From jsol@buit1.bu.edu Thu May 21 17:45:22 1987 Received: from buita.bu.edu by buit1.bu.edu (3.2/4.7) id AA29140; Thu, 21 May 87 17:45:22 EDT Return-Path: Received: by buita.bu.edu (1.1/4.7) id AA12518; Thu, 21 May 87 17:45:40 EDT Date: Thu, 21 May 87 17:45:40 EDT From: jsol@buit1.bu.edu Message-Id: <8705212145.AA12518@buita.bu.edu> To: telecom-dis Status: O Date: Thu, 21 May 87 17:36:03 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-to: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V4 #1 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU TELECOM Digest Thu, 21 May 87 17:36:03 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 1 Today's Topics: missing submissions Re: Regular Phone Chirp 1-800-XXX-0000 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Received: from buita.bu.edu by buit1.bu.edu (3.2/4.7) id AA25213; Thu, 21 May 87 06:20:23 EDT Return-Path: Received: by buita.bu.edu (1.1/4.7) id AA09788; Thu, 21 May 87 06:20:40 EDT Date: Thu, 21 May 87 06:20:40 EDT From: jsol@buit1.bu.edu Message-Id: <8705211020.AA09788@buita.bu.edu> To: telecom Subject: missing submissions Status: RO Due to a bug in the software during the setup of TELECOM at BUIT1, all input to the digest was lost for the past few days. If you don't see your submission in this digest, please repost/resend it to us. Sorry for the inconvenience. --jsol ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 May 87 06:20:40 EDT From: jsol@buit1.bu.edu To: telecom Subject: missing submissions Date: Thu, 21 May 87 10:01 EDT From: Subject: Re: Regular Phone Chirp To: telecom-request@xx.lcs.mit.edu I have a home-brew piezoelectric ringer signal on my line and the same thing happens, except it happens at 4:32am. A long time ago, I had a simple on-hook monitor which would listen to the phone line and run it through a small amp to a speaker. I would leave it running in my room to listen to the idle noise on the line. Well, one day I left it on my parents line, and they got a "chunk-chunk" noise at about 11:00pm. I put the speaker/amp on my line and waited for 4:32am, and sure enough, I got the same "chunk-chunk", accompanied by an obediant chirp from my piezo ringer. So from this I deduced it must be some sort of automated test sweep. I am in a 1aESS if that helps any. It sounds to me like the line is reversing polarity briefly, although I haven't checked it with a meter yet. David Harpe KAJOHN01@ULKYVX.Bitnet ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 May 87 10:11 EDT From: Subject: 1-800-XXX-0000 To: telecom-request@xx.lcs.mit.edu Completely by accident, I noticed the other day that if you dial 1-800-XXX-0000 where XXX is a valid 800 exchange, you get the following message: "You have reached the ATT long distance network. Thank you for choosing ATT. This message will not be repeated." And sure enough, it wasn't repeated. My question is: Why is this there? My long distance carrier is ATT, and I know there are numbers you can dial that allow you to check your LD carrier, but I thought those numbers were in the 700 range. Does this happen for those of you who have MCI, Sprint, etc? David Harpe KAJOHN01@ULKYVX.Bitnet ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* From jsol@buit1.bu.edu Fri May 22 19:25:57 1987 Received: from buita.bu.edu by buit1.bu.edu (3.2/4.7) id AA05302; Fri, 22 May 87 19:25:57 EDT Return-Path: Received: by buita.bu.edu (1.1/4.7) id AA03237; Fri, 22 May 87 19:26:16 EDT Message-Id: <8705222326.AA03237@buita.bu.edu> Date: Fri, 22 May 87 19:26:02 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V4 #2 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Status: RO TELECOM Digest Fri, 22 May 87 19:26:02 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 2 Today's Topics: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Re: TELECOM Digest V6 #51 Extended phone services in California ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Received: from XX.LCS.MIT.EDU by buit1.bu.edu (3.2/4.7) id AA01033; Fri, 22 May 87 02:12:25 EDT Received: from seismo.CSS.GOV by XX.LCS.MIT.EDU with TCP/SMTP; Fri 22 May 87 02:10:30-EDT Received: from utah-cs.UUCP by seismo.CSS.GOV (5.54/1.14) with UUCP id AA07955; Fri, 22 May 87 02:11:10 EDT Received: by cs.utah.edu (5.54/utah-1.0) id AA04185; Fri, 22 May 87 00:08:51 MDT Received: by gr.utah.edu (5.54/utah-1.0-slave) id AA28219; Fri, 22 May 87 00:08:48 MDT Received: by stride.Stride.COM (5.51/UUCP-Project/rel-1.0/11-05-86) id AA17027; Fri, 22 May 87 01:49:05 EDT From: utah-cs!stride.stride.com!unrvax@seismo.CSS.GOV (UNR VAX-11/750) Message-Id: <8705220549.AA17027@stride.Stride.COM> Date: 22 May 87 05:49:01 GMT To: comp-dcom-telecom%seismo.css.gov@seismo.CSS.GOV Subject: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Responding-System: stride.Stride.COM Status: RO Path: stride!utah-gr!uplherc!nrc-ut!nrcvax!ihm From: ihm@nrcvax.UUCP (Ian H. Merritt) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: TELECOM Digest V6 #51 Message-ID: <920@nrcvax.UUCP> Date: 18 May 87 18:19:48 GMT References: <8705142333.AA23356@media-lab.MIT.EDU> <8705150113.AA25364@media-lab.MIT.EDU> Reply-To: ihm@minnie.UUCP (Ian Merritt) Distribution: world Organization: The Frobboz Magic Telephone Co., Inc. Lines: 44 > > Date: Wed, 13 May 87 10:40 EDT > From: "Steven H. Gutfreund" > Subject: Phone card scam > > Does anyone have some reasonable technical suggetions about what > could be done (I realize that a lot of ideas are shot down by the > Long Distance Carries because of marketing and simplicity reasons) > > - Steven Gutfreund > >Sure. Hundred digit credit card numbers. Ok, twenty digits ought to be >enough. Especially with the spiffy AT&T phones that automatically >punch in your AT&T credit card number for you, there really isn't any >reason (beyond convience for people at manual phones) not to use big >numbers. > >At each central office, keep a list of every authorized credit card >number. (How hard would that be? Figure 100,000,000 valid credit card >numbers, 20 digits (10 bytes) each. With only BCD compression, this is >only 1GB of storage, which could easily be distributed on a weekly >basis. (Or looked up directly via some sort of packet switched >network.) You could veryify a number in less than a second.) Actually, that's exactly how the verification is done now. The AT&T CCIS (Common Channel Interoffice Signalling) network is employed for the inqueries to regional database sites (I don't recall thje AT&T term for them), and TSPS that handles the Calling Card service for them actually does the inquery for each attempt to use the card. The only thing you have suggested that would change the system is the additional digits. The problems are that it would be a bitch to memorize all that and difficult at best to type it all in error free. Remember there are often times you don't have your card with you to 'conveniently' insert into a handy-dandy slot phone, and such phones are not always available. I for one never carry my card; I just key it in from memory. I think it would be better extend the current scheme to a 7 digit PIN # (instead of the current 4). This would allow several new features I won't attempt to list here, it would improve security, and as mosty people have developed the ability to remember telephone numbers, the pin, being just another 7 digit number, would be easy to remember (without a card). Cheerz-- --i ------------------------------ From: utah-cs!stride.stride.com!unrvax@seismo.CSS.GOV (UNR VAX-11/750) Date: 22 May 87 05:49:01 GMT To: comp-dcom-telecom%seismo.css.gov@seismo.CSS.GOV Subject: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom From: ihm@nrcvax.UUCP (Ian H. Merritt) Subject: Re: TELECOM Digest V6 #51 Date: 18 May 87 18:19:48 GMT Date: Fri, 22 May 87 09:24:13 PDT From: blia.UUCP!ted@cgl.ucsf.edu (Ted Marshall) To: telecom@xx.lcs.mit.edu Subject: Extended phone services in California Recently, there was a big discussion here of the extended telephone services being tried by South Central Bell. Today, In the San Jose Mercury News, there was an article stating that Pacific Bell is planning to offer a set of such services to its customers starting in Q2, 1988. The list of services included is as follows: * auto callback * auto recall (call me back when call goes through) * customer-originated trace * call identification * call-identification blocking * distinctive ringing * selective call forwarding * selective call rejection The article does not state how long it will take until these are offered in all Pac Bell exchanges. It also does not give the charges for these services. Finally it notes that Pac Bell has not yet filed with the PUC and so everything is subject to change at the regulators' whim. -- Ted Marshall ...!ucbvax!mtxinu!blia!ted mtxinu!blia!ted@Berkeley.EDU Britton Lee, Inc., 14600 Winchester Blvd, Los Gatos, Ca 95030 (408)378-7000 The opinions expressed above are those of the poster and not his employer. ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* From jsol@buit1.bu.edu Sun May 24 01:11:08 1987 Received: from buita.bu.edu by buit1.bu.edu (3.2/4.7) id AA00990; Sun, 24 May 87 01:11:08 EDT Return-Path: Received: by buita.bu.edu (1.1/4.7) id AA01756; Sun, 24 May 87 01:11:04 EDT Message-Id: <8705240511.AA01756@buita.bu.edu> Date: Sun, 24 May 87 1:10:53 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #5 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Status: O TELECOM Digest Sun, 24 May 87 1:10:53 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 5 Today's Topics: Submission for comp.dcom.telecom (Communication Progress for Criminals) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 22 May 87 23:19:07 EDT From: kitty!larry@seismo.CSS.GOV To: seismo!xx.lcs.mit.edu!telecom@seismo.CSS.GOV Subject: Submission for comp.dcom.telecom (Communication Progress for Criminals) Cc: kitty!larry@seismo.CSS.GOV > In a recent article dmt@ptsfa.UUCP (Dave Turner) writes: > > The following is from an editorial by Wayne Green in the June, 1987 issue > of 73 Amateur Radio magazine: > > The recent legislation making cellular phone calls illegal to listen in on > has provided a bonanza for both organized and disorganized crime. It's > difficult not to laugh over the situation the cellular industry has gotten > itself into in its blind pursuit of the fast buck. > > What's happened is a mass move into cellular by criminals. They buy a > cellular system, have an unscrupulous dealer alter the electronic serial > number (ESN) on the built-in programmable IC, which makes calls both > untraceable and free--a great combo. They tool around town, making calls > to Pakistan, Columbia, and their Caribbean drug warehouses at will. I have a few comments to make on this and some related topics which may be of interest to Net readers. My comments are based upon personal knowledge and experience as one who has provided some forensic science consulting services to certain law enforcement agencies for a number of years. It's sort of interesting to note that it was even easier to implement spoofing fraud in dial IMTS mobile telephone installations, but such fraud has been virtually unheard of. The reasons for this are: much fewer IMTS channels and much fewer IMTS customers than cellular make such fraud extremely conspicuous; most IMTS installations are combined with MTS installations and have a high probability of telephone company (or RCC) operator monitoring. My personal opinion is that cellular fraud has been encouraged due to "safety in numbers". :-) > Cellular has turned out to be great for coordinating every kind of criminal > activity. It's just what criminals have been needing for years-- a > dependable, free, untraceable, and safe communications system. With a > combination of pagers and cellular phones, crooks are making a shambles > of the cellular system--all protected by Congress. > > If you wanted to deal in drugs, how better to get orders from your > customers than by giving them your cellular phone number? There's no way > to tap a telephone that can be anywhere in a big city, operating through > different cells as it moves around. And with an altered ESN it's all free! Progress in telecommunications has unquestionably been of benefit to criminal activity. Probably the single greatest benefit has been the introduction of call forwarding. This service has been of such great benefit to the conduct of unlawful gambling, narcotics and prostitution operations that for many years I have jokingly referred to it as: "1A Criminal Facilitation Service"; AT&T and BOC people may appreciate the satire in this remark. As an example, an unlawful gambling operation could change location every day or so, with the telephone number for bettors being the same. This situation also neatly defeats any court-authorized eavesdropping warrant since there would never be conversations on the telephone pair that was the subject of such a wiretap; a forwarded call never takes place on the physical line whose number was dialed. In earlier No. 1 and No 1A ESS installations there was no rapid method to determine to what number a given line had its calls forwarded; such determination could only be made by an experienced switchman using the ESS maintenance tty. This rather frustrated law enforcement agencies in their investigation of unlawful gambling and narcotics activity. Furthermore, I know of some instances where telephone company