I never thought I would find myself in the position of defending anything that NYNEX does, however, look at what you are comparing. Flexpath is a DID trunk service. Therefore, you should compare it to the price of 48 analog DID trunks, not 48 individual measured business lines. Russell Blau Swidler & Berlin, Chtd. Washington, D.C. ------------------------------ From: alta@pacrain.com Subject: Re: Callback System Hardware and Software? Date: 20 Mar 1995 09:51:03 GMT Organization: RAIN Public Access Internet (805) 967-RAIN Bernardo Lam (blam@panix.com) wrote: > Does anyone know where I can find information about the equipment and > software required for setting up a callback system? Try OneCom, at (805)565-5997. They, along with another company called Powercom, sell turnkey callback solutions, with state-of-the-art specialized callback switches, made by a company called ICON. Douglas Frank ------------------------------ From: Chris.Farrar@p1.f20.n246.z1.fidonet.org (Chris Farrar) Date: 20 Mar 95 20:38:09 -0500 Subject: Call Screen, aka *60 Organization: FidoNet Nameserver/Gateway I recently encountered a problem with Call Screen, or whatever you local telco calls the service under access code *60. You are supposed to be able to enter a phone number or numbers that you do not wish to accept calls from, and the caller will be routed to an intercept stating something politically correct in that you aren't taking calls at the moment. Well, here in Bell Canada land, we frequently receive Caller ID from the US. Some travel and promotion company in Tampa, FL was calling several times during the day, and hanging up on the answering machine. Problem is, that I was generally asleep at the times the calls came in, due to working midnights. Attempting to enter the offending number resulted in a message "the number you have entered can't be reached by this service." I tried it several times in two different ways, 813-915-XXXX and 1-813-915-XXXX. Each time, I'd get the above message. However, if I used #01# to reject the last calling party, the system would accept the number, and tell me, the "the number you have entered is 813-915-XXXX. Please continue..." . This works great, providing you don't have any subsequent calls between the time the offending number calls in and the time you go to block it. However, if I enter a number in Bell Canada territory, such as 416-274-XXXX or 1-905-625-XXXX, the system will accept it for blocking with no problems. Is there a bug/flaw in the setup of my telco's implementation of Call Screen, and is there a known fix that I can bring to their attention, as so far they say they can't find any problem. Email: Chris.Farrar@p1.f20.n246.z1.fidonet.org or ai703@detroit.freenet.org ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 20 Mar 1995 11:12:08 -0800 From: mrehmus@shell.portal.com (Mike Rehmus) Subject: Gray Associates WEB Site Up and Running Gray Associates is the leading supplier of facsimile engineering tools. Our site is designed to be your source of information not only of our company and products, but for all net-borne information on facsimile. Please take a look at our expanding tutorial on facsimile protocol standards and industry practice, and try some of our links to other FAX resources. hppt://www.grayfax.com Mike Rehmus mrehmus@grayfax.com 408 251-0263 408 251-0264 facsimile ------------------------------ From: dave@westmark.com (Dave Levenson) Subject: Re: Reinvention Team Dials in on U.S. Federal Phone Improvements Organization: Westmark, Inc. Date: Mon, 20 Mar 1995 15:01:38 GMT Pat writes: > Do any of you old-timers who remember the days of manual telephone > service remember the Bell System comment that 'if manual service were > to be continued, within the next several years, if every single woman > in the USA over the age of 18 was employed as a telephone operator, > there still wouldn't be any way to keep up with the demand for connections.' > Yes, Bell made that comment after a study in the 1950's as they were > beginning to phase in dial service. Now I have to wonder if by the > year 2000, and everyone in the USA was employed as a customer service/ > telephone attendant/operator if there would be any way to keep up with > demand for on the spot, telephone information. PAT] The classic rejoinder to the Bell System comment is that if everyone over the age of 18 were employed as a telephone operator, there would be nobody left who is not a telephone operator ... and therefore, nobody to place all of the telephone calls these operators would be waiting to connect! The same is true for customer-service personnel. The number of providers is, indeed, too small in many companies and in many government agencies. But continually increasing the number of servers will, at some point, diminish the number of clients, and therefore, the demand for service. Dave Levenson Internet: dave@westmark.com Westmark, Inc. UUCP: uunet!westmark!dave Stirling, NJ, USA Voice: 908 647 0900 Fax: 908 647 6857 [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: But they would not all be working at the same instant on the same day or in the same industry. The customer service clerk at a company may still want to make a personal call on her lunch or break period to find out about her social security benefits for example. So she'll need to use the services of both the telephone operator and the clerk at the government office. I heard the rejoinder to the Bell System comment a long time ago; and Bell's rejoinder to the rejoinder (?) was simply, "Well, we never said they would all be working at the same time ... two thirds of them would be off duty at any given time and perhaps wanting to make phone calls." Nor did they ever say 'all the *people* over the age of 18' ... they said 'all the *women* over the age of 18'. PAT] ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 19 Mar 1995 10:44:00 -0500 From: richard@mandarin.com Subject: Re: AT&T 500 Service Outside the USA PAT said: > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I got a call via my 500 number the > other day from someone at British Telecom who was experimenting with > the service trying to get it to work from the UK. Then the next day > I got a call from someone at AT&T who had been working with that > person at BT. They did not tell me what they had decided, or what > action was taken. Well, when Mercury (a UK competitor of BT) tried to set up links from the UK into AT&T's 500 service, their calls got rejected by the AT&T switch. When they tried to follow this up later with AT&T, the first representative they spoke to wouldn't help them: and they were called back by a manager who wanted to know where they had gotten the number from. It was, Mercury were told, "a special private network for the use of the US government only"! That's what might be expected if they had been trying to get access to +1-710: but it very definitely was +1-500. Some people at Mercury aren't talking to me right now -- they think I had been setting them up. Come on, AT&T, tell us (and Mercury) what is going on here. Richard D G Cox Mandarin Technology, P.O. Box 111, Penarth, South Glamorgan CF64 3YG Voice: 0956 700111; Fax: 0956 700110; VoiceMail: 0941 151515 e-mail address: richard@mandarin.com; [PGP2.6 public key on request] [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Isn't that precious! A private network for the US Government ... on 1/0-500. And a manager saying this yet; my, my. Reminds me of the time I called repair service to report some problem long since forgotten. I got called back by a repair clerk a bit later but was not here to take her call, however her *seven digit number* was on my caller-id display. So I punched the button on my box that calls back the number shown on the display. We talked a couple minutes and she promised to call me back. Instead of her calling back, maybe ten minutes later I was called by a very high level person in repair with a complaint about me: "You are using *unauthorized numbers* to call direct into our repair department. You are not to do this again and if you do you will get in big trouble, Mister!" I told her all I did was return a call to the number displayed on my caller-id box -- the service they sell to people, remember? -- and maybe she was the one who needed to get into some Big Trouble, and could I be of assistance in getting that accomplished? She had *no idea* how caller-id worked, or that internal numbers at Bell showed up on display boxes just like all other numbers, but she supervised a bunch of repair clerks, by golly ... since her number was on my display box also at that point when we hung up I dialed her back the same way, and she was furious. Remember, I mentioned here before that the first or second day of my 500 service being in operation and giving out the number -- 500-677-1616 -- I got called at seven in the morning by a guy working for AT&T on the east coast who hadn't the foggiest idea what he was calling either. I was so astounded I had to say, 'excuse me, you *do* work for AT&T?' ... Yes he did, but he had never heard of 500 service. Now wouldn't you think that when the company introduced this new service they would have gone out of their way to make sure *every employee* knew about it? It certainly is a wonderful service; AT&T is providing a great thing, why did they not explain it to all their employees and get everyone aware of how it worked and what a good deal it is? So ... come one, come all! Dial me now at -500-677-1616 here in the USA. If you can't get through, then advise your telecom admin- istration that its AT&T's new 'personal number service' and ask them to intervene and help you place your call. I want to be able to receive calls from my readers and friends all over the world. I want them to be able to locate me wherever I may be ... that's what I am paying for isn't it? And when you call, please let me know if you have yet sent in your sub- scription donation for the Digest. Quite a few of you have responded and I thank each of you for your financial assistance for the Digest. If you have not yet done so, please subscribe today. The suggested donation amount is twenty dollars per reader per year. Write: TELECOM Digest / 9457-D Niles Center Road / Skokie, IL 60076. Or phone me anytime -- 500-677-1616. Thank you! PAT] ------------------------------ From: sharon@earth.execpc.com (Sharon Ziebert) Subject: Telecommunications on Demand Reseller Package Date: 20 Mar 1995 16:02:47 GMT Organization: Exec-PC TELECOMMUNICATIONS ON DEMAND, INC. (TOD) - and a major west coast reseller have jointly developed the best package that TOD has ever offered. This program is NOT for 'dabblers'. We have persuaded the reseller to make the following concessions by promising them only serious marketers. The package is superior to what they normally offer. WILTEL PRODUCT Commissions will be PAID UPON BILLING. In some instances, commissions can actually paid UPON SUBMISSION. The following are some examples. 15.5% COMMISSION: INTERSTATE PEAK $.1453 OFF-PEAK $.1308 California .1069 .1069 Florida .1448 .1159 New York .1400 .1120 Texas .1645 .1316 12.5% COMMISSION: INTERSTATE PEAK $.1372 OFF-PEAK $.1236 California .1010 .1010 Florida .1368 .1094 New York .1322 .1058 Texas .1553 .1243 9.5% COMMISSION: INTERSTATE RATE PEAK $.1300 OFF-PEAK $.1171 California .0957 .0957 Florida .1296 .1037 New York .1253 .1002 Texas .1472 .1178 5.5% COMMISSION: INTERSTATE RATE PEAK $.1235 OFF-PEAK $.1112 California .0909 .0909 Florida .1231 .0985 New York .1190 .0952 Texas .1398 .1119 PROGRAM HIGHLIGHTS & INFORMATION 1) You will be contracted directly to the Service-Provider. You will also be PAID DIRECTLY by the Service-Provider. 2) A TOD staff person will be available to support (toll-free) your marketing efforts for this program. 3) You will be offered a substantial discount on qualified leads. If your production warrants it, you be offered leads at NO cost. 4) You will not be responsible for bad debt. 5) There are NO billing fees (outbound or inbound) to your customers. 6) There are no 'short-fall' penalties. The only volume commitment is $10K of business within 12 months. This is an easy number to achieve. In fact, a start-up should be able to produce at this level. Irregardless, if 10K is not achieved within 12 months, then the Reseller reserves the right to not accept additional order. HOWEVER, THEY MUST CONTINUE TO PAY YOU THE SAME MONTHLY RESIDUAL COMMISSIONS ON YOUR EXISTING BASE OF BUSINESS. For more information contact: Telecommunications On Demand, INC. (TOD) Midwest Office N38 W26876 Glacier Road Pewaukee, WI53072 (800) 781-5063 FAX (414) 691-4336 internet: sharon@execpc.com ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V15 #157 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa09736; 21 Mar 95 6:27 EST Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA24142; Tue, 21 Mar 95 00:12:13 CST Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA24136; Tue, 21 Mar 95 00:12:11 CST Date: Tue, 21 Mar 95 00:12:11 CST From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest (Patrick Townson)) Message-Id: <9503210612.AA24136@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V15 #158 TELECOM Digest Tue, 21 Mar 95 00:12:00 CST Volume 15 : Issue 158 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Re: Cellular Fraud in the News Again (Bob Compiano) Re: Cellular Fraud in the News Again (Phil Ritter) Re: Cellular Fraud in the News Again (Mike Frere) Re: New Bell Atlantic Service (Michael D. Sullivan) Re: Consuming Ourselves Into Oblivion (Chris Hardaker) Re: Help: E Telco Step-by-Step Switch (Bob Dunscomb) Re: ADCPM and CO's (Les Reeves) Re: T1 -> Modems (Rich Greenberg) Re: Trying to Locate Recommendation E.123 (Peter M. Weiss) Re: Trying to Locate Recommendation E.123 (Wally Ritchie) Re: NYNEX: Idiocy in Pricing (Terry Kennedy) Last Laugh! Techie SOs Unite! (Shirley Clawson via John Shaver) 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 America On Line. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available 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: 500-677-1616 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. A suggested donation of twenty dollars per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above. 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: Mon, 20 Mar 1995 15:19:04 -0500 From: Bob Compiano <74774.3167@CompuServe.COM> Subject: Re: Cellular Fraud in the News Again Organization: via CompuServe Information Service Why don't you work on that figure a bit (my lame excuse is I don't have a calculator) and see how many minutes a day it would take to rack up that figure, then divide by the top 35 major cellular markets and see if it is a reasonable amount of talking per city. If the numbers are too high you'll see that it is not possible for that much fraud to go on unless the per minute charge is some high, high figure. This would just help see if the figures fit in with reality or not. Doesn't do anything to confirm if the figures are accurate. Tell her she should do a follow up article on how they uncover the cloning operations. I don't know for sure, but I suspect they have equipment to detect receivers tuned to the coordination channel of the cellular band. Then they probably sit some place where there are traffic jams regularly and then scan for people who have receivers tuned to the coord. The equipment would have to be very, very sensitive. The cloners, on the other hand, may be aware of this and are probably taking counter-counter measures, including heavy shielding of their equipment, etc. etc. Bob ------------------------------ From: pritter@nit.AirTouch.COM (Phil Ritter) Subject: Re: Cellular Fraud in the News Again Organization: AirTouch Cellular, Los Angeles Date: Mon, 20 Mar 1995 22:16:45 GMT In article telecom@eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest Editor) writes: > Over the weekend in the {Chicago Tribune} writer Kathy O'Malley offered > an interesting article on cellular fraud, primarily discussing how > phones are cloned and then abused. > The thing which caught my eye, and which I discussed with her briefly on > the phone Monday morning was her tossing around of the figures given to > her by some industry people: $1.3 million per day in fraud; and that > this represented four percent of the industry's annual traffic. By my > calculations, 1.3 million per day comes to about $454 million per year, > and that figure is four percent of what astronomical amount? I don't want to get into the "Hard $$/Soft $$" debate. It is a difficult subject, somewhat like a religious argument, that we are unlikely to come to terms upon. Besides, I'm much too close to it to be objective and may have to deal in proprietary information to talk intelligently (which I am not authorized to do ... [reveal proprietary info, that is :-)]). However, the "annual revenue" for the "cellular industry" that is implied above is not only not astronomical, but probably understates the the actual industry revenues (well, OK, it is astronomical, but in the context above Pat also implies that it could not possibly be that high -- I contend that it is actually higher!). Here's how I back up that claim: Get a copy of "AirTouch Communications Facts & Financials" dated February 8, 1995 (order by calling Investor Relations, 415-658-2040). I am using this public information so that I do not have to deal with anything that might be proprietary (and that might get me into trouble ;-). Note that AirTouch' "Domestic Cellular Proportionate Results" shows domestic cellular revenues $1,149,0000,000, which mostly represents Los Angeles, San Diego, Atlanta, Sacramemto, and about 1/2 each of San Franscisco, Michigan & Ohio. There are a few more minority interests, but they are probably not significant for this "back of the envelope" argument. See Page 14 of the above reference. Assume that all of these markets are highly competetive and that that other system in each of these markets have approximately equal revenues. These markets then represent $2,298,000,000 in annual revenues. The "astronomical" industry revenue represented above is $454,000,000/.04 = $11,350,000,000. AirTouch and their direct market to market competetors account for 20.25%. Note that this revenue only represents 5.5 markets; No stretch of the imagination to see that these are less than 20% of total cellular markets and revenue. Therefore, the baseline implied for industry revenues is not inflated. No, Pat, these figures are probably realistic, not inflated. Now, the hard $$/soft $$ debate can continue without assuming that the baseline figures are inflated. Phil Ritter pritter@la.airtouch.com [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I did not get into a 'hard/soft' discussion with her; I wanted to see mainly if anything could be done with that '$1.3 million per day which is four percent of annual revenues' comment. I don't know how far I would get with her on the 'hard/soft' discussion anyway; her interest in the matter is as a consumer. She said to me her entire knowledge of cellular phones was that 'she turns it on and expects it to work ...'. She said she was inspired to write the piece based on the two instances of cloning which happened to her in the past year. Basically it was a good article and pretty factual. PAT] ------------------------------ From: Mfrere Subject: Re: Cellular Fraud in the News Again Date: 21 Mar 1995 02:36:32 GMT Organization: Solect Technology Group telecom@eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest Editor) wrote: > Over the weekend in the {Chicago Tribune} writer Kathy O'Malley offered > an interesting article on cellular fraud, primarily discussing how > phones are cloned and then abused. > The thing which caught my eye, and which I discussed with her briefly on > the phone Monday morning was her tossing around of the figures given to > her by some industry people: $1.3 million per day in fraud; and that > this represented four percent of the industry's annual traffic. By my > calculations, 1.3 million per day comes to about $454 million per year, > and that figure is four percent of what astronomical amount? > I know we have had discussions on this here before and many of you contend > losses due to fraud -- while a significant problem -- are substantially > less that the dollar amounts quoted on a routine basis in the media and > by industry representatives. > Ms. O'Malley asked me, if $1.3 million per day is *not* correct, then > what amount is correct or more realistic? I'd like to forward her some > more accurate data if that is possible. Can anyone provide anything? > She said to me she was prompted to write the article based on her own > unfortunate experiences of being cloned twice in the past year. I told > her I could easily see and understand her feelings, but that overstating > the amount in question did not benefit anyone ... some of you here explained > that to me the last time this topic came up. > She is at the {Chicago Tribune}, 435 North Michigan Avenue, Chicago 60611 > if you care to provide rebuttal, although it might be best if you send > it to me and I will pass it along. I think it will be difficult to get that number. Most companies are rather reluctant to provide that info, and it's a moving target anyway. I had a cellular fraud presentation last year, and the amount of overseas air time a cloned phone can ring up is wild! Up to $5500 a day per phone! This company regularly looks at the top ten daily users and cuts off on average six of them. They look at each phone's background, calling patterns, etc. If Joe Average has no record of calling Red China and is suddenly ringing up 18 hours of calls there, you're pretty sure its fraud! To fight this they don't give overseas calling privileges automatically. You need to ask for it. Also some carriers are now using PIN ID. Every call or LD call, you need to enter your PIN first. They also had alot of voice mail fraud. Alot of people use their last four numbers as their password. People can easaly figure out which block of phone numbers are assigned to cellular and hack in, change the password, then use the box for automated third party LD approval! They would change the persons greeting to yes,yes,yes,yes,yes,yes,yes, ... Then they would call the automated operator and tell it to bill to that mailbox number. The operator would call the box, wait for an acknoledgement, get 'YES' and put the call through! The companies have had little help from the overworked police, so they don't get to prosecute much. They just try to stay ahead of the game. Later, Mike ------------------------------ From: mds@access.digex.net (Michael D. Sullivan) Subject: Re: New Bell Atlantic Service Date: 20 Mar 1995 23:34:11 -0500 Organization: Wilkinson, Barker, Knauer & Quinn (Washington, DC, USA) Regarding Chris Cartwright's posting on Bell Atlantic's T-Mail: In the form T-mail will initially be made available, it won't be of much use to telemarketers. You can only store 25 numbers in a list, and you only have three lists. So you can only do a mass-T-mailing to 75 numbers. You would have to have the patience of Job (and a staff of dialing idiot-savants) to enter 400,000 numbers into such a format. Key in three lists of 25; record message; send; delete lists; repeat 5333 times. It would make more sense simply to hire a telemarketing boiler room (can't use an autodialer and a recorded message due to a law passed a couple of years ago). This isn't to say that a more commercial version won't be made available, however, once the experiment is through. Michael D. Sullivan | INTERNET E-MAIL TO: mds@access.digex.net Bethesda, Md., USA | also avogadro@well.com, 74160.1134@compuserve.com ------------------------------ From: Chris Hardaker Subject: Re: Consuming Ourselves Into Oblivion Date: Tue, 21 Mar 95 16:54:00 PST Mr. Martin raised a good point. I do, however, see a 'bright' side to all this. Humans invented the printed word. Then advertising discovered the printed word. Humans invented radio, then advertising discovered radio. Advertising were getting good at this by now so when humans invented television, advertising where already there, waiting. Every mass market attracts advertising. With the media hype, the 'Net' has become another mass market and advertising are ready to climb aboard. It's not that advertising follows technological advances, it's more that every time advertising comes along to 'pervert' the course of a technology, humans run, hide and invent a new technology just to bug the living hell out of advertisers. It's classic Tom and Jerry stuff. Cat chases mouse, mouse can't run as fast so slowly cat catches up. BUT just as the paw is about to spell the demise of our hero the mouse, there is a small hole in the wall, just big enough for the mouse to get thru ... WHAM a flat faced cat and all you hear is a mouse sniggering in the background. The 'Net' race has begun, the advertising cat is bigger than before and faster, but I'm running. In a year or two I will need a technological hole to dive through. So while the humans at the leading edge of technology are trying to invent the next giant leap for telecommunications, I'm happy to play cat and mouse and dream of hearing the WHAM as I slip away from advertising's graps. I only hope my firewall can handle the pressure until then ... Your expectantly, Chris Hardaker CLEAR Communications Auckland New Zealand HARDAKER@clear.co.nz +64 9 912 4286 Voice +64 9 912 4452 Fax [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I hope your firewall holds up. I can tell you the amount of advertising I get in a day's time here for the Digest and comp.dcom.telecom is pretty incredible. All kinds of messages with things for sale; personnel recruiting (head-hunting) type messages, etc. One person at some personnel company sends me a dozen messages at a time about the kinds of people they are looking for on behalf of their clients. And the nervy part is, not once do any of these jokers offer to send me nickle one ... they heard the Internet is 'free' and can't possibly imagine why they should have to pay to help support it. On three different occassions this person has sent me a big bunch of messages looking for people to fill various positions. I wrote back once saying 'you know, you charge your clients big $$ to fill these positions, how about becoming a corporate sponsor here in order that I can improve the Digest for all the readers ... who knows, I might develop a mailing list for the exchange of human resources information for the readers ...'. Instead of getting back an answer to that, instead I get two more big batches of messages to be run. :( Every small business is now setting up a home window they want you to look at, and they want me to tell you about. I do tell you about quite a few of them, but I can see where that is going to have to stop soon also; I've been reluctant to help some in this way while refusing to help others, or to show favoritism, but it is going to have to halt soon. None of them bother to read the archives or the back issues; they don't even want to subscribe presently; they just want a place to dump their commercial messages. Some days I feel like so much of my time is wasted doing this stuff. PAT] ------------------------------ From: dunscomb@aol.com (Dunscomb) Subject: Re: Help: E Telco Step-by-Step Switch Date: 20 Mar 1995 08:30:52 -0500 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) Reply-To: dunscomb@aol.com (Dunscomb) When I worked as a Craftsman for AT&T Long Lines (away back in ought-55) we were told that "KS" stood for "Kearny Specification", and that a KS number was applied to every part manufactured for the Bell System by anyone other than Western Electric. Kearny, NJ, was the location of an enormous Western Electric complex, so the first part of the story seems plausible. That the second part was true was, to quote Thomas Jefferson, "self-evident". Bob Dunscomb, Maxwell Consulting ------------------------------ From: lreeves@crl.com (Les Reeves) Subject: Re: ADCPM and CO's Date: 19 Mar 1995 07:02:10 -0800 Organization: CR Labs Steven Bergman (sbergman@ix.netcom.com) wrote: > I was wondering if anyone know of a resource whereby I could determine > whether a particular CO supported both ISDN and ADPCM. Also, what > devices, if any, are out there that currently combine the two of them in > some way. For ISDN, call the business office, and when they say they don't know ask them for someone in data communications marketing. Regarding ADPCM, in the context of ISDN I would think this is a terminal adapter issue. Les lreeves@crl.com Atlanta,GA 404.874.7806 ------------------------------ From: richgr@netcom.com (Rich Greenberg) Subject: Re: T1 -> Modems Date: Sun, 19 Mar 1995 03:30:11 GMT In article scottpcs@aol.com (ScottPCS) writes: >>> I need to bring in a T1 line to 24 1200 baud modems for my company. > Bill Grenoble responded: >> I have seen a T1 rack mount modem (V.Fast I think), but it cost more > Unfortunately the originator is a Verifone credit card terminal and > only has a 1200 baud modem. It is not possible at this time to get a > 2400 or faster. But the call length is only a few seconds and a > faster speed would not significantly shorten the call. For this type of application, 1200 baud is the best speed to use. The connection is so short that a faster modem would take longer in training than the data transmission at 1200 would take. The newest bells and whisles are not always the appropriate technology. Rich Greenberg Work: TBA. Know anybody needing a VM guru? N6LRT TinselTown, USA Play: richgr@netcom.com 310-649-0238 ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 20 Mar 1995 13:07:02 EST From: Peter M. Weiss Subject: Re: Trying to Locate Recommendation E.123 Organization: Penn State University Though I can find a gopher at info.itu.ch, and ITU-T and its submenu ITU-E series, I can not locate that specific one E.123 (nor does a gopher search at that site). -- co-owner INFOSYS, TQM-L, CPARK-L, ERAPPA-L, JANITORS, LDBASE-L, et -L Pete-Weiss@psu.edu "Ready, Aim, Fire, OOPS!" +1 814 863 1843 31 Shields Bldg. -- Penn State Univ -- University Park, PA 16802-1202 USA ------------------------------ From: writchie@gate.net Subject: Re: Trying to Locate Recommendation E.123 Date: 19 Mar 1995 04:01:55 GMT Reply-To: writchie@gate.net In , Wolf writes: > It was mentioned in TELECOM Digest that one "might wish to access the > PostScript format files available from the ITU" for the E.123 > recommendation. > How does one access ITU? I searched the Digest header, but there was > no mention of ITU's location, and the only other reference I can find > is to itu.edu, which does not have direct ftp access. ITU operates a gopher server where you get everything at: info.itu.ch Wally Ritchie Ft. Lauderdale, Florida ------------------------------ From: terry@spcvxb.spc.edu (Terry Kennedy) Subject: Re: NYNEX: Idiocy in Pricing Organization: St. Peter's College, US Date: Sun, 19 Mar 1995 19:25:17 GMT In article , rblau@neteast.com (RUSSELL BLAU) writes: > Personally, I never thought I would find myself in the position of > defending anything that NYNEX does ... however, look at what you are > comparing. Flexpath is a DID trunk service. Therefore, you should compare > it to the price of 48 analog DID trunks, not 48 individual measured > business lines. Unfortunately, if I want 48 numbers delivered on two T1's (perhaps because I have a US Robotics modem chassis that takes T1's and turns them into Ethernet packets), I wind up paying the same premium as the customer who wants DID service. If I have enough lines that NYNEX would bring me digital entrance facilities anyway, I'd have to pay them *more* to just leave the T's and not install a SLC/DIS*C/whatever to turn it back into copper. Worse yet, NYNEX's competitors price their service by being a certain percentage less than NYNEX's rates, without considering types of services that NYNEX isn't supplying. Until the competition gets their heads out of the sand, we're not going to see "real competition" for these services -- being 15% less than an unacceptable price won't cut it. Terry Kennedy Operations Manager, Academic Computing terry@spcvxa.spc.edu St. Peter's College, Jersey City, NJ USA +1 201 915 9381 (voice) +1 201 435-3662 (FAX) ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 08 Mar 95 09:08:59 MST From: John Shaver Subject: Last Laugh! Techie SOs Unite! SIGNIFICANT OTHERS SPEAK OUT !!! By: Shirley Clawson So you've found yourself attracted to a computer nerd. (Sorry techies; that IS what those of us that exist in the real world call you.) Spousal units and significant others (collectively referred to herein as "SO's") who have long endured the idiosyncrasies of their techie mates have banded together to provide the unsuspecting "future significant other" a peek at existence with: THE TECHIE. But first, a couple of disclaimers: All persons and events portrayed in this article are real and any resemblance to actual people or incidents is entirely intentional. Techies portrayed herein are of the male variety but male SO's have confirmed that they experience the same phenomenon in relation to their female techies. To properly co-exist with a techie, you must first understand three basic premises on which his view of the world is based: 1. There is a proper order in the universe. Computers come first; significant others somewhere thereafter. 