personnel flatly denied to law enforcement investigators that they could determine the forwarded telephone number; this was, of course, a false statement, but was made in a misguided effort to keep the telephone company "uninvolved". As an interesting aside, prior to the advent of ESS and call forwarding, some larger unlawful gambling operations used an electronic device called a "cheese box" that effected a rudimentary kind of call forwarding in a manner similar to a loop-around test line. Two telephone lines would be ordered for say, an unoccupied office or apartment, and each line would connect to the "cheese box". The actual location of the gambling operation would call the first line, and remain on the line and wait for calls; the "customers" would call the second line, with the result that it would auto-answer and be connected to the first line. Telephone company loop-around test lines were used for the conduct of unlawful narcotics dealing during the 1970's, but this practice has generally disappeared as telephone companies: (1) installed 60A control units or equivalent devices that dropped loop-around connections upon the detection of speech energy (legitimate use of loop-around test lines is for single frequency transmission measurements only); and (2) went ESS and therefore had "call trace" capability that would automatically determine the origin of calls to loop-around and other test lines. After call forwarding, the next most useful communications adjunct to criminal activity is the voice radio pager. It is an unfortunate fact of life that no self-respecting prostitute or "street dealer" of narcotics would be caught without their voice pager. Voice pagers represent an ideal, inexpensive method of arranging clandestine meetings. A typical voice pager scenario: customer calls narcotics dealer's pager from a coin telephone, giving coin telephone number; narcotics dealer finds coin telephone to call coin telephone where customer is waiting to arrange for a meeting. What could be simpler and more untraceable? In my travels, I have known of only two instances where criminals used any speech privacy devices (speech scramblers) to defeat eavesdropping (lawful of otherwise); however, I suspect that a new generation of low-cost digital speech privacy devices will result in more of these devices being used by criminals. The units that I have seen used were all based upon analog "speech inversion" techniques; these devices are easy to defeat, whereas the digital devices are virtually impossible to compromise by other than NSA. One of the most novel (at the time) applications of communications technology by criminals that I have personally seen was the use of telecopiers by a large unlawful gambling operation about 11 years ago. While the law enforcement agencies involved had obtained eavesdropping warrants to install wiretaps on some of the telephone lines involved, they were totally baffled by the strange sounds heard during some intercepted calls. I was called in to solve the mystery, and some listening told me that this was an FSK facsimile machine running in 6-minute mode. So we borrowed a telecopier to decode the tapes; this was not as easy as first anticipated. I finally had to modify the telecopier to start in receive mode without receiving a ringing signal (which was not possible from an after-the-fact tape recording). We got some pretty damning evidence, much to the consternation of the criminals (who suspected a wiretap, but felt that the facsimile machine was "secure"). While telecopiers are rather common today, such was not the case 11 years ago. I suspect that as telecopiers decrease in price, they too will be more commonly used by criminals. While Group I and Group II facsimile machines are fairly easy to monitor, the more common Group III (sub-minute) machines are much more complex since they are digital and require faking a handshake protocol by any receiving machine used as a monitor. > If it weren't against the law to listen to cellular channels, I'd suggest we > hams help the law by listening for suspicious cellular calls and recording > them. Say, how'd you like to get the goods on some serious crooks and find > (a) the evidence is inadmissible because it was illegally attained and (b) > yourself on trial for making the recordings. So join me in a big laugh, okay? I know of law enforcement agencies that have in the past used scanners to listen to paging service channels and IMTS mobile telephone channels, and have obtained useful intelligence information. None of the information so derived was used in court per se, but it may have contributed to the "probable cause" for looking in a certain _public_ place at a certain time. When any investigator was pressed in court for the "basis of probable cause", the information was attributed to an "anonymous informant" - a VERY common source of law enforcement information. Under the circumstances, I see nothing wrong with this - but I am certain that a number of people will disagree with me. For example, an experienced investigator can readily detect a drug deal going on via certain types of pager messages. Now, if a police cruiser just happened to be going by the aforesaid location, and decided it was time for a routine traffic check... :-) [Flames about prosecuting people for alleged "victimless" crimes such as gambling, narcotics and prostitution should be directed to /dev/null] <> Larry Lippman @ Recognition Research Corp., Clarence, New York <> UUCP: {allegra|ames|boulder|decvax|rocksanne|watmath}!sunybcs!kitty!larry <> VOICE: 716/688-1231 {hplabs|ihnp4|mtune|seismo|utzoo}!/ <> FAX: 716/741-9635 {G1,G2,G3 modes} "Have you hugged your cat today?" ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* From cmoore@BRL.ARPA Tue May 26 11:35:05 1987 Received: from bu-cs.BU.EDU by buit1.bu.edu (3.2/4.7) id AA00920; Tue, 26 May 87 11:35:05 EDT Received: from buit1.bu.edu by bu-cs.BU.EDU (3.2/4.7) id AB17576; Tue, 26 May 87 11:29:17 EDT Resent-Message-Id: <8705261529.AB17576@bu-cs.BU.EDU> Received: by VMB.BRL.ARPA id aa04732; 26 May 87 11:19 EDT Received: from BRL-SMOKE.ARPA by VMB.BRL.ARPA id aa26034; 24 May 87 2:42 EDT Received: from BU-CS.BU.EDU by SMOKE.BRL.ARPA id aa22512; 24 May 87 1:58 EDT Received: from buit1.bu.edu by bu-cs.BU.EDU (3.2/4.7) id AA05716; Sun, 24 May 87 01:11:50 EDT Received: from buita.bu.edu by buit1.bu.edu (3.2/4.7) id AA00963; Sun, 24 May 87 01:09:46 EDT Return-Path: Received: by buita.bu.edu (1.1/4.7) id AA01713; Sun, 24 May 87 01:09:43 EDT Message-Id: <8705240509.AA01713@buita.bu.edu> Date: Sun, 24 May 87 1:09:31 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-To: TELECOM@buit1.bu.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #3 To: TELECOM@buit1.bu.EDU Resent-Date: Tue, 26 May 87 11:17:16 EDT Resent-From: cmoore@BRL.ARPA Resent-To: telecom-request@buit1.bu.EDU Status: RO TELECOM Digest Sun, 24 May 87 1:09:31 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 3 Today's Topics: Re: 3-tone no connection question help on modem + answering machine Re: phone wiring for a modem Re: Ringback codes Re: Regular Phone Chirp ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To: "\F From: umix!itivax!chinet!aicchi!dbb@EDDIE.MIT.EDU (Burch) Subject: Re: 3-tone no connection question Date: 22 May 87 14:15:12 GMT Well, those three tones, (Which used to be real loud, 0dB), are called SIT or Special Information Tones. They are used to help your local phone switch when you are connected to an intercept recorder. They tell your switch what to do about billing your call. However, once offhook supervision has been returned by the party you call, they have no effect. Therefore, you may use them on your answering machine and they will have no effect. Except Cuteness... Seriously, I doubt that a recorder could send those with enough purity to be heard by the PLL's that listen for them. -- -David B. (Ben) Burch Analysts International Corp. Chicago Branch (ihnp4!aicchi!dbb) "Argue for your limitations, and they are yours." - R. Bach ------------------------------ To: moss!cbatt!comp-dcom-telecom@EDDIE.MIT.EDU From: moss!ihnp4!wheaton!steve@EDDIE.MIT.EDU (Steve Hurlbut) Subject: help on modem + answering machine Date: 22 May 87 21:15:30 GMT Is there a phone answering machine plus modem combination that allows owner to call in from remote location, have answering machine commect him to modem, then revert back to answering machine when owner is finished using modem? UUCP:ihnp4!wheaton!steve ------------------------------ To: seismo!comp-dcom-telecom@seismo.CSS.GOV From: pur-ee!uxc.cso.uiuc.edu!hamilton@seismo.CSS.GOV Subject: Re: phone wiring for a modem Date: 22 May 87 22:11:00 GMT > I need to wire a new phone line through a house for use with a modem. > Is there some kind of sheilded phone cable that I could use to help > reduce any noise in the connection? Anything else I should be aware > of when routing the wire such as not getting too close to electrical > wires? Thanks. i also expect to be installing a new line soon, so any advice or horror stories would be appreciated. wayne hamilton U of Il and US Army Corps of Engineers CERL UUCP: {ihnp4,seismo,pur-ee,convex}!uiucuxc!hamilton ARPA: hamilton@uxc.cso.uiuc.edu USMail: Box 476, Urbana, IL 61801 CSNET: hamilton%uxc@uiuc.csnet Phone: (217)333-8703 CIS: [73047,544] PLink: w hamilton ------------------------------ To: seismo!comp-dcom-telecom@seismo.CSS.GOV From: pur-ee!uxc.cso.uiuc.edu!hamilton@seismo.CSS.GOV Subject: Re: Ringback codes Date: 22 May 87 22:18:00 GMT > Every once in a while, someone posts a note asking about ringback codes > (numbers to dial to make your own telephone ring). Unfortunately, these > codes aren't the same everywhere, and are mostly undocumented. > ... i use a technique that has worked flawlessly whenever and wherever i have tried it: dial 0 ask the operator to ring your number hang up ('course, you do need to know your own number...) wayne hamilton U of Il and US Army Corps of Engineers CERL UUCP: {ihnp4,seismo,pur-ee,convex}!uiucuxc!hamilton ARPA: hamilton@uxc.cso.uiuc.edu USMail: Box 476, Urbana, IL 61801 CSNET: hamilton%uxc@uiuc.csnet Phone: (217)333-8703 CIS: [73047,544] PLink: w hamilton ------------------------------ To: telecom-dis@buit1.bu.edu Subject: Re: Regular Phone Chirp Date: Thu, 21 May 87 16:07:23 -0700 From: kent@decwrl.DEC.COM I'd completely forgotten about this. When we lived in Chicago, our bedroom phone would chirp at 7am on the dot, every weekday. After we stopped being annoyed by it, it became a useful alarm clock. chris ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* From cmoore@BRL.ARPA Tue May 26 13:50:33 1987 Received: from bu-cs.BU.EDU by buit1.bu.edu (3.2/4.7) id AA01659; Tue, 26 May 87 13:50:33 EDT Received: from BRL-VMB.ARPA by bu-cs.BU.EDU (3.2/4.7) id AA20387; Tue, 26 May 87 13:47:15 EDT Resent-Message-Id: <8705261747.AA20387@bu-cs.BU.EDU> Received: by VMB.BRL.ARPA id ab04732; 26 May 87 11:19 EDT Received: from BRL-SMOKE.ARPA by VMB.BRL.ARPA id ab26040; 24 May 87 2:43 EDT Received: from BU-CS.BU.EDU by SMOKE.BRL.ARPA id aa22505; 24 May 87 1:57 EDT Received: from buit1.bu.edu by bu-cs.BU.EDU (3.2/4.7) id AA05755; Sun, 24 May 87 01:12:47 EDT Received: from buita.bu.edu by buit1.bu.edu (3.2/4.7) id AA00987; Sun, 24 May 87 01:10:48 EDT Return-Path: Received: by buita.bu.edu (1.1/4.7) id AA01744; Sun, 24 May 87 01:10:46 EDT Message-Id: <8705240510.AA01744@buita.bu.edu> Date: Sun, 24 May 87 1:10:34 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #4 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Resent-Date: Tue, 26 May 87 11:17:41 EDT Resent-From: cmoore@BRL.ARPA Resent-To: telecom-request@BUIT1.BU.EDU Status: RO TELECOM Digest Sun, 24 May 87 1:10:34 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 4 Today's Topics: Submission for comp.dcom.telecom (ALIT and Telephone "Chirps") Submission for comp.dcom.telecom (Use of shielded cable for telephones) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 22 May 87 23:18:25 EDT From: kitty!larry@seismo.CSS.GOV To: seismo!xx.lcs.mit.edu!telecom@seismo.CSS.GOV Subject: Submission for comp.dcom.telecom (ALIT and Telephone "Chirps") Cc: kitty!larry@seismo.CSS.GOV > In a recent article roger@SLEEPY.CS.CORNELL.EDU (Roger Hoover) writes: > A friend of mine has a cheapo phone that chirps every night at > 11:55pm. A call to New York Telephone about this got a response > claiming that NYT did no regular testing that would cause this. > A telephone on the same line with a mechanical ringer does not > make any noise. > > 1) What is causing this noise? I am willing to bet that the response from New York Telephone is incorrect. While the action of New York Telephone test apparatus may be precipitating the problem, the telephone company has no responsibility to take any corrective action; such a position may be difficult for the average customer to accept. Their "denial" of regular testing is either based upon specific ignorance of the person to whom you spoke, or is intentionally based upon paranoia of creating a whole new basis for customer complaints. The latter situation is probably more likely. It sounds to me like the telephone is poorly designed, and causes the "chirp" whenever telephone line battery voltage is removed and then reapplied to the telephone when it is on-hook. Most telephone company central offices have ALIT (Automatic Line Insulation Test) apparatus which is used to detect the presence of faulty outside plant cables. ALIT apparatus is programmed to test all regular telephone lines (loop-start only) for low leakage resistance from each conductor to ground. In operation, ALIT apparatus first determines if the line under test if busy; if it is, the line is not tested. If the line is idle, the ALIT apparatus connects to the tip and ring of the line, while DISCONNECTING the line from the off-hook detection battery source. The ALIT apparatus then makes a resistance measurement from tip-to-ground, and ring-to-ground; such measurements require no central office battery on the line. The ALIT apparatus then disconnects from the line and restores it to normal. The entire ALIT measurement time is between 1 and 2 seconds per subscriber line. Lines which fail the ALIT test (i.e., their leakage resistance to ground is BELOW a given threshhold), are listed on a printer or transmitted by other means to a telephone company test center. Most ALIT apparatus will also transmit an alarm to an attended test center if a significant number of lines fail the test. So the point is: the most likely explanation for the "chirp" is that ALIT momentarily disconnects the telephone from the central office battery, thereby creating a transient voltage which is falsely triggering the "chirp" circuit in the telephone. It is also possible that the test voltage from the ALIT apparatus itself is falsely triggering the "chirp" circuit. Since ALIT apparatus can only test lines that are idle, ALIT testing is always done between 2300 and 0700 hours. Since ALIT apparatus tests lines in numerical sequence, the test time of any given line will remain pretty much the same every night (unless the ALIT apparatus programming is changed). > 2) Is their an easy way to stop it? Buy a better quality telephone. :-) <> Larry Lippman @ Recognition Research Corp., Clarence, New York <> UUCP: {allegra|ames|boulder|decvax|rocksanne|watmath}!sunybcs!kitty!larry <> VOICE: 716/688-1231 {hplabs|ihnp4|mtune|seismo|utzoo}!/ <> FAX: 716/741-9635 {G1,G2,G3 modes} "Have you hugged your cat today?" ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 22 May 87 23:18:45 EDT From: kitty!larry@seismo.CSS.GOV To: seismo!xx.lcs.mit.edu!telecom@seismo.CSS.GOV Subject: Submission for comp.dcom.telecom (Use of shielded cable for telephones) Cc: kitty!larry@seismo.CSS.GOV In a recent article dbj@RICE.EDU (Dave Johnson) writes: > I need to wire a new phone line through a house for use with a modem. > Is there some kind of sheilded phone cable that I could use to help > reduce any noise in the connection? Anything else I should be aware > of when routing the wire such as not getting too close to electrical > wires? Thanks. I can think of no valid reason to use shielded telephone cable for wiring in a house. Most AC powerline noise is imposed upon telephone lines through induction rather than conduction or radiation, so any conventional shielded cable won't help this situation anyhow. Furthermore, the relative exposure of inside telephone wiring to AC powerlines is insignificant when compared to outside cable plant exposure to the electromagnetic fields of high-voltage AC transmission lines. Shielded cable is only useful for high-speed twisted-pair LAN devices or other high-speed data lines (56 kbits/sec or greater). I have only two suggestions for your wiring: 1. Try to find two-pair "inside station wire" which is _truly_ paired. Many two-pair station cables have four wires which are NOT paired, and therefore have some susceptibility to noise pickup and crosstalk. I wouldn't lose any sleep if you can't find such cable, however. 2. Try to keep at least a 2 inch separation between telephone cables and any powerline wiring. <> Larry Lippman @ Recognition Research Corp., Clarence, New York <> UUCP: {allegra|ames|boulder|decvax|rocksanne|watmath}!sunybcs!kitty!larry <> VOICE: 716/688-1231 {hplabs|ihnp4|mtune|seismo|utzoo}!/ <> FAX: 716/741-9635 {G1,G2,G3 modes} "Have you hugged your cat today?" ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* From jsol@buit1.bu.edu Tue May 26 23:12:56 1987 Received: from buita.bu.edu by buit1.bu.edu (3.2/4.7) id AA03965; Tue, 26 May 87 23:12:56 EDT Return-Path: Received: by buita.bu.edu (1.1/4.7) id AA09893; Tue, 26 May 87 23:12:52 EDT Message-Id: <8705270312.AA09893@buita.bu.edu> Date: Tue, 26 May 87 23:12:39 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #6 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Status: RO TELECOM Digest Tue, 26 May 87 23:12:39 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 6 Today's Topics: Re: Submission for comp.dcom.telecom (Use of shielded cable for telepho Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Re: Extended phone services in California cellular inquiry ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To: comp-dcom-telecom@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU From: hoptoad!pozar@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU (Tim Pozar) Subject: Re: Submission for comp.dcom.telecom (Use of shielded cable for telephones) Date: 26 May 87 04:10:44 GMT In article <8705230318.AA03545@seismo.CSS.GOV> kitty!larry@SEISMO.CSS.GOV writes: >In a recent article dbj@RICE.EDU (Dave Johnson) writes: >> I need to wire a new phone line through a house for use with a modem. >> Is there some kind of sheilded phone cable that I could use to help >> reduce any noise in the connection? Anything else I should be aware >> of when routing the wire such as not getting too close to electrical >> wires? Thanks. > > I can think of no valid reason to use shielded telephone cable I can give you one reason: RFI or Radio Frequency Interference. I spec'ed a Northern Telecom SL-1 (s series) for our AM station in San Jose. I knew at that time there was some pretty nasty RF levels in the building and cofermed them with a RF field strength meter. 200volts per meter! The building contains a 50Kw transmitter and sits in the main lobe of the direc- tional. When we spec'ed the SL-1, I told Pac Tel (the folks we were purchasing the switch from) that they would be encountering some high RF and shielded, twisted pair would be advisable when installing the sets. They said, "No problem", and instaled unshielded, twisted pair. Boy did they lose money on our purchase! They had to not only reinstall shielded, twisted pair, but drop .01uf caps on all the lines and ferrite beads! Now I relize that most houseing will not be right next to a 50,000 watt AM radio station, but if you are one of the small unfortunate RFI can be handled with shielded wire and mabey a couple of .01uf caps. -- Tim Pozar UUCP pozar@hoptoad.UUCP Fido 125/406 USNail KLOK-FM 77 Maiden Lane San Francisco CA 94108 ------------------------------ To: comp-dcom-telecom@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU From: hoptoad!pozar@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU (Tim Pozar) Subject: Re: Submission for comp.dcom.telecom (Use of shielded cable for telephones) Date: 26 May 87 04:10:44 GMT In article <8705230318.AA03545@seismo.CSS.GOV> kitty!larry@SEISMO.CSS.GOV writes: >In a recent article dbj@RICE.EDU (Dave Johnson) writes: >> I need to wire a new phone line through a house for use with a modem. >> Is there some kind of sheilded phone cable that I could use to help >> reduce any noise in the connection? Anything else I should be aware >> of when routing the wire such as not getting too close to electrical >> wires? Thanks. > > I can think of no valid reason to use shielded telephone cable I can give you one reason: RFI or Radio Frequency Interference. I spec'ed a Northern Telecom SL-1 (s series) for our AM station in San Jose. I knew at that time there was some pretty nasty RF levels in the building and cofermed them with a RF field strength meter. 200volts per meter! The building contains a 50Kw transmitter and sits in the main lobe of the direc- tional. When we spec'ed the SL-1, I told Pac Tel (the folks we were purchasing the switch from) that they would be encountering some high RF and shielded, twisted pair would be advisable when installing the sets. They said, "No problem", and instaled unshielded, twisted pair. Boy did they lose money on our purchase! They had to not only reinstall shielded, twisted pair, but drop .01uf caps on all the lines and ferrite beads! Now I relize that most houseing will not be right next to a 50,000 watt AM radio station, but if you are one of the small unfortunate RFI can be handled with shielded wire and mabey a couple of .01uf caps. -- Tim Pozar UUCP pozar@hoptoad.UUCP Fido 125/406 USNail KLOK-FM 77 Maiden Lane San Francisco CA 94108 From: root@sgi.sgi.com (Superuser) Date: 26 May 87 09:02:30 GMT To: ames!comp-dcom-telecom@ames Subject: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Path: sgi!wdl1!kck From: kck@wdl1.UUCP (Karl C. Kelley) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: Extended phone services in California Message-ID: <3590001@wdl1.UUCP> Date: 26 May 87 07:43:00 GMT References: <8705221624.AA07193@blia.BLI> Lines: 11 few weeks ago I got a note from my telephone co (pacbell) informing that they are going to install some kind of new equipment and telling me that if I use things like a modem (which i'm using now) or an answering machine, (which i have come to depend on a great deal), that I should contact the place where I bought the equipment and THEY would be able to tell me if any adjustment is needed when this new telco equipment comes online. This irritates me because I have little hope of going to the electronics dept at Emporium and getting a rational response to my query. It strikes me that I might have better luck asking the question here, since some of you appear to follow these things, and in particular this entry looks like it could be related. Anybody out there know if these two things are related, or what the phone co has in mind? ------------------------------ To: comp-dcom-telecom@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU From: hoptoad!pozar@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU (Tim Pozar) Subject: Re: Submission for comp.dcom.telecom (Use of shielded cable for telephones) Date: 26 May 87 04:10:44 GMT In article <8705230318.AA03545@seismo.CSS.GOV> kitty!larry@SEISMO.CSS.GOV writes: >In a recent article dbj@RICE.EDU (Dave Johnson) writes: >> I need to wire a new phone line through a house for use with a modem. >> Is there some kind of sheilded phone cable that I could use to help >> reduce any noise in the connection? Anything else I should be aware >> of when routing the wire such as not getting too close to electrical >> wires? Thanks. > > I can think of no valid reason to use shielded telephone cable I can give you one reason: RFI or Radio Frequency Interference. I spec'ed a Northern Telecom SL-1 (s series) for our AM station in San Jose. I knew at that time there was some pretty nasty RF levels in the building and cofermed them with a RF field strength meter. 200volts per meter! The building contains a 50Kw transmitter and sits in the main lobe of the direc- tional. When we spec'ed the SL-1, I told Pac Tel (the folks we were purchasing the switch from) that they would be encountering some high RF and shielded, twisted pair would be advisable when installing the sets. They said, "No problem", and instaled unshielded, twisted pair. Boy did they lose money on our purchase! They had to not only reinstall shielded, twisted pair, but drop .01uf caps on all the lines and ferrite beads! Now I relize that most houseing will not be right next to a 50,000 watt AM radio station, but if you are one of the small unfortunate RFI can be handled with shielded wire and mabey a couple of .01uf caps. -- Tim Pozar UUCP pozar@hoptoad.UUCP Fido 125/406 USNail KLOK-FM 77 Maiden Lane San Francisco CA 94108 From: root@sgi.sgi.com (Superuser) Date: 26 May 87 09:02:30 GMT To: ames!comp-dcom-telecom@ames Subject: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Path: sgi!wdl1!kck From: kck@wdl1.UUCP (Karl C. Kelley) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: Extended phone services in California Message-ID: <3590001@wdl1.UUCP> Date: 26 May 87 07:43:00 GMT References: <8705221624.AA07193@blia.BLI> Lines: 11 few weeks ago I got a note from my telephone co (pacbell) informing that they are going to install some kind of new equipment and telling me that if I use things like a modem (which i'm using now) or an answering machine, (which i have come to depend on a great deal), that I should contact the place where I bought the equipment and THEY would be able to tell me if any adjustment is needed when this new telco equipment comes online. This irritates me because I have little hope of going to the electronics dept at Emporium and getting a rational response to my query. It strikes me that I might have better luck asking the question here, since some of you appear to follow these things, and in particular this entry looks like it could be related. Anybody out there know if these two things are related, or what the phone co has in mind? Date: Tue, 19 May 87 06:32:11 mdt From: utah-cs!gr.utah.edu!uplherc!wicat!uucp@seismo.CSS.GOV (UUCP) To: comp-dcom-telecom@seismo.CSS.GOV ------------------------------ To: comp-dcom-telecom@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU From: hoptoad!pozar@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU (Tim Pozar) Subject: Re: Submission for comp.dcom.telecom (Use of shielded cable for telephones) Date: 26 May 87 04:10:44 GMT In article <8705230318.AA03545@seismo.CSS.GOV> kitty!larry@SEISMO.CSS.GOV writes: >In a recent article dbj@RICE.EDU (Dave Johnson) writes: >> I need to wire a new phone line through a house for use with a modem. >> Is there some kind of sheilded phone cable that I could use to help >> reduce any noise in the connection? Anything else I should be aware >> of when routing the wire such as not getting too close to electrical >> wires? Thanks. > > I can think of no valid reason to use shielded telephone cable I can give you one reason: RFI or Radio Frequency Interference. I spec'ed a Northern Telecom SL-1 (s series) for our AM station in San Jose. I knew at that time there was some pretty nasty RF levels in the building and cofermed them with a RF field strength meter. 