2. Programmers, while reluctantly admitting (subsequent to intense pressure) that they are not God, are however, equal to God. 3. Computer illiterate people are complete morons. These three premises result in techies having a drastically different way of thinking as compared to the average person. This unique approach to life will be exhibited on a daily basis in many subtle ways: TOPIC WHAT YOU'RE THINKING WHAT HE'S THINKING ============== ======================= =========================== Ideal Vacation Tahiti Las Vegas -- during Comdex Shopping Trip New wardrobe Computer bookstore Eating Out Chez Romantic Vending machine at the office Fun Weekend Picnic in the mountains Non-stop programming 6 A.M. Romantic sunrise Late night of programming People over for Dinner Friends, Conversation Victims to view latest software developments Tax Time Call an accountant Order a tax package for SO Looking at Stereo Equipment Casual browsing Select model, Close deal Share Housework 50/50 Refrain from complaining that Pepsi isn't restocked Spending more time with Children Interactive Learning Set up Barbies next to computer Reason to cash out Investments Child's Education This years BMW's look good It is true that techies rarely subscribe to GQ magazine but, in all fairness, let's dispense with the slide-rule, taped glasses, white, button-down shirt stereotype. They no longer wear slide-rules; laptops are in. Taped glasses -- well, ok, sometimes. White shirts have been replaced by t-shirts and flowered Hawaiian atrocities. "Dressing up" for a special occasion entails putting on jeans and a wrinkled shirt with a collar. If you happen to be domestically inclined, don't bother ironing shirts (or if you're not, feeling guilty about NOT ironing them) because pressed shirts are simply not a priority in a Techie's life and neither he nor any of his contemporaries will notice that the shirt he's wearing looks like it's been trapped between his mattress and box springs for a year. Material possessions are of vital importance to the techie. Of paramount importance is: THE CAR. The cost of this is directly proportional to the size of: THE EGO. There are two types of vehicles owned by techies: 1966 station wagons with deteriorating wood on the sides OR the most expensive vehicle income will allow. (Neither category would be caught dead, however, driving a car with a Mary Kay bumper sticker attached.) Single techies can be identified by their dumpy apartments, frayed clothing and impeccably maintained Ferraris. Techies with vehicles in the second category assemble their machines for the annual Testosterone 500. Grown men gather at an area race track, spend 90 percent of the day walking around bragging about their car to anyone who will listen and devote the balance of the time tearing around on a track hoping they won't kill themselves. What we are witnessing is NOT simply a car race, but rather a battle of the egos. This same group of techies has also mastered the art of maneuvering discussion of THE CAR into every conversation. The home computer system is another source of competition. Our family of four (techie, SO, eight and two year old) is the proud owner of six computers, seven monitors, three laser printers, two dot matrix printers, two scanners, two optical disk drives, a CD ROM drive, and four boxes of cables that "might come in handy someday". Most appalling of all is that the two year old is limited to a 286 with an EGA! HORRORS! Special effort is made to explain to visiting techies that we are in the process of upgrading her system. Other elaborate electronic devices run a close second to the "home computer competition". Techies must always have the latest and the best of any electronic device on the market and they MUST be the first in their group to own one. We have established true superiority with our home PBX phone system with the capacity to handle ten incoming lines, conference calls, 45 auto-dial numbers and, best of all, music on hold. Oh, and our answering machine has voice mail capabilities, can receive fax transmissions and makes dinner. As you've probably already noticed, dating a techie has special challenges and rewards. Although your social hours are restricted to 11:00 p.m. - 3:00 a.m., you do have the opportunity to meet other SO's who, like you, are hanging around the office waiting for "just one more compile". A techie's estimate of "15 more minutes" generally means they will appear an hour or two later having absolutely no clue that more than 15 minutes has passed. If you do manage to convince your techie to take a vacation, plan on his inspecting the computer system at every hotel, gas station, restaurant, car rental agency and airline. Expect him to make suggestions for improvements to busboys, valets, maids and waiters, none of whom have the remotest interest in their establishment's computer system, much less any influence in this arena. Keep in mind also that no matter where you go, techies will find each other. The first trip I, my sweetie and his portable computer took together was to Europe. I was one of the lucky few to be dating a man who owned one of the first portable computers manufactured, which of course automatically entitled us to first class service everywhere. He no sooner had placed the computer on the airline tray table than six fellow techies leaped to his side to discuss the merits of the computer. Personal conversation with my traveling companion totalled ten minutes out of a six hour flight. Lunching with a group of techies is comparable to being dropped into a remote village in central Albania, with one major difference: Sign language is completely useless. They are speaking a foreign language and they are completely oblivious to this fact. My suggestion: Don't bother going. No one will notice that you were there anyway, including your techie. Parties dominated by techies are truly exciting experiences. Techies have never developed the art of smalltalk (their computers don't require this attribute) so don't expect to see a techie talking to a non-techie. If a techie was forced to bring his SO, he will feel obligated, however, to forego technical discussions for at least the first ten minutes. If you are unfortunate enough to be an SO with a "real job", you will encounter additional difficulties. The techie cannot fathom anyone going to work earlier than 10:00 a.m. He will tell you to simply inform your boss that you won't be starting until then. Techies are very well read. They devour books and articles on such exciting topics as memory management, VXD's and debugging but give them a book on relationships and watch the panic spread across their faces. Mention a couples workshop you think both of you should attend and watch those deadlines move up. At some point in their relationship, the SO must reveal to the techie that a romantic holiday does not entail bringing along a portable computer, stacks of computer magazines and a trunkload of listings. They will be expected to spend an entire weekend without their computer! If you make it through this traumatic experience, a marriage or move-in-together proposal may be in the air. Expect any proposal to be very practical. Important issues such as what kind of dog you will get, how much money will be allotted to ego-related purchases, and how much space will be allocated for the special, hands-off place for his computers in your future home must be settled before a techie will even consider a permanent relationship. (Critical tip: This allotted space will double in size within six months, often spewing out into other areas of your home if you have not planned ahead.) Your wedding date will be arranged around development conferences, COMDEX and technical crises. If, at some point in your relationship, you decide to have children, you will have to fit baby-making in between compiles. If you do manage to conceive, take a few photographs of your techie to tape over the baby's crib so your child will recognize your techie's face as well as his back. On a personal level, the techie is very supportive of his significant other. When I decided to diet, my techie stood by me and agreed to diet with me; as long as he didn't have to give up Pepsi and Twinkies. When I determined that I needed a new look, he promised not to laugh when I came back with a new hairdo and agreed to unlimited funding for purchases made at lingerie shops. The techie is also an accomplished gift-giver. Just last month, for my birthday, my techie gave me a Bug Zapper. (You know, one of those things that vaporizes the bugs flying around on your patio.) It seems he "heard me mention that we should get one." Guess he missed the references to the diamond necklace and pearl earrings. Last Christmas I was the proud recipient of a portable toolkit -- it's a beaut. Well, I'd better close now. I'm due for my 10:43 appointment to review the 1991 COMDEX floor plan with you-know-who. Never a dull moment ... -------------------- Biography: The author is married to a techie who denies exhibiting any of the aforementioned behavior and feigned ignorance when asked if he noticed these characteristics in any of his fellow techies. (c) Copyright 1991 by Shirley Clawson, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V15 #158 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa19952; 21 Mar 95 19:46 EST Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA07476; Tue, 21 Mar 95 13:33:07 CST Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA07469; Tue, 21 Mar 95 13:33:05 CST Date: Tue, 21 Mar 95 13:33:05 CST From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest (Patrick Townson)) Message-Id: <9503211933.AA07469@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V15 #159 TELECOM Digest Tue, 21 Mar 95 13:33:00 CST Volume 15 : Issue 159 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson 500 Service and Federal Telecom System (mstandrew@aol.com) Re: T3 Framing and Connection (synchro@access4.digex.net) Re: T3 Framing and Connection (Richard M. Kenshalo) Re: Bandwidth Question (synchro@access4.digex.net) Downloading Mac Software With a PC (Reid Goldsborough) Alarm Reporting Black Box (D.E. Jennings) CCIT G.711 PCM Format (also Dialogic 8khz, 8 bit PCM Format) (P. Chehowski) 100VG AnyLAN (Phil Ho) Sources For Telecom Law (khh@access2.digex.net) MicroUnity Contact Wanted (Stewart Fist) X25 and TCP/IP (Marios Scottis) Motorola Cell Programming Help Needed (Jim Knoll) Re: X.25/ISDN Prices; Global Information Wanted (Again) (Steve Cogorno) Re: X.25/ISDN Prices; Global Information Wanted (John Combs) Re: NYNEX: Idiocy in Pricing (Fred R. Goldstein) Re: Credit Checking on Cellular Customers (Jeff Wolfe) Re: Looking For "Help Desk" System (Joe Sulmar) Re: LAPD and Variants Implementation (Matthew P. Downs) Re: Benchmarking Internet Providers (Mike Rehmus) Re: Voicemail System Wanted (D.F. Anderson) Re: Recommendations For Good Primer on Telecom Technologies (D.F. Anderson) Last Laugh! Great Moments in Radio History (Nigel Allen) 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 America On Line. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available 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: 500-677-1616 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. A suggested donation of twenty dollars per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above. 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: mstrandrew@aol.com (MSTRANDREW) Subject: 500 Service and Federal Telecom System Date: 21 Mar 1995 11:26:41 -0500 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) Reply-To: mstrandrew@aol.com (MSTRANDREW) I asked a friend recently to call me from his work phone using my new ATT 500 number. He indicated that the local phone network accepted the 500 number, but the call would not process through FTS. Does any one know if FTS is going to get the message? I understand that FTS does not process international calls as well as calls to Canada. Since I call program my 500 number to any number in the world, I wonder if FTS wants to avoid accepting 500 numbers so that calls can not be forwarded to points outside the FTS system. On a totally unrelated note, does any one know if thought was given to assigning new NPAs to Guam (671) and American Samoa (684), so that they could be treated as "domestic" calls?? [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: In both Guam and American Samoa the locals refer to themselves as 'area code 671' and 'area code 684' when giving their phone number to persons needing to call them. Strictly speaking this is not true yet, but a recent chat I had with someone at Bellcore leads me to believe that soon enough the '011' international prefix will not be needed to those two points and that their area codes will simply be the country codes they have been using all along. Speaking of the South Pacific region, the 808 area code which traditionally has been just Hawaii was expanded about a year ago to include Midway Island and the United States Trust Territory collection of islands. PAT] ------------------------------ From: synchro@access4.digex.net (Steve) Subject: Re: T3 Framing and Connection Date: 21 Mar 1995 12:19:17 GMT Organization: Express Access Online Communications, Greenbelt, MD USA The details for the DS3 frame formats are best obtained from the source (i.e. ANSI document T1.107 or similar) because the frame structure is subdivided into subframes (it's hard to follow). C-bits are essentially only to be altered by DS3 sources. In the M13 arena, M23 mux sections use the C-bit to indicate the presence of stuffing. Whereas in C-bit parity applications it may be used for something else (like performance monitoring on the fly ...) The two coax connections are needed because each coax is a side of the channel (i.e. one for transmit, the other for receive). Fiber systems have these two coax connections for each DS3 also. The only thing that may come in the middle of any DS3 connection is just a manual jack field (DSX-3) or an electronic cross connect (an automatic version of a patch panel). ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 21 Mar 1995 09:04:27 -0800 From: RICHARD M KENSHALO Subject: Re: T3 Framing and Connection On 19 Mar 1995, Phillip Schuman <72510.1164@CompuServe.COM> wrote: > I'm looking for some brief explanation of the two kinds of framing > on T3 - M13 and C-parity. I'm pretty familiar with D4/SF and ESF. Two basic formats are used, each composed of the basic M-Frame structure. Both channelized (M13 format) and un-channelized (C-Bit Parity) service applications are supported. The various applications of the basic M-frame structure are distinguished from one another by the way the 21 C-bits are used. M13 format uses the 21 C-bits for bit stuffing. C-Bit Parity uses the C-bits for maintenance purposes. M13 Format (Subrated/Channelized DS3) - The M13 format will allow a DS3 signal to be channelized into 28 DS1s. C-Bit Parity Format (Subrated/Channelized and Non-Subrated/Non- Channelized DS3) - C-Bit Parity can be used for either channelized or non-channelized DS3 signals. It is recommended in all cases for non- channelized DS3 service because of it's superior maintenance capabilities over the standard M13 format. DS1 to DS3 multiplexing (channelized) using the C-Bit Parity format is the same two-step multiplexing process used for standard M13 (channelized) format except that bit stuffing is done at every opportunity during the second step of multiplexing. Since stuffing is done 100% of the time, the C-bits are no longer needed to indicate the presence of stuff bits, and are used for proprietary maintenance overhead capabilities. In the C-Bit Parity format, the 21 C-bits are allocated as follows: AIC = Application Identification Channel: 1 C-bit NA = Reserved Network Application bit: 1 C-bit FEA = Far-End Alarm bit: 1 C-bit DL = Data Link bits: 12 C-bits CP = C-Bit Parity bits: 3 C-bits FEBE = Far-End Block Error bits: 3 C-bits Path Level Monitoring Implications: M13 vs. C-Bit Parity Formats: With the M13 format, the only available path level monitoring technique is to use the P-bit, which is a parity designation for the entire payload (4704 bits of data). The problem is that most networking equipment interfacing at the DS3 level was designed to segment the network on a point to point basis. Thus, at intermediate points along the network, the network equipment corrects the value of the P-bit before transmitting the signal along the DS3 line. This results in no complete monitoring on a path basis. Path level monitoring using the C-Bit Parity format allows end to end monitoring of the path level since these bits are not altered anywhere along the path. Also, the FEBE allows the far end to indicate to the near end that a parity error on a block of data has occurred. > Also -- on a picture of the Digital Link T3 mux -- there are two BNC > connectors; are both used, or in/out or what? How does this work in > connecting to a fiber based system like T3 -- is there another > interface box between the telco and the CPE? One BNC is DS3 IN and one is DS3 OUT. No other interface box is required between the telco and the CPE, as long as the DS3 meets the following electrical interface requirements: Electrical Interface 1. The pulse amplitude shall be between 0.36 volts and 0.85 volts (peak), measured at the center of the pulse. 2. The transmission rate of the DS3 signal shall be 44.736 Mbps plus or minus 895 bps. 3. The line codes for the DS3 signal shall be Bipolar with 3 Zero Substitution (B3ZS). 4. The test load shall be a pure resistive termination of 75 ohms at the network interface and shall be used to evaluate signal characteristics. Hope this helps. Richard Kenshalo tsrmk@acad1.alaska.edu ------------------------------ From: synchro@access4.digex.net (Steve) Subject: Re: Bandwidth Question Date: 21 Mar 1995 12:01:32 GMT Organization: Express Access Online Communications, Greenbelt, MD USA "Switched 56" is a good way of doing an economical bandwidth on demand thing. With this you just dial up more 56kbps lines as you need them. You pay channel termination charges for each possible line; however, the rest is usage. Take it easy, Steve ------------------------------ From: reidgold@netaxs.com (Reid Goldsborough) Subject: Downloading Mac Software With a PC Date: 21 Mar 1995 17:25:04 GMT Organization: Philadlephia's Complete Internet Provider Here's the short version: What do I need to do to download Mac shareware and commercial bug fixes with a Windows-based PC to make the software usable on a Mac? Here's the long version: I have a Windows-based PC that I'm going to use as a word processor and telecommunications machine and a new Power Mac that I'm using as a graphics and desktop publishing machine. I'm trying to figure out, without success so far, how to download Mac software with the PC and transfer it so it's usable with the Mac. I understand that Mac software has these resource fork thingies, which complicates things. What I've done so far is grab from Apple's FTP server four files that update System 7.5 (they each have the extension .hqx). They're now sitting on my Windows PC's hard disk, renamed to conform to DOS 8.3 naming conventions (I'll rename them back once they're on the Mac's hard disk). One problem is that two of the compressed files are larger than 1.44 MB, so they can't fit on a floppy as is. The DOS program PKZip could handle this problem. I've downloaded the Mac PKZip unzip program. I actually found two program. One has the filename mac-unzip-50p1.hqx, the other is named unzip-201.hqx. I believe you need the program StuffIt (or equivalent) to unstuff these files with extensions .hqx). So I also downloaded UnStuffIt.1.5.bin. I'm not sure what the extension .bin means. Does it mean it can unstuff itself by doubleclicking on its icon? Well, I copied UnStuffIt.1.5.bin from my PC's hard disk to my Mac's hard disk, but when I doubleclicked on it, I just got a message that Apple File Exchange didn't recognize it. This is a Mac program so it doesn't need Apple File Exchange, but my Mac thinks it's a PC program. So this is where I'm stuck. One option would be to get a Mac telecom program and move my 14.4 external modem to the Mac whenever I needed to download Mac programs. But this would be inconvenient. I'd rather try to find a solution where I could simply use a floppy to transfer Mac programs to the Mac that I downloaded with the PC. Any advice greatly appreciated. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 21 Mar 95 00:43:46 PST From: Jennings Subject: Alarm Reporting Black Box Is there an "off the shelf" black box that will take an alarm output from a system or subsystem and dial a phone number to report the state of the alarm output ... the black box should have a modem built in and would call another modem that would be in the auto answer state, and after the exchange of handshake, dump the status ... this must be a common requirement, it seems to me, does anyone have a vendor of this kind of stuff, a part number? Thanks, D. E. Jennings Spectrum Analysis & Frequency Engineering, Inc. pp000539@interramp.com-voice:301.869.7969-FAX:301.869.6992 ------------------------------ From: paulc@hookup.net (Paul Chehowski) Subject: CCIT G.711 PCM Format (also Dialogic 8khz, 8 bit PCM Format) Date: Tue, 21 Mar 1995 02:47:37 GMT Organization: Sulis Computing Is anybody familiar with the actual values behind the PCM telephony format specified in CCIT Spec G.711? I'm trying to write a conversion program that converts between Dialogic PCM VOX files and Microsoft Windows WAV files, and the good folks at Dialogic told me that no one in tech support there could help me with their file format specification, but that it was the same format specified in the CCIT spec. In the Microsoft WAV specification for 8 bit PCM WAV files, the minimum value is 0 and the maximum value is 255 (0xff). As far as I have been able to decipher so far, some conversions between Dialogic VOX and Microsoft WAV files are (all values are hex): WAV VOX --- --- 001 000 (near minimum value for WAV file) 080 0FA (near middle value, 0 magnitude for WAV file) 080 0FB 080 0FC 080 0FD 080 0FE 080 0FF 081 0F0 082 0E0 083 0D8 084 0D0 088 0C0 090 0B0 0FE 080 (near maximum value for WAV file) Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Paul Chehowski paulc@hookup.net Sulis Computing ad771@freenet.carleton.ca ------------------------------ From: hop@ix.netcom.com (Phil Ho) Subject: 100VG AnyLAN Date: 21 Mar 1995 05:39:58 GMT Organization: Netcom Is anyone familiar with 100VG AnyLAN? What does it take to upgrade a existing IPX 10BaseT network to 100VG? New NICs, new hubs, and what else? What about the printers on the network with JetDirect? There isn't a 100VG equivalent of a JetDirect, is there? I understand that it's 802.3 compatible, but what does this really mean in practical sense? I appreciate any comments or suggestions. Please email to me. Thanks, phil ------------------------------ From: khh@access2.digex.net Subject: Sources For Telecom Law Date: 21 Mar 1995 17:04:15 GMT Organization: Express Access Online Communications, Greenbelt, MD USA To find out more about the state of the telecommunications industry and telecommunications law, you might want to point a WWW browser to http://khht.com/huber/ft/ftl.html; http:/huber//geo1/geo1.html; or khht://huber/geo2/geo2.html, where you can read excerpts from the books of one of the Nation's leading telecommunications experts, Peter Huber. ------------------------------ Date: 21 Mar 95 06:03:17 EST From: Stewart Fist <100033.2145@compuserve.com> Subject: MicroUnity Contact Wanted Does anyone know how to contact MicroUnity, the company that is supposedly making a very high-speed media-processing chip? Any information about the company, location or the chip developments would be of help. Stewart Fist Technical journalist ------------------------------ From: scottis@bigdog.engr.arizona.edu (Marios Scottis) Subject: X25 and TCP/IP Date: 21 Mar 1995 08:27:11 GMT Organization: College of Engineering and Mines, University of Arizona I need to use TCP/IP on top of X25. I am trying to get an internet access through an X25 connection. Does anybody know how to do this? What hardware and software is needed? Also any vendor names will be greatly appreciated. Thanks, Marios Scottis scottis@ece.arizona.edu ------------------------------ From: jknoll@winternet.com (Jim Knoll) Subject: Motorola Cell Programming Help Needed Date: Tue, 21 Mar 1995 10:27:11 CST Patrick, I got a copy of your Motorola Programming manual and have been playing with my brick portable phone. I picked up the phone used and want to add it as an "extension" to my mobile phone number. I seemed to get everything almost correct and wanted to change another item in the nam, only to find out that I have a phone with three runs at programming before you can do no more. Do you know of any more detailed info on how to reset the nam so I can continue with my programming effort? Or, do you know where to get information on the net for creating the extension phone with my Motorola brick? I have heard that this information is available, but don't know where. Thanks for any and all help. Thanks, Jim jknoll@winternet.com [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: What you have to do is put the phone in 'local mode'; that will give you a lot more programming options including one to reset the counter which keeps track of how many times the phone number has been changed. For many/most cellular phones, putting it into 'local mode' involves shorting a contact on the phone where the battery is connected. Notice from schematics that one of the pins on the connector is chassis ground. One of the other pins has to be held low, meaning shunted to the ground. One way of doing this is to get one of those connectors at Radio Shack which allow you to open the case and move the arrangement of the pins around. Typically they are used to reverse pins 2/3 (or is it 1/2) between a computer and modem, but you can use it just as easily for this purpose. Drop a teeny tiny bit of solder in there between the two wires in question causing a short. Then plug the battery into one end of this and the other end into where the battery would normally be connected. What happens is you now have caused the pin in question to go low -- or to ground -- and when the phone turns on it will be in programming mode. When done programming just pull this device out of the line and attach the battery in the normal way. You can do lots of interesting things in local mode including punching in whatever channel you want to be on *whether or not it is in use* then sitting there and listening to the people who are using that channel. You can boost the power on the phone up a little; this is sometimes called 'burning' a channel. The main thing is you want to reset the register which keeps track of how often the phone number has been changed back to zero. I forget which pin needs to be grounded, and it may vary from one model of Motorola to another. If you have forgotten the lock code and find yourself locked out of the phone you can also use 'local mode' to cure that; one programming option lets you zero out everything back to factory default, giving you a 'phone number' of 000-000-0000 and a passcode of 0000. Someone who has the programming manual will proabably write you with specifics, but bear in mind you do need that one very minor hardware modification in the power supply. For extra credit in this class, do this: mount a tiny toggle switch on the side of the phone which allows you to toggle in and out of local mode as desired. Cut the wire to the chassis ground and send it through that little switch and out to the desired pin (or not) depending on the position of the switch. Then when you have used up the three chances they give you with the phone number, just press that little switch for a few seconds, punch a couple buttons on the keypad, release the switch and start over! :) I'm sure others will be in touch with you soon. PAT] ------------------------------ From: cogorno@netcom.com (Steve Cogorno) Subject: Re: X.25/ISDN Prices; Global Information Wanted (Again) Date: Mon, 20 Mar 1995 08:24:49 PST Rishab Aiyer Ghosh said: > Someone wrote: [on X.25 over ISDN]: >> Rates in the Pacific Bell Service area for data packets are: >> .05 CENTS for transaction setup >> .005 CENTS per octet of data > That works out to about $52 per Mb - is that _cheap_? Where did you get this figure? When I calculate it it works out to $3.27 per MB. 1 MB = 1024K = 1048576 Bytes = 8388608 bits = 65536 octets (1 octet=128 bits) 65536 octets * .005 cents = 327.68 cents = $3.27 And yes, that is a lot cheaper than the approximately $9.90 that it would cost to transmit the same amount of information over a 1200bps modem (what the poster orignally asked for). What you don't know is that Scott needed info for credit card authorizations which take less than 100 bytes to transmit. Steve cogorno@netcom.com ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 20 Mar 95 22:13 EST From: Testmark Laboratories <0006718446@mcimail.com> Subject: Re: X.25/ISDN Prices; Global Information Wanted In TELECOM Digest<15.155> Rishab Aiyer Ghosh wrote: > Someone wrote: [on X.25 over ISDN]: >> Rates in the Pacific Bell Service area for data packets are: >> .05 CENTS for transaction setup >> .005 CENTS per octet of data > That works out to about $52 per Mb - is that _cheap_? Actually, there are 16 bits per two byte octet. Therefore: ((0.005 cents)/16 bits)*(1,048,576 bits/Mbit) = 328 cents/Mbit, or $26.21/Mbyte, still rather pricey! I wonder who would actually pay rates like this for packet data? John Combs, Project Engineer, TestMark Laboratories, testmark@mcimail.com ------------------------------ From: fgoldstein@bbn.com (Fred R. Goldstein) Subject: Re: NYNEX: Idiocy in Pricing Date: Tue, 21 Mar 1995 11:29:11 GMT Organization: Bolt Beranek & Newman Inc. In article terry@spcvxb.spc.edu (Terry Kennedy) writes: > In article , rblau@neteast.com (RUSSELL BLAU) > writes: >> Personally, I never thought I would find myself in the position of >> defending anything that NYNEX does ... however, look at what you are >> comparing. Flexpath is a DID trunk service. Therefore, you should compare >> it to the price of 48 analog DID trunks, not 48 individual measured >> business lines. > Unfortunately, if I want 48 numbers delivered on two T1's (perhaps > because I have a US Robotics modem chassis that takes T1's and turns > them into Ethernet packets), I wind up paying the same premium as > the customer who wants DID service. If I have enough lines that NYNEX > would bring me digital entrance facilities anyway, I'd have to pay > them *more* to just leave the T's and not install a SLC/DIS*C/whatever > to turn it back into copper. NYNEX does "bundle" DID service into Flexpath, and ISDN PRI, so you only have to pay for the numbers. If you don't need 100 numbers, you still pay for DID service. That's minor. What's really dumb is the way NYNEX prices both T1-based services. The idea they use is that T1 is a PREMIUM that adds VALUE to the service, so you should pay THEM for it. This made some sense back in 1985 when they introduce it, since they had mostly analog CO switches. Flexpath was implemented by sticking a big fat D4 channel bank next to the switch, running 24 wires into the D4, and giving you a T1. Nowadays, of course, the CO is usually digital, so the economics are flipped around: Analog lines require the extra hardware. But the tariff is unchanged. This causes NYNEX to waste money. Another dumbness in their tariff is the pricing for the T1 loop itself. For an analog loop, distance is THEIR problem. If you build a factory six miles from the CO, then they string fat wire on the poles, or do whatever they feel like doing, but the price is the same. (There is no "rural" area in Mass., at least; some states have surcharges.) For T1 loops, they charge mileage from the CO, so it's quite costly if you're even three miles out. This enocurages the use of costly separate pairs for the long runs, and cheap T1 muxing for short runs -- ecoomically counter to NYNEX' best interests, unless they're really more interested in padding the rate base. Fred R. Goldstein k1io fgoldstein@bbn.com Bolt Beranek & Newman Inc., Cambridge MA USA +1 617 873 3850 ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 21 Mar 1995 12:13:44 -0500 From: Jeff Wolfe Subject: Re: Credit Checking on Cellular Customers Organization: PSU - Earth & Mineral Sciences In article is written: > IMHO, I think it's funny that people with poor credit won't complain > about failing to qualify for a new car loan but will complain because > a cellular carrier won't take a risk that they'll skip after > generating tens of thousands of dollars (retail, let's not start that > argument again) worth of cellular service. A cell phone is no > different than having a Visa card with a $10,000 limit so it's not > surprising that they won't give them to just anyone. > No insult intended towards college students but they should know how > hard it is to get credit for anything. I graduated in May of last year with a dual major BS in Computer Sci and Geography (gis). I've got a car loan and two credit cards. I pay my full credit card balance monthly, and I have a few thousand left on my car loan. I travel a lot, and I wanted a phone for my 'peace of mind'. I walked into the local Cell One "phone store" cash-in-hand. I was ready to pay up front for the phone. (In this area, One likes to push expensive phones on payment plans.) They ran a credit check on me and decided that I'd need a $250 deposit to open a cell account. I left, walked down the street to Wireless one, bought the same phone for $70 less, and had service the next day, no deposit required. As far as I'm concerned, Cell One lost my business. I'll never recommend them to anyone I know. I went through the "write the credit agency to see why process" The response I got was that I had a low income, and an unsecured loan. Oh well ... I have a cell phone now and I daresay I've been a good customer. Jeff ------------------------------ From: jsulmar@shore.net (Joe Sulmar) Subject: Re: Looking For "Help Desk" System Date: 21 Mar 1995 03:46:08 GMT Organization: Telecommunications Consultant In article , actmjs@hawk.depaul.edu (Mark J. Sullivan) says: > I am interested in a computer-based phone help-desk system to assist > in the selling of a product. In general, I would like to support five > phone attendants with voice mail and fax back capability. I would > also like it to be expandable. I would like to deal with an integrator > in the Chicago area ... Mark -- I have worked on a number of help-desk projects, but my clients are in the Boston area. If you would consider working with someone from outside of Chicago, I'd like to learn more about your requirements. I'm familiar with many of the packaged help-desk products, and I'd be happy to talk to you about them. Recently, I have employed Lotus Notes to support some help desk applications, and it provides a nice way to get up and working quickly with good tools for extending the system later. It also can provide a fax server option. Please email me if you'd like more info. Regards, Joseph J. Sulmar (jsulmar@shore.net) Computer-Telephony Consultant Lexington, MA ------------------------------ From: mpd@adc.com (Matthew P. Downs) Subject: Re: LAPD and Variants Implementation Date: 15 Mar 1995 13:42:39 GMT Organization: ADC Telecommunications keshavac@enuxsa.eas.asu.edu (Bhaktha Keshavachar) writes: > Are there any examples or application notes on the implementation of > the data link layer of ISDN, LAPD (Q.921). Any information on the > variants of LAPD like LAPM, LAPDm etc. are most welcome. Just about any telecommunication product (that is a switch, PBX, etc) uses LAPD. > Is it too naive to expect the source code for LAPD on the internet? Yes since most companies charge thousand of dollars for it. ------------------------------ From: Mike Rehmus Subject: Re: Benchmarking Internet Providers Date: 21 Mar 1995 13:52:57 GMT Organization: Portal Communications (service) shafroth@students.wisc.edu (Marc Shafroth) wrote: > My employer is working on an RFP for Internet access. SLIP/PPP at > first and dedicated link later. Don't think it will work, Marc. You cannot predict the path of the packets across the net. Therefore your timings will be somewhat random. The small differences in speed won't be all that apparent anyway. A much bigger effect will be the loading of the service provider's systems which and that is cyclical depending on time of day, etc. Mike ------------------------------ From: dfanderson@aol.com (DFAnderson) Subject: Re: Voicemail System Wanted Date: 19 Mar 1995 21:14:56 -0500 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) Reply-To: dfanderson@aol.com (DFAnderson) {Teleconnect Magazine} publishes an annual roundup issue (next month) providing a summary of most available products. They can be contacted at 800/LIBRARY. ------------------------------ From: dfanderson@aol.com (DFAnderson) Subject: Re: Recommendations For Good Primer on Telecom Technologies Date: 19 Mar 1995 21:31:52 -0500 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) Reply-To: dfanderson@aol.com (DFAnderson) Two good sources are {Teleconnect Magazine} and {Computer Telephony} magazine. Further information available by dialing 800/LIBRARY. The publisher, Harry Newton, can be overbearing but this is the best overall source. Talk the order taker into giving you a free copy of their dictionary of telecom terms. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 20 Mar 1995 21:41:20 -0500 From: ndallen@io.org (Nigel Allen) Subject: Last Laugh! Great Moments in Radio History Kenny Pate (kpate@vprua.vprua.uab.edu) posted the following note to the Student Media (stumedia@uabdpo.dpo.uab.edu) mailing list. February 28, 1990 Transcript: KLOS-FM, Los Angeles (Minutes after a 5.5-magnitude earthquake rattles San Gabriel mountains.) "The telephone company is urging people to please not use their phones unless it is absolutely necessary ... we'll be right back after this break to give away a pair of Phil Collins concert tickets to caller 95." Nigel Allen, Toronto, Ontario, Canada ndallen@io.org ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V15 #159 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa20439; 21 Mar 95 20:52 EST Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA11319; Tue, 21 Mar 95 15:33:03 CST Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA11311; Tue, 21 Mar 95 15:33:01 CST Date: Tue, 21 Mar 95 15:33:01 CST From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest (Patrick Townson)) Message-Id: <9503212133.AA11311@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V15 #160 TELECOM Digest Tue, 21 Mar 95 15:28:00 CST Volume 15 : Issue 160 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Per Line Blocking Device is Inexpensive, Easy to Use (Mel Beckman) Re: U.S. 800 Users Alert (Colin Smale) Re: Cellular Fraud in the News Again (Michael P. Deignan) Re: Caller ID in CA (Lynne Gregg) Re: Consuming Ourselves Into Oblivion (Subroto Mukerjea) Re: Gouging at Pay Phones; a War Story (Jim Gooch) Re: Using Live Radio With Automated Attendant (Jacques Vidrine) Re: Anything Cheaper Than LCI? (josephh888@aol.com) Re: Anything Cheaper Than LCI? (Barton Fisher) Re: Yes, Yung'uns. CNID -is- Logged at Your Local CO. (Carl B. Page) Re: Callback System Hardware and Software? (josephh888@aol.com) Re: What is Loop Start? (Scot M. Desort) Re: Ni-Cad Batteries (David Chessler) Re: New NPA in Colorado (Bob Compiano) Re: Taxing Your Telco Service (Bob Compiano) X.25 Level 2 Information Wanted (Popa Madalin) Re: Video Dialtone, HFC, HDSL, or ADSL (Matthew P. Downs) 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 America On Line. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available 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: 500-677-1616 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. A suggested donation of twenty dollars per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above. 