200volts per meter! The building contains a 50Kw transmitter and sits in the main lobe of the direc- tional. When we spec'ed the SL-1, I told Pac Tel (the folks we were purchasing the switch from) that they would be encountering some high RF and shielded, twisted pair would be advisable when installing the sets. They said, "No problem", and instaled unshielded, twisted pair. Boy did they lose money on our purchase! They had to not only reinstall shielded, twisted pair, but drop .01uf caps on all the lines and ferrite beads! Now I relize that most houseing will not be right next to a 50,000 watt AM radio station, but if you are one of the small unfortunate RFI can be handled with shielded wire and mabey a couple of .01uf caps. -- Tim Pozar UUCP pozar@hoptoad.UUCP Fido 125/406 USNail KLOK-FM 77 Maiden Lane San Francisco CA 94108 From: root@sgi.sgi.com (Superuser) Date: 26 May 87 09:02:30 GMT To: ames!comp-dcom-telecom@ames Subject: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Path: sgi!wdl1!kck From: kck@wdl1.UUCP (Karl C. Kelley) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: Extended phone services in California Message-ID: <3590001@wdl1.UUCP> Date: 26 May 87 07:43:00 GMT References: <8705221624.AA07193@blia.BLI> Lines: 11 few weeks ago I got a note from my telephone co (pacbell) informing that they are going to install some kind of new equipment and telling me that if I use things like a modem (which i'm using now) or an answering machine, (which i have come to depend on a great deal), that I should contact the place where I bought the equipment and THEY would be able to tell me if any adjustment is needed when this new telco equipment comes online. This irritates me because I have little hope of going to the electronics dept at Emporium and getting a rational response to my query. It strikes me that I might have better luck asking the question here, since some of you appear to follow these things, and in particular this entry looks like it could be related. Anybody out there know if these two things are related, or what the phone co has in mind? Date: Tue, 19 May 87 06:32:11 mdt From: utah-cs!gr.utah.edu!uplherc!wicat!uucp@seismo.CSS.GOV (UUCP) To: comp-dcom-telecom@seismo.CSS.GOV From: SPGDCM%UCBCMSA.Berkeley.EDU@berkeley.edu Date: Tue, 26 May 87 17:36:45 PDT To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu Subject: cellular inquiry MSG:FROM: SPGDCM --UCBCMSA TO: NETWORK --NETWORK 05/26/87 17:36:44 To: NETWORK --NETWORK Network Address From: Doug Mosher Title: MVS/Tandem Systems Manager (415)642-5823 Office: Evans 257, Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA 94720 Subject: cellular inquiry To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu I do not yet understand enough about the cellular technology, and perhaps the answers are relatively simple and of interest to others as well as me. (If not, the moderator may wish to divert the discussion). Clearly a customer can rent a cellular phone, and register for service in a particular area; then they can both send and receive calls. The technology somehow recognizes and notes the user's location as they drive about, and knows in what cell to ring them if an outsider calls them. The questions: 1. How is the location-recognition accomplished? Does one's currently inactive cellular phone burp regularly and its address get re-noted? Does that drain your battery? If it's really off are callers told something different from "ring...ring...ring...no answer"? 2. Over how large an area does this typically work? 3. If an owner drives from SF, normal location, to New York, and tries to call out, what happens? 4. If while they are in New York, someone in SF, their home, calls them, what happens? 5. Can you register as a visitor in a distant area, electronically or by calling in or however? Does this enable anyone else to call you from long distance? Must they know, essentially, where you went and when you're there? Thanks, Doug [ cellular inquiry ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* From jsol@buit1.bu.edu Thu May 28 20:32:26 1987 Received: from buita.bu.edu by buit1.bu.edu (3.2/4.7) id AA07208; Thu, 28 May 87 20:32:26 EDT Return-Path: Received: by buita.bu.edu (1.1/4.7) id AA14607; Thu, 28 May 87 20:32:28 EDT Message-Id: <8705290032.AA14607@buita.bu.edu> Date: Thu, 28 May 87 20:31:40 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #7 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Status: O TELECOM Digest Thu, 28 May 87 20:31:40 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 7 Today's Topics: Administrivia - Status of TELECOM bandwidth of LADS (metallic?) circuit Celluar phones at the Indy ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, 26 May 87 04:35:29 CDT From: academ!uucpmgr@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU (UUCP Adminstration) ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 27 May 87 15:57:52 EDT From: jsol@buit1.bu.edu To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu Subject: Administrivia - Status of TELECOM As we continue to experience pain and anguish over the conversion from XX.LCS.MIT.EDU to BUIT1.BU.EDU, I note three problems, one of which has been solved. 1) The digestifier was generating bad digests. Specifically message #2 included the text of message #1; #3 contained both #1 and #2, etc. etc. This made the digest very large and without much content. This problem has been solved. 2) USENET continues to mail duplicate messages. I am manually looking at each set of submissions before sending out a digest, and I generally catch most of the duplicates; but occasionally a digest goes out with a message from a previous digest. This can't really be helped without a major programming effort; something I do not have the time to do. This problem is really a usenet-wide problem, and I believe the usenet administrators are working on a fix, so bear with them (and me). 3) BUIT1.BU.EDU is having problems connecting to some of the digest recipients. BBN.COM and YUMA.ARPA are examples of hosts I cannot send mail to. This may be an exasperation of #1 above, since very large digests might time out, I am not sure. This may be fixed when our ARPANET connection goes in, but in the mean time, I will try forwarding Telecom digests that I can't mail to directly, through a forwarding host (probably XX.LCS.MIT.EDU). Well, now you know what the state of TELECOM is. I pledge that I will do what I can to insure the best possible digest, both in quality, and in speed of delivery. ------------------------------ To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu Cc: dyer@harvard.harvard.edu Subject: bandwidth of LADS (metallic?) circuit Date: Thu, 28 May 87 01:04:14 -0400 From: Steve Dyer I've been running for several months with a LADS circuit between my house and the university, running at 9600 baud with a pair of Gandalf LDS 309A short-haul modems. I'm quite happy with this setup, but I am wondering how much of the available bandwidth I am using. If the leased line is truly just a length of copper which runs from both endpoints into the central office, and the total length of the wire is probably no more than a mile, wouldn't there be a chance that the capacity of the line was greater than 9600 or 19.2kb? Actually the distance between my house and the other end is about 2 blocks, but I assume these lines always must pass through the central office. Note that this isn't a "voice grade" line, but something NETel calls "LADS" which presumably means "Local Area Data Service" or some such. I think that this is the same as a metallic line, although it's hopeless to talk to anyone at the phone company who knows enough about what they're providing. Are there are bandwidth restrictions imposed on this type of line by the telco in addition to those imposed by the length? How would you recommend measuring the effective capacity of the line? Is there any chance of exploiting the residual bandwidth (if there is any at all) using something other than the LDS309As (or would the expense of such equipment argue that a DDS line would be cheaper!) As you can tell, I'm dreaming of a poor-man's 56kb+ line and am trying to gauge how much of a pipe dream it is. --- Steve Dyer dyer@harvard.harvard.edu dyer@spdcc.COM aka {ihnp4,harvard,linus,ima,bbn,halleys}!spdcc!dyer ------------------------------ From: adams%littlei%reed%tektronix.tek.com@RELAY.CS.NET To: tektronix!comp-dcom-telecom%reed.uucp@RELAY.CS.NET Date: Tue May 26 14:45:36 1987 To: Path: littlei!adams From: adams@littlei.UUCP (Robert Adams) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Celluar phones at the Indy Message-ID: <122@littlei.UUCP> Date: 26 May 87 21:45:32 GMT Reply-To: adams@littlei.UUCP (Robert Adams) Distribution: world Organization: Intel Corp., ISO Systems Development, Hillsboro, OR Lines: 12 While watching the Indianapolis 500 on TV this Sunday, I saw them do a feature on one of the car crews that were using a celluar phone to talk to the driver on the track. You see, most crews use some sort of CB or shortwave set to talk between the pit and the driver and the TV announcers are always talking about what they overheard on the radios. This one car had a celluar phone and the crew would phone the driver to discuss things. This seemed really strange to me until I realized that the use of the phone meant that no one could legally listen in on their conversations. Everyday someone discovers a new way to use that law. -- Robert Adams ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* From jsol@buit1.bu.edu Sat May 30 17:31:26 1987 Received: from buita.bu.edu by buit1.bu.edu (3.2/4.7) id AA16339; Sat, 30 May 87 17:31:26 EDT Return-Path: Received: by buita.bu.edu (1.1/4.7) id AA05659; Sat, 30 May 87 17:31:30 EDT Message-Id: <8705302131.AA05659@buita.bu.edu> Date: Sat, 30 May 87 17:28:08 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #8 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Status: O TELECOM Digest Sat, 30 May 87 17:28:08 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 8 Today's Topics: New area code 890! Cellular Fraud Cellular phone ids Re: Ringback codes Re: cellular inquiry ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 29 May 87 08:04:49 EDT From: prindle@nadc.arpa (F. Prindle) To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu Subject: New area code 890! An insert in my latest phone bill says AT&T is going to start using the 890 area code to augment it's current 800 toll free service; I suppose, with the need to allocate some of the 800 prefixes to the alternates, they have simply run out of prefixes in 800. But 890 surely is a strange area code, with that 9 in the middle; my ESS currently doesn't parse 1-890-xxx-xxxx correctly, thinking that it is a local prefix of 890 and not an area code. Is this the first area code that is not N0X or N1X? Frank Prindle Prindle@NADC.arpa ------------------------------ Date: Sun 24 May 87 03:21:33-EDT From: Doug Reuben Subject: Cellular Fraud To: Telecom@XX.LCS.MIT.EDU Cc: s.m-cirillo%KLA.WESLYN@Wesleyan.Bitnet, cc004019@brownvm.bitnet Well, although Cellular is "untraceable" in the same way that regular phones are, it still is not the ideal system to commit toll fraud on. >From what I understand about how the cellular system works, a new subscriber is assigned a phone number, and then given a 4 digit code that is unique to his cellular phone. Thus, the chip that is placed into a cell phone to identify it may have a # like this: 212-909-1234-5555. The 5555 is the 4 digit ID code, very much like the PIN number on Bell System Calling Cards. When you request service, you have to have your number "turned on" at the Cellular Company. And, like a calling card, the Cell Co. checks to see if the special ID # matches before it puts the call through (It checks a lot of other things too, like signal strength and stuff, but that's not important now...). So in order for someone to make free calls, he has to know an active number, and then go to the dealer who sold the phone with that number and ask the dealer what the ID number is. If the dealer is unscrupulous, he will give out the ID number, and THEN you can make free calls. However, in no more than a month, if the customer finds that there are a lot of calls which he did not make, he can call the Cell. Co. and demand that they remove the calls from his bill. The Cell. Co. will also change the ID number, and if they are smart will check out the Cellular phone dealer to see if he gave away the ID code to that specific number. So what free Cellular service will get you is at best a month's worth of calls, and that's about it. Also, you will have to go to different dealers all the time, since if it happened with the same dealer a lot the Cell Co. might investigate the Cellular phone dealer. Also, you would have to change your number every month if you wanted people to call you. Stolen Bell Cards work the same way, although faster. If you steal a Bell System Calling Card, and you use it a lot, the local Bell Company (or, heaven forbid, the GTE company if you can manage to use a calling card there! :-) ) will call the paying customer and ask "did you make 300 calls today?". Usually, the customer says no, so they just cancel the card and issue a new PIN number to the customer, usually right away. (The system to assign PIN numbers is almost instantaneous, it seems. The minute they assign you a PIN # you can use it!). Assuming the free calls were made from a payphone, the Bell Co. will still call the destination numbers to see if anyone knows who called them, in hopes of catching the person. If they get enough people to say "Sure, I know Mr. so-and-so", then they may go after the person who stole the card. The point is that Bell Calling Cards have a built in safety system to protect against fraud. (The alternates don't have anything quite as sophisticated...). It would not be very hard to put a similar "excessive use" system of cellular phones. Thus, if cell fraud becomes pervasive, it should be a relatively simple manner to end it, and thus Cell Fraud is really not much better than the standard stuff people do at payphones. Also, Bell System Calling Cards can be used as frequently as you like. The normal "warning" occurs if you have more that 30 calls in 3 hours (or is it 36?). However, if you use your Bell Card a lot (like I do), then you can ask your local Bell Co. to put a little note on your account that you are a heavy user of the card. That way, if you make more than 30 calls in 3 hours (or whatever), you don't get the card turned off. This is VERY convenient if you are away from home and don't want to worry about how many calls you make. Basically then, the people who designed the Cellular System were smart, and they made sure you can't cheat it too easily or too long. Seeing how easy it is for them to stop Calling Card fraud, I see no reason why with the Cellular system set up the way it is that they can't prevent Cell fraud as well... (I'm sure I made a few mistakes there, so any corrections are welcome...) Well, that's my two cents worth! - -Doug REUBEN@WESLYN.BITNET S.D-REUBEN%KLA.WESLYN%WESLEYAN.BITNET@WISCVM.ARPA ...seismo!weslyn.bitnet!reuben (UUCP) ------- ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 27 May 87 15:30:43 edt From: gordon!davido (David Ornstein) Subject: Cellular phone ids To: telecom@xx.lcs.mit.edu Somebody broke into my car a while ago and they took my Alpine stereo system, but left my cellular phone. This got me thinking about their reasoning. The obvious reason for not taking it is that the real guts of the thing are burried in a box with 3 Z80s in it under the back of the car. My second thought was that they knew that it would be almost useless to them unless they could change the number of the phone. Is this true? COuld somebody fill me in on the background of the custom part of the average cellular phone? Is it just a 10-byte prom with my phone number in it? -- ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- David Ornstein "Never join a religion that has a water slide." Internet: davido@gordon UUCP: {mit-eddie|seismo}!mirror!gordon!davido or {harvard|ames|decvax|husc6}!necntc!davido US Snail: Access Technology, 6 Pleasant St, Natck MA 01760 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------ To: comp-dcom-telecom@seismo.CSS.GOV From: elroy!grieggs%jplpro.JPL.NASA.GOV@seismo.CSS.GOV (John T. Grieggs) Subject: Re: Ringback codes Date: 29 May 87 00:03:29 GMT In article <8705171242.AA10372@ci.sei.cmu.edu> pdb@SEI.CMU.EDU (Pat Barron) writes: >... >Your CO is smart enough to know that it makes no sense to allow you to >call yourself. Using the credit card (apparently) bypasses your CO. At least on GTE in Torrance, the CO is not all that smart. I am able to dial my own number, hang up immediately, and have it ring once... _john -- John T. Grieggs (Telos @Jet Propulsion Laboratory) 4800 Oak Grove Drive, Pasadena, Ca. 91109 M/S 301-260A (818) 354-0465 Uucp: {cit-vax,elroy,chas2}!jplpro!grieggs Arpa: ...jplpro!grieggs@cit-vax.ARPA ------------------------------ To: comp-dcom-telecom@RUTGERS.EDU From: keithh@rosevax.rosemount.com (Keith Holmquist) Subject: Re: cellular inquiry Date: 28 May 87 14:20:58 GMT > Subject: cellular inquiry > > To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu > > I do not yet understand enough about the cellular technology, and perhaps the > answers are relatively simple and of interest to others as well as me. > (If not, the moderator may wish to divert the discussion). > > Clearly a customer can rent a cellular phone, and register for service in a > particular area; then they can both send and receive calls. > > The technology somehow recognizes and notes the user's location as they drive > about, and knows in what cell to ring them if an outsider calls them. First my background in cellular was as a design engineer for both mobile units and base station, primarily designed the brain sections along with signal and audio processing. It`s been 2 years since I`ve worked on it so some of my answers may be out dated but I`ll try not to lead you astray. > > The questions: > > 1. How is the location-recognition accomplished? Does one's currently inactive > cellular phone burp regularly and its address get re-noted? Does that drain > your battery? If it's really off are callers told something different from > "ring...ring...ring...no answer"? The systems do not know where a particular subscriber is at any time. As a mobile unit cruises the streets It locks on to a dedicated channel called the control channel. As travel progresses the mobile periodical scans all the avaible control channels and continually looks for the stronges signal. When a call is initiated all the control channels in a given system ( i.e. not all the systems in the country) transmit the request. The mobil whose being called then responds on it present control channel a voice channel is then assigned for the remainder of the call. I'm not clear on what you mean by "burp". How a non responding mobile unit would be delt with is really up to the individual systems. I am unaware of any regulations in that area, the systems I worked on responded with a recorded messge similar to "The mobil unit you are requesting is unavailable at this time" or something equelly as dry and tasteless. > > 2. Over how large an area does this typically work? It works over an entire system in any one geographical area. > > 3. If an owner drives from SF, normal location, to New York, and tries to cal > out, what happens? Typically the way this is being handled is the call is intercepted and the caller is given the option to place the call by credit card. It is entirely possible for the system to decide if this caller is registered with It in another city but would reqiure a nation wide network from cellular system to cellular system. I have not read any articles saying this is reality yet. It was all just a dream 3 years ago. > > 4. If while they are in New York, someone in SF, their home, calls them, what > happens? I believe presently that the caller from SF get the message you are unavailable. There are provisions in the protocol for a mobil to register whenever it roams from its preferred system and from that point it is up to the base systems to determine if the subscriber is valid or not. Again a nation wide network is needed. see above response > /------------\ > 5. Can you register as a visitor in a distant area, electronically or by > calling in or however? Does this enable anyone else to call you from long > distance? Must they know, essentially, where you went and when you're there? Now an editorial comment: The cellular concept is a good one but due to pressures to not allow it to become a monoply it may never reach it's full potential. If one uses the as an example the Bell system, I think you would agree that the nation wide/ world wide coverage was made easier by allowing one large operating system the privealage to design and implement the entire system. Could you imagine the confusion of having Dick and Jane Telephone on the west coas and Ted and Alice on the East. Cellular is presently in that state although a few large operators seem to be positioning themselves for more complete coverage. Just thought I comment. The end An opinionated source Keith > > [ cellular response] ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* From jsol@buit1.bu.edu Mon Jun 1 19:53:18 1987 Received: from buita.bu.edu by buit1.bu.edu (3.2/4.7) id AA22336; Mon, 1 Jun 87 19:53:18 EDT Return-Path: Received: by buita.bu.edu (1.1/4.7) id AA14430; Mon, 1 Jun 87 19:53:25 EDT Message-Id: <8706012353.AA14430@buita.bu.edu> Date: Mon, 1 Jun 87 19:51:14 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #9 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Status: O TELECOM Digest Mon, 1 Jun 87 19:51:14 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 9 Today's Topics: Re: (none) Re: bandwidth of LADS (metallic?) circuit 9600 bps dialups Cellular phone ID's Re: Cellular Fraud confusion about 890 service Re: confusion about 890 service Cellular authentication Interception of cellular ID numbers 890 Area Code?? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To: cmcl2!uiucdcs!cbatt!comp-dcom-telecom@rutgers.EDU From: ames!pyramid!ncc!lyndon@RUTGERS.EDU (Lyndon Nerenberg) Subject: Re: (none) Date: 29 May 87 17:09:51 GMT > While watching the Indianapolis 500 on TV this Sunday, I saw > them do a feature on one of the car crews that were using a celluar > phone to talk to the driver on the track. > [...] This seemed really strange to > me until I realized that the use of the phone meant that no one > could legally listen in on their conversations. > Everyday someone discovers a new way to use that law. It has *always* been illegal to divulge the contents of any non-amateur or non-broadcast transmission. This has never stopped anyone from listening in to private communications, and I doubt that the new law will make have any significant impact on this practice. I think the primary motivation for using cellular is that it is *technically* much more difficult (for the average person) to intercept a transmission. Lyndon Nerenberg VE6BBM pyramid!ncc!lyndon || pyramid!ncc!lyndon@sun.com ------------------------------ Date: Saturday, 30 May 1987 17:55:14 EDT From: Gene.Hastings@h.cs.cmu.edu To: dyer@harvard.harvard.edu Cc: telecom@buit1.bu.edu Subject: Re: bandwidth of LADS (metallic?) circuit We have several LADS lines in service, all at 56kbs, synchronous. There should be information available from the vendor of an arbitrary short-haul modem telling you what speed it can push how far (longer distance-> lower speed). We were frustrated and slightly amused when we called the person who was the official Point-of-Contact for our campus asking what the milage was on one of our lines and got the reply that they didn't know and had never heard the question before. Gene ------------------------------ Date: Saturday, 30 May 1987 17:59:58 EDT From: Gene.Hastings@h.cs.cmu.edu To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu Subject: 9600 bps dialups I remeber seeing discussion here months ago about 9600 bps dialup modems that were really half-duplex with fast turnaround. Has the game changed any since? I've seen an ad from US Robotics offering one that is full-duplex, but with split speed (9600/300), and turns around which channel gets to talk fast. I don't remeber if anyone said so before, but is there any sort of arbitration in these things to decide which direction gets the high speed? Thanks, Gene ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 30 May 87 15:58:07 PDT From: Mark Crispin Subject: Cellular phone ID's To: Telecom@BUIT1.BU.EDU The "PIN" on the telephone number is NOT assigned by the Cellular Phone company, but rather is the serial number of the radio you are using. Every radio has a unique serial number, supposedly on a chip that is epoxied onto the radio's PC board. The number is in the format XX-0-XXXX where X represents hex digits. The first XX is the manufacturer's code (e.g. for EF Johnson phones it is 83) and the last XXXX is the manufacturer's serial number for your phone. The PROM which has your cellular phone number, features, etc., is removable, of course. The only "security" thing on this PROM (sometimes called a NAM) is the lock-code for your phone, which of course can be easily read (the main purpose of the lock-code is to keep away randoms who might try to use your phone in your car. When your phone initiates a call it transmits the phone number and the radio serial number. They must match for the call to go through. That is why if you change the radio on your phone you (or your dealer) must call your cellular phone company to tell them about the new radio. The weakness