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: Mon, 20 Mar 1995 22:19:20 -0800 From: mbeckman@mbeckman.com (Mel Beckman) Subject: Per Line Blocking Device is Inexpensive, Easy to Use David Sternlight (strnlght@netcom.com) wrote: >> Relax, John. You can't keep a good technologist down, and according to >> another post here, Hello Direct is already selling a little box that will >> provide you with per-line blocking. It seems to be the ideal solution, since >> it is unfair to impose the costs of per-line blocking on every other phone >> user. Per-line blockers should pay the costs of that, just as Caller ID >> readers should pay the costs of that. Letting the costs fall on the user of >> each capability is correct public policy in such matters. John Navas wrote: > Any such device would undoubtedly be unduly expensive and problematic. You don't know what you're talking about. I have one, and have used it in several states. It works fine. It simply automatically dials the per-line blocking code for you before every call. The thing costs about $75. Hello Direct also has another very clever device that automatically dials a prefered local-call provider for local calls, based on dynamically programmed prefixes. It also works great. The FCC's per-line blocking block has been blocked. Mel Beckman | Internet: mbeckman@mbeckman.com Beckman Software Engineering | Compuserve: 75226,2257 Ventura, CA 93004 | Voice/fax: 805/647-1641 805/647-3125 ------------------------------ From: colin@integow.integrity.nl (Colin Smale) Subject: Re: U.S. 800 Users Alert Date: 21 Mar 95 12:11:32 GMT Organization: Signify BV, Woerden, Holland In the discussion about protecting 'special' 800 numbers, don't forget that letters on dials have just about disappeared in Europe. If you want someone in Europe to be able to use your number, you will have to publish the digits. Numbers are not nearly as 'special' as the words you can make from them with a US telephone. Colin Smale colin@integrity.nl Signify BV Woerden, Holland ------------------------------ From: md@pstc3.pstc.brown.edu (Michael P. Deignan) Subject: Re: Cellular Fraud in the News Again Date: 21 Mar 1995 13:36:04 GMT Organization: The Ace Tomato Company In article , Bob Compiano <74774.3167@Compu Serve.COM> writes: > Tell her she should do a follow up article on how they uncover the > cloning operations. I don't know for sure, but I suspect they have > equipment to detect receivers tuned to the coordination channel of the > cellular band. Then they probably sit some place where there are > traffic jams regularly and then scan for people who have receivers > tuned to the coord. The equipment would have to be very, very > sensitive. The hardest part of cloning a cell phone is having the correct equipment to program it. Intercepting the necessary data on a control channel is just a matter of having a few pieces of equipment that can easily be put together for under $1000, and then get into your dark panel van and sit under a control tower. As for detecting someone receiving control channel signals ... I don't see how, since sitting and listening on the frequency is a passive activity. There may be some residual noise from a receiver's FM IF section, but that in of itself doesn't mean anything. MD ------------------------------ From: Lynne Gregg Subject: Re: Caller ID in CA Date: Tue, 21 Mar 95 09:23:00 PST The post on this subject from jnavas@netcom.com (John Navas) doesn't quite hit on the topic. John posted excerpts from the FCC Order on Calling Number Services. Along those lines, though, the FCC stayed (indefinitely) the portion of that Order that called for removal of Per Line Blocking (on March 17). Per Line Blocking may continue to be offered by telcos providing Caller ID services. Can anyone address the original post by Drew McEachern (drew@nbn.com)? > Does anyone out there have the latest info on Caller ID in CA? It's my > understanding that it's any week now. Is this true? I'd love to have it. Thanks! Lynne ------------------------------ From: Subroto Mukerjea Organization: E & A Services, Univ. of Maryland Date: Tue, 21 Mar 1995 12:23:01 EDT Subject: Re: Consuming ourselves into oblivion Well said, Mr. Martin. But I would like an opportunity to reply. It is true that television has consumerism built into it as a default mode, however it is you or I need to accept it blindly. Despite its faults, television is not an evil. My wife and I come from India. Television is our link with India. We see India every weekend. We also see China, Japan, Russia, France, Germany and Italy every week. This is something that only television can provide. Television provides information across ideologies, time zones, and governments. I am not willing to give this up very easily. If you wish to consume you can. I would like to be a willing consumer, however I cannot afford it, so I am relatively immune to the shrill consumerism of television. But neither do I speak ill of consumers, after all they are the engines of commerce, rightly or wrongly. May I suggest a bit of advice that an ancient Greek gave us, "Moderation, in all things, moderation. Even though Aristotle wasn't speaking about television, it makes sense. True, television is a lean, mean, consuming machine, but it need not be. It can be a teacher if you very, very carefully pick and choose. Similarly so, the Internet. Like television, I speak to friends in India and they talk back. I gather information about telecom, single malt whiskeys, what others think about investment in Russia and the latest CD. I am barraged by advertising, multi-level marketers and endless e-mails. I apply the same principle as I do about television. Pick and choose, very, very carefully. Like it or not the Internet has to grow up. Having fulfilled its destiny in the 70's and 80's, it needs to have another purpose. It is up to you and me to define and develop another purpose than commerce. Electronic town halls, referendums for states, towns and municipalities are all good alternatives that need to be developed. I have developed a use for the Internet. I am part of a virtual corporation. My firm is in Phoenix, Arizona and I sit here in Maryland, e-mailing, faxing, phoning and gathering information on the Internet. For me, the hacker is an entity who stands for anarchy and purposelessness, not connectivity and value. The future of the Internet is by no means certain or predictable. This is the first tool that can be shaped and you have that opportunity. As a final observation, 90% of television and the Internet is idiotic and irrational. So is life. But you keep finding value and substance in the oddest circumstances which is what makes it all interesting. Subroto Mukerjea ------------------------------ From: Jim.Gooch@sciatl.com (jgooch) Subject: Re: Gouging at Pay Phones; a War Story Date: 21 Mar 1995 18:14:00 GMT Organization: Scientific Atlanta In article , johnwpan@aol.com (JohnWPan) says: > Being an experienced traveler, I thought I knew all the tricks. Alas, > but no. I was stumped vacationing in FL. > Finally, I dialed my carrier's human operator, and was able to talk my > way through a credit card call. However, the dial pad was still > disabled so I could not access my voice mail. > Years ago, I used to carry a DTMF generator with me. I have to do > that now, again. Ah progress. The RBOCS are buying smartphones from TSG Inc. and others. They have fraud prevention that doesn't even allow DTMF from the handset. Don't be surprised if your hand-held doesn't work either. [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Is that what it is going to come to, that we have to give up our voice mail and our call back services and whatever so the RBOCs can continue their fight against fraud? You're saying even Genuine Bell payphones won't be something we can rely on much longer? PAT] ------------------------------ From: nectar@communique.net (Jacques Vidrine) Subject: Re: Using Live Radio With Automated Attendant Date: 21 Mar 1995 11:47:02 GMT Organization: Communique, Inc. In article , TELECOM Digest Editor noted in reply to jbutz@hogpa.ho.att.com: > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: The thing that bugs me about that help line > and the DJ is that for what they pay the DJ to put on this show for people > on hold, they could easily afford to pay one or two more experienced techs > to be there taking phone calls. What's one or two more support representatives when you already have hundreds? As one who has used Microsoft's tech support on several occassions, I _like_ the DJ idea. > Also, why not recorded Q/A messages to help callers, i.e. 'while you > wait, you may listen to some pre-recorded messages which may solve > your problem ...'. Compuserve does this and it weeds out the crowd of > callers pretty nicely, even though you still can get waits of 10-15 > minutes during their busiest hours. PAT] This is definately a good idea. I've encountered help-line phone systems that let me peruse the on-line help information (FAQ & A!) without losing my place in the queue. [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: They may have hundreds of techs employed there; they do *not* have hundreds of techs taking phone calls from the public. Think about it; if they had 'hundreds' of techs taking phone calls then they would be taking many hundreds of calls per hour and still not be able to catch up. This would put them in the league with the credit card offices, etc in terms of sheer volume of inbound traffic, and Microsoft does NOT have a phone room that size. Yes, they get plenty of calls; its that the typical call cannot be handled in thirty seconds or a minute. They've probably got at any given time a dozen or so people taking calls; that is just my estimate. Maybe they need to have a couple more, and some method of dealing with the most repetitive questions and answers which probably take up a large percentage of their time. To do that, you ask each of the regular phone people to list the two or three questions which come up over and over the most in a day's time. You then look at all the results and pick those things which every phone person said happens frequently. You take ten or twelve of those things the phone people voted 'most common' and you make recorded messages about them or you hire someone to manage just those calls. A person answering on the front end says 'what do you want to talk about?' and parks your call in one queue or another. PAT] ------------------------------ From: josephh888@aol.com (JosephH888) Subject: Re: Anything Cheaper Than LCI? Date: 20 Mar 1995 21:07:52 -0500 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) Reply-To: josephh888@aol.com (JosephH888) Are you seeking a six second minimum call as well as six second increments thereafter? ------------------------------ From: bartonfisher@delphi.com Subject: Re: Anything Cheaper Than LCI? Date: Mon, 20 Mar 95 20:07:11 -0500 Organization: Delphi (info@delphi.com email, 800-695-4005 voice) I also use LCI. But my rates are at 10.5 cpm. But they do have the 18 second duration. Maybe you should give them a call. If they won't give in, leave me a Email. I'll get you a name to call. Bart ------------------------------ From: carlp@teleport.com (Carl B. Page) Subject: Re: Yes, Yung'uns. CNID -is- Logged at Your Local CO. Date: 20 Mar 1995 17:56:28 -0800 Organization: Teleport - Portland's Public Access (503) 220-1016 With regard to: >> Also, I assume everyone agrees that the privacy of the caller should >> not be a consideration if a residential customer claims to be >> receiving obnoxious calls. The privacy of the callee is certainly more >> important than that of the caller in this case, and arguably so in all >> cases. > Carter assumes too much. > I, for one, would not be willing to toss the privacy rights of the > caller on the trash heap merely on the strength of a "claim" by any > given residential customer that they found the call "obnoxious." This is already implemented -- has been for years. Ever hear of the new Call Trace feature? The telco's don't advertise it because they lose (small amounts of) money on it. They should because it is one of the few positive developments to come out of the CLASS services, which include Caller ID. Caller ID blocking options can be provided while protecting the called party from abusive/threatening callers. Most states provide for the new "Call Trace" feature which provides the caller-id information to the telephone companies nuisnance bureau and potentially to the police (in a form that will stand up in court). The privacy of the caller is NOT violated because their number is not provided to the called party. It is provided only to the nuisnance bureau and the police. Just dial *57 after the abusive call, in a supported area. And pay $1.00 for the pleasure, in Oregon. (arl carlp@teleport.COM Public Access UNIX and Internet in OR & WA at (503) 220-1016 (2400-14400, N81) ------------------------------ From: josephh888@aol.com (JosephH888) Subject: Re: Callback System Hardware and Software? Date: 20 Mar 1995 21:10:21 -0500 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) Reply-To: josephh888@aol.com (JosephH888) Call Robin Gamble of The Satcom Group 908-846-6272 Their full business is CallBack equipment. Robin's the boss. Tell him I sent you, if you'd like. Joe Horton ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 21 Mar 1995 00:50:06 -0500 From: gsmicro@ios.com Subject: Re: What is Loop Start? tony.zuccarino@nb.rockwell.com wrote: > Is there a reliable way for local telephone equipment to determine > that the remote caller has disconnected? > In other words, when someone hangs up after recording a message on my > answering machine, is there a way for the answering machine DAA to > detect that this caller has hung up, apart from detecting silence for > some time? > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Sure there is. I think CPC -- Called > Party Control -- does that. I've had answering machines and voicemail > equipment at various times that did that. As soon as the calling party > disconnected, my equipment did the same immediatly. In fact I have a > Big Mouth card here now which operates that way. PAT] In technical terms, I think the CPC equipment detects an 'open switch interval' or OSI, where the CO drops battery momentarily or something like that. I think all digital CO switches today provide OSI (if you have a phone with a line powered dial pad light, you can check for this -- wait for someone who has called you to hang up, and watch the dial pad. The light on the dial pad will go out for about half a second then come back on. That is the OSI). When you are the calling party and *you* hang up, the switch disconnects the call immediately. If you are the *called* party and hang-up, the switch gives you a grace period of 15-30 seconds where you can pick up the phone again and re-establish your conversation (if the calling party hasn't already hung-up), before it disconnects the circuit and provides an OSI to the calling party. Of course, this may be different in your exchange. I don't know if you can buy an add-on device that will monitor OSI and disconnect the call for a non CPC-complaint device. But most decent answering machines from Panasonic, AT&T and others support CPC. Scot M. Desort Garden State Micro, Inc. +1 201-244-1110 +1 201-244-1120 Fax gsmicro@ios.com ------------------------------ Subject: Re: Ni-Cad Batteries From: david.chessler@neteast.com (DAVID CHESSLER) Date: Tue, 21 Mar 95 03:18:00 -0500 Organization: Online Technologies, Inc. - 301-738-0001 Reply-To: david.chessler@neteast.com (DAVID CHESSLER) In article david.chessler@neteast.com wrote: >> With a cellular battery of peculiar voltage and conformation, just >> build a small battery-drainer on a scrap of pegboard, using a >> flashlight bulb of appropriate size. > Doing this is a good way for the first cell to hit zero to be pushed > negative as the other cells continue to discharge. This is about the > worst thing you can do to the cell, and will ensure its shorter life. > The phone knows how low to take the battery. Trust it. > If you don't want to do that, use the intellicharger and don't leave > it on trickle. Not overcharging the battery will be the best move > towards keeping the battery away from voltage depression, and get good > service. I do not believe this is a problem. What happens is you take all cells down to zero, and then recharge together. If imbalances were a problem they would occur at any level. In the event, the problem is that repeated discharges that are less than complete slowly lower the capacity of the battery. This occurs because of memory -- crystalization in the battery -- and occurs because, as a practical matter, we do not discharge a battery fully. Toward the end of its capacity, the battery cannot supply adequate voltage, and the radio or other appliance does not perform properly (it may have distortion, loss of sensitivity, drift off frequency, have low volume, etc.). So one discharges to this point, which becomes the memory point -- effective zero -- and then the next time one discharges "not quite" to this point, and so it goes. The only solution is do discharge the battery completely. Since we cannot do this in the appliance (cellular radio, or whatever) without tying up the appliance in some way, we must do it in the charger -- if the charger has a discharge cycle. If the charger does not have a discharge cycle (that is, discharge into a resistance to take the battery to real zero (which discharges into a load), then the obvious solution is to discharge the battery the rest of the way into a home-built dummy load. My suggestion is a flashlight bulb appropriate for the voltage. However, a resistor might be used. The following message which appeared on another network suggests that the problem you suggest is also solved when the battery is fully discharged into a dummy load. >This message was from JAMES MC SHANE to SCOTT SEAB, >originally in conference R-Phones >and was forwarded to you by DAVID CHESSLER. >SS> -=> Quoting Lou Ramsay to All <=- >SS> LR> A while back, someone posted a method of "rejuvenating" NI-CAD >SS> LR> phone battteries. It involved putting a resistor across the battery >SS> LR> terminals for a period of time. Does anyone recall the value of the >SS> LR> resistor and the length of time? > The NI-CAD battery packs have multiple individual cells {the > original meaning of the word "battery", as in artillery} and in > repeated discharging and recharging, sometimes one weak cell > will reverse its polarity [they are in +___-,+___-,+-___-,+___- > order and one cell will become -___+]. The solution is to > totally discharge all the cells of the battery, then start over > to charge all the cells, which ussually gets the polarities back > in order. david.chessler@neteast.com chessler@capaccess.org chessler@trinitydc.edu [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Once someone asked me to define the term 'dummy load'. I said to them, in your application, it would be that round thing which sits on top of your shoulders. PAT] ------------------------------ From: Bob Compiano <74774.3167@CompuServe.COM> Subject: Re: New NPA in Colorado Date: 20 Mar 1995 09:37:05 GMT Organization: via CompuServe Information Service Southwestern Bell swears on a stack of phone books that the only way, the only sensible way, to maintain phone growth in Dallas is to overlay a 972 area code over the existing 214 area code. Anybody have any thoughts on this? It means that ANY new number requested will come with a 972. I don't understand why they didn't restrict the area code geographically and also to all new data/pager/cellular services and cut over all existing cellular service to 972 (for that matter, existing pagers, too). Wouldn't that free up tens of thousands or more numbers? The plan they have now will probably result in scads of wrong numbers being dialed. What if you have a business number of 361 5000. That number could exist in both area codes and it will probably get dialed constantly by parties looking for one of two different subscribers. I don't know about this plan ... [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: The decision was finally formalized on northern Illinois and 630 on Monday. The south/southwestern suburbs of Chicago will keep 708. The western suburbs will get 630. The northern suburbs will get a new code not yet announced. Chicago will remain 312 by itself. 815 will remain as is; there will be no need for any split there for several years, if ever according to Ameritech. PAT] ------------------------------ From: Bob Compiano <74774.3167@CompuServe.COM> Subject: Re: Taxing Your Telco Service Date: 20 Mar 1995 09:46:19 GMT Organization: via CompuServe Information Service There is a suburb in Minneapolis, I think it is Roseville, but I could be wrong, which is passing a law to tax cellular phone service in the city limits based on the airtime used. Imagine the nightmare for the cell phone company if every little 'burb is able to tax their airtime on a cell-by-cell basis. Any comments? ------------------------------ From: pr90120@ulise.cs.pub.ro (Popa Madalin) Subject: X.25 Level 2 Information Wanted Date: Tue, 21 Mar 1995 12:47:52 EST My name is Popa Madalin and I am a student in the last year at Departament of Computers Science at Politechnical University of Bucharest in Romania. If you could help me I need some sources of Data Link Level (LAPB) for my own implementation of TCP/IP over X.25 . I really need this sources for my final exam at this Departament. (It isn't for commercial use !) Thank you very much, Popa Madalin (pr90120@ulise.cs.pub.ro) ------------------------------ From: mpd@adc.com (Matthew P. Downs) Subject: Re: Video Dialtone, HFC, HDSL, or ADSL Date: 20 Mar 1995 14:09:49 GMT Organization: ADC Telecommunications jlundgre@kn.PacBell.COM (John Lundgren) writes: > Timothy Kreps (tkreps@netcom.com) wrote: >> Where can I find info or discussions on: >> - video dialtone, >> - Hybrid Fiber/Coax (HFC), > We were talking in a meeting with our Pac Bell service reps last week > and we brought up the subject of ISDN and pair gain, and one of the > reps said that if we get the SLICs, they might be connected to the CO > by fiber. And PacBell is looking into installing fiber into > neighborhoods, and there will be some coax going from the fiber 'hub' > (I don't know what they will be calling it), to the individual > subscribers. I guess this is what is being talked about among others > besides the telcos because it involves competition for the cable TV > companies' customers. Well, not really. Most of the telco's are looking at HFC which delivers telephony via coax cable. This is due mainly to the cost of fiber-to-the- curb and fiber-to-the-house. HFC has been seen as the most cost effective way to get every one up on higher speed networks. BTTC is great for new places, but what about in existing neighborhoods? Most are already wired with coax. ADC Telecommunications (for whom I work) annouced a large contract with Australia last week for just such a system. We are also producing a version for the US. Others are also working on such systems...such as AT&T, Scientific Atlanta, Fujitsu, DSC ...(at least most of that list any way). It appears right now that the HFC system is the system of choice. Most of the current field trails are with FTTC ot FTTH systems, but it is the understanding of most people that this is not direction that most of the companies wish to pursue. Matt ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V15 #160 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa29602; 22 Mar 95 16:42 EST Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA28890; Wed, 22 Mar 95 09:25:23 CST Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA28882; Wed, 22 Mar 95 09:25:19 CST Date: Wed, 22 Mar 95 09:25:19 CST From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest (Patrick Townson)) Message-Id: <9503221525.AA28882@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V15 #161 TELECOM Digest Wed, 22 Mar 95 09:25:00 CST Volume 15 : Issue 161 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson IEEE Benelux Workshop 1995 (Thierry Pollet) Committee Suggests Break-up of India's Dept. of Telecom (Rishab A. Ghosh) How Do I Create a TelCo ? (Chris Mentzel) Defective Caller ID (Roberta Kay Splieth) Routing Inbound FAX Using DID (Don Wegeng) LD Marketers Association (Sharon Ziebert) White Pages on the Internet? (Karen Brady) Fax, 1895 Style (Jim Haynes) Interesting Telemarketing, Sad Actually (Perry Engle) Looking For Excel Corp (Phil Kehr) Voice Mail Research Project (Gary Smith) Re: Is ISDN Equipment Limited by Switch? (Chip Sharp) Re: ISDN, ADPCM and COs (Eric Paulak) Re: Long Distance Rate Tables (Eric Paulak) Re: Call Waiting Purgatory (Ken Stox) Re: PHS Doesn't Work in Moving Vehicles? (Jack Quinn) Re: U.S. 800 Users Alert (Judith Oppenheimer) 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 America On Line. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available 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: 500-677-1616 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. A suggested donation of twenty dollars per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above. 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: thierry@iris.elis.rug.ac.be (Thierry Pollet) Subject: IEEE Benelux Workshop 1995 Date: 22 Mar 1995 10:48:02 GMT Organization: University of Ghent, Belgium organized by the IEEE Joint Chapter on Communications and Vehicular Technology, Benelux Section supported by the Human Capital and Mobility Program ERBCHRXCT930405 May 11, 1995 Gent Belgium IEEE WORKSHOP ON SYNCHRONIZATION AND EQUALIZATION IN DIGITAL COMMUNICATIONS Date : May 11, 1995 Venue : 'Het Pand', Onderbergen 1, 9000 GENT, BELGIUM General Workshop Chairman : Prof. Marc Moeneclaey Communications Engineering Lab. Universiteit Gent Programme : 9.00 - 12.00 : Registration 9.30 - 9.40 : Welcome; M. Moeneclaey, Univ. Gent 9.40 - 10.25 : Synchronization algorithms and receiver implementation issues; H. Meyr, RWTH Aachen 10.25 - 10.55 : Coffee break 10.55 - 11.40 : Carrier Frequency estimation algorithms; M. Moeneclaey, Univ. Gent 11.40 - 12.25 : Synchronization for CDMA M. Luise, Univ. Pisa 12.25 - 14.00 : Lunch 14.00 - 14.45 : Equalization for Coded Modulation on fading channels; S. Fechtel, RWTH Aachen 14.45 - 15.15 : Coffee Break 15.15 - 16.00 : Synchronization and Equalization issues in single- carrier and multi-carrier systems; H. Sari, SAT Paris 16.00 - 16.45 : Equalization and interference cancellation for single-carrier and multi-carrier CDMA; L. Vandendorpe, Cath. Univ. Louvain-la-Neuve 16.45 - 16.55 : Closure; Chapter chairman R. Prasad, TU Delft ===================================================================== Registration form IEEE WORKSHOP ON SYNCHRONIZATION AND EQUALIZATION IN DIGITAL COMMUNICATIONS May 11, 1995 Gent, Belgium Name : ............................................. Organization : ............................................. Address : ............................................. ............................................. ............................................. Telephone : ............................................. Fax : ............................................. E-mail : ............................................. I have transferred/will pay the Fee as indicated below Registration Fee (without lunch) - IEEE Member 1 000 BEF yes / no (member no. .............) - non-IEEE member 1 500 BEF yes / no - undergraduate student 300 BEF yes / no Lunch at 'Het Pand' 1 000 BEF yes / no TOTAL : ..... BEF Payment should be made to the following bank account (bank transfer costs are to be charged to the attendees) : IEEE Workshop'95 001-2568144-48 ASLK Bank, B-9840 DE PINTE or the fee should be payed at the registration desk on May 11, 1995. Completed registration forms together with the payment transfer should be received before April 20, 1995 Return the form to : Prof. Marc Moeneclaey Universiteit Gent, Communications Engineering Lab. Sint-Pietersnieuwstraat 41 B-9000 GENT, BELGIUM Fax : +32-9-264 4295 E-mail : Marc.Moeneclaey@lci.rug.ac.be ========================================================================== Hotel accomodation Attendees can make reservations (single/double room : 2678 BEF/2925 BEF per night) at the following hotels (with parking facilities), located within walking distance from the Workshop venue : Hotel IBIS (cathedral) Hotel IBIS (opera) Limburgstraat 2 Nederkouter 24 B-9000 GENT B-9000 GENT Tel. +32-9-223 00 00 Tel. +32-9-225 07 07 Fax +32-9-223 10 00 Fax +32-9-223 59 07 How to reach Gent and the Workshop venue : - Train : The train station Gent Sint-Pieters can be easily reached from Antwerp, Brussels, Kortrijk or Oostende (one train each half hour). At Gent Sint-Pieters, take a tram (no. 1, 10 or 12) to Korenmarkt, which is within walking distance from the Workshop venue. - Car : Gent can be reached by car via the highways E17 (when coming from Antwerp or Kortrijk) or E40 (when coming from Brussels or Oostende). E17 : Take exit Gent Centrum E40 : At the crossing with E17, select direction Gent-Antwerp and take exit Gent Centrum Parking in the immediate vicinity of the conference venue is very limited. We suggest to use the parking garage at Korte Meer (near Kouter), which is within walking distance from the Workshop venue. Workshop information and a detailed plan of Gent will be made available on Internet : http://iris.elis.rug.ac.be/~thierry/Announcements ------------------------------ Subject: Committee Suggests Break-up of India's Dept. of Telecom From: rishab@dxm.ernet.in (Rishab Aiyer Ghosh) Date: Tue, 21 Mar 95 03:32:27 IST Organization: Deus X Machina --==(C) Copyright 1995 Rishab Aiyer Ghosh (rishab@dxm.ernet.in) Committee suggests break-up of India's Dept of Telecom A report by an official committee headed by former member of India's Telecom Commission, Mr D K Gupta, recommended on Sunday (19th March 1995) that the Commission be separated from the Indian Government's Department of Telecommunications (DoT), which is also the monopoly service provider. The Minister for Communications, Mr Sukh Ram, is to consider the Gupta committee recommendations this week. The committee suggested the creation of an autonomous organization, India Telecom, as a service provider replacing the DoT. This would be subject to the regulatory control of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), which is in the process of being set up. While the TRAI would be analogous to the US FCC, the Telecom Commission would continue to formulate national policy, which may include the regulations to be enforced by the TRAI. The Commission would continue to supervise the operation of the autonomous Centre for the Development of Telematics (C-DOT), an effort at creating indigenous equipment that has proved extremely successful especially in rural telecom. A member of the Commission would also hold the ex-officio post of CEO, India Telecom. The government is good at funding committees and studying reports. One last year, led by Mr. M.B. Athreya, which suggested the break-up of the DoT's operations into four regional companies, was not welcomed by its half million or more permanent employees. The Gupta recommendations, which suggest independently profitable telecom 'circles' (regions) within India Telecom, may not be more popular. This committee is the latest in the government's attempts at fostering fair competition between the public- versus private- sector duopoly in telecom services that will be in operation by next year. --==(C) Copyright 1995 Rishab Aiyer Ghosh (rishab@dxm.ernet.in) --==May be distributed electronically provided that only compilation or --==transmission charges are applied. Other uses require written permission. Rishab Aiyer Ghosh For Electric Dreams subscriptions rishab@dxm.ernet.in and back issues, send a mail to rishab@arbornet.org rishab@arbornet.org with Vox +91 11 6853410 Voxmail 3760335 'help' in lower case, without H 34C Saket, New Delhi 110017, INDIA the quotes, as the Subject. ------------------------------ From: chrism@aloha.net (Chris Mentzel) Subject: How Do I Create a TelCo? Date: Wed, 22 Mar 1995 01:19:57 -1000 Organization: Hawaii OnLine - Honolulu, HI Does anybody know what is involved in the creation of a telephone company -- let's say a switchless reseller? Are there information sources on that? Thank you! Aloha from Maui! Chris [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: As long as we are not going to bother with any formalities such as purchasing a switch, stringing wires or otherwise having massive amounts of cash outlay and outside plant, etc., then I guess you become a telco when you say you are one. If you have made arrangements with a company to resell their services and are actively doing so, then I guess you are a telco. Having seen your message on here, I suspect at least a few folks will send you email with their latest propositions for independent long distance sales agents, call back services, etc. Good luck in your new business! PAT] ------------------------------ From: splieth@csd.uwm.edu (Roberta Kay Splieth) Subject: Defective Caller ID Date: 21 Mar 1995 22:12:25 -0600 Organization: UTexas Mail-to-News Gateway Does anyone know of the following happening to caller ID subscribers and/or have an explanation as to why it occurs? A business associate who subscribes to caller ID finds that when certain parties call him from within his caller ID service area, their telephone numbers do not display on his caller ID unit the first time. The screen on his display unit is blank. However, when he has the same parties call back a second time, their telephone numbers and names will display. The display unit has been replaced three times in the past month so we don't think the problem is in the equipment or because of a low battery. Also, the local telephone company has checked the line for trouble and come up with nothing. Any ideas on this? Please post or email me if you do. Thanks, Roberta Splieth [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: You say the first time the screen is 'blank'. Do you mean literally nothing shows up at all, not even just a few dashes, or some garbled characters? Most caller id boxes will respond to the ringing of a telephone with *something*, even if just dashes across the screen to indicate nothing was sent. I would begin by doing this: since you have already tried three different boxes on the same line and gotten the same results, try taking the box to some other line independent of the one it is on now and trying it there. See if the results on that (caller id equipped) line are the same. If so then maybe it is the box. If possible, install a caller-id box from some other vendor on the line where you are having the trouble and see if the problem persists with a display box *from a different vendor*. Let's try to isolate the problem as to display box or line and proceed from there. PAT] ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 21 Mar 1995 13:11:18 PST From: wegeng.XKeys@xerox.com Subject: Routing Inbound FAX Using DID I`m curious about LAN FAX servers that route inbound FAX messages to e-mail addresses using Direct Inward Dialing (DID) lines. I`m not familiar with DID, and would like to learn more. How, technically, does DID work? How is information about the phone number that was dialed delivered to the FAX server? What special hardware is required? How much do DID numbers cost on top of regular business phone rates? Since I`m not ready to purchase a system, I would prefer not to talk to vendors at this time. Surely this information is documented somewhere in the public literature (handcopy/electronic). Can anyone provide a pointer? Thanks, Don Wegeng- Xerox wegeng.xkeys@xerox.com ------------------------------ From: sharon@earth.execpc.com (Sharon Ziebert) Subject: LD Marketers Association Date: 21 Mar 1995 21:58:08 GMT Organization: Exec-PC TELECOMMUNICATIONS ON DEMAND, INC- (TOD) is looking into sponsoring a "Long Distance Marketers Association" (LMA). Its purpose would be similar to TRA's function with service-Providers (carriers and resellers. The LMA's mission would be to standardize and stabilize the marketing aspect of our industry as well as to reward and protect its members. In addition, a certification/competency process would be initiated to benefit LMA members who wish to stand out from those who merely "dabble" in the marketplace. The following are some ideas that are being considered: (1) LMA members who are "certified," would be offered higher commissions from the leading industry service-Providers. (2) LMA members will be offered 10 cent long distance rates for their own personal use. (3) The LMA will offer training and sponsor conferences. (4) The LMA will publish a newsletter/magazine specifically geared to long distance. currently, there are no long distance publications. (5) The LMA will track and report to its members unreliable service-Providers who fail to live up to their commitments to their marketers and to their end-users. The LMA will work with the TRA to "clean up" the industry. TOD has already broached this subject with Ernie Kelly, Executive Director of the TRA. (6) Qualified end-user leads and other discount business services will be offered to LMA members. If you are interested or have more ideas and/or wish to take a proactive role, Email TOD Vice President, Sharon Ziebert your request for more information. Thank you, sharon@execpc.com ------------------------------ From: Brady, Karen M Subject: White Pages on the Internet? Date: Wed, 22 Mar 95 09:52:00 EST Dear Pat, I am interested in getting information about the publication of telephone White Pages on the Internet. I have heard that some telcos do publish their directories on the Internet and I need to know the following. 