in this system is that a thief could get ahold of a phone without a epoxied serial number (either by building one or by buying one of the cheapos that don't epoxy the serial number chip in it) and then change it. I suspect the easiest instance of fraud is to use an out-of-service-area phone number (e.g. a San Diego phone number in San Francisco) that has roamer privileges. Generally, the companies don't have serial number records for roamers (consider the problems of keeping records of some other company's customers!) and rely upon hot-listing known bad guys. So you pick a fraudulant phone number and serial number pair, and change it periodically when the company finds out it ain't real. This must be what the drug pushers and similar slime are doing. They aren't particularly clever, they're relying upon the deregulation mania of the present US regime to guarantee poor communication between telephone service providers. ------- ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 31 May 87 17:36:41 EDT From: Michael Grant To: S.D-REUBEN%KLA.WESLYN%WESLEYAN.BITNET@wiscvm.wisc.edu, Subject: Re: Cellular Fraud Cc: cc004019%brownvm.bitnet@umd2.umd.edu, Excuse me...YOU ARE WRONG! The Electronic Serial Number is an 8 digit Hexidecimal number. It is not easily changed. Both the MIN, (Mobil Id Number, your phone number) and the ESN are sent out when you press the send key. Your MIN is easily changed by reprogramming your phone, but the ESN is not easily changed. To change your phone number, both the phone, and the cell system must be changed. Depending on the cell system you are trying to commit fraud on, you may get several months of free calls, or just one. If you are using one of the systems that participate in the fraud detection systems in use, (the name slips my mind at the moment), your service will be cut off after the first fraudulent call--in all of those systems. You may have gotten the 5 digit code from the lock feature that comes with most cell phones these days. This is just a security feature to keep your phone from being used while it's unattended. It has nothing to do with the cell system itself. My phone only has a 3 digit security code. I usually see this security code set to the last n digits of the phone's phone number. -Mike ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 1 Jun 87 09:25:33 EDT From: prindle@nadc.arpa (Frank Prindle) To: telecom@xx.lcs.mit.edu Subject: confusion about 890 service Cc: cmoore@brl.arpa It seems I've misinterpreted my phone bill insert which talked about 890 service. My AT&T bill is usually at the tail end of my Bell of PA bill, so I assumed this insert was from AT&T, but it was really from Bell of PA. I called them and, though somewhat confused herself, the service rep explained that it was "like 800 service in that you dial 1-890 to use it", but then clarified that the 890 was a prefix, not an area code; i.e. 1-890-1234 would be a toll free number supplied by Bell of PA. That explains why it is not in the format of an area code. Is this prefix (890) universally unused and thus available to the LOCs to use for this service, or is this just a Bell of PA special? Sincerely, Frank Prindle Prindle@NADC.arpa ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 1 Jun 87 9:49:41 EDT From: Carl Moore (VLD/VMB) To: Frank Prindle Cc: cmoore@BRL.ARPA, telecom@BRL.ARPA Subject: Re: confusion about 890 service So you are actually referring to 215-890? I don't know offhand if that is being "used". But 890 is not universally-UNused (I think there is a 617-890 near Boston). ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 1 Jun 87 10:02:37 PDT From: mse%Phobos.Caltech.Edu@DEImos.Caltech.Edu (Martin Ewing) Subject: Cellular authentication To: telecom%Phobos.Caltech.Edu@DEImos.Caltech.Edu I am interested in the recent discussion of cellular protocols. Does anyone know/care to comment on how mobile units convince the Cellular Offices (COs?) they are who they claim to be? The 4-digit "PIN" is fine, but what is to keep me from snooping around for a convenient mobile's ID and using the same numbers for my own call? This seems like a good application for public-key encryption, but I doubt that the world has made so much progress yet. Martin Ewing mse%deimos@Deimos.Caltech.Edu Caltech Radio Astronomy mse@CITPHOBO.bitnet ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 1 Jun 87 10:34 CDT From: Mike Linnig Subject: Interception of cellular ID numbers To: Telecom@BUIT1.BU.EDU If the cellular ID numbers are sent from the car are unencrypted, someone with the right (underground) connections could make quite a fortune by building a box that pulls these numbers "out of the air". Are protocols used by cellular phones published anywhere? Mike ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 1 Jun 87 16:47 EST From: "Scott D. Green, Classroom Services" Subject: 890 Area Code?? To: telecom-request@buit1.bu.edu I understood (from Bell o' PA, I think) that they were setting up 890 as a toll-free exchange for reaching the Business Office, rather that the 800- numbers they had been using. It always seemed a little absurd to use an 800- number to call across town, anyway. Sounds a little like the 950- exchange they set up for no-charge calls to the ALDCo's. -scott ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* From jsol Tue Jun 2 17:54:19 1987 Received: by buit1.bu.edu (3.2/4.7) id AA26397; Tue, 2 Jun 87 17:54:19 EDT Message-Id: <8706022154.AA26397@buit1.bu.edu> Date: Tue, 2 Jun 87 17:52:05 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #10 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Status: RO TELECOM Digest Tue, 2 Jun 87 17:52:05 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 10 Today's Topics: Steve Dyer's msg regarding LADS Circuits 9600 bps dialups Cellular Telephone System 890 prefix Re: Cellular Fraud A twist on modems calling people ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, 2 Jun 87 10:08:20 EDT From: dixon@bucsb.bu.edu (Jim Dixon) To: telecom@buit1.BU.EDU Subject: Steve Dyer's msg regarding LADS Circuits With a line of that length (like less then 4 km or so), it would be quite possible to run at a much higher speed. For example, the ISDN U-interface can be run at either 80kb or 160kb (full duplex over 1 pair, even) over distances like that with little or no problems. Sometime soon, I am going to be performing some experiments with this type of interface running at 160kb on a loop that is aprox 1.5 km long. I think that this type of setup could lend itself to be kind of a happy medium between a dial-up line (even at 9.6kb) and a VERY MEGA-EXPENSIVE dds line, which I dont think that any of us could personally afford. If anyone has any interest in these types of experiments, please contact me. P.S. My mail link was down today, so I dialed up into BU. I can normally be reached at DIXON@OZ.AI.MIT.EDU or more specifically JIM%EGGO%LAMBDA@OZ.AI.MIT.EDU Happy Networking... Jim Dixon.. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 1 Jun 1987 21:32 MDT From: Keith Petersen To: Gene.Hastings@H.CS.CMU.EDU Cc: Info-Modems@SIMTEL20.ARPA, telecom@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: 9600 bps dialups The US Robotics HST 9600 modem is indeed full duplex. It uses a return channel of 300 baud, which is plenty fast enough for hand typing from a terminal. The modem runs at a fixed speed on the RS232 line so the switching between 300 and 9600 is transparent to your terminal. The end with the most data to send gets the 9600, the other 300. The negotiation between modems is fast and changes dynamicly. I recently installed an HST modem on my Remote CP/M bulletin board system. It is quite impressive in it's performance, handling both interactive terminal sessions and XMODEM file transfers (using the YMODEM 1k block size protocol). Those who predicted that the 300 baud return channel would be unusable for data, claiming it would be used only by the modem for MNP ack/nak's, were wrong! I am very impressed by the USR HST 9600 and would not hesitate to recommend it to anyone. I use one here at home to communicate with my RCP/M which is located in the computer club President's home about 5 miles away. We have received long distance calls from several other SysOps around the country who also have the HST. There have been no problems with any of the calls. It wouldn't surprise me if the HST becomes the defacto standard for 9600 bps. It beats those pseudo full duplex (really half duplex) modems. --Keith Petersen Arpa: W8SDZ@SIMTEL20.ARPA Uucp: {bellcore,decwrl,harvard,lll-crg,ucbvax,uw-beaver}!simtel20.arpa!w8sdz GEnie: W8SDZ RCP/M Royal Oak: 313-759-6569 - 300, 1200, 2400 (V.22bis) or 9600 (USR HST) ------------------------------ To: From: allegra!mikel@codas.att.com (Mikel Manitius) Subject: Cellular Telephone System Date: 2 Jun 87 16:59:56 GMT I have seen a lot of confusion here over cellular telephone technology latley. I will attempt to explain some of the basic principles of how cellular telephones work. Please keep in mind that beyond the basic technology, each Cellular Operatiing Company can change a lot of things. A cellular system consists of a geographical area, such as a city. I will use Orlando as an example here. The coverage in Orlando is well over a hundred miles from edge to edge, however there exist much larger systems such as the New York/New Jersey area. The size is limited only by the number of cells, and the system's capacity for number of cells. A system is divided into "cells". Each cell has it's own transmitter and receiver, which is connected via leased lines to the cellular central office (CO). Each cell has it's own "control" frequency on which it accepts and issues calls. Each mobile unit is identifed by two numbers that are encoded in it's memory. The first is a serrial number, which is guaranteed to be unique anywhere in the world (kind of like Ethernet), the second is the ten digit telephone number of the unit that it has been assigned. (ie: mine is 305-222-xxxx) Incomming calls: When an incomming call arrives at the cellular CO (305-222) the system announces the call to ALL CELLS on their control channel. A mobile unit is given a time threshold to respond on the control channel. If it does not respond, the caller is given some message such as "The Bell South Mobility customer you have dialed, has travelled beyond the service area, or has left the vehicle". If the mobile does respond, it sends it's two identification numbers, and is assigned a voice frequency by the CO from the nearest cell site (strongest signal). The mobile phone then begins ringing. And the call is left to complete (ie: either the person answers, or the phone keeps ringing). Outgoing calls: The customer enters the number he wishes to call, and pushes a "SEND" button on the phone. The mobile unit transmits it's two identification numbers, and the destination number over the control channel to the nearest cell, and the call is either validated, and a voice channel is assinged for the completion of the call, or the call is rejected, and the mobile issues a siren tone. Traveling within the service area: Once the call has been established, the cellular system constantly monitors the signal strength of each mobile in each cell that has an active call. As the signal drops below an acceptable level, the system automatically selectes a another cell and transmits the new frequency to the mobile. Then the call is switched in less than a second, and the change is usually inaudiable. Roaming: Roaming occurs when a cellular mobile from system A travels into the service area of system B (ie: Orlando to Miami). In most cases the unit is allowed to place credit card and local calls only. However if system B is operated by the same company (ie: Bell South) it's network may authorize billing and allow the mobile to place toll calls. The mobile may also receive calls. However the person who is calling you must know which city you are in, dial the access number for that city, wait for a second dial tone, and then key in your full ten digit telephone code (on a touch-tone telephone). Then the call proceeds as described above. >From my own personal experience, I have had a cellular phone in my car for almost a year. I drove from Orlando to Montreal with it over christmas, and was able to use my phone without any problems in the following cities: (I took I-95 to NY and then I-87 [thuway]) Jacksonville, Charleston, Norfolk, Richmond, Washington/Baltimore, Wilmington, New York/New Jersey, Albany, and Montreal. It most cities I was able to place toll calls directly, which later appeared on my regular Orlando bill as "Roamer" changes. I was also able to receive calls while driving from people who knew which city I was in (I had supplied them with time estimates and access numbers). What really surpried me was the size of the service area around Montreal. I was able to use my cellular telephone from within the Adirondak State Park on the New York Northway, my service was being provided by the "Bell Canada Northern Corridor Service", at that time I was over 35 miles away from the Canadian border! 70 miles away from Montreal! I did however later find out that this service was not part of the Montreal system. Cellular phone can get costly too. I pay $30/month for leasing the equipment, which I get to keep after 36 months. $20/month for service, and $0.35 peak/$0.22 off peak minus 6% AT&T corporate discount (even for personal use). A usual month's bill is $100. Roaming gets much more expensive. It's anywhere from $0.40 to $1 per minute while roaming, and some [but not many] cities also add a $1 to $5 /day charge for roamers. If I were a roamer in Orlando, I would be paying $0.55 per minute for airtime. These charges apply for inbound and outbound calls alike, and area *VERY* service area dependant. In Orlando, 911 and 811 (Customer Assitance) calls are free. The cellular companies also make out on mobile to mobile calls, since then they get two people paying for the call. -- Mikel Manitius @ AT&T-IS mikel@codas.att.com.uucp Copyright 1987. Redistribution via Stargate PROHIBITED ------------------------------ From: SPGDCM%UCBCMSA.Berkeley.EDU@berkeley.edu Date: Tue, 02 Jun 87 12:43:14 PDT To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu Subject: 890 prefix MSG:FROM: SPGDCM --UCBCMSA TO: NETWORK --NETWORK 06/02/87 12:43:13 To: NETWORK --NETWORK Network Address From: Doug Mosher Title: MVS/Tandem Systems Manager (415)642-5823 Office: Evans 257, Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA 94720 Subject: 890 prefix To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu Pacific Bell in California uses the prefix "811" to enable customers to call their business office from anywhere in the lata, toll-free; this sounds like the 890 prefix service mentioned here earlier. Different final 4 digits are used for different prefixes. It seems almost overkill to allow calls from anywhere in the lata, in that my most urgent calls when travelling are not usually to telco business offices. However, if they have chosen to route all calls to a central location for service, it makes more sense. Bank of America here routes all calls about statements and what checks have cleared to one central office in Cal. for all x hundred branches, and no longer can you go to your branch and review your checks. Thanks, Doug Z 890 prefix ------------------------------ To: comp-dcom-telecom@RUTGERS.EDU From: ron@topaz.rutgers.edu (Ron Natalie) Subject: Re: Cellular Fraud Date: 2 Jun 87 15:29:25 GMT > The Electronic Serial Number is an 8 digit Hexidecimal number. It is not > easily changed. Both the MIN, (Mobil Id Number, your phone number) and the > ESN are sent out when you press the send key. Your MIN is easily changed > by reprogramming your phone, but the ESN is not easily changed. To change Make that, it is not supposed to be easily changed. While the ESN is not in that NAM (the EPROM with the phone number) in it's nice ZIF socket, many manufacturers just put it in another ROM which anybody with a small amount of electronics background can change. I would expect the most common sort of Cellular fraud involves using phones from another system through automatic ROAM agreements. Presumably the ESN/Phone number checking isn't as rigourous or as up-to-date in remote systems as it is in your home system. -Ron ------------------------------ To: telecom@xx.lcs.mit.edu, risks@csl.sri.com Date: Tue, 2 Jun 87 13:10:25 EDT Subject: A twist on modems calling people From: smv@necis.NEC.COM The folks at our main facility just installed a new telephone switch, and made two changes which are not user-transparent. The two changes involve the method used to reach our remote switch, and the method used to dial an international call. If you haven't guessed yet, the old international prefix corresponds to the new method of ringing my extension from the main facility. This would be amusing if it weren't for all the auto-dial facsimile machines trying to phone home to Japan with the old dialing codes. They're not much fun to talk to, and they don't seem to report the fact that the calls aren't getting through. The moral of this story: Get your Fax straight, before you make changes. -- Steve Valentine, NEC Information Systems 289 Great Rd., Acton, MA 01720 smv@necis.nec.com Robots don't use software! Software uses Robots! ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* From Roach.SysMaint@MIT-Multics.ARPA Mon Jun 15 22:29:32 1987 Received: from MIT-Multics.ARPA by buit1.bu.edu (3.2/4.7) id AA19369; Mon, 15 Jun 87 22:29:32 EDT Date: Mon, 15 Jun 87 22:22 EDT From: "Roger A. Roach" Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #11 To: telecom-request@BUIT1.BU.EDU Message-Id: <870616022252.112737@MIT-Multics.ARPA> Forum-Transaction: [0380] in the >site>arpa_mail_dir>Telecom meeting Transaction-Entered-By: Network_Server.Daemon@MIT-Multics.ARPA Transaction-Entered-Date: 4 Jun 87 19:39 EDT Status: RO From: jsol@buit1.bu.edu@buita TELECOM Digest Thu, 4 Jun 87 18:51:19 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 11 Today's Topics: Re: 9600 bps dialups (HST 9600) 9600 bps dialups (HST 9600) "890" and warning letter Re: bandwidth of LADS (metallic?) circuit Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Party line question Re: Cellular Fraud -- trivial 1-800-XXX-0000 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, 2 Jun 87 21:12:55 EDT From: Michael Grant To: Gene.Hastings@H.CS.CMU.EDU, W8SDZ@SIMTEL20.ARPA Subject: Re: 9600 bps dialups (HST 9600) Cc: Info-Modems@SIMTEL20.ARPA, telecom@BUIT1.BU.EDU >It wouldn't surprise me if the HST becomes the defacto standard for 9600 baud. >--Keith Petersen I would be surprised. Even though I usually don't require more than 300 baud to type at a terminal, my systems support UUCP which wouldn't work very well with 300 baud in one direction. Do these modems do some sort of flow analys and adjust the speed accordingly? I feel that the only good 9600 baud modem is one that provides at least a full 9600 baud in both directions, with NO egregious delays. -Mike p.s. the Microcom MNP level 6 comes close. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 2 Jun 1987 21:45 MDT From: Keith Petersen To: Michael Grant Cc: Info-Modems@SIMTEL20.ARPA, Telecom@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: 9600 bps dialups (HST 9600) The USRobotics HST 9600 modem assigns the 9600 baud direction to the end that is sending the most data. It should work fine with uucp. Most file transfer protocols have the receiving end sending only some kind of acknowledge or negative acknowledge (resent request) which usually consists of only a few characters. --Keith Petersen Arpa: W8SDZ@SIMTEL20.ARPA Uucp: {bellcore,decwrl,harvard,lll-crg,ucbvax,uw-beaver}!simtel20.arpa!w8sdz GEnie: W8SDZ RCP/M Royal Oak: 313-759-6569 - 300, 1200, 2400 (V.22bis) or 9600 (USR HST) ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 3 Jun 87 00:04:28 PDT From: jimmy@PIC.UCLA.EDU (Jim Gottlieb) To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu Subject: "890" and warning letter Someone mentioned that AT&T was adding a toll-free area code of 890. In fact, Bell of PA (and perhaps the other Bell Atlantic companies?) has created the toll-free *prefix* of 890. This would be accomplished through agreements with neighboring independent Telcos and appears to actually be a way for Bell Atlantic to offer a local toll-free service without involving AT&T. Personally, I don't think Telcos should be allowed to do this. The area code 800 is well established as a toll free prefix and the introduction of different toll-free prefixes in each area code will only add to customer confusion. Uniformity should not be sacrificed in favor of the Telco saving a few cents. A different someone mentioned a letter from Pacific Bell warning that a new switch was being installed. P*B has been routinely sending out these letters to those about to be converted (usually from crossbar) to a Northern Telecom DMS100 Digital switch. The switch has many quirks, but especially annoying is often a lack of CPC (Calling Party Control signal), though P*B has been adding this to the DMS switches. The letter is just for P*B to cover themselves ("We warned you!"). Telephone enthusiasts (and anyone else with an interest in communications) is invited to call the ESSug (ESS Users Group) on (714)973-2000 (300/1200bps) Jim Gottlieb ------------------------------------------------------------------------- ARPA: jimmy@PIC.UCLA.EDU UUCP: {ucbvax, sdcsvax!sdcrdcf!ucla-cs} !pic.ucla.edu!jimmy (this machine has no UUCP link) Tel. (213) 824-5454 ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 2 Jun 87 22:28 EDT From: Jeffrey Del Papa Subject: Re: bandwidth of LADS (metallic?) circuit To: hastings@morgul.psc.edu Cc: dyer@harvard.harvard.edu, telecom@buit1.bu.edu Date: Saturday, 30 May 1987 17:55:14 EDT From: Gene.Hastings@h.cs.cmu.edu We have several LADS lines in service, all at 56kbs, synchronous. There should be information available from the vendor of an arbitrary short-haul modem telling you what speed it can push how far (longer distance-> lower speed). We were frustrated and slightly amused when we called the person who was the official Point-of-Contact for our campus asking what the milage was on one of our lines and got the reply that they didn't know and had never heard the question before. Gene the easiest answer to this question is to simply short out the line and use an ohmmeter. the number is ~6k ohm/mile but look in the aprop telco documents for the exact number. (you could also use a TDR if you happen to have on hanging around... that is also the only easy way to be sure that they didn't leave the loading coils on the line.) ------------------------------ From: ssc-vax!clark@beaver.cs.washington.edu (Roger Clark Swann) Date: 3 Jun 87 23:18:40 GMT To: uw-beaver!comp-dcom-telecom@beaver.cs.washington.edu Subject: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Path: ssc-vax!clark From: clark@ssc-vax.UUCP (Roger Clark Swann) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Party line question Keywords: pulse dialing, mechanical, electronic Message-ID: <1273@ssc-vax.UUCP> Date: 3 Jun 87 23:18:39 GMT Distribution: na Organization: Boeing Aerospace Corp., Seattle WA Lines: 27 **** jam for line eater **** I recently had a question for a friend that could not figure out: problem: electronic phone won't dial when connected to party line. My friend has a beach house with phone service being a party line. I don't remember if he said how many connections there are to the line, but he said that he DOES NOT get any rings other that his own. He normally has an WECO 500 style insturment on the line with no problems dialing or receiving calls. However, when he tried to hookup an 'electronic' (keypad with chip that generates dial pulses) phone the line, he could only dial about three digits before getting a re-order recording. He said that he could hear the 'clicks' as the pulses were being generated and they sounded OK. Someone can call in and the phone will ring and voice circuits are OK. (This same phone instrument works fine at his in town residence) The only thing I could think of was that the 'electronic phone was not pulsing at the correct speed. But then he told me that he tried hooking his modem to the line and making it pulse dial. The result was the same re-order recording. So, this makes me think that there is some strange configuration on this phone line or something??? Anyone have an idea as to what is going on here? Roger Swann uw-beaver!ssc-vax!clark [Any number of reasons could cause this problem. FCC regulations don't even *allow* you to plug in a modular instrument to a party line. --JSol] ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 4 Jun 87 03:53:18 PDT From: hoptoad.UUCP!gnu@cgl.ucsf.edu (John Gilmore) Subject: Re: Cellular Fraud -- trivial To: telecom@xx.lcs.mit.edu In article <8705312136.AA01347@mimsy.umd.edu>, mgrant@MIMSY.UMD.EDU (Michael Grant) writes: > The Electronic Serial Number is an 8 digit Hexidecimal number. It is not > easily changed. Both the MIN, (Mobil Id Number, your phone number) and the > ESN are sent out when you press the send key. Your MIN is easily changed > by reprogramming your phone, but the ESN is not easily changed. To change > your phone number, both the phone, and the cell system must be changed. The whole thing is pretty silly. Each unit has a serial number and the serial number is "supposed to be" impossible to change. Actually in many systems it is in a PROM in a socket, so no biggy. Even if it was impossible to change, it's not impossible to change the ROMs that hold the program that runs the phone, so you could always reprogram it to ignore the ROM. You could embed the whole phone in epoxy, but who would buy a $2000 phone that you have to throw away if any little thing breaks? The best deal would be to make a program ROM where if you put it in this mode, it would listen on the control channel for phones making calls or answering rings, and save away 10 or 20 of their phone number/ serial number pairs. Anytime you wanted to make a call, it would pick one at random and pretend to be that phone. The load on any individual's bill would be light enough that you'd be hard to catch. This would not let you receive calls for free, but I seem to recall some scheme for that, too. Geoff Goodfellow, Bob Jesse, and Andrew Lamothe published a paper on this in the November 1985 issue of Personal Communications Technology magazine (FutureComm Publications Inc., 4005 Williamsburg Ct., Fairfax, VA 22032, 703/352-1200). The cellular phone standard is called "EIA IS-3-B" though I think they recently upgraded it to "-C". You can get