1. Which companies publish their directories on the Internet? 2. What does it cost people to look up numbers? 3. Do people use it ? How many searches per day? 4. How easy is it to verify bulk lists of directory telephone numbers? 5. Are there any Australian telephone directory information currently available? Please reply directly to my internet address, as I do not have a subscription to TELECOM Digest. Regards, Karen Brady +61 7838 2069 +61 78351018 [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I am not familiar with any telco white pages on the Internet. Readers, are there any? PAT] ------------------------------ From: haynes@cats.ucsc.edu (Jim Haynes) Date: Tue, 21 Mar 1995 16:47:39 -0800 Subject: Fax, 1895 Style The current (April) issue of {Scientific American}, page 12, the 100 years ago section, has pictures of the "electro-artograph" which transmits copies of photographs to any distance and reproduces them in line engraving, ready for press printing. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 21 Mar 1995 14:29:07 -0500 From: engle@lmig.com Subject: Interesting Telemarketing, Sad Actually I was settling down to watch the Frontline about Rush Limbaugh, when the phone rang: [ I am NOT making this up ] Them: Hello - Is Mr. or Mrs. Engle there?: Me: I'm Mr. Engle. Them: [Blah Blah they are from NYNEX and would like to know how many other people share the phone with me, a wife or a girlfriend perhaps?] Me: I AM married, two of us. Them: Has anyone ever told you that they had problems reaching either of you when the phone was busy? etc. etc Me: ( interrupting ) Are you talking about call waiting? Them: Well, Yes. Me: No Thank you, I don't like call waiting. [Sometimes I don't even answer the phone] Them: Are you interested in any of our other services? Me: Yes, ISDN. [ My town is one of the first in NH to offer it ] Them: Could you spell that please? Me: I - S - D - N Integrated Services Digital Network. Them: I don't know anything about that, it might be one of our business services. What is it? Me: It's a high speed digital phone line for accessing computers or the Internet. Them: What is that? Is that a service your company sells? Me: Nynex is the only company in NH that is allowed to sell ISDN. Have you heard of Compuserve, America Online, Prodigy? Them: No. Me: They've been in all the papers, national magazines, you haven't heard of any of these things? Them: You sound really smart, and I sound so stupid. [ I wasn't wasting both of our time on purpose, really ] Perry Engle Engineering Services Liberty Mutual Insurance Conpany engle@lmig.com [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Very sad, and very true. Truer than it should be. A lot of folks have still never heard of those services; they know nothing about computers and very little about phones except that when they pick them up they work or don't work. Telco probably sent those telemarketers to a class -- or series of classes -- to give them enough knowledge to do the limited job they do. The classes prob- ably taught them a few basic -- very basic! -- details about the phone industry and products such as custom calling features. They got passing grades in that class and were offered jobs selling telco services by phone. They probably went home thrilled and told their families they had gotten a job working 'for the phone company'. That's why I wish people would not be so harsh with telemarketers; many of them are doing the best they can do in life. You can courteously say yes or no and hang up the phone and they can move along to the next name on their list to be called. Computer illiteracy *is* a major thing in the USA; despite the incredible growth experienced by the Internet and services such as Compuserve or America On Line, the overwhelming majority of Americans know little or nothing about them. They think its busy and overloaded with traffic now; wait until even as little as ten percent of America gets on line! I feel very oppressed when I realize how much needs to be done to educate people in (as an example) the inner city areas of Chicago. If I were to win the Illinois State Lottery today and pick up a few million dollars I would see to it that every public library in Chicago had an online terminal to the Internet, and a full time instructor to show people how to use it and how to participate. Do you understand where I am coming from? And as we hurl forward with our technological advances, a very distinct and definable 'underclass' of citizens -- people who will never join us in our new world -- is growing. The writer/poet John Bunyan once remarked that, "I am oppressed by things undone; oh! that my dreams and deeds could be one ..." . When I stop and realize how much *I* don't know about this industry in the past couple decades, and how much *I* need to learn to keep up what I said above becomes all the more painfully apparent. What the heck! I can barely keep this Digest going some days, let alone cure the rest of the ills I see around me. PAT] ------------------------------ From: pcare@pdial.interpath.net (Phil Kehr) Subject: Looking for Excel Corp Date: Wed, 22 Mar 1995 13:47:54 GMT Organization: Interpath -- Providing Internet access to North Carolina I'm looking for information on the Dallas, Texas based Excel Corporation. Does anyone have any knowledge? ------------------------------ From: Gary.Smith@state.net (Gary Smith) Subject: Voice Mail Research Project Date: 21 Mar 1995 22:53:59 GMT Organization: Minnesota OnLine Reply-To: Gary.Smith@state.net In doing research on the usage of voice mail technology, I have reduced all calls to the following three classifications: Urgent call: Those calls requiring your immediate attention and response or call to action. Non-urgent calls:Calls that are requests for information that do not require your immediate response. Personal calls: Calls that are from your family, friend, or colleagues; these also include calls that are made during business hours for personal reasons (broker, banker, daycare, etc.). Question is, is this the only way, or the best way, to classify calls vis-`-vis voice mail? Thanks for your assistance. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 21 Mar 95 08:56:47 EST From: hhs@teleoscom.com (Chip Sharp) Subject: Re: Is ISDN Equipment Limited by Switch? hmweine@PacBell.COM (Howard M. Weiner) wrote: > In early implementations, AT&T and NTI went different ways, in access > protocol as well as architecture. They, of course, also felt the need > to come up with unique features to distinguish themselves. This is very true. In the earlier days the switches were much different. > Because of these issues, the major stakeholders got together and > eventually hammered out something called "National ISDN" (NI), as > documented by Bellcore. ...stuff deleted... > So, your NI-1 compliant CPE will still work (all the NI-1 supported > features) after the switch has been upgraded to NI-2. ...stuff deleted... > PacBell is in the process of retrofitting their 5e`s and DMS100`s with > NI-1 software. How far along in the process this conversion is, I > longer have contact with. All the above is true, but it leaves the impression that after NI-1 is deployed that there will be no more differences between the AT&T and the NTI switches. The different architectures developed by the different vendors, described by Mr. Weiner, have carried over into the NI-1 implementations. Therefore, there are still differences in the two switches, even under NI-1. For example, if you want to use both B-channels for data, you will need two Directory Numbers, two SPIDs and two TEIs, whereas AT&T requires only one. Hopefully, these differences will go away in the migration to NI-2,3, ... ;-) Good Luck! Hascall H. ("Chip") Sharp Teleos Communications, Inc. Sr. Systems Engineer 2 Meridian Road Eatontown, NJ 07724 USA voice: +1 908 544 6424 fax: +1 908 544 9890 email: hhs@teleoscom.com ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 21 Mar 1995 05:53:32 -0500 From: ericp@ucg.com (Eric Paulak) Subject: Re: ISDN, ADPCM and COs > I was wondering if anyone know of a resource whereby I could determine > whether a particular CO supported both ISDN and ADPCM. Also, what > devices, if any, are out there that currently combine the two of them in > some way. I don't know where you can find ADPCM availability listed on a CO basis, but CCMI is currently compiling a database of ISDN and Switched 56 Kbps availability and pricing by CO for the Switched Digital Services Applications Forum (SDSAF). If you would like some more information on it, please give George David a call at CCMI. His number is (800) 929-4824, ext. 240. Hope this helps. Eric Paulak -- erip@ucg.com The Center for Communications Management Information -- the largest provider of rate and tariff information in North America and publisher of specialty telecom newsletters and on-line services (301) 816-8950, ext. 327 11300 Rockville Pike, Suite 1100, Rockville, MD 20852 gopher://earth.usa.net:70/11/News%20and%20Information/uni tedcom ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 21 Mar 1995 16:02:49 -0500 From: ericp@ucg.com (Eric Paulak) Subject: Re: Long Distance Rate Tables > I am looking for long distance rate tables from all the long > distance carriers. Anyone know where I can get this information? CCMI provides a product called the Guide to Networking services that compares telecommunication rates -- both local and long distance. It's a monthly update service that breaks telecommunications down into five volumes: interLATA switched, intraLATA switched, interLATA private line, intraLATA private line and U.S.-based private line services. CCMI can be reached at (800) 929-4824, ext. 835. ------------------------------ From: stox@fsgi01.fnal.gov (Ken Stox) Subject: Re: Call Waiting Purgatory Date: 21 Mar 1995 15:54:37 -0600 Organization: FERMILAB, Batavia, IL In article , Robohn Scott writes: > I had an interesting experience with call waiting last night. During > a conversation with Mike, he received another call and put me on > "wait" (I guess it's not really on "hold" since it's call _waiting_). > Mike's fairly gregarious and eventually forgot about me, but I was > patient and caught a short piece on Dustin Hoffman being interviewed > by Bob Costas while I waited. > After at least five minutes, I received a call from James, which I > took and put Mike's call on wait. Well, James received another call > within 30 seconds of our call, so we just said we'd talk later, but he > actually put me on wait also. So I was in deadlock: Mike and James > both had me on wait. "I'm connected, but I can't hang up." I stayed > that way for probably another 10 minutes, switching back and forth > between both waiting calls. I tried several times to go on-hook for > an extended period of time (approximately 15 seconds), but each time If memory serves correct, just three more seconds, and the line would have been dropped. You are a victim of what is a nice feature of the network. A called party may hangup for up to 18 seconds before the line is disconnected. The purpose of this is feature is to allow the called party to hangup the phone and move to a more comfortable phone. To bad they don't document this to the public very well, I only found out about it after working on the 5ESS switch. Ken Stox Fermilab stox@fnal.gov Batavia, Illinois ------------------------------ From: Jack.Quinn@mosmicro.com (Jack Quinn) Subject: Re: PHS Doesn't Work in Moving Vehicles? Date: 21 Mar 1995 22:37:46 GMT Organization: Micrologic Research Reply-To: jquinn@mosmicro.com In article , Steve Samler says: > I read in {Kyodo} today that the Japanese PHS phones do not work in > moving vehicles. Is this due to the Doppler effect? As I understand it, it's due to the speed that handoffs can be performmed. PHS users much smaller cell sizes than standard cellular, and handoffs speed is adequate when the telephone moves from cell to cell at a walking pace. A vehicle zooms through a series of these small cells very rapidly, and the system is not designed to perform the rapid handoffs that would be required. Jack Quinn Email: Jack.Quinn@mosmicro.com ------------------------------ From: producer@pipeline.com (Judith Oppenheimer) Subject: Re: U.S. 800 Users Alert Date: 21 Mar 1995 19:17:25 -0500 Organization: Interactive CallBrand(TM) Just a brief reminder -- a new global phone pad standard was approved just a few months ago. It includes the same letter/number configuration as the U.S. telephones, with the addition of Q and Z, which new U.S. phone will add as well. Judith J. Oppenheimer, Producer@Pipeline.com Interactive CallBrand(TM) ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V15 #161 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa04629; 23 Mar 95 0:17 EST Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA15813; Wed, 22 Mar 95 19:47:04 CST Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA15806; Wed, 22 Mar 95 19:47:02 CST Date: Wed, 22 Mar 95 19:47:02 CST From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest (Patrick Townson)) Message-Id: <9503230147.AA15806@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V15 #162 TELECOM Digest Wed, 22 Mar 95 19:47:00 CST Volume 15 : Issue 162 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Book Review: "How to Manage Your Network Using SNMP" (Rob Slade) FCC Delays CLID Availability (Andrew Robson) Testing Computer Telephony Applications (Tim Burchell) Planning Cellular and PCS Systems (Mario Castano) ATT Merlin 2 vs Toshiba DK Systems (Michael Sendrowicz) Primer Required on Cell Phones and Radio Paging (Akhila Ganapathy) Help on T1 and Leasing Line Needed (Min Wang) 500 Number Not Working (Chris Michael) 500-FINGERS (Carl Moore) Keypad Letter Pattern (was Re: U.S. 800 Users Alert) (Carl Moore) Call-Back Companies Information Request (Rogier van Kreveld) EDI Sources Please (Paul Hutmacher) MCI Now Using 1-900-GET-INFO (Carl Moore) Re: Credit Checking on Cellular Customers (Robert Levandowski) Re: Why Doesn't Zmodem Work? (Robert Levandowski) Re: Downloading Mac Software With a PC (Robert Levandowski) 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 America On Line. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available 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: 500-677-1616 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. A suggested donation of twenty dollars per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above. 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, 22 Mar 1995 18:21:51 EST From: Rob Slade Subject: Book Review: "How to Manage Your Network Using SNMP" BKNTMGPR.RVW 950220 "How to Manage Your Network Using SNMP: The Network Management Practicum", Marshall Rose/Keith McCloghrie, 1995, 0-13-141517-4 %A Marshall Rose %A Keith McGloghrie %C 113 Sylvan Avenue, Englewood Cliffs, NJ 07632 %D 1995 %G 0-13-141517-4 %I Prentice Hall %O (515) 284-6751 FAX (515) 284-2607 beth_hespe@prenhall.com %P 549 %T "How to Manage Your Network Using SNMP: The Network Management Practicum" There seems to be some disagreement between the authors and the publisher as to which is the title, and which is the subtitle, of this work. Nevertheless, both title and subtitle imply a useful guide. To this end, each chapter contains tutorial material, discussion of the available tools, and examination of some specific problems. The authors have produced an application programming interface in Tcl and Tk, for both practical and tutorial purposes, which is available on the Internet. While the material in the book does a good job of explanation, the appearance it presents is *not* for the technically faint of heart. The overview of SMNP, itself, for example, is not filled with C sources, but a language much more frightening--that of protocols and standards committees. The perseverant can follow the text, but it does take some dedication. copyright Robert M. Slade, 1995 BKNTMGPR.RVW 950220. Distribution permitted in TELECOM Digest and associated publications. Rob Slade's book reviews are a regular feature in the Digest. Vancouver ROBERTS@decus.ca | "My son, beware ... of the Institute for Robert_Slade@sfu.ca | making of books there is Research into rslade@cue.bc.ca | no end, and much study is User p1@CyberStore.ca | a weariness of the flesh." Security Canada V7K 2G6 | Ecclesiastes 12:12 ------------------------------ From: arobson@Gateway.Uswnvg.COM (Andrew Robson) Subject: FCC Delays CLID Availability Date: 22 Mar 1995 23:13:02 GMT Organization: U S WEST NewVector Group, Inc. The following item appeared in the 3/17/95 "Daily_Summary" on the FCC's server at fcc.gov: CALLER ID. Effective March 17, stayed effectiveness of Sections 64.1601 and 64.1603 of the Commission's rules in the matter of Rules and Policies Regarding Calling Number identification Service -- Caller ID. (CC Docket 91- 281 by Order [FCC 95-119] adopted March 17 by the Commission) It would appear that they are backing away from their agressive positions on transport and blocking of Calling Line IDentification information. Andy ------------------------------ From: tburchel@bbn.com (Tim Burchell) Subject: Testing Computer Telephony Applications Date: 22 Mar 1995 16:10:26 GMT Organization: Bolt, Beranek, & Newman, Inc. I am researching testing tools for testing computer telephony applications. I have found several products: The Hammer from Hammer Technologies Vscript from Natural Microsystems ProVIDE from Telephone Response Technologies The Hammer seems to be the most complete system. It offers a script langauge to create tests. It can drive up to 48 ports. It has extensive scheduling and reporting capabilites. It comes in an installed 486 PC SCO box. It uses Dialogic boards. It can run with analog and T1 boards. Vscript runs on OS/2. It uses NMS boards. It can run with analog and T1 boards. It has a larger script language tham Hammer but no reporting tools for diagnostics. ProVIDE is used to develop an application and test it. Has anyone used any the above tools? If you have used them, what is your opinion of the tool? Do you know of any other tools on the market? Thanks in advance, Tim Burchell voice: (617) 873-4335 BBN HARK Systems Corporation fax: (617) 873-2473 70 Fawcett St. email: tburchel@bbn.com ------------------------------ From: Mario Castano Subject: Planning Cellular and PCS Systems Date: Wed, 22 Mar 1995 11:15:50 GMT Hello all: Is there any good source that address the economic and technology aspects of cellular and PCS systems planning? Any help would be appreciated. Mario Castano ITEC/Telecom ------------------------------ From: cur93@ix.netcom.com (Michael Sendrowicz) Subject: ATT Merlin 2 vs Toshiba DK Systems Date: 22 Mar 1995 14:23:38 GMT Organization: Netcom Just curious to know how these two systems are thought of in the field. The scenario for application includes 8-12 incoming lines, with 20-30 stations. Is one system hands-down superior to the other? Or do they each excel in different areas? I have installed Toshiba systems, and find them easy to install, and quite dependable. I have had no experience with the Merlin system, but have heard some positive feedback from users. Currently, I have a customer who is looking at both systems. Additionally, I may have an opportunity to pick up the Merlin system used. (in an 8x16 configuration ...) Any range you would consider 'fair' for that type of system in the aftermarket? Thanks in advance, Cur93@ix.netcom.com ------------------------------ From: Akhila Ganapathy Subject: Primer Required on Cell Phones and Radio Paging Date: Wed, 22 Mar 95 19:56:21 IST Hello! I am looking for some beginner's material on cellular phone technology/radio paging. Could anybody out there guide me? Thanks, Akila e-mail:akhila@wipsys.soft.net ------------------------------ From: mikewang@pegasus.rutgers.edu (Min Wang) Subject: Help on T1 and Leasing Line Needed Date: 22 Mar 1995 09:37:09 -0500 Organization: Rutgers University If anyone knows where I can get information on T1 and leasing lines, please tell me. Thanks a lot! E-mail: mikewang@pegasus.rutgers.edu [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Have you asked your local telco about this? They'll be glad to tell you everything you need to know. If you would like a perhaps somewhat more impartial response from our group of reader/advisers here, perhaps you could write again and be a bit more explicit about your requirements and plans. PAT] ------------------------------ From: cm@nwu.edu (Chris Michael) Subject: 500 Number Not Working Date: 22 Mar 95 16:45:40 GMT Organization: Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, US Reply-To: cm@nwu.edu (Chris Michael) Sorry if you've already covered all this, but I'm wondering if I have bad 500 number karma or if it really doesn't work too well. I've had three people try to call me for a record of zero getting through. Then, of course, ATT tells me that *no* cellular phones can call 500 numbers because "the cellular carriers don't have any way to bill for the calls". Is this going to fly or not? christopher michael, george s. may international, 708-825-8806 x 395 [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: 500 numbers are a new enough concept that most cellular carriers have not yet made any arrangements for handling such traffic. You can forward your 500 number to a cellular phone, its just that you can't call *from* a cellular phone to a 500 number. At least not yet. Back in the days when there was but one telephone company, and that telephone company saw to it that everything meshed together nicely and that all the parts could talk to and deal with all the other parts this would not have been a problem. Now that all the individual companies do their own thing with only a casual thought given to the customer -- and then, usually in the context of the customer being an interupption to their work rather than the purpose of it -- lots of the parts don't merge well with the other parts. Of course a rejoinder to this is that if there were still just the one Mother Company would we even have cellular service and 500 number service at all .... What happens when your associates attempt to call your 500 number from 'regular' or landline phones of the non-payphone, non-hotel switchboard variety, i.e. the phones in their home? Are they unable to get through on those lines either? PAT] ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 22 Mar 95 12:29:42 EST From: Carl Moore Subject: 500-FINGERS I got a newsletter in which I noticed someone in Akron, Ohio grabbed 500-FINGERS, apparently as a vanity number. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 22 Mar 95 13:25:56 EST From: Carl Moore Subject: Keypad Letter Pattern (was Re: U.S. 800 Users Alert) I guess I skimmed right past the original notice, including WHAT KEYS Q AND Z GO ON. Perhaps the U.S. dialpad (with the newly- added Q and Z) could be put into frequently-asked questions. To rehash notes about the Q/Z problem: 1. somebody (a radio station?) ran a vice-presidential poll in 1988 regarding Dan Quayle (Republican) and Lloyd Bentsen (Democrat), with instructions to press Q or B as the case may be. The poll was rendered invalid due to the keypad having no Q. 2. some voice menu involving movie titles had special instructions for Q and Z; I believe it was to use 1 for those letters. ------------------------------ From: kreveld@dds.nl (Rogier van Kreveld) Subject: Call-Back Companies Information Request Date: 22 Mar 1995 06:23:36 GMT Organization: De Digitale Stad (020-6225222) Does anybody have e-mail addresses and/or fax numbers of so called call-back companies? These are companies that give you a US or UK dialtone after you dial a trigger number in the US or UK. After that you can make your international phone call usually with a substantial savings compared with what the Dutch phone company charges. I am especially interested in companies that do not charge the typical $25 monthly minimum usage. In case you want to respond via e-mail please direct your response to kres@geo.vu.nl. Any help would be appreciated. ------------------------------ From: paul@Starbase.NeoSoft.COM (Paul Hutmacher) Subject: EDI Sources Please Date: 22 Mar 1995 13:33:14 GMT Organization: My Personal Soapbox (tm) Reply-To: paul@Starbase.NeoSoft.COM (Paul Hutmacher) I am interested in finding newsgroups or other sources dealing with EDI. If someone would point me in the proper direction I would greatly appreciate it. Thanks in advance. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 22 Mar 95 16:47:29 EST From: Carl Moore Subject: 1-900-GET-INFO This arrived today from: 1-900-GET-INFO, P.O. BOX 30004, PENSACOLA, FL 32503 (first class, U.S. Postage Paid, Permit No. 293, Merrifield, VA). I made some changes to accommodate my terminal: 1. due to no "cents" sign, blank followed by "cents" used instead. 2. long lines of text have been split; continuation is signalled by a single blank at the start of a line. 3. SM (does that mean "service mark"?) has been enclosed in parentheses instead of being superscripted. 1-900-GET-INFO (SM) America's Long Distance Directory Assistance (SM) Thank you for using our nationwide long distance directory assistance service. Thousands of callers like you found it convenient and simple-to-use. Now we have a new number for long distance information-- 1-900-GET-INFO It's the same great service at the same price of 75 cents. Just dial this one, easy-to-remember number anytime you need long distance directory assistance. The operator will give you the listing and even offer to put the call through at no extra charge. If you wish to be connected, the call itself will be billed at MCI's already-low long distance rates. Need someone's zip code? 1-900-GET-INFO can also be used to find zip codes anywhere in the U.S. 1-900-GET-INFO...Just 75 cents * No need to know the area code * Call connection at no extra charge * Zip codes * Friendly operators * 24 hour a day service * Listings for business, residential or government-- anywhere nationwide and in many locations around the world It cost just 75 cents for up to two listings in the U.S. -- that's the same price most people pay today for interstate long distance directory assistance. The cost for one international listing is only $1.99. 1-900-GET-INFO offers the convenience of billing long distance directory assistance to your home phone. And if you're calling from a phone where 900 access is not available, such as a payphone, you can use 1-800-GET- INFO (SM) and charge the service to a major credit card. 1-900-GET-INFO, it's as simple as it sounds. ------------------------------ From: rlvd_cif@uhura.cc.rochester.edu (Robert Levandowski) Subject: Re: Credit Checking on Cellular Customers Organization: University of Rochester - Rochester, New York Date: Tue, 21 Mar 95 21:54:56 GMT In Alan Dahl writes: > No insult intended towards college students but they should know how > hard it is to get credit for anything. The thing is, I have good credit. Perhaps I can't buy a house, but neither do alarms go off when I pull out my credit card. :) I have two lines with RochTel, and a good payment history with them ... so I was a bit surprised that they were looking for a rather large amount of available credit on my line before they'd waive the deposit. This, in itself, isn't too objectionable ... but when they turn around and waive the deposit anyway when I balk, and instead just take my MasterCard number, it seems a bit sleazy. If I were a person walking in off the street with no references, I'd understand the need for protection. However, as someone who has kept a household for two years, and paid phone and long distance bills to the company in question without complaint for that time ... and someone who can afford $25k a year to go to the University ... it just makes me a bit uncomfortable. If it were really to cover their ass in event of fraud, why do they treat it like a used-car salesman treats the "dealer prep fee"? It's there until it looks like it'll lose the sale, and then it vanishes. My credit check through Equifax isn't good enough for them ... but my MasterCard, which at the time had $70 left on it, being Christmastime, was sufficient. This just doesn't seem to make sense! Rob Levandowski Computer Interest Floor associate / University of Rochester macwhiz@cif.rochester.edu [Opinions expressed are mine, not UR's.] [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: The ridiculous part of it all is that literally *anyone* can get VISA or Mastercard, regardless of how bad their credit is. Both of those cards have lending institutions associated with them which offer 'secured' VISA or MC. That is, you deposit some sum of money in their bank which you are unable to touch ever again and they in turn issue you a VISA/MC with a credit line equal to whatever amount of money you had put in the bank. Having a VISA/MC is *not* a sign that one has good credit, particularly if you are in the industry and you can look at the first four digits on the card (which identify the bank issuing the card) then look the cardholder in the face and say, "but sir, this is a *secured* VISA ..." A few years ago all the major retailers were running a promotion where if you came in their store(s) and presented a VISA/MC as payment, they would give you 'instant credit' in the form of one of their own credit cards without bothering to do a credit check. After all, credit checks cost them money, and VISA had already done one, right? So people with lousy credit would tear off one of those coupons on the bus advertising sign saying 'regardless of bad credit you can have a VISA/MC' and send it in with a hundred dollars. They'd get back a VISA with a 'credit limit' of one hundred dollars, then take this card and go shopping at Neiman Marcus or Marshall Fields. The store clerk gets some small premium for each new credit card customer (s)he signs up that the credit office approves, so when the customer whacked his plastic on the counter, the clerk would say how would you like to have a Neiman Marcus credit card?. The savings for the store were obvious. Instead of having to factor that paper through their bank and lose a few points, they'd carry the paper themselves. The credit risk can't be too bad, they'd think ... after all the customer did have a pocket full of VISA/MC's ... Montgomery Ward got burned badly on 'instant credit' a few years ago, as did Rosendorf and a couple other chains. To make matters worse, unlike VISA, where its no skin off their nose if the merchant makes the sale or not and credit limits are pretty closely watched, the merchants were *really, really hungry* two years ago at Christmas time. Credit limits be damned! they said, letting customers with their in-house cards go way over limit lots of times in order to get a good sale. Their rationale was if we do not approve this sale on our card, the customer will simply use his VISA card to pay for it, and we lose the fee. If it had been me, I would have said "VISA will approve this sale? Good!!! Let them eat it ..." The catch in credit granting is to enhance the possibility of making the sale while at the same time keeping the costs involved with the extension of credit as low as possible. Fine tune the process to where creditors can make some reasonably sophisticated decisions regards who to give credit to and who not to give it to; how much credit to extend, and what to charge for it. Someone -- probably the same outfit which devised the worthless 'point scoring' tests the creditors use as a shortcut to *real* (and very costly) investigation of prospective customers -- put a bug in the creditors' ear that as long as some VISA/MC affiliate had approved the customer, you can do the same. So the merchants gleefully glutted the market with their own in-house cards only to have the bad debt get higher than ever. A very cynical person would say it must have been a scheme devised by collection agencies, many of whom have been laughing all the way to the bank because of their increased caseload in the past couple years due to 'instant credit' given by your friendly local branch of Wards. PAT] ------------------------------ From: rlvd_cif@uhura.cc.rochester.edu (Robert Levandowski) Subject: Re: Why Doesn't Zmodem Work? Organization: University of Rochester - Rochester, New York Date: Tue, 21 Mar 95 22:14:36 GMT In saclib@garnet.msen.com (David Burns) writes: > I am using a shell account to access the Internet, and most of the time I > get there via MichNet, which is a local call. The trouble is that none of > the fast protocols, e.g., Zmodem, work when I'm dialed in this way. Kermit > works, but it is slow and not absolutely trustworthy. > If I dial in via direct line, bypassing MichNet, Zmodem works > fine, but then I am paying a toll call. > Can anyone supply any answers/solutions/confirmations? ZMODEM needs an 8-bit, clean data path. If you're using telnet, that's often a 7-bit protocol. Also, some systems eat important characters like XON/XOFF, which ZMODEM wants to use. Our Xyplex terminal servers were notorious for eating control characters that ZMODEM wanted to use. You can try using the "escape control characters" mode of ZMODEM, but this may signifigantly decrease ZMODEM's speed. At UR, we recommend the use of Kermit because it's very difficult to make default Kermit fail completely. Yes, it's slow as molasses by default. However, if you change the packet size from 94 bytes to something more reasonable -- 5000 to 9024 bytes -- you'll see Kermit's performance leap right up into ZMODEM's ballpark. You can get further increases by using sliding windows (3 - 5 windows seems to work well) and the least necessary control prefixing. Kermit takes a bit of optimizing; you might try and get a copy of "Kermit News" No. 5 (July 1993) from Columbia University. That issue has an article on optimizing Kermit, and documents Kermit transferring a MS-DOS binary file via a v.42bis modem at 569% efficiency (8192 cps). The issue gives an Ordering Information phone number: +1 212 854-3703. Rob Levandowski Computer Interest Floor associate / University of Rochester macwhiz@cif.rochester.edu [Opinions expressed are mine, not UR's.] ------------------------------ From: rlvd_cif@uhura.cc.rochester.edu (Robert Levandowski) Subject: Re: Downloading Mac Software With a PC Organization: University of Rochester - Rochester, New York Date: Wed, 22 Mar 95 01:10:20 GMT In reidgold@netaxs.com (Reid Goldsborough) writes: > Here's the short version: What do I need to do to download Mac shareware > and commercial bug fixes with a Windows-based PC to make the software > usable on a Mac? > I believe you need the program StuffIt (or equivalent) to unstuff these > files with extensions .hqx). So I also downloaded UnStuffIt.1.5.bin. I'm > not sure what the extension .bin means. Does it mean it can unstuff > itself by doubleclicking on its icon? ".bin" means it's in MacBinary format, a way of formatting a Mac two-forked file so that it can be transferred to a one-forked file system like MS-DOS or UNIX. You will need to decode this file before you can use it. Most Mac telecom programs do this automatically when you download. StuffIt will also decode MacBinary, but that would put the cart before the horse. You might want to check with a local Mac guru about getting a copy of StuffIt. Self-extracting files (which can be decompressed by double-clicking on their icon) usually have the suffix ".sea". Also, UnStuffIt 1.5 is hideously out of date. You should get a copy of StuffIt Expander 3.5 or later, and a copy of DropStuff with Expander Enhancer, which will let you decode PKZIP files with Expander. Expander is freeware and DropStuff is shareware. > Well, I copied UnStuffIt.1.5.bin from my PC's hard disk to my Mac's hard > disk, but when I doubleclicked on it, I just got a message that Apple > File Exchange didn't recognize it. This is a Mac program so it doesn't > need Apple File Exchange, but my Mac thinks it's a PC program. So this is > where I'm stuck. It's a file transferred from a PC, so the Mac assumes it's a PC program and sets its type accordingly. (It's a binary file, but it's not a Macintosh two-forked binary file, so it's "unknown".) > this would be inconvenient. I'd rather try to find a solution where I > could simply use a floppy to transfer Mac programs to the Mac that I > downloaded with the PC. To do this most easily, you'll need to get a copy of a program that can decode BinHex files. StuffIt Expander will do this. A local user group, or any computer dealer worth doing business with, can give you a copy. You can then download the BinHex (.hqx) files as ASCII text to your PC, copy the files to the Mac, and drag them to the Expander icon to decode and decompress them. There are programs out there that can convert .hqx files to MacBinary format and back, but until you have a Mac program that can convert .hqx or MacBinary back to the native Macintosh two-forked file format, you won't be able to use any downloaded applications. Any conversions before the Mac will wipe out part of the file when you save it to the DOS machine's one-forked file format. Rob Levandowski Computer Interest Floor associate / University of Rochester macwhiz@cif.rochester.edu [Opinions expressed are mine, not UR's.] ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V15 #162 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa05240; 23 Mar 95 1:29 EST Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA17749; Wed, 22 Mar 95 21:07:16 CST Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA17743; Wed, 22 Mar 95 21:07:13 CST Date: Wed, 22 Mar 95 21:07:13 CST From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest (Patrick Townson)) Message-Id: <9503230307.AA17743@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V15 #163 TELECOM Digest Wed, 22 Mar 95 21:07:00 CST Volume 15 : Issue 163 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Microsoft Techs and Phone Calls (TELECOM Digest Editor) Re: Defective Caller ID (Howard M. Weiner) Re: Defective Caller ID (Ronell Elkayam) Re: X.25/ISDN Prices; Global Information Wanted (Matthew P. Downs) Re: X.25/ISDN Prices; Global Information Wanted (Tony Harminc) Re: X.25/ISDN Prices; Global Information Wanted (Steve Cogorno) Re: Caller ID in CA (hihosteveo@aol.com) Re: Cellular Fraud in the News Again (Robert Virzi) Re: Telecom Professional Organizations and Magazines (Mike Patterson) Re: Ni-Cad Batteries (Charles Marks) Re: How Do I Create a TelCo? (hihosteveo@aol.com) 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 America On Line. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available 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: 500-677-1616 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. A suggested donation of twenty dollars per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above. 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, 22 Mar 95 20:32:51 CST From: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest Editor) Subject: Microsoft Techs and Phone Calls A couple days ago we were discussing here the management of telephone queues for help lines and information services, etc. Mention was made of Microsoft and their disk jockey who plays music and gives announcements about queue holding times. I ridiculed this idea, saying instead of having a disk jockey play music, it would be better to hire a couple more people to take phone calls instead and move the queue a little faster. Someone responded saying 'if you already have hundreds of technicians taking calls, what good would one or two more do?'. I expressed some amazement at this and suggested that Microsoft might hire hundreds of tech people, but I was certain they did not have them all there to sit and take phone calls from the public eight hours per day. I suggested that perhaps a much smaller number of employees actually took phone calls. I got a phone call Wednesday afternoon from someone I had not talked to in years -- since a previous lifetime actually! -- by the name of Shawn Goodwin. Back in the early 1980's, he lived in (I think) Downers Grove, Illinois and operated the 'Suburban Round Table BBS'; it was an Apple ][ BBS running Bill Blue's software. The purpose of his call was to put me in touch with a woman who formerly worked for Microsoft as a supervisor of the techs who answered all those phone calls. I spoke with the woman for about twenty minutes in a conference call with Shawn, and it was very enlightning for me to say the least. It showed me the way different people, doing a lot of the same work, but from much different directions can have vastly different perspectives. I've been involved with big phone rooms at one time or another; a dozen or more people on each shift handling in total thousands of calls daily in a bang! bang! bang! kind of environment, with very sophisticated record keeping and telecom equipment. As a result, I assume I know something about phone rooms and long holding queues and how to manage the callers waiting, etc. The woman told me a much different account of things. It seems Microsoft does indeed have *hundreds* of people, whom they call technicians taking calls at three locations in the USA. This woman was responsible for super- vising quite a few of them when she worked for Microsoft. I asked her if you had hundreds of people taking calls seven or eight hours per day, how many thousands of calls must you have received, with people waiting in line for upwards of twenty minutes yet to get through, and a DJ who tells you there are eighteen calls ahead of yours, etc. It was not that there was such a huge volume of calls in terms of the number of calls as it was that *each call lasted an average of nine minutes*. Many calls took quite a bit longer. Many times, she said, the technicians had to literally start from the beginning with a customer and go from the initial installation of the software forward. They might have to get into things like the customer's config.sys file and almost re-write it all. Naturally there were the customers who read in the book to press 'any key' who called to say there was no such button on their keyboard marked 'any'. Seriously. She said a relatively small handful -- one hundred perhaps, or maybe two hundred -- of customers always called them repeatedly, over and over. These poor souls had to be walked through everything, everytime. This was the reason the queue was so sluggish, despite *hundreds* of people taking calls. The average nine minute call is what shocked me. I found that incredible and still do. This illustrates well the different directions people travel to get to the same place. In the phone rooms I worked in, a nine minute call would have been outrageous, and if holding time in the queue got to more than one or two minutes -- perhaps eight to ten calls holding -- the supervisors got frantic. And we handled perhaps ten times the number of calls daily that Microsoft gets. So I asked the lady, if Microsoft had to spend that much time and effort and personnell -- with the inherent payroll costs involved -- in providing customer support, where is the profit in developing software? Well, she said, that was the hangup; there wasn't much profit, not as the system was configured. Yes, there was some, and she said customer support was never intended to be a profit center for the company, but it got ridiculous. She mentioned a couple of products Microsoft had put out that (as she put it) customer support got hit very hard on. She said they had the same people working nine hours per day taking calls, never getting to the end of the queue. They could have stayed open 24 hours per day and maybe the queue would have gotten skimpy around five in the morning. Thus they decided to begin PAID customer support. Customers get a certain amount of free support in the beginning and pay for it after that. She said it was a relatively small number of customers who forced them to do that, but the way it had been going, customer support was a drain on the whole company. I was reminded of telco's decision to begin charging for directory assist- ance after how many ever years of free service. It was much the same thing, with a handful of big corporate subscribers who were very heavy users of directory assistance (credit departments, collection agencies, etc) banging away at them so much that they could no longer give it away for free. Anyway, I stand corrected, at least in Microsoft's case. As to the DJ, I still don't know what I think of that idea. The woman said using the DJ was not all that successful since predicting the holding times in the queue was next to impossible. The customer ahead of you in the queue might be gone in thirty seconds or he might be there for thirty minutes. Thanks very much Shawn for putting together the conference. It was quite interesting and informative to say the least. PAT ------------------------------ From: hmweine@PacBell.COM (Howard M. Weiner) Subject: Re: Defective Caller ID Date: Wed, 22 Mar 1995 12:03:26 -0800 Organization: Pacific Bell Strategic Systems Architecture In article , splieth@csd.uwm.edu (Roberta Kay Splieth) wrote: > A business associate who subscribes to caller ID finds that when > certain parties call him from within his caller ID service area, their > telephone numbers do not display on his caller ID unit the first time. > The screen on his display unit is blank. > However, when he has the same parties call back a second time, their > telephone numbers and names will display. The display unit has been > replaced three times in the past month so we don't think the problem > is in the equipment or because of a low battery. Also, the local > telephone company has checked the line for trouble and come up with > nothing. Just a thought ... how quickly is he answering the call the first time. If I remember right, the data is sent between the first and second ring (this may even differ from switch type to switch type). Could he be answering too soon? Howard M. Weiner hmweine@pacbell.com ------------------------------ From: relkay01@solix.fiu.edu (ronell elkayam) Subject: Re: Defective Caller ID Date: 22 Mar 1995 21:34:38 GMT Organization: Florida International University I know exactly what is happening. I experienced the same thing before they upgraded the equipment in the telco. (Oh, this happened to me when the telco offered _only_ CID number delivery, once they upgraded to name and number, the problem stopped.) But as I was saying, I had the same problem of some calls not delivering _any_ information to the caller ID device, and I _did_ pinpoint the roots: If someone calls you on his three way (meaning, he is already on the line with someone, and then flashes and calls you -- the person with the CID) then the caller ID would not receive ANYTHING from the telco (the equivalent of hooking a caller ID device to a line that is not subscribed to Caller ID service). Now that is not entirely true ... let me re-say more accurately: If I speak to someone, and then flash, call another person on my three-way and then flash right back BEFORE it rings on that other person (meaning the first person I was talking to can hear the ringing of the new call), then the Caller ID does not receive the information. However, if I talk to someone, and then flash, call another person on my three-way and WAIT for two rings (or until he picks up) and only then click back to the original call, then the caller ID will show the information. They fixed the bug in the upgraded system, but now there is a new cute bug. Now, when I call my caller ID modem, using three way, and click over to the original call AFTER I see the Caller ID information has been transmitted, it will send the information a second time, so on my screen I will see the same exact call showing up twice ... There is another bug I realized they have, which nobody will probably believe me they have (as it will make many people kinda sweaty), but that is another story. Just to give you a hint: _don't_ give out your credit card number/information if you happen to make a call that goes through my local phone company main office. (And no, it absolutely takes no special rewiring or even a device to do, as I said -- it's a bug in the system...) Don't forget to tell me if the problem really was the three-way deal! > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: You say the first time the screen is > 'blank'. Do you mean literally nothing shows up at all, not even just > a few dashes, or some garbled characters? Most caller id boxes will > respond to the ringing of a telephone with *something*, even if just > dashes across the screen to indicate nothing was sent. What are you talking about? No they won't! Try hooking any caller ID box to a line which does not subscibe to Caller Id service, it will show a blank screen (and perhaps a flashing "No Data Sent" which will not stay in the memory with the usual time/date stamp). > Since you have already tried three different boxes on > the same line and gotten the same results, try taking the box to some > other line independent of the one it is on now and trying it there. > See if the results on that (caller id equipped) line are the same. If > so then maybe it is the box. If possible, install a caller-id box from > some other vendor on the line where you are having the trouble and see > if the problem persists with a display box *from a different vendor*. > Let's try to isolate the problem as to display box or line and proceed > from there. PAT] It's not the box, Pat. There are too many bugs in the phone system. If only I lived in Washington DC, I could have made MILLIONS selling overheard conversations of corrupt congressman (without even leaving home OR using _anything_ but a phone line, a phone and my finger). But I value my life too much for that. I rather just overhear funny people talking discretely, believing in the good ol' Ma' Bell to provide them privacy ... Laugh if you want, it matters not to me. [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: That's amazing. I imagine a lot of the readers are testing it out as they read this ... do you mean to say that I could dial a silent termination number, flash for three way and then dial your number, flash quickly without you getting the ID and then converse with you (and the silent termination line as our third part of it) ... and you'd never see my ID, let alone the privacy indicator or anything else ... hmmm. Please write back again soon and explain the other quirk you found with credit card numbers, won't you? I'm sure a number of readers will want to investigate and repair that problem also. I'm not laughing ... I beleive you. PAT] ------------------------------ From: mpd@adc.com (Matthew P. Downs) Subject: Re: X.25/ISDN Prices; Global Information Wanted Date: 21 Mar 1995 20:47:50 GMT Organization: ADC Telecommunications cogorno@netcom.com (Steve Cogorno) writes: > Rishab Aiyer Ghosh said: >> Someone wrote: [on X.25 over ISDN]: >>> Rates in the Pacific Bell Service area for data packets are: >>> .05 CENTS for transaction setup >>> .005 CENTS per octet of data >> That works out to about $52 per Mb - is that _cheap_? > Where did you get this figure? When I calculate it it works out to $3.27 per > MB. > 1 MB = 1024K = 1048576 Bytes=8388608 bits=65536 octets (1 octet=128 bits) When did an octet become 128 bits? In everything I read an octet is 8 bits. Matt ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 21 Mar 95 18:18:02 EST From: Tony Harminc Subject: Re: X.25/ISDN Prices; Global Information Wanted cogorno@netcom.com (Steve Cogorno) wrote: >>> Rates in the Pacific Bell Service area for data packets are: >>> .05 CENTS for transaction setup >>> .005 CENTS per octet of data >> That works out to about $52 per Mb - is that _cheap_? > Where did you get this figure? When I calculate it it works out to $3.27 per > MB. > 1 MB = 1024K = 1048576 Bytes=8388608 bits=65536 octets (1 octet=128 bits) > 65536 octets * .005 cents = 327.68 cents = $3.27 An octet is a byte. Oct = 8. Octopus: 8 legs, octagon: 8 sides, octothorpe: # character, octet: 8 bits. Perhaps the rate you quoted was per packet. Typical X.25 packet sizes are 128 and 256 bytes/octets. Tony Harminc ------------------------------ From: cogorno@netcom.com (Steve Cogorno) Subject: Re: X.25/ISDN Prices; Global Information Wanted Date: Tue, 21 Mar 1995 17:08:10 PST Tony Harminc said: > From: cogorno@netcom.com (Steve Cogorno) >>>> Rates in the Pacific Bell Service area for data packets are: >>>> .05 CENTS for transaction setup >>>> .005 CENTS per octet of data >>> That works out to about $52 per Mb - is that _cheap_? >> Where did you get this figure? When I calculate it it works out to $3.27 per >> MB. >> 1 MB = 1024K = 1048576 Bytes=8388608 bits=65536 octets (1 octet=128 bits) >> 65536 octets * .005 cents = 327.68 cents = $3.27 > An octet is a byte. Oct = 8. Octopus: 8 legs, octagon: 8 sides, octothorpe: > # character, octet: 8 bits. Perhaps the rate you quoted was per packet. > Typical X.25 packet sizes are 128 and 256 bytes/octets. Yes, I know an octet is a byte, but the PacBell people call 128 bytes an octet (I don't know why). I was erroneously told last week that the packets are 128 bits, but I thought that was too small. I called again, and they said it is 128 bytes. I still don't know why they call it an octet though. Steve cogorno@netcom.com ------------------------------ From: hihosteveo@aol.com (HiHoSteveo) Subject: Re: Caller ID in CA Date: 21 Mar 1995 17:13:49 -0500 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) Reply-To: hihosteveo@aol.com (HiHoSteveo) Don't expect Caller ID in CA in the forseeable future. 61 parties appealed the FCC order on interstate. State of California wants blocking of origin- ating party to prevail, PacBell wants no blocking. Pet for Recon was supposed to be out last year but is in limbo. CA is the only state not offering or with pending offering. Both parties said they would appeal the FCC Recon if it went against them. Appeals of FCC go the Wash District, allow two years. ------------------------------ From: rv01@gte.com (Robert Virzi) Subject: Re: Cellular Fraud in the News Again Date: 22 Mar 1995 18:49:05 GMT Organization: GTE Laboratories, Waltham, MA PAT wrote: >> The thing which caught my eye, and which I discussed with her briefly on >> the phone Monday morning was her tossing around of the figures given to >> her by some industry people: $1.3 million per day in fraud; and that >> this represented four percent of the industry's annual traffic. By my >> calculations, 1.3 million per day comes to about $454 million per year, >> and that figure is four percent of what astronomical amount? Phil Ritter responded: > However, the "annual revenue" for the "cellular industry" that is > implied above is not only not astronomical, but probably understates > the the actual industry revenues (well, OK, it is astronomical, but in > the context above Pat also implies that it could not possibly be that > high -- I contend that it is actually higher!). I came late to this discussion, but I think I might have something to add, related to the size of the cellular industry. Let's see, if I did this right, the total cellular industry was estimated to be $11.35 Billion. That's from $454M = 4%. Here are some numbers from my companies annual report, so they must be public info: 2.3 million cellular customers $1.6 Billion (yes folks, with a 'B') revenues That comes to about $700 per year per cellular subscriber. Dividing the $11B total revenue by the estimate of revenue per subscriber I get just over 16M subscribers. We're the second largest cellular provider, and these figures suggest we'd have about 1/7th of the overall market. Since there are nine majors (seven regionals, GTE, and ATT) this makes sense, and confirms the figure somewhat. Bob Virzi rvirzi@gte.com +1(617)466-2881 ------------------------------ From: mapa@chevron.com (Mike Patterson) Subject: Re: Telecom Professional Organizations and Magazines Date: 22 Mar 95 19:47:43 GMT Organization: Chevron Information Technology Co. In article SMITHB@nutra.monsanto.com (Brian Smith) writes: > I am new to the InterNet. I am looking for suggestions of professional > telecommunication groups to join, newsgroups on the Net, and professional > journals or magazines. I am a consultant working with AT&T PBX systems. > Any help or suggestions would be great! Join the IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers), the largest engineering organization in the world. They have a wide variety of services, including numerous technical societies. One of them is the Communications Society, which very possibly has local chapter meetings in your area. Another is the Computer Society. They also have excellent periodicals and journals on a wide variety of topics, some dedicated to telecommunications, and a large inventory of books from their own press and other publishers. As a bonus, they further provide access to several personal and professional services, such as job and career databases and information, inexpensive term life and other insurance, various loans (including mortgages), credit cards, mutual funds, discounts at Kinkos, rental car agencies and hotels and several other services. You can save the cost of your annual membership fee on the life insurance alone. Contact them at member.services@ieee.org or 800/678-4333. ------------------------------ From: cfmarks@mixcom.com (Marks) Subject: Re: Ni-Cad Batteries Date: 22 Mar 1995 21:46:50 GMT Organization: Alpha.net -- Milwaukee, WI Reply-To: cfmarks@mixcom.com >> Doing this is a good way for the first cell to hit zero to be pushed >> negative as the other cells continue to discharge. This is about the >> worst thing you can do to the cell, and will ensure its shorter life. > I do not believe this is a problem. What happens is you take all > cells down to zero, and then recharge together. If imbalances > were a problem they would occur at any level. This is a problem and it is called reversal. It is caused by the fact that manufacturers cannot economically match cell capacities in a series string. If you have a cell that is low in capacity relative to the others in the string (only 1% low is enough to do it) only at the end of discharge, due to the Ni-Cads flat discharge profile, will reversal occur and be a problem. It *will not* occur "at any level". >> If you don't want to do that, use the intellicharger and don't leave >> it on trickle. Not overcharging the battery will be the best move >> towards keeping the battery away from voltage depression, and get good >> service. False. Modern Ni-cad batteries have a very efficient overcharge mechanism and can be left on charge indefinately without a problem (unless the charger fails). The only time this is not true is if you have the very rapid recharge batteries and charger. Extended overcharge (if even possible with the charger) will damage this type of battery. Charles Marks Quantum Energy Consulting Consultant to the Battery Industry cfmarks@mixcom.com ------------------------------ From: hihosteveo@aol.com (HiHoSteveo) Subject: Re: How Do I Create a TelCo? Date: 22 Mar 1995 16:57:42 -0500 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) Reply-To: hihosteveo@aol.com (HiHoSteveo) Call the Telephone Resellers Association (TRA), find them in your librarry Encylopedia of Associations; I think they are in Arlington. ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V15 #163 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa07096; 23 Mar 95 3:13 EST Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA20209; Wed, 22 Mar 95 22:46:15 CST Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA20200; Wed, 22 Mar 95 22:46:09 CST Date: Wed, 22 Mar 95 22:46:09 CST From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest (Patrick Townson)) Message-Id: <9503230446.AA20200@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V15 #164 TELECOM Digest Wed, 22 Mar 95 22:46:00 CST Volume 15 : Issue 164 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Request For Information on ADSI Standard (Grant D. Cooper) Looking For X.25 Cards (Cedric Perret) Re: Info Wanted About Comstar (Kenneth E. Gray) Can Anyone Recommend a Good T1 Text (David M. Meyer) Library Technology and Telecommunications (Theresa Arenholz via FAX) Re: Who's the B Cell Carrier in Ithaca NY? (Robert Levandowski) Re: Who's the B Cell Carrier in Ithaca NY? (Peter A. Morenus, Jr.) Fax Evaluation Criteria (idesteve@aol.com) European WAN - How?? (Steve Alburty) Router Connection via T1 (Frank M. Koerber) Re: Denver International Airport (Buchanan Natalia) Re: Looking for Excel Corp (Mike Rehmus) Re: Looking for Excel Corp (Gerry Gollwitzer) Wanted: Used Business Telephone Systems (Integrity Telecommunications) 800 Numbers, and FLOWERS Again (Mel Beckman) Re: This Newsgroup Demo'ed on PBS's "Internet Show" (Bruce McGuffin) Caller ID Specs Wanted (Gordon Jacobson) 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 America On Line. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available 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: 500-677-1616 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. A suggested donation of twenty dollars per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above. 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: Mon, 13 Mar 1995 08:52:57 -0500 From: gcooper@interlog.com (G.D.Cooper) Subject: Request For Information on ADSI Standard Hi, I am about to embark on a project involving the ADSI standard. For those not familiar, this is a handset that allows the customer the ability to dial the Telco and download information to the phone. This download activates or deactivates services based on the customers requirements. 'nough said 'bout that. I would like to ask for any related information regarding the ADSI CPE technology. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Sincerely, Grant Cooper Global Project Manager Architel Systems Corp. ------------------------------ From: perretc@eiga.unige.ch (Perret Cedric) Subject: Looking For X.25 Cards Organization: E.I.G Date: Thu, 23 Mar 1995 01:18:38 GMT Hello, Landis & Gyr is looking for an X.25 Card. They use the card from Gateway Communications, Ref G/X.25 Gateway. Sadly, this society don't sell this card anymore. It can be new card for a retailer (please give some addresses). Or even some old cards that are unused. They need 10-20 cards. Please E-mail answer. Thanks, Perretc@eig.unige.ch Perret Cidric ------------------------------ From: kgray@minerva.cis.yale.edu (Kenneth E Gray) Subject: Re: Info Wanted About Comstar Date: 22 Mar 1995 07:40:29 GMT Organization: Yale University - New Haven, CT USA Mr. Sanders, Please let me know what information you would like on Comstar. I spent this past summer in Moscow and did research in the Russian telecommunications industry, so I know a lot about Comstar from both the technical and business sides. Basically, they are a joint-venture of a British firm (I don't have the name in front of me) and the Moscow City TElephone Network (MGTS). They provide international, national and local phone service at ridiculous rates (though, as their sales pitch goes, the call goes through "first time, every time" a big improvement on the Russian system). They have a sister company in Petersburg called Peterstar, who did a lot of the communications for the Good Will Games. comstar operates two digital switches in Moscow, with a connection to Eutelsat for international traffic. Rates are crazy and support the addage, when there are bodies in the desert, the vultures circle. Installation runs from $250 to $800 with a minimum of $150 per month (not too hard to do considering calls to the US are $3.25 per minute). They operate a payphone service in Russia where for $12 per minute (yes, that is twelve dollars) you can call the USA. The phones take prepay cards or credit cards. Their service is reliable and state of the art, something difficult to find when it comes to Russian phones. There are other similar providers in Moscow, Combellga is Belgian and Sovintel is the American one. I believe Itallian telecomm recently opened Astelit as well. None of them are cheap, they are all joint-ventures with Russian companies (well, the Russian state anyways), but they provide reliable communications that wouldn't be there otherwise. That's a summary; if you have any specific questions, I'll be happy to try to answer. You can call Comstar themselves at +7 503 956-0001. Kenneth Gray kgray@minerva.cis.yale.edu ------------------------------ From: meyer@frostbite-falls.uoregon.edu (David M. Meyer) Subject: Can Anyone Recommend a Good T1 Text Date: 22 Mar 1995 20:46:24 GMT Organization: University Network Services, University of Oregon, Eugene, OR Can anyone recommend a good textbook on T1? Thanks, David M. Meyer Voice: +1.503.346.1747 Senior Network Engineer Pager: +1.503.342.9458 Office of University Computing Cellular: +1.503.954.1103 Computing Center FAX: +1.503.346.4397 University of Oregon Internet: meyer@ns.uoregon.edu 1225 Kincaid Eugene, OR 97403 ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 22 Mar 95 21:53:20 CST From: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu (Theresa Arenholz via FAX) Subject: Library Technology and Telecommunications Dear Pat, I enjoy reading your journal each day in Grouptalk, which is on the mainframe where I work. I very much look forward to a personal sub- scription within the year when I buy my PC for graduate school. Although I am not the most technologically competent person among the readers to your journal, I do manage to comprehend enough to keep me interested in telecommunications. Reading your Digest each day has helped me become aware of the many very exciting developments in tele- communications. Since I have read-only access to Grouptalk, and because I do not have a home computer or access to the Internet itself, I would appreciate it if you could post this question for me: I am working on an undergraduate research paper in Library Technology and I would appreciate any assistance you or other readers can give me. Some theorists have postulated that the library of the future will be a virtual library, i.e. a library without walls, from which patrons wil have full access to materials from their home computers. Is this a plausible scenario? What telecommunications technology will support this? I can read anything posted in response, but if your readers would prefer to send me a personal response they can do that also. Please send responses by snail-mail (my apologies for not being wired): Theresa Arenholz 15 Sgt. Morgan Lane Haddam Neck, CT 06424 All replies will be greatly appreciated and acknowledged, and if there is sufficient interest and responses sent to me by snail-mail I will forward same to you. -------------------- [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Theresa, here is your note, and I hope it generates some responses to you. I'd like to receive the replies here if possible so we all can share in the discussion. I think your scenario sounds quite plausible. I can't ever see physical libraries as such disappearing, but we are in fact seeing more and more libraries 'on line', with all sorts of services ranging from simple BBS programs to more sophisticated catalog services, etc. The first library in the world, so far as I know, to have a BBS was here in Chicago at the North-Pulaski branch of the Chicago Public Library. It was 1981, and a simple, very humble beginning. I was grateful to be part of it for a year or so. PAT] ------------------------------ From: rlvd_cif@uhura.cc.rochester.edu (Robert Levandowski) Subject: Re: Who's the B Cell Carrier in Ithaca NY? Organization: University of Rochester - Rochester, New York Date: Wed, 22 Mar 95 06:37:21 GMT In johnl@iecc.com (John Levine) writes: > I find that I'm spending enough time in Ithaca NY that I'm thinking of > getting a cell phone. Oddly, there seems only to be an A carrier > here, and no B carrier. This is the only part of New York with no B > carrier, and it's nowhere near as rural as areas farther north and > east. > So can anyone tell me who has the B franchise for the NY-4 RSA? It > consists of Cayuga, Chenango, Cortland, Schuyler, Seneca, Tompkins, > and Yates counties. NYNEX/NYT is the dominant wireline carrier with > some Contel and several tiny independents with one or two exchanges. I have your definitive answer in my cellular documentation! :) The Ithaca area is in the middle of a large blob around the Finger Lakes listed as "1995 Projected Roaming Area" for The Upstate Cellular Network, operated by RochesterTel Mobile Communications. RochTel Mobile is partners with NYNEX Mobile and Advantage Cellular on the B-side throughout New England; you'll be able to get their Q-Plan service plans. You can get a choice of packages with various amounts of prepaid on/off peak time built in and discounted overage; and as long as you are in NY, VT, NH, ME, MA, RI, or CT, you'll pay $0.65 after taxes for roaming with no daily fee. They have excellent coverage out here and along the NY Thruway, and according to their maps, the Ithaca/Finger Lakes region is the only major dead spot left in their NY system. I'm happy with their service; they're happy to adjust your bill if you find charges you didn't expect or that don't look right. Oh, Call Waiting, Enhanced Call Forwarding, Conference Calling, and ACD are free of charge. RochTel Mobile (716) 777-2700 (The map I have implies RochTel will be the actual carrier, but it might be NYNEX or Advantage. RochTel serves Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, Watertown, Massena, Jamestown, Corning, and points inbetween.) And no, I don't work for them; I just like 'em. :) Rob Levandowski Computer Interest Floor associate / University of Rochester macwhiz@cif.rochester.edu [Opinions expressed are mine, not UR's.] ------------------------------ From: pam2@cornell.edu (Peter A. Morenus, Jr.) Subject: Re: Who's the B Cell Carrier in Ithaca NY? Date: Wed, 22 Mar 1995 11:37:24 -0500 Organization: Cornell University Photography In article , johnl@iecc.com (John Levine) wrote: > So can anyone tell me who has the B franchise for the NY-4 RSA? It > consists of Cayuga, Chenango, Cortland, Schuyler, Seneca, Tompkins, > and Yates counties. NYNEX/NYT is the dominant wireline carrier with > some Contel and several tiny independents with one or two exchanges. As of the last time I called the FCC -- perhaps six months ago -- the wireline franchise still hadn't been awarded. If I remember correctly NYNEX, The Trumansburg Home Telephone Company, and an area Indian group were involved in some legal dispute over the licence. Peter Morenus pam2@cornell.edu ------------------------------ From: idesteve@aol.com (IDESTEVE) Subject: Fax Evaluation Criteria Date: 22 Mar 1995 13:33:00 -0500 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) Reply-To: idesteve@aol.com (IDESTEVE) A fairly comprehensive nine page white paper which takes much of the mystery out of evaluating high end fax products is currently available from Brooktrout Technology. Written by Dave Duehren, chief scientist at BTI, available on fax on demand. Call 800 333 5274 and request document number 56. ------------------------------ From: alburty@panix.com (Steve Alburty) Subject: European WAN - How?? Date: Wed, 22 Mar 1995 20:57:48 -0500 Organization: PANIX Public Access Internet and Unix, NYC My company just bought a chain of companies in Europe which will give us about 24 offices throughout the world. And now management wants them all connected, every employee in every office, via electronic mail. They all use a hodge-podge of Macs and Windows machines. Does anybody out there have any idea of how you even get STARTED building a wide-area-network in Europe?? I would imagine that having dedicated lines between all of those offices, some of which are in Eastern Europe, in order that people can do both mail and have file server access, is prohibitively expensive. Does anybody know anybody who has figured out how to at least connect a bunch of European offices via e-mail? Steve Alburty [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Well you know what you *might* do to get started: All the major email services will lease you resources on their systems. MCI Mail, ATT Mail, Compuserve, etc ... they'll all set you up with facilities which for all intents and purposes appear to be your own; it will not be obvious at all to your end users. And considering, as you pointed out, the costs of doing it yourself from almost scratch, it might be a lot better to let an established service do it and negotiate for the best terms you can get. Get a short term contract for starters so you can buy some time while you investigate starting your own. I suspect with the proper coordination, you could have something on line in a couple months via one of the established email vendors with which your managment would be quite pleased, and at much less cost -- especially start up cost -- than you could ever swing on your own. PAT] ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 22 Mar 1995 19:11:37 -0500 From: FRANK.M.KOERBER@gte.sprint.com Subject: Router Connection via T1 Organization: GTE Northwest I am trying to improve the throughput between two Cisco 7000 routers which are in separate buildings about 10 miles apart. The highest bandwidth facilities available between the locations are T1. At the present time the routers are connected together with four T1s but the throughput is inadequate. Is there a device I could put at each end which would allow me to inverse mux several T1s into a DS-3 or higher speed link? Can the Cisco router accept DS-3 (or faster) interface? Is VSAT an option? Roughly how much would VSAT connectivity cost for DS-3? Any other suggestions / solutions would be greatly appreciated. Thanks, Frank M. Koerber Everett, Wa. ------------------------------ From: buchann@ucsub.Colorado.EDU (Buchanan Natalia) Subject: Re: Denver International Airport Date: 23 Mar 1995 02:23:20 GMT Organization: University of Colorado, Boulder In article , Greg Monti wrote: > The prefix on the pay phones is 303-342-XXXX. 342 spells DIA on a > telephone dial. Cute. Especially cute considering that the new airport never was DIA and never will be. The identifier while under construction was DVX; the identifier now is DEN, same as Stapleton was. Timothy ------------------------------ From: Mike Rehmus Subject: Re: Looking for Excel Corp Date: 23 Mar 1995 01:43:31 GMT Organization: Portal Communications (service) pcare@pdial.interpath.net (Phil Kehr) wrote: > I'm looking for information on the Dallas, Texas based Excel Corporation. > Does anyone have any knowledge? There are nine companies with Excel in their name listed in Dallas according to the eleven million business phone book CD-ROM. There are 97 in Texas. You need to be a bit more specific, I think. Best, Mike Rehmus Gray Associates [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Well I dunno about that. *Someone* seems to know who he is trying to contact. A representative from the company has also responded in the next message. PAT] ------------------------------ From: gerryg@earth.execpc.com (Gerry Gollwitzer) Subject: Re: Looking for Excel Corp Date: 22 Mar 1995 16:26:37 GMT Organization: Exec-PC Phil Kehr (pcare@pdial.interpath.net) wrote: > I'm looking for information on the Dallas, Texas based Excel Corporation. > Does anyone have any knowledge? Phil, I am a rep with Excel. What information can I provide? Gerry [TELECOM Digest Editor's Npte: Are you sure you are a rep with the *right* 'Excel'? PAT] ------------------------------ From: itelecom@bilbo.pic.net (Integrity Telecommunications) Subject: Wanted: Used Business Telephone Systems Date: 22 Mar 1995 20:56:19 GMT Organization: Integrity Telecommunications We are currently purchasing all manufacturer's key and PABX systems. Also T1 channel banks and multiplexers. Please fax or email an itemized inventory to us and we will respond quickly! Integrity Telecommunications "The name says IT all!" 2970 Blystone Lane, Ste. 102 Voice: 214-357-7484 Dallas, TX 75220-1515 FAX: 214-357-7485 email: itelecom@pic.net ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 22 Mar 1995 15:33:11 -0800 From: mbeckman@mbeckman.com (Mel Beckman) Subject: 800 Numbers, and FLOWERS Again Jerry Leichter writes: > I can see the argument for allowing the *full* "1-800-FLOWERS" as a > trademark. It uniquely identifies a particular number across a whole > national market; it can be used in trade; it's only partially > meaningful. And here is where we see the true folly of ideas like Oppenheimer's: in the case of 1-800-FLOWERS, a trademark is entirely unnecessary, because there can be only one owner of that number in the U.S. phone system. What's really alarming about Oppenheimer's logic, though, is that it would presumably entitle the owner of 800-FLOWERS to also own FLOWERS.COM, "FLOWERS" on America Online, and the use of the word FLOWERS in any other electronic addressing scheme. After all, if prior ownership of an address-name in the U.S. provides for ownership in a completely new domain -- the international telephone market -- then surely a business would be silly not to press for similar reasoning in any other domain (e.g. Internet addresses). And that's not even considering the arrogance of U.S. companies presuming to have priority over non-U.S. enterprises in the worldwide telephone arena. Mel Beckman | Internet: mbeckman@mbeckman.com Beckman Software Engineering | Compuserve: 75226,2257 Ventura, CA 93004 | Voice/fax: 805/647-1641 805/647-3125 ------------------------------ From: mcguffin@ll.mit.edu (Bruce McGuffin) Subject: Re: This Newsgroup Demo'ed on PBS's "Internet Show" Date: Wed, 22 Mar 95 09:48:03 -0500 Organization: MIT Lincoln Laboratory Boy, those left-wingers at PBS will stoop to anything. Imagine actually discussing net use, when they could have been exposing kiddie porn. I'll bet they're in favor of kiddie porn. They're probably trying to lure children onto the net, where they will be exposed to unwholesome ideas. I hope Newt cuts off all their funding, so I don't have to risk exposing my children to any of these left wing polemics. I say if its not lurid enough for wholesome commercial broadcasting like 60 minutes, its not journalism. Bruce McGuffin (Who thinks Newt Gingrich hates PBS because it encourages thinking, and Newt wants to do all of our thinking for us.) ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 22 Mar 1995 16:45:19 -0500 From: Gordon Jacobson Subject: Caller ID Specs Wanted Pat - I need to find the tech specs on Caller ID in the US -- how it originates, how it is transmitted and how it is received. I note from discussions on the alt.dcom.telecom, that messages posted on this or a similar topic have appeared, but the original thread has long since disappeared from my provider's server. Could you point me in the right direction for such information -- do you have any of the thread info that is relevent and accurate? Many thanks - Regards, - GAJ Home Page: http://www.seas.upenn.edu/~gaj1/home.html [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I am sure it can be found in the Telecom Archives; a lot of technical data on Caller-ID is there. Perhaps some readers will also drop you quick notes with the references you need. PAT] ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V15 #164 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa17316; 23 Mar 95 17:48 EST Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA03595; Thu, 23 Mar 95 11:37:18 CST Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA03589; Thu, 23 Mar 95 11:37:14 CST Date: Thu, 23 Mar 95 11:37:14 CST From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest (Patrick Townson)) Message-Id: <9503231737.AA03589@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V15 #165 TELECOM Digest Thu, 23 Mar 95 11:37:00 CST Volume 15 : Issue 165 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson CFP: Call for Abstracts for IS&N 95 - Deadline April 10 (Pat McLaughlin) Re: T3 Framing and Connection (Wally Ritchie) Re: Callback Providers (Paul Jonathan E. Go) Re: Keypad Letter Pattern (was Re: U.S. 800 Users Alert) (Robert Virzi) Re: U.S. 800 Users Alert (Stuart McRae) Re: New Bell Atlantic Service (Sam Drake) Re: New NPA in Colorado (Peter Laws) Re: New NPA in Colorado (Robert Geradts) Re: Switch Architectures Literature (Jack Warner) Northern Telecom Meridian: How Much? (intiaa@ozemail.com.au) Backlighted Caller ID Box Wanted (Bill Halvorsen) Recommendations on Voice Mail Systems Wanted (Mark P. Braee) Help Wanted With Qmodem Version 4.2F (Gary Michael Brinkman) Re: T1 -> Modems (Dale Dhillon) T1 Test Equipment Available (Michael Glaser) International Country Codes Wanted (Henry Valentino) Telecom Archives Email Information Service (TELECOM Digest Editor) 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 America On Line. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available 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: 500-677-1616 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. A suggested donation of twenty dollars per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above. 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: Patrick McLaughlin Subject: CFP: Call for Abstracts for IS&N 95 - Deadline April 10 Date: 23 Mar 1995 12:38:51 -0000 Organization: Broadcom Eireann Research Ltd, Dublin, Ireland. IS&N 95 - 16-20 Oct. 1995 Call for Abstracts Deadline: April 10th Conference Location: Crete New network technologies and de-regulation of the telecommunications market offers the opportunity to offer communication services to people at unprecedented levels.Justification of the required investment will, however, be determined by the uptake of services by potential users of these services. This conference is concerned with the necessary infrastr ucture to cost-effectively develop, deploy, and manage new and innovative communication services; addressing definition of these services, architectures, engineering processes, methods, tools and techniques. The conference is organised by participants in the RACE (Research into Advanced Communications in Europe) Programme. Aims and Audience: The provision of advanced communication services will have to take place in an environment where a number of technological service and network strands (IN, TMN, mobility, etc.) will have to interwork and, eventually, converge. How and where the advanced services would be delivered in such a diverse environment is a major area of study --- the subject of "Intelligence in Services and Networks (IS&N)". The Conference provides a forum for the dissemination of knowledge and experience in activities relating to the realisation of IS&N systems. It provides an excellent opportunity to submit technological developments to the critical scrutiny of a broad community of systems professionals, managers and users with a view to eventual market development. The Conference programme includes presentations, discussions and workshops, plus keynote addresses by internationally recognised speakers, and is relevant to a broad range of people with an interest in, or responsibility for, the planning, development, engineering, management, provision, and operation of advanced communication services Issues and Scope: The Conference programme addresses issues such as: -IS&N Applications and Required Advanced Services -Usability Factors for Advanced Services -Service Architectures -Communications Management Architectures -Service Management and Quality of Service Management -Security of Services and Networks. -Software Infrastructures -Strategies, Policies and Standards for IS&N Implementations The following questions are to be posed and answered in presentations, discussions and workshops: -What requirements will users place on Advanced Communications Services? -What type of intelligence is required for current and future services and networks and where should it be placed? -Which security concepts and functions are crucial for advanced services -Which emerging technologies are required to achieve integrated IS&N systems, embracing service creation, management and execution? -Will these technologies prove themselves in practice and will they be cost-effective? -What standards need to be defined for IS&N, and do the appropriate mechanisms exist to ensure their timely preparation? -How should the IS&N marketplace be tested to establish service viability? -How can services be configured to meet the needs of particular users and applications? Contributions: Those intending to present papers should submit, by e-mail, an extended abstract (approx. 1000 words) in "flat" ASCII format to the Programme Committee at addresses: conf@postman.dg13.cec.be AND despo@alpha.ath.forthnet.gr The abstract should include the main points of the paper and, where possible, indications of supporting diagrams and references. If desired, additional formatted and printed material (e.g. diagrams) may be sent to the Conference Secretariat. The selection will be made according to the recommendations of a review panel. Those authors whose abstracts are selected will be invited to develop their papers and provide a full typescript of approximatly ten pages of text. The consolidated conference proceedings will be published as a book. Contributors should note the following key dates: Abstracts received by: 10 April 1995 Notification of acceptance: 22 May 1995 Final papers available: 3 July 1995 Camera ready paper received : 30 July 1995 Conference Secretariat: Despina Haralambidou Alpha Systems SA Xanthou Str 78 Tavros, Athens, Greece Tel: +30.1.48.26.014-17 Fax: +30.1.48.26.017 e-mail: despo@alpha.ath.forthnet.gr Organising Committee Chairman: Nikos Karatzas (e-mail: nikos@alpha.forthnet.gr) Programme Committee Chairman: Anne Clarke (e-mail:A.M.Clarke@lut.ac.uk) ------------------------------ From: writchie@gate.net Subject: Re: T3 Framing and Connection Date: 23 Mar 1995 06:21:35 GMT Reply-To: writchie@gate.net In , Phillip Schuman <72510.1164@CompuServe. COM> writes: > I'm looking for some brief explanation of the two kinds of framing > on T3 - M13 and C-parity. I'm pretty familiar with D4/SF and ESF. > Also -- on a picture of the Digital Link T3 mux -- there are two BNC > connectors; are both used, or in/out or what? How does this work in > connecting to a fiber based system like T3 -- is there another > interface box between the telco and the CPE? DS-3 framing is a bit more complicated than DS-1 due mainly to the need to control the insertion of stuffing bits on the DS-2 streams. I posted the format a few months ago in this group. A DS-3 frame format includes redundant parity over the data bits in the previous frame which is widely used for performance monitoring. The BNC's are normally DSX-3 level signals with a separate connector for each direction. Most fiber equipment provides DSX-3 signals. There are, however, some types of equipment with direct fiber connectors which are internally demultiplexed to the DS3 level inside the box. DSX-3 equipment is often protected 1:1 Hope this helps. Wally Ritchie Ft. Lauderdale, Florida ------------------------------ From: pj@dogbert.ugcs.caltech.edu (Paul Jonathan E. Go) Subject: Re: Callback Providers Date: 23 Mar 1995 08:35:20 GMT Organization: California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA From {Telephony} 3/20/95: "The following 15 firms are players in the international callback market:" European Telecom Walnut Creek, CA Gateway USA San Luis Obispo, CA Justice Technologies El Segundo, CA Intl Discount Telecom Hackensack, NJ Intl Long Distance Los Angeles, CA Kall Back Seattle, WA LA Technologies Ft. Lauderdale, FL MTC Petaluma, CA Prarie Systems Omaha, Nebraska Technology Resources Denver, CO Telegroup Fairfield, IA USA Global Link Fairfield, IA USFI NY, NY Viatel NY, NY World Pass Miami, FL Ironically, {Telephony} does not provide telephone numbers for the callback providers :) Paul Jonathan E. Go 363 Glenullen Drive 213 344 7275 Pasadena CA 91105-2155 pj@alumni.caltech.edu ------------------------------ From: rv01@gte.com (Robert Virzi) Subject: Re: Keypad Letter Pattern (was Re: U.S. 800 Users Alert) Date: 23 Mar 1995 15:55:00 GMT Organization: GTE Laboratories, Waltham, MA In article , Carl Moore wrote: > I guess I skimmed right past the original notice, including WHAT > KEYS Q AND Z GO ON. Perhaps the U.S. dialpad (with the newly- > added Q and Z) could be put into frequently-asked questions. and > 2. some voice menu involving movie titles had special instructions > for Q and Z; I believe it was to use 1 for those letters. Where to put Q and Z is a matter of some debate. The financial services industry had a de facto standard of putting Q and Z on the 1. Most cellular phones I have seen follow(ed) this standard. It works well, and supports two-stroke key entry better (e.g., 71 for p, 72 for r, and 73 for s). Next time you're at your ATM, try to find the Q and Z. Bet you they're on the 1. PBX manufacturers and voice mail folks wanted a standard they could call their own, so they started putting Q on 7 and Z on 9, where they belonged! ;-) I think all ATT phones now sport these letters in these locations. This configuration makes the most sense for when you don't need a to identify a specific letter, the program just tries to figure out which one of the three you meant. However, it does make life difficult for anyone trying to enter a specific letter. So now things are really confused. Do you assume your callers on a cellular phone (QZ=1), an ATT phone (Q=7, Z=9), or a phone without Q and Z anywhere on the keypad? Additional stickler, assume you are building a financial application, and people will also be using the service on an ATM. Bob Virzi rvirzi@gte.com +1(617)466-2881 [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I bet they'd like to get ahold of the fellow who originally designed the telephone dial and give him a piece of their mind. PAT] ------------------------------ Date: 23 Mar 1995 09:45:09 EDT Reply-To: STUART@SOFTSW.SSW.COM From: McRae, Stuart Subject: Re: U.S. 800 Users Alert > In the discussion about protecting 'special' 800 numbers, don't forget > that letters on dials have just about disappeared in Europe. If you > want someone in Europe to be able to use your number, you will have > to publish the digits. Numbers are not nearly as 'special' as the words > you can make from them with a US telephone. Incidentally, the letters had completely disappeared in the UK until a year or so ago, when BT started putting them back on their phones. The obviously they now understand the marketing potential of providing easier access to network services. I bet someone wishes they had never taken them off :-) Stuart ------------------------------ From: samdrake@netcom.com (Sam Drake) Subject: Re: New Bell Atlantic Service Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 261-4700 guest) Date: Thu, 23 Mar 1995 06:53:05 GMT In article , Chris J. Cartwright - ELF wrote: > The phones will not ring to alert the recipient. Instead they will > hear the beeps before the dial tone when the phone is picked up, or a > light will blink (of the customers own newer models of telephones > equipped with message lights). I'd really like such a phone. Has anyone got a recommendation? I've never actually seen such a phone, and was hoping they existed. Thanks, Sam [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: You'll find them in hotel rooms many times, and some companies have them also. Or, you can build your own. It isn't that hard. We've discussed it here a few times in the past and the schematics are somewhere in the Telecom Archives, available using anonymous ftp lcs.mit.edu. When connected, 'cd telecom-archives'. Perhaps someone will send you the schematics. PAT] ------------------------------ From: plaws@comp.uark.edu (Peter Laws) Subject: Re: New NPA in Colorado Date: 23 Mar 1995 15:18:06 GMT Organization: University of Arkansas stans@panix.com (Stan Schwartz) writes: > Yes, it was announced in September that the 303 NPA was splitting, leaving > 303 for Denver and 970 for everywhere else that is not already 719. I assume that the switches can differentiate between 970 (the NPA) and 970 (the chat line) ... or is that no longer used? Peter Laws|"Suppose you were a politician. Now suppose you n5uwy@ka5bml.#nwar.ar.usa.noam |were an idiot. Ah, but I repeat myself."-Twain The Fourth Amendment - 1791-1995 - R.I.P. ------------------------------ From: css@pacifier.com (Robert Geradts) Subject: Re: New NPA in Colorado Date: 23 Mar 1995 07:06:24 GMT Organization: Pacifier Internet Server (206) 693-0325 In article , THE PILOT says: > Does anyone have any information concerning the addition of a new NPA > in Colorado? Supposedly (from a USWest CSB guy) metro Denver will get > the new area code in April of '96. > Anyone able to confirm this and/or tell us what the new NPA might be? The new NPA will be 970 and will cover most of the RURAL areas of Colorado. The greater metropolitan area of Denver will remain 303. Rob [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: When someone provides me with a list of exactly which communities and prefixes will be in each area code, I'll post it in the Archives. PAT] ------------------------------ From: jackeagle@aol.com (Jackeagle) Subject: Re: Switch Architectures Literature Date: 22 Mar 1995 22:52:12 -0500 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) Reply-To: jackeagle@aol.com (Jackeagle) Check a good engineering reference library for a series of books by Amos Joel and some other authors. Amos is a world expert in telephone switching. Covers the history of switching to modern times with good architecture diagrams. Published two to four years ago. Jack Warner Kan-Caryl Ranch, Colorado Soaring over a sea of information; seeking Wisdom ------------------------------ From: intiaa@ozemail.com.au (The Manager) Subject: Northern Telecom Meridian: How Much? Date: 22 Mar 1995 15:17:12 GMT Organization: Head Office Can somebody please tell me by mail how much a eight line, eight extension system would cost in the real world (as opposed to list prices that have no nexus to reality). Thanks in advance, Geoff ------------------------------ From: billh@cais2.cais.com (Bill Halvorsen) Subject: Backlit Caller ID Box Wanted Date: 23 Mar 1995 05:12:26 GMT Organization: Capital Area Internet Service A few years ago I bought some excellent CIDCO Caller ID units; the best feature is that the displays are the usual LCD's but are brightly lit by red LED's behind the panel; very easy reading under any lighting condition. Now that we have name and number (and soon Caller ID with call waiting) I'm wondering if anyone makes a unit that is backlit anymore. I've seen some CIDCO units sold under other names that have a "new call" light (until you review your list) but can't find any actually backlit. I really dislike trying to read LCD's in poor light (or turning on a light just to see it if I'm awakened in the night by the phone). Also would appreciate recommendations of good quality two-line sets with "really good" speakerphones (anything better than the AT&T 732 or its ilk)?? Thanks! [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: One of my caller-id boxes is from CIDCO (although with the Ameritech logo on the front) and it has the 'new call' red light in the corner which blinks off and on until you begin to review the entries. I've never seen any that were backlighted. PAT] ------------------------------ From: DIALS800@ix.netcom.com (MP BRAEE) Subject: Recommendations Wanted on Voice Mail Systems Date: 23 Mar 1995 14:41:42 GMT Organization: Netcom Thank you for taking the time to read this posting! We are interested in establishing a voice mail system for a private club. Presently we are looking at a system called "Vicki", we have also considered a program by "Technically Speaking". We would be interested in all comments and recommendations on programs of this nature. System requirements: 3000+ mail boxes; full featured reporting on mailbox use, line use, etc. 4/8 line boards. Easy of use and good tech support is a must. Thank you for your attention. Mark ------------------------------ From: gbrinkma@oucsace.cs.ohiou.edu (Gary Michael Brinkman) Subject: Help Wanted With Qmodem Version 4.2F Organization: Ohio University CS Dept,. Athens Date: Wed, 22 Mar 1995 15:36:51 GMT I have this really old version of Qmodem, and I want to be able to use the cursor keys to navigate on a UNIX host, but the cursor keys are apprently not sending the correct escape sequence for the host to understand what I want to do. Does anyone know how to make Qmodem send the correct escape sequences for VT100 emulation? I could probably find out the correct codes for VT100 cursor movement, but I don't know how to tell Qmodem to use them when I press those keys. Thanks for any help. Please e-mail any tips. Gary M. Brinkman Computer Science Dept., Ohio University, Athens, Ohio mailto:gary.brinkman@ohiou.edu http://ace.cs.ohiou.edu/personal/gbrinkma.html ------------------------------ From: sdl@world.std.com ([Dale Dhillon]) Subject: Re: T1 -> Modems Organization: The World Public Access UNIX, Brookline, MA Date: Wed, 22 Mar 1995 13:54:44 GMT ScottPCS (scottpcs@aol.com) wrote: > I need to bring in a T1 line to 24 1200 baud modems for my company. > It seems like an inefficient solution to run the T1 into a channel > bank to end up with 24 phone lines and then plug in 24 modems plugged > into 24 serial ports. Is there any type of hardware that can handle > this T1 / modem problem better? Preferrably something PC based > (Windows NT) and cheap . My company offers T1 interface boards that will link up to T1 csu/dsu. We also have a board that will be available soon, that has an integrated csu/dsu. If you would like more information please mail me. Rubin SDL Communications Inc. ------------------------------ From: Michael Glaser Subject: T1 Test Equipment Available Date: 23 Mar 1995 03:45:36 GMT Organization: LI Net (Long Island Network) I have a bunch of: T1 test equipment; EAPBX; and Central Office equipment for sale -- let's talk!! Mike 516-447-1041 ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Mar 95 21:32 EST From: hv3@passport.ca (Henry Valentino) Subject: International Country Codes Wanted How can I get a media version of a listing of international country codes and the corresponding countries? Thanks, hv3@dgs.dgsys.com [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: A very complete, very comprehensive list of country codes and the city codes within them is available at the Telecom Archives, accessible using anonymous ftp lcs.mit.edu. When you login in, then 'cd telecom-archives', then 'cd country-codes' to examine these files. Or if you prefer, you can use the Telecom Archives Email Information Service, a method of retrieving anything in the archives, including back issues of this Digest by email. The final message in this issue today documents the email service. PAT] ------------------------------ From: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest Editor) Subject: Telecom Archives Email Information Service Date: Wed, 23 Mar 1995 11:30:00 CST The Telecom Archives is available for your use. It is located at MIT and is available at least a few ways: If you have a real-time Internet connection and are allowed to go off your local net, then you can use FTP as well as possibly gopher and web services. You would issue the command: ftp lcs.mit.edu login anonymous (use name@site as password) cd telecom-archives Once connected, you will see the main directory and the several sub- directories with files on various topics. All the back issues of TELECOM Digest since 1981 are filed in the back.issues sub-directory beginning with years such as '1987' at the top. For gopher and web services, consult the instructions for those programs. If you prefer, you are welcome to use the Telecom Archives Email Infor- mation Service instead. Return mail to Internet addresses is usually accomplished within a minute or two. Sites using UUCP/other networks will get their responses back by email in due course, as mail is deliv- ered at their site. To use the Telecom Archives Email Service: send email to: tel-archives@lcs.mit.edu The subject does not matter. In the text of the message, enter these commands on your first use of the system so you will get help by return mail: REPLY yourname@site **This must be the first command** HELP INFO INDEX END **This must be the last command** You will get back three items in the mail: a help file, an information file, and an index to the files in the Telecom Archives. You can then order additional items as desired, as well as search the master index to Telecom Digest for authors and subject titles since 1989. The help and info files will explain how to use the Archives Email Service to its fullest advantage. Also, check out the interactive commands in the email server which provide lookup services such as AREACODE, GLOSSARY, and SEARCH. Happy hunting and exploring! Fourteen year's worth of stuff will be a lot for you to go through. (All issues of the Digest since 1981 are in the archives; that's several thousand issues.) Patrick Townson ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V15 #165 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa26406; 24 Mar 95 6:46 EST Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA24015; Fri, 24 Mar 95 00:11:10 CST Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA24009; Fri, 24 Mar 95 00:11:08 CST Date: Fri, 24 Mar 95 00:11:08 CST From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest (Patrick Townson)) Message-Id: <9503240611.AA24009@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V15 #166 TELECOM Digest Fri, 24 Mar 95 00:11:00 CST Volume 15 : Issue 166 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Book Review: "Mosaic Quick Tour for Windows" by Branwyn (Rob Slade) Your 500 Number and International Access (Serge Burjak) Re: CDPD vs Ckt Cell Data UPDATE (Terrence McArdle) Re: European WAN - How?? (Bob Elliot) Re: 500 Number Not Working (Chris Michael) Re: Downloading Mac Software With a PC (Brad Hicks) Re: Is Caller ID to be Mandantory Nationally, April 1995? (Lynne Gregg) Re: X.25/ISDN Prices; Global Information Wanted (Steve McKinty) Re: X.25/ISDN Prices; Global Information Wanted (Michael Shields) Seeking Inexpensive 800 Services (Clara Mass) Re: Northern Telecom Meridian: How Much? (Jean Tkacik) Help! Sim. of Burst Transmission (Pubate Satienpoch) Information Wanted on Sites For Technical Help (Timothy Brown) Mitel(200sx) Phone number request (John E. Brissenden) Tech Information Wanted on Old Brick Cell Phone (Michael Umansky) 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 America On Line. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available 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: 500-677-1616 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. A suggested donation of twenty dollars per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above. 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, 23 Mar 1995 14:38:42 EST From: Rob Slade Subject: Book Review: "Mosaic Quick Tour for Windows" by Branwyn BKMSQTWN.RVW 950217 "Mosaic Quick Tour For Windows", Gareth Branwyn, 1994, 1-56604-194-5, U$12.00 %A Gareth Branwyn gareth@vmedia.com %C PO Box 2468, Chapel Hill, NC 27515 %D 1994 %G 1-56604-194-5 %I Ventana Press %O U$12.00 800-743-5369 919-942-0220 fax: 919-942-1140 dludlow@vmedia.com %P 192 %T "Mosaic Quick Tour For Windows" This is a very solid documenting of Mosaic, much like "Using Mosaic for Windows" (cf BKUMOSWN.RVW). It has particularly strong coverage of the menus and MOSAIC.INI. Branwyn's coverage of installation is reasonably thorough, covering sites for Mosaic, itself; Trumpet, WinSock, Win32s, and even PKZip. I'm beginning to believe that none of the Mosaic writers have actually installed it, themselves, though since, in common with all the others, it jams out on the actual setup and connection of SLIP or PPP. A good guide to the operation of Mosaic. copyright Robert M. Slade, 1995 BKMSQTWN.RVW 950217. Distribution permitted in TELECOM Digest and associated publications. Rob Slade's book reviews are a regular feature in the Digest. Vancouver ROBERTS@decus.ca Institute for Robert_Slade@sfu.ca Research into rslade@cue.bc.ca User p1@CyberStore.ca Security Canada V7K 2G6 ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 24 Mar 1995 10:40:24 GMT From: Serge Burjak Subject: Your 500 Number and International Access After reading your note I thought I give you call for old times sake (dialback days for you). Lo and behold I could not do it from Australia. I, being a resoureful guy tried AT&T's USA Direct, "I am sorry you cannot make calls to 700 or 500 numbers on this service." She put me through to an AT&T Business Office for free. The guy there said "I have never heard of a 500 service". Tried talking to OPTUS (the second long distance carrier here. Owned 50% by Bell South) and they said they would investigate it. They rang back and said quoting "an AT&T source" that "service is restricted to US only". I tried again later in the day asking for a supervisor and got the same story. I cannot dial this number via Telstra, (the old government owned monopoly). The jury is still out on this one. They take a few days to come up with excuses usually. My question to you is, do you have any AT&T document that acutally states the service is acessible outside the US? It is not for me. I know it can; I would like to shove this up the relevant phone companies' noses. Regards, Serge Burjak [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I decided to call the 500 people now and find this out once and for all. The woman immediatly answered me saying it can *always* be done through USA Direct; whether or not it can be dialed direct otherwise (as an international call) from other countries depends on the country and the telecom admininstration. But she did emphasize it can ALWAYS be done through USA Direct. So I read her your email. She was quite familiar with OPTUS and Telstra; she recognized the names immediatly and said she did not know their specific policies but that either *should have* referred you to USA Direct even if they could do nothing else. We got back to USA Direct and I quoted your email to her about getting connected to the business office and the man telling you he never heard of 500 service ... she also found a note on my account saying that you had called and reported the problem yesterday and a specialist had gotten involved. Then she said, "I want to try something ...". She put me on hold and used another line to call USA Direct herself and asked to be connected to my number. The operator told HER it could not be done. !! She talked to a supervisor at USA Direct who said the same thing ... and then to a manager at USA Direct who said 'well you are supposed to be able to do it ...'. She came back to me and said "those people are confused." She said the marketing department at AT&T specifically planned 500 service for use from anywhere in the world to anywhere in the world, albiet via USA Direct when international direct dial was unavailable. I told her about getting the call at 7 AM my time from the guy in New York with AT&T 'international' who had never heard of 500 service, and the (now) three other calls I have received from an AT&T employee (a woman who called one day and said she had been given 500-677-1616 as a 'test number'), a Bell South service representative who was trying to help a customer, and someone from British Telecom who reached me on my 708 number to ask some questions. Regards the ignorance of AT&T people about 500 service, she said, "that's incredible ...". I asked her why in the world all AT&T employees had not been made aware of this new program; after all, it is a very good service. She said that all employees got written notice. How did she know? Because it was printed on their paycheck, and they all get paychecks, and they all look at what the paycheck says ... ... not only that, she said, it was offered to all employees under special terms and many employees had called to sign up. It was mentioned on company internal 'newsline' messages. She said she still had her own paycheck stub with the announcement offering 500 service to employees. Even if all employees did not know that much about the offering, you'd think affected employees (i.e. traffic department people, service reps, etc) would know, wouldn't you? Yes, she said, you'd think so ... After finishing with her I tried another experiment of my own from this end. I dialed the double zero operator (in the USA, zero alone defaults to the local operator, and zero zero alone defaults to the operator for the long distance carrier, in this case AT&T) to see what she had to say. "Assist in dialing please on a no ring, no answer, 500-677-1616 ..." meaning I had dialed it and could get no response from the network. Her reply, "There is no such area code as 500, that's why your call would not go through." Uh-huh ... tired at this point and wanting to get back to sending out this issue of the Digest I thanked the operator for her court- eous and thoughtful response and disconnected. We'll see what happens in a few days. I'm told 'marketing' will get my case history as an example for their use. PAT] ------------------------------ From: mcardle@paccm.pitt.edu (Terrence McArdle) Subject: Re: CDPD vs Ckt Cell Data UPDATE Date: Thu, 23 Mar 1995 17:40:38 -0500 Organization: University of Pittsburgh Medical Center In article <95.03.21.221ghet@eecs.nwu.edu>, aircom1@aol.com (AIRCOM1) wrote: > Subject: CDPD vs Ckt Cell Data UPDATE > A bit is a single 1 or 0, and a baud is the "raw" number of bits that can > be sent per second. For instance, a 1200 baud modem can send up to 1200 > raw bits per second. We use the term "raw" here to not include error > correction or compression, as these will change the users perceived number > of bits per second transferred. Just a note, perhaps a nit -- my understanding of the term baud is that it refers to the rate of modulations or signal changes per second, rather than the number of bits per second. In other words, the baud rate is always equal to or less than the bit per second rate. Using common standards, the 300 baud modem transmits and receives data at 300 bits per second; however, a 14,400 bit per second modem operates only at 2400 baud. (it might be a different baud rate - the point is that there is no such device as a 14,400 baud modem) Someone with more technical expertise can field this issue better than I, but I am quite sure that "baud" is one of the more misused and misunderstood terms in telecommunications. Terry McArdle email mcardle@paccm.pitt.edu Mgr, Information Systems work (412) 648 9218 Pulmonary, Allergy, and Critical Care University of Pittsburgh Medical Center ------------------------------ From: eti@starbase.neosoft.com (Bob Elliot) Subject: Re: European WAN - How?? Date: 24 Mar 1995 02:15:39 GMT Organization: NeoSoft Internet Services +1 713 968 5800 Steve Alburty (alburty@panix.com) wrote: > My company just bought a chain of companies in Europe which will give > us about 24 offices throughout the world. And now management wants > them all connected, every employee in every office, via electronic > mail. They all use a hodge-podge of Macs and Windows machines. Does > anybody out there have any idea of how you even get STARTED building a > wide-area-network in Europe?? I would imagine that having dedicated > lines between all of those offices, some of which are in Eastern > Europe, in order that people can do both mail and have file server > access, is prohibitively expensive. Does anybody know anybody who has > figured out how to at least connect a bunch of European offices via > e-mail? I would suggest that you invest a lot of time into putting each of the companies on the Internet and that you use the Internet commercially as the vehicle to for inter-office communications. What with the advent of the Internet Phone and Video Conferencing plus the fact that security problems are being overcome, why pay for leased lines. I can't think of anywhere you might not be able to interconnect. Depends upon the geographical locations of each office but I probably have already been there and done the same thing. BTW, you will probably immediately reduce total comms cost by 80% at the start. Hope this is helpful, Bob Elliott - Global Internetworks eti@starbase.NeoSoft.com +1.713.495.6116 ------------------------------ From: cm@nwu.edu (Chris Michael) Subject: Re: 500 Number Not Working Date: 23 Mar 1995 19:57:00 GMT Organization: Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, US Reply-To: cm@nwu.edu (Chris Michael) > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: 500 numbers are a new enough concept > What happens when your associates attempt to call your 500 number from > 'regular' or landline phones of the non-payphone, non-hotel switchboard > variety, i.e. the phones in their home? Are they unable to get through > on those lines either? PAT] Well ... it works fine from *my* home . From my work, I can dial 1-500, but not 0-500 (I'm in Centel land). From my wife's office you get a recording that says the call can't go through and an operator won't be able to place it either. The one outside person I've given it to so far wasn't able to dial it from his work, called information -- they'd never heard of it -- talked to an operator, who talked to a supervisor who thought maybe it was an ATT thing and finally was told to dial ATT and was able to get through to me. All in all this doesn't seem like a big labor saving device. Chris christopher michael, george s. may international, 708-825-8806 x 395 [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: You have my permission to use my 500 number (500-677-1616) for testing purposes. You might want to make sure your inability to reach 0-500 from Centel territory is a problem of Centel and *not* something to do with the switchboard at your company. If you can use a nearby payphone also on Centel and get through then your switchboard is blocking 0-500 for some reason. If the payphone or some private phone in Centel territory won't let you through either then call their business office and ask why not. 1-500 won't get out through a Centel payphone anymore than it will from an Ameritech pay phone simply because there is no number to bill, and they are not accepting coins as payment. You did not mention if your wife was on the Centel or Ameritech side of the northwest suburbs; if she is on the Ameritech side, then that's one more central office where the translations were loaded incorrectly. When I finally got someone in repair to listen to me, they fixed our office here in Skokie the same day, several hours later. Regards your friend at his office, try to eliminate his company switchboard as the source of the problem. If it is blocking the calls, there is really nothing telco or AT&T can do. If he has access to a payphone and/or private line *in the same immediate vicinity preferably out of the same central office* and still cannot get through at all, then there is another telco problem. If he can get through under those circumstances, its his company lines that are blocked. And remember, you need to get through to 500-677-1616 in order to let the Moderator know that your Love Offering; your tithes; your Token of Sincerity; your annual subscription payment for this Digest is in the mail. PAT] ------------------------------ From: /G=Brad/S=Hicks/OU1=0205465@mhs-mc.attmail.com Date: Thu, 23 Mar 1995 13:57:55 -0600 Subject: Re: Downloading Mac Software With a PC Apple divides all files into up to two "forks" or byte streams, one of which, the "resource fork" holds specially formatted data, including all of the code segments for a program. They also have different directory attributes, including longer file names and attributes called the "type code" and "creator code" which tell the operating system what application to launch and what icon to display. There are three competing standards (and some proprietary solutions) for representing this information on a non-Macintosh computer; the most common of which is MacBinary II, which originated on CompuServe's MacDev forum. Another common work-around is to compress the files using any of the standard compression packages; the result is a plain, data fork only, file. You then have to hope that your decompression software is smart enough to ignore the missing type and creator codes, but increasingly, they are. As somebody already wrote in, the =easy= solution is for you to =somehow= obtain a copy of StuffIt Expander 3.5.2. You can buy StuffIt Deluxe at any software shop; that way you get both StuffIt Expander and DropStuff. You can pick up StuffIt Expander and the annoyanceware version of DropStuff for $2 or so at any Mac user group meeting, I suspect. Or you can download it from just about any bulletin board or online service ... to your Mac. If you're determined to =only= use the modem on your PC, you can get baroque and then use a null-modem cable to connect your PC to your Mac, and use =terminal software= on both ends to transfer the file; the Mac will recognize an incoming MacBinary file and decode it. But by the time you screw around with the cables, you might as well move the modem this once. Once you get StuffIt Expander installed on your Mac, if you have System 7.x you can drag and drop just about anything, or even whole folders of anything, onto StuffIt Expander's icon and it will figure out what archive format was used on each file and unpack it all for you. Oh, and you'd rather get StuffIt Deluxe or put up with the shareware notices in the shareware version of DropStuff, by the same company; once it's installed, StuffIt Expander will not only unpack StuffIt (*.SIT, *.SDT) archives, MacBinary (*.BIN) files, and BinHex (*.HEX and *.HQX) files, but also almost everything else including Arc (*.ARC), PackIt (*.PIT), PKZip (*.ZIP), Compactor Pro (*.CPT), UUEncode (*.UU), Tar (*.TAR) and just about everything else I've run across. In fact, if somebody compressed a MacBinary and then uuencoded it, it'll do all three passes in one step. I have no connection to Aladdin Systems or to Ray Lau except as a satisfied customer. J. Brad Hicks Internet: mc!Brad_Hicks@mhs.attmail.com X.400: c=US admd=ATTMail prmd=MasterCard sn=Hicks gn=Brad ------------------------------ From: Lynne Gregg Subject: Re: Is Caller ID to be Mandantory Nationally, April 1995? Date: Thu, 23 Mar 95 12:49:00 PST Original post from jwarren@well.sf.ca.us (Jim Warren) > "Mark your calendar. In April, 1995, Caller ID will be a 'done deal,' > nationwide. You may or may not have Caller ID service from the phone > company today. But in April, every telephone company coast-to-coast > will be required to offer it, by law. This is an interesting "interpretation" of the FCC Order. But, NO, the FCC did NOT mandate that Caller ID services be made available everywhere effective 4/12/95. The FCC DID state in their Order on Calling Number Services that if a telco is "SS7-capable", they must transport Calling Party Number (CPN). With SS7 installed, this alone does not make a telco capable of CPN transport. The Order as originally written (3/94), made other assumptions that were not correct or technologically feasible. As a result, the FCC stayed the portion of their Order related to blocking. The original Order specified that on interstate calls, the telco could NOT offer Per Line Blocking. However, most states require Per Line Blocking as well as Per Call Blocking. The FCC only wanted consumers to have Per Call Blocking (using *67). The problem the telcos faced was that they were unable to process interstate calls in a different manner than intrastate, and as a result, would be either violating state or federal regulations (they were contrary in most states). The problem was exaggerated in the cellular environment, where a "local service area" can span multiple states. Recently, McCaw deployed the first true Caller ID service on a cellular network in its Oregon operation (Cellular One). In Oregon, digital (TDMA) subscribers are enjoying this service and both Per Line and Per Call blocking options are supported. Regards, Lynne ------------------------------ From: smckinty@sunicnc.France.Sun.COM (Steve McKinty - SunSoft ICNC Grenoble) Subject: Re: X.25/ISDN prices; Global Information Wanted (Ag Date: 23 Mar 1995 19:03:58 GMT Organization: SunConnect In article , cogorno@netcom.com (Steve Cogorno) writes: > Rishab Aiyer Ghosh said: >> Someone wrote: [on X.25 over ISDN]: >>> Rates in the Pacific Bell Service area for data packets are: >>> .05 CENTS for transaction setup >>> .005 CENTS per octet of data >> That works out to about $52 per Mb - is that _cheap_? > Where did you get this figure? When I calculate it it works out to $3.27 per > MB. > 1 MB = 1024K = 1048576 Bytes = 8388608 bits = 65536 octets (1 octet=128 bits) Nope. In the X.25 world 1 octet = 8 bits (nominally 1 byte, but not all bytes are 8-bit bytes) > 65536 octets * .005 cents = 327.68 cents = $3.27 x 16 = $52.32 Steve McKinty Sun Microsystems ICNC 38240 Meylan, France email: smckinty@france.sun.com ------------------------------ From: shields@tembel.org (Michael Shields) Subject: Re: X.25/ISDN Prices Date: 23 Mar 1995 19:18:35 -0000 Organization: Tembel's Hedonic Commune In article , Testmark Laboratories <0006718446@mcimail.com> wrote: > Actually, there are 16 bits per two byte octet. Then why is it called an `octet'? Shields ------------------------------ From: cmass@freenet.scri.fsu.edu (Clara Mass) Subject: Seeking Inexpensive 800 Services Date: 23 Mar 1995 19:34:39 GMT Organization: Tallahassee Free-Net I recently called my local 800 (AT&T) service provider and had a little chat with them about 800 services. They gave me a typical rundown of thier services. $10 setup, $4 a month, $.21 per minute non-peak, $.28 on peak. This is fine and dandy. They also informed me that it would not be a problem that the 800 number points to my local rotary service. Cool. What is happening is, I am running a Internet Service provider, and naturely, it would be of great benefit if I could expand out to areas that don't have internet services (but still deliver good rates). With the rates I described above, I will have to charge about $16.00 bucks a hour just to break even on the call, not to mention the service fees. That's a little much; I was hoping from something around the $3-5 dollars hour. I have heard that there are third party 800 suppliers, and would like to look into them. Does anyone have any comments on these third party services? How about some good services to look into? With the demand that we will carry, it would seem that we could find a cheaper method, which I could pass on to my users. [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Well, you can get 800 service alot cheaper than 20-25 cents per minute -- even from the big three -- but generally you need to commit to purchasing *a lot* of it each month. If you can produce big time traffic for the carrier, I've seen 800 service priced as little as $6-7 per hour (10-12 cents per minute with six second billing, etc) delivered on T-1. Maybe you can get it even cheaper than that, but the literature I've seen always talked in terms of $10,000 - $30,000 worth of traffic per month with a commitment for at least a year, sometimes longer. The price is a bit higher than above, but then once you cross a certain threshold -- and make prompt payment each month -- discounts kick in which bring it down to the above range. The so-called third-party people I've seen all talk in terms of 20-25 cents per minute; they are getting it cheap enough but want their cut of the action also. You did not mention the volume of traffic you anticipate, or how far out you want to stick your own neck waiting for the traffic to materialize -- if it does -- or how much cash you want to have tied up each month after you pay the carrier and wait for your customers to pay you, but if you pull it off right, yeah, I would say you could get 800 very cheaply and on good terms such as six second billing. PAT] ------------------------------ From: tkacik@mathworks.com (Jean Tkacik) Subject: Re: Northern Telecom Meridian: How Much? Date: 23 Mar 1995 21:50:55 GMT Organization: The MathWorks Inc. Please contact Tac Centre. They are located in Reading, MA. They are remarketers of Northern Telecom products and will be glad to quote a system for you. Please call 617-944-5709 and ask for Jeff Cail, Stephen Saia or Dave Flannagan. Good Luck. ------------------------------ From: Pubate Satienpoch Subject: Help! Simualation of Burst Transmission Date: Thu, 23 Mar 1995 13:57:42 -0500 Organization: The George Washington University, Washington DC Hello, I'm Pubate, a graduate student in EE at GWU. I need some help about my term project.I take the course Simulation of Communications System and my professor give me the topic: " timing synchronization for burst transmission " I really have no idea about it, what it means by burst transmission and what is the purpose for the synchronization of it . I try to figure out by looking in the library but I can't find any topic related to this one. Could you give me an idea about that. I think I might change the topic if I can't do anything about this one. Would you please suggest another interesting topic in communications that I can simulate by the software (either SystemView or SPW) . Or if you have any experience about this kind of simulation, please give me some suggestion. Thank you very much for your help. Sincerely, Pubate Satienpoch ------------------------------ From: tb@MO.NET (Timothy Brown) Subject: Information Wanted on Sites For Technical Help Date: 23 Mar 1995 20:55:18 GMT Organization: [MO.NET] Network Ops Does anyone have a few sites that I can look up technical information on T1, 56k leased line, etc? Bandwidth, etc. Thanks! Timothy Brown | Finger for PGP Key/Resume Network Operations Team | ------------------------- User/Systems Support | Interface Consulting, Inc. [+1 314-928-5250 Fax] | 2733 McClay Valley Blvd [+1 314-670-9464 Pager] | St. Peters, MO, 63376 P-Net, Inc. | [http://www.mo.net/~tb] [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: You can always try the Telecom Archives accessible using anonymous ftp lcs.mit.edu. Everything ever written in this Digest -- and a lot more -- is there. PAT] ------------------------------ From: jeb2@dana.ucc.nau.edu (John E. Brissenden) Subject: Mitel (200sx) Phone Number Request Date: 23 Mar 1995 19:48:20 GMT Organization: Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff AZ, USA Could some kind soul email me Mitel's phone number. I need to get the format of the SMDR output. Many thanks, john ------------------------------ From: misha@convex.convex.com (Michael Umansky) Subject: Tech Information Wanted on Old Brick Cell Phone Date: 23 Mar 1995 14:50:38 -0600 Organization: Engineering, Convex Computer Corporation, Richardson, Tx USA Hi, I have acquired (very cheaply) couple of old broken Motorola brick cellular phones, one says 'classic' and is very thick (about three inches), the other says 'ultra classic' and is about 1.5 inches. Neither has battery but I did get one battery eliminator. Neither even powers up. I took them apart but I think I am way over my head since everything is (almost) surface mounted and the IC chips have codes which don't correspond to anything I have seen, except for the 27c512 prom and some 8Kx8 static ram. Does anyone know what CPU is used in these phones? Is there a way to get a service manual or schematics for these phones? Thanks, Michael Umansky (misha@convex.com) Convex Computer Corp; 3000 Waterview Parkway; Richardson, TX 75080 10541 Sandpiper Lane; Dallas, TX 75230 214-497-4717 (work) 214-739-2461 (home) ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V15 #166 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa02626; 24 Mar 95 15:00 EST Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA29762; Fri, 24 Mar 95 09:02:18 CST Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA29753; Fri, 24 Mar 95 09:02:15 CST Date: Fri, 24 Mar 95 09:02:15 CST From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest (Patrick Townson)) Message-Id: <9503241502.AA29753@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V15 #167 TELECOM Digest Fri, 24 Mar 95 09:02:00 CST Volume 15 : Issue 167 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson "Communications Decency Act" Update (ACLU Information) ISDN Showcase at USC (Cherie Shore) BLV Flaw (ahoffman@li.net) Looking at Data Gate (Gateway) Software (jlou@cs.uml.edu) T-1 Link (Ryan Khoo) Re: Gouging at Pay Phones (an200543@anon.penet.fi) Re: Can Anyone Recommend a Good T1 Text (Gerald Serviss) Re: New NPA in Colorado (Stan Schwartz) Re: New NPA in Colorado (Bob Goudreau) Re: New NPA in Colorado (Carl Moore) Re: Current Status of Caller-ID in CA (hihosteveo@aol.com) Re: Telephony Demand Estimates - Any Clues? (Bick Truet) 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 America On Line. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available 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: 500-677-1616 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. A suggested donation of twenty dollars per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above. 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: ACLU Information Date: Thu, 23 Mar 1995 14:45:05 -0500 Subject: "Communications Decency Act" Update March 23, 1995 A Cyber Liberties Alert from the ACLU Senate Committee Backs Cyber Censorship, and Imposes Criminal Penalties WHAT JUST HAPPENED: The Senate Commerce Committee adopted late Thursday morning a modified version of the Exon bill, the so-called "Communications Decency Act" (originally introduced as Senate Bill 314). Senator Slade Gorton (R-WA), who had cosponsored S. 314 with Senator James Exon (D-NE), proposed the amendment in Exon's absence. It was adopted on voice vote as an amendment to the Telecommunications Competition and Deregulation Act of 1995. The amendment would subject on-line users to scrutiny and criminal penalties if their messages were deemed to be indecent, lewd, lascivious or filthy -- all communications that are protected by the Free Speech Guarantees of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. Although protecting children from pornography is its most often cited rationale, this is really a "bait and switch" with your rights at stake. Note that the amendment in fact goes way beyond child pornorgaphy. It's like the opponents of TV violence who first said children should be protected and then made "Murder She Wrote" with Angela Landsbury their number one target. Or like the censors who banned "Huckleberry Finn," "Where's Waldo?" and even Webster's Dictionary (it has "bad" words in it, after all). The Exon/Gorton Amendment would invite active interference in the basic speech of everyone using any telecommunication device -- simply because some government bureaucrat somewhere thought the speech was indecent or lascivious. All senators on the committee had been informed that the Exon/Gorton amendment would violate the Constitution, assault the liberties of net users, stifle development of new technologies (many of which offer greater choice and control by all users -- including parents), and spawn expensive litigation -- while not succeeding at reducing access by children to pornography. A coalition of civil liberties organizations -- including the ACLU -- and numerous commercial companies warned against adopting the Exon/Gorton amendment, which originally would also have made all online service providers (in fact, anyone transmitting an offensive message) criminally liable. Some commercial companies offered Exon and Gorton language exempting themselves from liability while still letting their subscribers be prosecuted. Today Senator Gorton said that the amendment had been modified to exempt those merely "transmitting" the message. The amendment would, however, still cover anyone who originates a message deemed indecent, lascivious etc. WHAT YOU CAN DO: 1. Contact the senators from your state, and all senators on the Commerce Commitee expressing your disappointment with Thursday morning's action. Thank Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Larry Pressler (R-SD) for not including the Exon/Gorton amendment in his proposed bill, and urge him to support action on the Senate floor to remove the anti-cyber amendment. 2. Contact your online service providers and ask them what they have been doing about this Exon/Gorton assault on your liberties. Some providers are still standing up for your rights; others may not have.Urge them, not to support any legislation that protects them, but violates your free speech rights. Urge them to oppose the modified Exon/Gorton amendment. 3. Contact all the other senators and urge them to support deletion of the Exon/Gorton amendment when the bill comes to the Senate floor. 4. Stay tuned for further information and action items for both House and Senate. The American Civil Liberties Union is a nationwide, nonpartisan organization of over 275,000 members. Now in its 75th year, the ACLU is devoted exclusively to protecting the civil liberties guaranteed by the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, whereever these liberties are at risk -- in a bookstore, in school, on the street, in cyberspace, wherever. The ACLU does this through legislative action, public education and litigation. ---------------------- Send your letter by e-mail, fax, or snail mail to: Senator Larry Pressler, S.D. Chairman, Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation SR-254 Russell Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510-6125 (202) 224-5842 (phone) (202) 224-1259 (fax of Commerce Committee) e-mail: larry_pressler@pressler.senate.gov To maximize the impact of your letter, you should also write to the members of the Senate Commerce Committee and to your own Senators. Majority Members of the Senate Commerce Committee: Senator Bob Packwood, Ore. SR-259 Russell Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510-3702 (202) 224-5244 (phone) (202) 228-3576 (fax) Senator Ted Stevens, Alaska SH-522 Hart Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510-0201 (202) 224-3004 (phone) (202) 224-1044 (fax) Senator John McCain, Ariz. SR-111 Russell Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510-0303 (202) 224-2235 (phone) (202) 228-2862 (fax) Senator Conrad Burns, Mont. SD-183 Dirksen Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510-2603 (202) 224-2644 (phone) (202) 224-8594 (fax) Senator Slade Gorton, Wash. SH-730 Hart Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510-4701 (202) 224-3441 (phone) (202) 224-9393 (fax) e-mail: senator_gorton@gorton.senate.gov Senator Trent Lott, Miss. SR-487 Russell Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510-2403 (202) 224-6253 (phone) (202) 224-2262 (fax) Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, Tex. SH-703 Hart Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510-4303 (202) 224-5922 (phone) (202) 224-0776 (fax) e-mail: senator@hutchison.senate.gov Senator Olympia J. Snowe, Maine SR-174 Russell Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510-1903 (202) 224-5344 (phone) (202) 224-6853 (fax) Senator John Ashcroft, Mo. SH-705 Hart Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510-2504 (202) 224-6154 (phone) (202) 224-7615 Minority Members of the Senate Commerce Committee ------------------------------------------------- Senator Ernest F. Hollings, S.C. SR-125 Russell Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510-4002 (202) 224-6121 (phone) (202) 224-4293 (fax) Senator Daniel K. Inouye, Hawaii SH-772 Hart Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510-1102 (202) 224-3934 (phone) (202) 224-6747 (fax) Senator Wendell H. Ford, Ky. SR-173A Russell Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510-1701 (202) 224-4343 (phone) (202) 224-0046 (fax) e-mail: wendell_ford@ford.senate.gov Senator J. James Exon, Neb. SH-528 Hart Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510-2702 (202) 224-4224 (phone) (202) 224-5213 (fax) Senator John D. (Jay) Rockefeller IV, W. Va. SH-109 Hart Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510-4802 (202) 224-6472 (phone) (202) 224-1689 (fax) Senator John F. Kerry, Mass. SR-421 Russell Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510-2102 (202) 224-2742 (phone) (202) 224-8525 (fax) Senator John B. Breaux, La SH-516 Hart Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510-1803 (202) 224-4623 (phone) (202) 224-2435 (fax) Senator Richard H. Bryan, Nev. SR-364 Russell Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510-2804 (202) 224-6244 (phone) (202) 224-1867 (fax) Senator Byron L. Dorgan, N.D. SH-713 Hart Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510-3405 (202) 224-2551 (phone) (202) 224-1193 (fax) You can also write or fax your own Senator at: The Honorable ______________________ U.S. Senate Washington, D.C. 20510 Senate directories including fax numbers may be found at: gopher://ftp.senate.gov:70 gopher://una.hh.lib.umich.edu:70/0/socsci/polscilaw/uslegi Additional information about the ACLU's position on this issue and others affecting civil liberties online and elsewhere may be found at: gopher:\\aclu.org:6601 OR request our FAQ at infoaclu@aclu.org ACLU Free Reading Room | American Civil Liberties Union gopher://aclu.org:6601 | 132 W. 43rd Street, NY, NY 10036 mailto:infoaclu@aclu.org| "Eternal vigilance is the ftp://ftp.pipeline.com | price of liberty" ------------------------------ From: cashore@PacBell.COM (Cherie Shore) Subject: ISDN Showcase at USC Date: 24 Mar 1995 06:01:35 GMT Organization: Pacific Bell We are pleased to invite you to an ISDN Showcase sponsored by USC Telecommunication Services, to be held on April 13. We will show the broad range of ISDN's capabilities, including: Desktop videoconferencing Remote LAN access Internet access Telecommuting solutions Remote Image Telemedicine The following vendors of ISDN products and services will participate in this event, designed to present you with a wide range of ISDN options. Each vendor will demonstrate their ISDN technology, in an environment which invites informative comparisons. This list includes local and long distance ISDN carriers, hardware manufacturers, system integrators and Internet service providers: AT&T Ascend ACE ADAK Adtran Combinet ComNet Data General Digiboard Digilink Gandalf Graybar Electronics GTE Helfrich Co. IBM IMA Intel ISDN*tek MCI Motorola Network Express Northern Telecom OSI Pacific Bell PictureTel Sun Microsystems 3COM Vivo Software YasCo The ISDN Showcase will be held on the USC campus, at the Davidson Conference Center, which is located at 3415 S. Figueroa St (the corner of Jefferson and Figueroa) in Los Angeles. Ample parking is available at the Shrine Auditorium. Exhibits will be open from 10am until 4pm. This event is in trade show format; no reservations required. For more information, please call (213) 743-ISDN. Cherie Shore cashore@pacbell.com ISDN Technology Manager, PacBell ------------------------------ From: ahoffman@li.net (Hoffman) Subject: BLV Flaw Date: 23 Mar 1995 22:52:19 -0500 Organization: LI Net (Long Island Network) Forgive my ignorance perhaps in asking this question. I am but a mere amateur in the study of telephones, and its sort of a hobby of mine, so I can't always verify the accuracy of the information that I read. My question is I've read of the BLV (Busy Line Verification) flaw in the past, and supposedly it could theoretically allow someone to drop the trunk into somebody's conversation quite discreetly. Supposedly according to an old telecom newsletter that I have, phone phreaks could possibly be able to access this fuction. Is their any validity to this? What version of ESS was effected by this? What would be the exact steps involved in exposing this flaw? When was it fixed? ------------------------------ From: jlou@cs.uml.edu (Dreamer) Subject: Looking Into Data Gate (Gateway) Software Date: 24 Mar 1995 05:25:07 GMT I am in the market for a software which has following functionality: 1. standard comm. clients (drivers), such as driver for LU6.2 driver for 3270 2. standard data translation: translate data from one protocol to another. 3. transaction log 4. real time 5. priority queuing 6. status monitoring 7. audit log 8. SNMP alert generation 9. backup (fault tolerance) 10. response time monitoring This software connects to different LAN and computers which using different protocols. It routes and track transactions between LAN and computers. If you have any similar product, please let me know. Dreamer, jlou@cs.uml.edu ------------------------------ From: rkkhoo@tartarus.uwa.edu.au (Ryan Khoo) Subject: T-1 Link Date: 24 Mar 1995 10:05:16 GMT Organization: The University of Western Australia I would like to obtain prices for T-1 links from the USA to Australia. Could any telecomuter help me? One, three and five years terms ... Popsite is in LA 305253 or Chicago 312248. Please email to me the terms and pricing. The Australian end will be in the central business district. Regards, Ryan ------------------------------ From: an200543@anon.penet.fi Reply-To: an200543@anon.penet.fi Date: Fri, 24 Mar 1995 13:20:04 UTC Subject: Re: Gouging at Pay Phones Jim.Gooch@sciatl.com (jgooch) wrote: > In article , johnwpan@aol.com (JohnWPan) > says: >> Being an experienced traveler, I thought I knew all the tricks. Alas, >> but no. I was stumped vacationing in FL. >> Finally, I dialed my carrier's human operator, and was able to talk my >> way through a credit card call. However, the dial pad was still >> disabled so I could not access my voice mail. >> Years ago, I used to carry a DTMF generator with me. I have to do >> that now, again. Ah progress. > The RBOCS are buying smartphones from TSG Inc. and others. They have > fraud prevention that doesn't even allow DTMF from the handset. Don't > be surprised if your hand-held doesn't work either. > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Is that what it is going to come to, > that we have to give up our voice mail and our call back services and > whatever so the RBOCs can continue their fight against fraud? You're > saying even Genuine Bell payphones won't be something we can rely on > much longer? PAT] Any phone that won't transmit DTMF from the handset is clearly defective. Defective phones can be fixed with a bit of epoxy. It may take a few treatments, but eventually the equipment starts working as God and Alexander Graham Bell intended. I guess one won't be able to use a modem with these phones either. I guess you can see why I'm posting this anonymously! [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Yeah, I guess I can see why you are posting it anonymously. Either the equipment starts working correctly or else its owners take it out entirely, eh? So the ninety percent of the American public who has never heard of voicemail, and the ninety-five percent or so who don't have it or need to retrieve anything from it get punished as well by having the one payphone in their neighborhood which formerly had been operated by Bell replaced by a COCOT. I can see your point though. It does make you kind of angry. PAT] ------------------------------ From: serviss@tazdevil.cig.mot.com (Gerald Serviss) Subject: Re: Can Anyone Recommend a Good T1 Text Date: 24 Mar 1995 14:07:19 GMT Organization: Cellular Infrastructure Group, Motorola In article , David M. Meyer wrote: > Can anyone recommend a good textbook on T1? I have found the text: "The Guide to T-1 Networking" William A. Flanagan 4th edition, copy 1990 ISBN 0-936648-26-0 I have found it to be a useful and very readable introduction to the subject. It has answered most if not all of my questions. It is published by Telecom Library Inc. 1-800-999-0345 Jerry Serviss Motorola Inc serviss@cig.mot.com ------------------------------ From: stans@panix.com (Stan Schwartz) Subject: Re: New NPA in Colorado Date: 23 Mar 1995 22:47:47 -0500 Organization: PANIX Public Access Internet and Unix, NYC Peter Laws (plaws@comp.uark.edu) wrote: > stans@panix.com (Stan Schwartz) writes: >> Yes, it was announced in September that the 303 NPA was splitting, leaving >> 303 for Denver and 970 for everywhere else that is not already 719. > I assume that the switches can differentiate between 970 (the NPA) and 970 > (the chat line) ... or is that no longer used? The 970 lines are still used in the NY Metro area. However, dialing 970-XXXX from within the 516 NPA as opposed to dialing 1-970-NXX-XXXX is the same as the difference between dialing 334-XXXX and 1-334-NXX-XXXX. It's not so much that the switches need to be re-programmed as the PBX's that now block 970 calls. Does anyone know if there is a method to the madness in selecting the new NPA's? Originally it was based on the number of 'pulls' and the last few in the N10/N1X series were whatever was left. It almost seems random. You would think that they would stay away from 97X and 5XX, given the number of premium-charged services with similarly numbered prefixes. Sheesh! Stan [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: *Is there* any method to the madness now? Does anyone know of any formula pr process used to select the numbers being assigned as the new area codes? We all know how 212, 213, 312, 313 and others in that range came to be selected: in the rotary dial era those were the ones with the shortest number of 'pulls' and they were assigned to the major cities on the assumption most calls would go to those places. What about now? Is it just random, or do telcos request certain codes in the same way subscribers request vanity numbers? PAT] ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 23 Mar 1995 15:48:53 -0500 From: goudreau@dg-rtp.dg.com (Bob Goudreau) Subject: Re: New NPA in Colorado plaws@comp.uark.edu (Peter Laws) writes: > I assume that the switches can differentiate between 970 (the NPA) > and 970 (the chat line) ... or is that no longer used? I assume you mean the premium 970 exchange present in some NPAs, where it is similar in function to the 976 exchange. There's nothing preventing any NPA from continuing to use 970 as an exchange. Eight-digit dialing (e.g., 1-970-XXXX) went away earlier this year in those places that required it, so local 970 numbers now have to be dialed as either 970-XXXX or as 1-NPA-970-XXXX. Ask your local telco to find out which dialing plan applies to your area. Bob Goudreau Data General Corporation goudreau@dg-rtp.dg.com 62 Alexander Drive +1 919 248 6231 Research Triangle Park, NC 27709, USA ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 23 Mar 95 14:18:54 EST From: Carl Moore Subject: Re: New NPA in Colorado plaws@comp.uark.edu writes about a 970 chat line. So where is it and how is it dialed? There should NOT be any ambiguity. For one thing, the history file, which I have continued to update, has dealt with changes in dialing instructions which were made necessary by the coming of these generalized area codes. Long distance to points in the new 970 area would be 1-970-xxx-xxxx, even within that area code. Non-telephone-company equipment could be troublesome in this regard, however. ------------------------------ From: hihosteveo@aol.com (HiHoSteveo) Subject: Current Status of Caller-ID in CA Date: 23 Mar 1995 13:31:11 -0500 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) Reply-To: hihosteveo@aol.com (HiHoSteveo) For those of you who may have endured my prior note(s) on the subject, I said the FCC interstate order was being reconsidered. A ruling was expected last Fall. Last Friday 3-17, the FCC formally suspended the meaningless "effective date" of 4-12 (since it is rapidly approaching), and stayed a decision indefinitely -- didn't even try to set a date. Adios CLID in CA. ------------------------------ From: bicktrg@aol.com (BickTRG) Subject: Re: Telephony Demand Estimates - Any Clues? Date: 24 Mar 1995 09:38:45 -0500 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) Reply-To: bicktrg@aol.com (BickTRG) When looking at demand estimates, keep the following issues in mind: 1. Can the technology (in this case available bandwidth) support the demand? In some US markets, we've seen that -- without further multiplexing -- PCS (GSM) can support 20% of the POPs (200/1,000). There should be a ceiling there (at least near term). 2. The "80% interesteds" are just that ... interested. But, adoption is another story. Take into account TALC (Technology Adoption Life Cycle) which suggests a 1-2% share initially (innovators), another 10% subsequently (early adopters) and then, with a herculean effort, migration into mainstream markets (at best...another 30-40%). Prior to migration into mainstream markets there will be a big consolidation of carriers (just to garner the resources & bucks necessary to successfully stimulate adoption among mainstreamers which are classically "attacked" one market segment at a time). 3. I think the Swedish statistic (9.8%), without seeing how collected/analyzed, etc. but from a structural perspective, is the most realistic. 9.8% would assume 100% share of innovators and most early adopters. Mainstreamers are always a gamble but will jump in at some point. They are risk averse, however, and while the time line moves fwd, innovators and early adopters may have already jumped into a newer technology. 4. In the U.S., our "rule of thumb" for PCS is a 10-15% adoption rate near term (eg., three years). After that, god only knows. I hope this information helps. Please feel free to message me if you have any questions or comments. Bick Truet New Technologies Productization Technologies Research Group, Inc. 44 Old Route 22 Clinton, NJ 08809 BickTRG@AOL.com 908.730.9050 ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V15 #167 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa06028; 24 Mar 95 19:14 EST Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA09137; Fri, 24 Mar 95 13:11:12 CST Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA09131; Fri, 24 Mar 95 13:11:09 CST Date: Fri, 24 Mar 95 13:11:09 CST From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest (Patrick Townson)) Message-Id: <9503241911.AA09131@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V15 #168 TELECOM Digest Fri, 24 Mar 95 13:11:00 CST Volume 15 : Issue 168 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson PBX Managers in NANP Denial (Greg Monti) SC Internet Real Estate Guide (Brian Moura) Internet GURU Needed! (atlantic12@aol.com) Data Communication With GSM (pix048@vx8820.uib.es) Cell Fraud Hotline Established (Greg Monti) Guilty Plea in Computer Pornography Case (TELECOM Digest Editor) Re: Why Doesn't Zmodem Work? (Chuck A. Forsberg) Re: Tech Information Wanted on Old Brick Cell Phone (Richard L. Barnaby) Re: Can Anyone Recommend a Good T1 Text (Brian Brown) Re: Caller-ID Specs (David Goessling) Re: CDPD vs Ckt Cell Data UPDATE (Richard Kenshalo) Song: The Day the Bell System Died (Lauren Weinstein/Telecom Archives) 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 America On Line. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available 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: 500-677-1616 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. A suggested donation of twenty dollars per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above. 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: Fri, 24 Mar 1995 12:01:37 EST From: Greg Monti Subject: PBX Managers in NANP Denial The newsletter {Communications Daily} reported in its March 24, 1995, issue that Bellcore officials are taking PBX managers to task for failing to keep up with the new style of area codes in North America. Ron Conners, director of the numbering plan, said at the Supercomm '95 conference in California that many PBXs have not been upgraded to allow the new Alabama 334, Washington 360 and Arizona 520 area codes to be reached. In most cases, users have complained to the serving local operating company when they should be complaining to their PBX managers. Apparently, switches manufactured before 1993 are the ones that largely don't support the new area codes without upgrades. PBX managers are resisting upgrading their switches, the story says, because they don't want to spend the money and because they feel that the new area codes are in remote areas of the country that their users would not call much anyway. "People are in denial," said Conners. The story notes that customers in Alabama and Washington caused an "avalanche" of complaint calls because their "phones suddenly went silent." I can't explain this since we are still in the permissive dialing period for these places. US West, which serves most of Washington, announced that it would begin assigning duplicate prefixes in the 206 and 360 area codes TWO WEEKS after permissive dilaing ends because the shortage of numbers is acute. The story reviews upcoming or in-progress area code additions: Colorado, existing code 303, new code 970 Texas, 713, 281 Florida, 813, 941 Connecticut, 203, 860 Illinois 708, 630 Virginia, 703, 540 Tennessee, 615, 423 Georgia, 404, 770 South Carolina, 803, new code not given, but we know it's 864 Missouri, existing code not given, but I'll bet it's 314 Oregon, 503, new code not given Florida, 904, new code not given For the remainder of the century, Bellcore predicts new area codes in: Ohio, existing code not given, but I'll bet it's 216 Minnestoa, existing code not given, but I'll bet it's 612 California, 619 Texas, 817 Texas, 210 California, 213 Louisiana, 318 British Columbia, 604 Missouri, 816 plus ten more splits beyond these before December 31, 2000. Greg Monti, Tech Mgr, FISPO, Distribution Division National Public Radio Phone: +1 202 414-3343 635 Massachusetts Av NW Fax: +1 202 414-3036 Washington, DC 20001-3753 Internet: gmonti@npr.org [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Greg, it was the same thing years ago when telcos first started using prefixes of the form X0/1X or XX0 or X00. The PBX guys denied it, refused to deal with it as long as they could, and made service very difficult for many users. I recall a case of a large store in downtown Chicago for whom I did some part time work on a contract basis for quite a few years. I reported the inability to get calls out to such an exchange. I reported it various times. The guy who took care of the PBX would do nothing about it ... said there was 'no reason to call that exchange, anyway'. I had voicemail at the time on that exchange, so my answer was to delete any and all references to my home phone number from the records of those who needed it, and leave my voicemail/pager number instead as my contact instead. I guessed it would be just a matter of time ... sure enough about a month later they wanted to call me one day to ask for something. Three different people in the department spent the better part of two hours trying to reach me. They finally gave up and went to a payphone nearby. The next day the PBX had been adjusted. PAT] ------------------------------ Date: 24 Mar 95 11:06:24 EST From: Brian Moura <76702.1337@compuserve.com> Subject: SC Internet Real Estate Guide CITY OF SAN CARLOS Press Release For More Information, Contact: Brian Moura, Assistant City Manager (415) 802-4210 Internet e-mail: scarlos@crl.com Internet web server: http://www.abag.ca.gov/abag/ local_gov/city/san_carlos/schome.html. For Release 9:00 A.M. March 10, 1995 SAN CARLOS ANNOUNCES INTERNET REAL ESTATE GUIDE On Line Restaurant Guide Also Enhanced SAN CARLOS, CA -- March 10, 1995 -- The City of San Carlos announced today a new service on its Internet server called "The San Carlos Real Estate Guide." This is an area on the Citys "San Carlos On Internet" service that provides information on housing projects being built by the San Carlos Redevelopment Agency, property available for lease in the San Carlos portion of Redwood Shores for two restaurants, a point and click guide to houses for sale in San Carlos and information on real estate agents in San Carlos. The information in the San Carlos Real Estate Guide on City housing projects has been compiled by the San Carlos Redevelopment Agency. The other information has been taken from material placed on the Internet by local realtors from Coldwell Banker, Cornish & Carey and Re/Max. By combining the information in an easy index, San Carlos residents and firms and potential San Carlos residents and businesses can quickly find out about housing and commercial properties in San Carlos. Mayor Kevin Kelly said that "San Carlos has received many calls and letters complimenting us on our vision to be one of the first cities in the country to use the Internet to keep the public informed about City services. The next step in this process is to use our presence on the Internet to make businesses in San Carlos more successful. The new San Carlos Real Estate Guide on the Internet is a great step in this direction." City Manager Michael Garvey noted that "We have been offering businesses in San Carlos who are on the Internets 'World Wide Web' a free listing on the City Internet Web area. To date, four San Carlos businesses -- Bay Area Model Mugging (womens self defense training), Friendly Software Store, Library Solutions Press and Salvatores Restaurant -- have taken us up on this free offer. Opening the San Carlos Real Estate Guide provides a similar opportunity for realtors and property owners in San Carlos. Im looking forward to seeing how this program helps stimulate the business and real estate markets in San Carlos." Assistant City Manager Brian Moura added that "Our San Carlos on Internet project is now attracting over 1,000 users and over 3,000 document requests per month. With that much activity, adding information about firms doing business in San Carlos is a natural extension of our Internet project and we trust that San Carlos citizens and other users of the Internet will find these new services of interest." San Carlos Restaurant Guide on Internet Enhanced ================================================ The City also announced that it has enhanced it's on line guide to San Carlos Restaurants. The guide now includes reviews of eight San Carlos restaurants, an index to the on-line edition of Salvatores Restaurant (this features the lunch and dinner menu at Salvatores) and the new Internet ordering service at Cafe LaTosca where users of the Internet can now order authentic Italian dishes from this popular restaurant in downtown San Carlos simply by calling up an on-line menu and filling out their selections. Note: The City of San Carlos on Internet information is available on the Internets World Wide Web service. This information can be accessed through any Internet service provider or through the Prodigy dial-up service (using the Jump words "WWW" or "Web"). The San Carlos On Internet address is: http://www.abag.ca.gov/abag/local_gov/city/san_carlos/schome.html. The City Hall mail box on the Internet is at scarlos@crl.com. ------------------------------ From: atlantic12@aol.com (ATLANTIC12) Subject: Internet GURU needed! Date: 24 Mar 1995 10:59:03 -0500 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) Reply-To: atlantic12@aol.com (ATLANTIC12) Telecommunications provider seeks part-time researcher/representative with extensive INTERNET experience and familiarity. A working knowledge of the TELECOM industry and issues is required. * Flexible hours; * Salary commensurate with experience; * Excellent INTERNET skills and creativity a must; * Knowledge of the TELECOM industry is needed; * Experience in telecommunications and international trade issues a definite plus. For more information, please respond by e-mail including a brief background. ------------------------------ From: PIX048@vx8820.uib.es (PRAC) Subject: Data Communication With GSM Date: 24 Mar 1995 16:07:13 GMT Organization: Universitat de les Illes Balears Hallo! I am a student girl. I am from Spain and I study computer science in University of Balearic Islands (Spain). Please, please.... help me. I need information about GSM (Global System for Mobile Communication). I will be very pleased, and I will be very happy. My E-mail is pix048@ps.uib.es Carmen ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 24 Mar 1995 11:58:15 EST From: Greg Monti Subject: Cell Fraud Hotline Established The Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association's Fraud Task Force has established a hot line mailbox on the Internet for reporting illegal wireless phone activity. Drop a dime on your favorite cellular hacker at: cell-fraud@tmn.com. Greg Monti, Tech Mgr, FISPO, Distribution Division National Public Radio Phone: +1 202 414-3343 635 Massachusetts Av NW Fax: +1 202 414-3036 Washington, DC 20001-3753 Internet: gmonti@npr.org [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I assume the mailbox itself along with twm.com are well protected against intrusions and hacking ... one of the telcos once started a voicemail thing where people could leave anonymous messages about phone phreaks. Before long, that voicemail box was defaced, and telco itself got hacked and phreaked for a bundle via some hole in the voicemail they forgot to plug up. Maybe the cellular folks will have better luck with theirs. PAT] ------------------------------ From: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest Editor) Subject: Guilty Plea in Computer Pornography Case Date: Fri, 24 Mar 1995 12:10:00 CST The net has been saved once again from the pornographers. In the first computer pornography case in Illinois, Raymond F. Netupski, 32 of Des Plaines pleaded guilty to misdemeanor charges. Netupski was charged after a woman complained that her son got sexually explicit graphics from a computer bulletin board. Prosecutors alleged Neptuski posted the sex pictures on the bulletin board to which the boy had access. Based on his plea of guilty, the court found Netupski guilty, and he was sentenced on Wednesday to two year's probation, 200 hours of community service, and psychiatric treatment. Ummm .. that should do him a world of good, I'm sure. PAT ------------------------------ From: caf@omen.com Subject: Re: Why Doesn't Zmodem Work? Organization: Omen Technology INC, Portland Rain Forest Date: Fri, 24 Mar 1995 15:44:23 GMT In article rlvd_cif@uhura.cc.rochester.edu (Robert Levandowski) writes: > optimizing; you might try and get a copy of "Kermit News" No. 5 (July > 1993) from Columbia University. That issue has an article on > optimizing Kermit, and documents Kermit transferring a MS-DOS binary > file via a v.42bis modem at 569% efficiency (8192 cps). The issue > gives an Ordering Information phone number: +1 212 854-3703. There they go again. The "True Life Benchmarks" in that issue of Kermit News leave much to be desired in reproducibility or even logical plausibility. For a second opinion please download and read knewstru.zip from ftp: ftp.cs.pdx.edu pub/zmodem or TeleGodzilla. Chuck Forsberg WA7KGX caf@omen.COM 503-621-3406 FAX:-3735 Omen Technology Inc "The High Reliability Software" Author of YMODEM, ZMODEM, Professional-YAM, ZCOMM, GSZ and DSZ TeleGodzilla BBS: 503-621-3746 FTP: ftp.cs.pdx.edu pub/zmodem ------------------------------ From: barnaby@world.std.com (Richard L Barnaby) Subject: Re: Tech Information Wanted on Old Brick Cell Phone Organization: The World Public Access UNIX, Brookline, MA Date: Fri, 24 Mar 1995 16:21:53 GMT misha@convex.convex.com (Michael Umansky) writes: > I have acquired (very cheaply) couple of old broken Motorola brick > cellular phones, one says 'classic' and is very thick (about three > Is there a way to get a service manual or schematics for these phones? Michael, Have you tried calling Motorola? Although the phones are "old" I believe they are still sold and maintained. I own one, and was able to get parts from a regular Motorola Dealer. Just so you know, there are those of us who *prefer* "the brick" because it is rugged, and don't mind the extra weight. Both phones are quite good. If you got them cheaply you got a real "Classic" or "Ultra Classic" as the case might be :-) barnaby@world.std.com ------------------------------ From: bfbrown@teal.csn.org (Brian Brown) Subject: Re: Can Anyone Recommend a Good T1 Text Date: 24 Mar 1995 16:31:10 GMT Organization: Colorado SuperNet, Inc. In article meyer@frostbite-falls.uoregon. edu (David M. Meyer) writes: > Can anyone recommend a good textbook on T1? Flanagan, William A.: _The Guide to T-1 Networking_, 1990 (the copy I have), Telecom Library, Inc. NY,NY - 1-800-999-0345. I am in no way affiliated with them. Not a bad book though. BB ------------------------------ From: David_Goessling@fcbbs.ss.kpmg.com Organization: Strategic Services of KPMG Peat Marwick Date: Fri, 24 Mar 1995 11:38:15 EST Subject: Re: Caller ID Specs I think that the following Bellcore specs from the Bellcore Catalog of Tech Specs should answer most questions on this topic. You can order them by calling 1-800-521-2673. You can also search them yourself at the Bellcore internet Web site: bellcore.com. TR-NWT-000031 CLASS Feature: Calling Number Delivery FSD 01-02-1051 ($28.00) TR-NWT-001273 Generic Requirements for an SPCS to Customer Premises Equipment Data Interface for Analog Display Services ($70.00) SR-NWT-002024 Customer Premises Equipment Compatibility Considerations for the SPCS-to-CPE Transmission Interface ($23.00) SR-INS-002461 Customer Premises Equipment Compatibility Guidelines for the Analog Display Services Interface ($64.00) TR-TSY-000030 SPCS Customer Premises Equipment Data Interface SR-NWT-002495 Guidelines for Writing Applications WHich Use the Analog Display Services Interface (ADSI) for Data Communications ($75.00) SR-TSV-002697 An Encryption Capability for the Analog Display Service Interface ($46.00) There are also numerous BOC specs listed in the Bellcore Catalog of Tech Specs including: AM TR-NIS-000099 Ameritech's Caller ID, CAller ID with Name and Visual Messgae Waiting Indicator ($6.00) DMG ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 24 Mar 1995 09:08:38 -0800 From: RICHARD M KENSHALO Subject: Re: CDPD vs Ckt Cell Data UPDATE > Just a note, perhaps a nit -- my understanding of the term baud is > that it refers to the rate of modulations or signal changes per > second, rather than the number of bits per second. In other words, > the baud rate is always equal to or less than the bit per second rate. Modulation protocols use phase and amplitude modulation to encode a certain number of bits (i.e. two, four, six, etc.) per baud symbol. A CCITT V.22bis (2400 bps International Standard) modem sends four bits per symbol and 600 symbols per second to achieve its speed of 2400 bits per second. The V.32 modem sends four bits per symbol and 2400 symbols per second to reach its speed of 9600 bits per second. The V.32bis modem sends six bits per symbol and 2400 symbols per second to achieve 14.4K bits per second. Thus, higher digital computer speeds use increasingly complex modulation protocols for the same symbol rate. Loop symbol rate is the baud rate that occurs on the physical loop, analog side, of the Public Switched Telephone Network. Richard Kenshalo tsrmk@acad1.alaska.edu ------------------------------ From: TELECOM Digest Editor Subject: Song: The Day the Bell System Died Date: Fri, 24 Mar 1995 12:45:00 CST Now and again a request comes along to reprint one of the classics we have had here over the years, and one such example is "The Day the Bell System Died" by Lauren Weinstein. This originally appeared in TELECOM Digest almost twelve years ago -- July 12, 1983 to be exact -- about six months after AT&T and the various Bell Companies parted company. I know the thousand plus new people on the mailing list in the past year have probably not seen this, so here it is. Lauren is a 'charter subscriber' to the Digest; he is one of the original names on the mailing list from August, 1981. Since we do not hear from him nearly enough these days, now and then I re-run his song. *DO NOT* write to Lauren at the address shown; it has been out of service for years. PAT From: Lauren Weinstein Subject: "The Day Bell System Died" Date: Tuesday 12-Jul-83 01:18:19-PDT To: TELECOM@ECLB Greetings. With the massive changes now taking place in the telecommunications industry, we're all being inundated with seemingly endless news items and points of information regarding the various effects now beginning to take place. However, one important element has been missing: a song! Since the great Tom Lehrer has retired from the composing world, I will now attempt to fill this void with my own light-hearted, non-serious look at a possible future of telecommunications. This work is entirely satirical, and none of its lyrics are meant to be interpreted in a non-satirical manner. The song should be sung to the tune of Don Mclean's classic "American Pie". I call my version "The Day Bell System Died"... --Lauren-- ************************************************************************** *==================================* * Notice: This is a satirical work * *==================================* "The Day Bell System Died" Lyrics Copyright (C) 1983 by Lauren Weinstein (To the tune of "American Pie") (With apologies to Don McLean) ARPA: vortex!lauren@LBL-CSAM UUCP: {decvax, ihnp4, harpo, ucbvax!lbl-csam, randvax}!vortex!lauren ************************************************************************** Long, long, time ago, I can still remember, When the local calls were "free". And I knew if I paid my bill, And never wished them any ill, That the phone company would let me be... But Uncle Sam said he knew better, Split 'em up, for all and ever! We'll foster competition: It's good capital-ism! I can't remember if I cried, When my phone bill first tripled in size. But something touched me deep inside, The day... Bell System... died. And we were singing... Bye, bye, Ma Bell, why did you die? We get static from Sprint and echo from MCI, "Our local calls have us in hock!" we all cry. Oh Ma Bell why did you have to die? Ma Bell why did you have to die? Is your office Step by Step, Or have you gotten some Crossbar yet? Everybody used to ask... Oh, is TSPS coming soon? IDDD will be a boon! And, I hope to get a Touch-Tone phone, real soon... The color phones are really neat, And direct dialing can't be beat! My area code is "low": The prestige way to go! Oh, they just raised phone booths to a dime! Well, I suppose it's about time. I remember how the payphones chimed, The day... Bell System... died. And we were singing... Bye, bye, Ma Bell, why did you die? We get static from Sprint and echo from MCI, "Our local calls have us in hock!" we all cry. Oh Ma Bell why did you have to die? Ma Bell why did you have to die? Back then we were all at one rate, Phone installs didn't cause debate, About who'd put which wire where... Installers came right out to you, No "phone stores" with their ballyhoo, And 411 was free, seemed very fair! But FCC wanted it seems, To let others skim long-distance creams, No matter 'bout the locals, They're mostly all just yokels! And so one day it came to pass, That the great Bell System did collapse, In rubble now, we all do mass, The day... Bell System... died. So bye, bye, Ma Bell, why did you die? We get static from Sprint and echo from MCI, "Our local calls have us in hock!" we all cry. Oh Ma Bell why did you have to die? Ma Bell why did you have to die? I drove on out to Murray Hill, To see Bell Labs, some time to kill, But the sign there said the Labs were gone. I went back to my old CO, Where I'd had my phone lines, years ago, But it was empty, dark, and ever so forlorn... No relays pulsed, No data crooned, No MF tones did play their tunes, There wasn't a word spoken, All carrier paths were broken... And so that's how it all occurred, Microwave horns just nests for birds, Everything became so absurd, The day... Bell System... died. So bye, bye, Ma Bell, why did you die? We get static from Sprint and echo from MCI, "Our local calls have us in hock!" we all cry. Oh Ma Bell why did you have to die? Ma Bell why did you have to die? We were singing: Bye, bye, Ma Bell, why did you die? We get static from Sprint and echo from MCI, "Our local calls have us in hock!" we all cry. Oh Ma Bell why did you have to die? -------------------------- [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: As always, thank you Lauren. This Digest began in the summer of 1981; when there was a "Bell System", and when most people had never heard of MCI or Sprint -- not even some of our very early readers here. There was no such thing as custom calling or ESS; issues of the Digest in the early to middle 1980's talk about things like the beginning of cellular phone service in 1983, the beginning of new long distance competitors like MCI and Sprint, and how Electronic Switching -- still a rarity in the early 1980's -- was the phone service of the future, with such amazing things as call waiting, three way calling and call forwarding. Debates here in those days covered topics like whether or not there was such a thing as caller-id or if it was just the figment of some people's imagination. TELECOM Digest is the oldest continuing e-journal on the Internet, and those of you who have been here since the beginning know we have covered a lot of ground over the years. In those days it was easy; today it is a lot harder, which is what makes your support all the more appreciated. You know what needs to be done, and as always I thank you. Do have a great weekend! PAT] ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V15 #168 ****************************** Received: from delta.eecs.nwu.edu by MINTAKA.LCS.MIT.EDU id aa11120; 25 Mar 95 4:04 EST Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA22071; Fri, 24 Mar 95 23:16:23 CST Return-Path: Received: by delta.eecs.nwu.edu (4.1/SMI-4.0-proxy) id AA22065; Fri, 24 Mar 95 23:16:21 CST Date: Fri, 24 Mar 95 23:16:21 CST From: telecom@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest (Patrick Townson)) Message-Id: <9503250516.AA22065@delta.eecs.nwu.edu> To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V15 #169 TELECOM Digest Fri, 24 Mar 95 23:16:00 CST Volume 15 : Issue 169 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Book Review: "The Information Superhighway: Beyond the Internet" (R Slade) 800 Numbers, and FLOWERS Again (Judith Oppenheimer) Outsourcing of International Telecom Services (Victor Prochnik) Re: Your 500 Number and International Access (Tony Harminc) Re: X.25/ISDN Prices: Global Information Wanted (Andy Lochridge) Re: Interesting Telemarketing, Sad Actually (William Wood) Re: Keypad Letter Pattern (was Re: U.S. 800 Users Alert) (Mark Brader) Re: Recommendations Wanted on Voice Mail Systems (Paul Hanson) New Area Code Assignments (Neal McLain) 800 Service Costs and ISDN Rates (Arthur Greenwald) 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 America On Line. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available 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: 500-677-1616 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. A suggested donation of twenty dollars per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above. 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: Fri, 24 Mar 1995 13:31:44 EST From: Rob Slade Subject: Book Review: "The Information Superhighway: Beyond the Internet" BKINFSUP.RVW 950224 "The Information Superhighway: Beyond the Internet", Peter Otte, 1994, 1-56529- 825-X, U$19.99/C$26.99 %A Peter Otte %C 201 W. 103rd Street, Indianapolis, IN 46290 %D 1994 %G 1-56529-825-X %I Que Corporation %O U$19.99/C$26.99 800-858-7674 75141.2102@compuserve.com 317-581-3743 %P 241 %T "The Information Superhighway: Beyond the Internet" The "Information Superhighway" is a political and promotional catch phrase. The reality behind it is the National Information Infrastructure, the intent of which is to promote advantages to American business through advanced technology. A number of actions, promotions, bills, and proposals are said to be related to the NII; the most frequently cited is "The High-Performance Computing Act of 1991". (It is one of the ironies of this work that the author has chosen to make his home in Amsterdam.) This book is an opinion piece, told by a professional "gee-whizzer", full of verbiage and vendor promotions, signifying nothing. The author introduces the book by suggesting that it is best read as nine magazine articles. It certainly doesn't have enough structure for a book: even the individual chapters are undisciplined and disorganized. In common with most of those who rhapsodize over the Information Superhighway, Otte has very little idea of what he wants it to be -- just exciting, and high tech, seems to be enough. For those who have any professional background in the broader field of information technology, there will be nothing of any interest here. Ah, but what of the poor "struggling masses"? There isn't much for them, here, either. Chapter four, on "Computing Tools", is an extremely simplistic introduction to PCs and peripherals. "Multimedia Online Services" is a flat-out advertisement for CompuServe, America OnLine and Prodigy. Errors abound, and it is *quite* clear that this author does *not* have a solid grasp of technology. The need for "repeaters" on long distance phone lines would be eliminated if they would just use EtherNet (maximum run length, five hundred metres). PDAs (Personal Digital Assistants) are predicted to be shipping "in volume" by the time the book sees print. XCOPY is a backup program. Multimedia is hyped for eighteen pages -- and then Mosaic is dismissed in half a paragraph, as a "front end" for the Internet, much like WinCIM for CompuServe. I could, very easily, go on. No, I can't even recommend it for newbies. This presents a barely informed, distorted, and "blue sky" view of future technology. copyright Robert M. Slade, 1995 BKINFSUP.RVW 950224. Distribution permitted in TELECOM Digest and associated publications. Rob Slade's book reviews are a regular feature in the Digest. Vancouver ROBERTS@decus.ca Institute for Robert_Slade@sfu.ca Research into rslade@cue.bc.ca User p1@CyberStore.ca Security Canada V7K 2G6 ------------------------------ From: producer@pipeline.com (Judith Oppenheimer) Subject: 800 Numbers, and FLOWERS Again Date: 24 Mar 1995 13:57:10 -0500 Organization: Interactive CallBrand(TM) In comp.dcom.telecom mbeckman@mbeckman.com (Mel Beckman) said: > Jerry Leichter writes: >> I can see the argument for allowing the *full* "1-800-FLOWERS" as a >> trademark. It uniquely identifies a particular number across a whole >> national market; it can be used in trade; it's only partially >> meaningful. > And here is where we see the true folly of ideas like Oppenheimer's: > in the case of 1-800-FLOWERS, a trademark is entirely unnecessary, > because there can be only one owner of that number in the U.S. phone > system. The trademark is *unnecessary*? Is that a legal opinion? Regarding the U.S. phone system, if we are discussing a cyber-distinction in the United States, you help make my very point. 011 800 FLOWERS and 1 888 FLOWERS are both designed to co-exist in the United States with 1 800 FLOWERS. Now, I'm not familiar with your hometown of Ventura, California. But I can tell you that if there were more than one Fifth Avenue, or Madison Avenue, or Park Avenue, in Manhattan, or duplicated addresses on those avenues, their real estate value would be in a shambles. That value is not a *false* or arbitrary value, but rather is based on real market activity. They are prime magnets for business activity. So is 1 800 FLOWERS. To say it's not is folly. > What's really alarming about Oppenheimer's logic, though, is that it would > presumably entitle the owner of 800-FLOWERS to also own FLOWERS.COM, > "FLOWERS" on America Online, and the use of the word FLOWERS in any > other electronic addressing scheme. After all, if prior ownership of > an address-name in the U.S. provides for ownership in a completely > new domain -- the international telephone market -- then surely a > business would be silly not to press for similar reasoning in any other > domain (e.g. Internet addresses). These very issues are being addressed right now, as there *are* proprietary and other rights to be considered in adopting standards and distributing these properties. > And that's not even considering the arrogance of U.S. companies > presuming to have priority over non-U.S. enterprises in the worldwide > telephone arena. I've said it before -- I'll say it again. 1. U.S. companies own U.S. brands. European companies own their brands. There is no arrogance there. 2. The vast majority of the direct marketing business - the very behavior of direct phone response - is a U.S. cultural behavior. That's why there are 4 mil + 800 numbers in the U.S., and barely 150,000 throughout the rest of the world. It is appropriation of this existing-behavior, dollar-spending, comparatively "wealthy" marketplace that makes U.S. marketing numbers and brands desirable to non-U.S. companies at all. Otherwise, grandfathering of U.S. 800's would be a non-issue -- a practical request to be granted with no fuss or debate. They wouldn't want 'em if they wasn't worth something. Get it? Judith J. Oppenheimer, Producer@Pipeline.com Interactive CallBrand(TM) ------------------------------ From: victorp@omega.lncc.br (Victor Prochnik) Subject: Outsourcing of International Telecom Services Date: Fri, 24 Mar 1995 19:14:19 GMT We have just started a research project (30 man/month) on the demand of large Brazilian and multinational firms for global telecommunication services and their interest in outsourcing this services. Suggestions of publications, unpublished dissertations, case studies or market studies on this theme are most welcome. We are also interested in mantaining contact with people working in this or similar areas. The research project is the following. RESEARCH PROJECT ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE AND TELECOMMUNICATION SERVICES DIFFUSION IN BRAZIL Victor Prochnik Industrial Economics Institute Federal University of Rio de Janeiro E-mail: VICTORP@OMEGA.LNCC.BR The aims of this project are in the first place to identify the demand perspectives for global telecommunication services in large enterprises operating in Brazil and in the second place to access the degree of interest of these corporations in outsourcing its international telecom networks. In this project, a greater demand for global telecommunication services is not strictly seen as a result of international commerce growth and greater intensity of financial flows between Brazil and the rest of the world. Our preliminary hypothesis is that another important determinant of demand can be found in the process of organizational change toward new models of network structuring within an expanding globalization process. The adoption of new corporate internal structuring and external relations (industrial automation, groupwork, quick response etc.) requires an increased use of new telecommunication services. In fact, the lines of causality are bi-directional as the introduction of new services also demands organizational change. It is also often observed that such an interplay between corporate change and telecommunications has unexpected consequences. Devised applications not before imagined become intensively used, provoking unplanned changes in corporation organisation. In order to follow this line of investigation, the research team will try to associate new organizational forms or technologies and their requirements in terms of telecommunications services. Following this interdependence scheme between entrepreneurial activities and the respective use of telecommunication services and, at the same time, having collected information on the firms modernization plans, it will be possible to discuss the demand evolution in telecommunication services. In this respect, one of the major worldwide discussed trends is the outsourcing of these global services. No one knows for sure, however, the extent to which large corporations are willing to outsource their international telecom operations. Managerial decisions m