a copy from Global Engineering Documents (call 800 information). It is not lucid but it is readable if you flip around a lot and think about it. ------------------------------ Date: 04-Jun-1987 1311 From: cantor%delni.DEC@decwrl.DEC.COM (Dave C., 226-7726, LKG1-3/A06) To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu, telecom_digest%delni.DEC@decwrl.DEC.COM Subject: 1-800-XXX-0000 Ref message subj as above dtd Thu, 21 May 87 10:11 EDT from David Harpe, : >Completely by accident, I noticed the other day that if you dial 1-800-XXX-0000 >where XXX is a valid 800 exchange, you get the following message: > "You have reached the ATT long distance network. Thank you for > choosing ATT. This message will not be repeated." I checked a few codes and found a similar message. However, 800-444-0000, in particular, identified itself as the MCI long distance network. An article in Telecom Digest 5:156 mentioned that 800 NXX codes are equal access based and an article in TD 6:3 gave a list of the 800 NXX codes assigned to MCI. Also, I dialed 800-NXX-0000, where the particular NXX I used is the same as the one through which you reach my beeper. I found that it connects to a recorder machine, as though it were a regular telephone number. Using some other NXX codes for some of my colleagues' beeper numbers, I found that they seem to be regular beeper numbers. (No, I didn't actually send the beep, though.) It's likely that the beeper exchange numbers I called are not routed through any long distance carrier, and that New England Telephone allows NXX-0000 to be used as a regular number. Perhaps it is just a convention that both AT&T and MCI follow that 800-NXX-0000 produces the same message as 700-555-4141. Oh yes, it apparently doesn't matter what the default long distance carrier is. One of my lines is assigned to Sprint and the other to MCI. I got the same results using both of these lines. Dave C. (David A. Cantor) ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* From Roach.SysMaint@MIT-Multics.ARPA Mon Jun 15 22:32:58 1987 Received: from MIT-Multics.ARPA by buit1.bu.edu (3.2/4.7) id AA19386; Mon, 15 Jun 87 22:32:58 EDT Date: Mon, 15 Jun 87 22:22 EDT From: "Roger A. Roach" Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #12 To: telecom-request@BUIT1.BU.EDU Message-Id: <870616022252.952149@MIT-Multics.ARPA> Forum-Transaction: [0381] in the >site>arpa_mail_dir>Telecom meeting Transaction-Entered-By: Network_Server.Daemon@MIT-Multics.ARPA Transaction-Entered-Date: 6 Jun 87 14:10 EDT Status: RO From: jsol@buit1.bu.edu@buita TELECOM Digest Sat, 6 Jun 87 13:23:45 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 12 Today's Topics: Administrivia re:help!!! DMS100 Nurse, Get Me A Telephone phonevision Maryland phone prefixes Horror stories wanted ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 4 Jun 87 19:12:00 EDT From: jsol@buit1.bu.edu To: telecom Subject: Administrivia I am using an experimental delivery mechanism for TELECOM now. I have in place a "second queue", specially for TELECOM. It takes a quick two line modification to sendmail itself, and some configuration hacking to do it. I did this because bu-cs (our mail gateway) was overloaded by TELECOM distributions, so I made a system that I could move around from site to site as the needs change and as the load changes (if we really lose I can have my workstation deliver the digest). The incoming mailboxes, telecom and telecom-request will always be at BUIT1.BU.EDU (unless we change the host name). There are some folks who have "copyrighted" their submissions. I am going to return unsubmitted any message that is copyrighted because TELECOM is in the public domain and in order for it to remain a valuable asset to the community, it must remain so. I don't want to get involved with the legal issues of copyrighted material. Note that also, any material that comes from the AP or UPI newswire will not be submitted either. This policy is consistent with my previous notes about message content. If you announce the latest batch of "illegal sprint codes" I will not publish that either, in fact that is the main reason why TELECOM is a moderated digest. I think we have pretty much settled down from the move. We still get duplicates, but I suspect that this is being tracked down and will slowly become a non-issue. I will continue to the best of my ability weed out the duplicates. ------------------------------ Date: 04-Jun-1987 1823 From: lippis%delni.DEC@decwrl.DEC.COM (Nick Lippis DS Strategic Planning) To: telecom@xx.lcs.mit.edu Subject: re:help!!! DMS100 From: DELNI::LIPPIS "Nick Lippis DS Strategic Planning" 8-MAY-1987 10:37 To: RHEA::DECWRL::"telecom@xx.lcs.mit.edu",LIPPIS Subj: re: help!!! DMS100 From: TELCOM::MCMILLAN 8-MAY-1987 09:53 To: DELNI::LIPPIS When we (DEC) had problems in MKO our problems mostly were with intra SL-100 calls and local CO calls. We found that the SL-100 was hitting the data sets with too high a level and the modems (DF124 & DF112 but not DF03) were having their receiver circuitry saturated. This is due to a diifference in design between modems. We also had some local CO problems. But for the most part our long distance data calls were not any more of a problem than they were before. Now if these people have put in some new carriers to service their long distance service (e.g. T-spans) they may have different problems than they had previously. It is difficult to answer your question, we don't have much detail (i.e. what type modems we talking about, how is your paddata table set-up, what did you have before DMS, what was changed with DMS install, etc., etc.) George ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 5 Jun 87 13:01:20 EDT From: "Michael A. Patton" Subject: Nurse, Get Me A Telephone To: TELECOM@XX.LCS.MIT.EDU Cc: MAP@AI.AI.MIT.EDU The following item appears in the Business Notes section of the Time magazine dated June 8, 1987. It appears with a photograph captioned "In hospitals, these devices make money" and which shows what appears to be a standard cheap one-piece phone being plugged into a modular jack by a patient (you can tell by the wrist band ID (which is readable). New Products: Nurse, Get Me A Telephone Disposable razors have long been a consumer staple, and throwaway cameras are a new photographic fad. Now the latest items to use and lose are telephones. Several companies, including Mini-Phone, Diversified Communications and International Connectors, are selling an estimated 100,000 lightweight, disposable phones a year, and the market is growing fast. The best customers are not individuals but hospitals, which sell the phones to patients as a moneymaking venture. Health-care institutions pay a manufacturer about $9 a phone, then charge patients about $12 to use the instrument during their stay. And since many patients formerly walked off with standard-issue phones (average price: $75), the theft of a disposable phone is less costly. Says Kendall Gallagher, a Mini-Phone vice president: ``A patient confronted with a hospital bill might feel he's entitled to everything in the room, including the phone.'' Philadelphia's Mercy Catholic Medical Center estimates that it saves between $50,000 and $75,000 a year by installing the discardable devices. Indeed, they have proved so popular that throw-away phones will soon be sold in the hospital's gift shop--at 30% over cost. ------------------------------ From: SPGDCM%UCBCMSA.Berkeley.EDU@berkeley.edu Date: Fri, 05 Jun 87 14:12:33 PDT To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu Subject: phonevision MSG:FROM: SPGDCM --UCBCMSA TO: NETWORK --NETWORK 06/05/87 14:12:31 To: NETWORK --NETWORK Network Address From: Doug Mosher Title: MVS/Tandem Systems Manager (415)642-5823 Office: Evans 257, Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA 94720 Subject: phonevision to: telecom@buit1.bu.edu Phonevision (TV pic + audio phones) may hit us from a slightly different angle. A recent brochure from Datapoint notes their addition of MINX to their Starbuilder network architecture. MINX adds what they call "voice and full-motion video" to PC communication networks. It appears that you add a Datapoint monitor-camera combination to some sort of IBM PC; presumably the same monitor is used at other times for high quality color graphic monitor use. I have no idea what quality; certainly some teleconferencing video is limited scan, like 2 per second or whatever; their term "full-motion" is interesting. It seems to be a contest as more features are added to one's telephone and networked pc workstation, until they meet in the middle. (But then at that point you'll have TWO of them on every desk....) Remembering also that the Datapoint co. stimulated the whole pc business in the first place in about 1975 by their chip activity and the Intel 8004, 8008... Thanks, Doug phonevision ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 6 Jun 87 3:50:46 EDT From: Carl Moore (VLD/VMB) To: telecom@BRL.ARPA Subject: Maryland phone prefixes Area code 301 here (202 also useable near DC). There are some hints that prefixes are in short supply in Maryland. I checked with the operator just now and got 286 Berwyn and 878 Fort Ritchie. 286 had been listed in older directories as Clarksville (since Clarksville has 531 for Columbia service and 988 for Ellicott City service--531 local to Balt. city and 988 for Balt. metro area service--you wonder what now appears on the pay phones in Clarksville). 878 does appear in the Md. suburban direc- tory as Silver Spring (Fort Ritchie is far outside DC area); some older sour- ces have 878 as Fort Ritchie (Balt. City service). 369 is listed as Laurel (Berwyn service, which is to DC metro). 703-369 is at Manassas, Va., immediately adjacent to the calling area from DC proper. (There already is 301-490 at Laurel, Md. and 703-490 at Woodbridge, Va.) 738 is listed at Rockville, in the DC area. Previously, there was no 301- 738, but there's a 738 at Ridgely, W. Va., across the Potomac from, and local to, Cumberland, Md., causing me to wonder if it was "protected"; if that 738 is still there, you can now call 738-xxxx from Cumberland to Ridgely (W.Va.) and 1-738-xxxx from Cumberland to Rockville. ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 6 Jun 87 08:33:28 EDT From: Simson L. Garfinkel To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu Subject: Horror stories wanted I am currently gathering research data (ie: stories) for horror-experiences with equal access and hotel PBX's. That is, I am collecting stories of people who have tried to use the carrier of their choice while staying at hotels and have found out that they have no choice and must instead use the carrier the hotel has chosen. Please send your story to simsong@media-lab.mit.edu Your story may be used in a class-action law suit against hotel operators. Please include your full name, address, and phone number. Thanks.. ...simson ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* From Roach.SysMaint@MIT-Multics.ARPA Mon Jun 15 22:36:06 1987 Received: from MIT-Multics.ARPA by buit1.bu.edu (3.2/4.7) id AA19406; Mon, 15 Jun 87 22:36:06 EDT Date: Mon, 15 Jun 87 22:22 EDT From: "Roger A. Roach" Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #13 To: telecom-request@BUIT1.BU.EDU Message-Id: <870616022253.683102@MIT-Multics.ARPA> Forum-Transaction: [0382] in the >site>arpa_mail_dir>Telecom meeting Transaction-Entered-By: Network_Server.Daemon@MIT-Multics.ARPA Transaction-Entered-Date: 9 Jun 87 21:45 EDT Status: RO From: jsol@buit1.bu.edu@buita TELECOM Digest Tue, 9 Jun 87 20:51:41 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 13 Today's Topics: Re: Horror stories wanted 890 prefix Confidencer Wanted Re: Horror stories wanted Re: phonevision X.25 PAD Sought Re: Cellular Fraud ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sat, 6 Jun 87 17:33:46 EDT From: "Keith F. Lynch" Subject: Re: Horror stories wanted To: simsong@MEDIA-LAB.MEDIA.MIT.EDU Cc: KFL@AI.AI.MIT.EDU, Telecom@XX.LCS.MIT.EDU What is wrong with a hotel allowing access to only one carrier? Or with a hotel not even HAVING any phone service? (The latter may be a good selling feature!) If a hotel customer doesn't like what the hotel provides, he can always find another hotel. ...Keith ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 7 Jun 87 12:39:15 PDT From: csustan!elric@lll-crg.ARPA (Elric of Imrryr) To: lll-crg!telecom@xx.lcs.mit.edu Subject: 890 prefix Cc: Is this prefix (890) universally unused and thus available to the LOCs to use for this service, or is this just a Bell of PA special? Sincerely, Frank Prindle Prindle@NADC.arpa Well here in California (Pacfic Bell), 890 is one of the ringback prefixes. PacBel has been using '811' as the toll free prefix to call your service rep. Brad -- elric Lunatic Labs @ Csustan {lll-crg,lll-lcc}!csustan!elric Reality is what ever you can get away with! | The info on cracking DES will be | in my next transmission... ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 7 Jun 87 13:11:40 PDT From: scotto@pnet01.CTS.COM (Scott O'Connell) To: crash!telecom%mit-xx.arpa@nosc.mil Subject: Confidencer Wanted Cc: crash!scotto@nosc.mil Does anyone know where I can purchase a Rohn Confidencer? It's the noise cancelling microphone used on 500 type WE telephones. AT&T phone stores say they haven't carried them in a long time. Please reply directly, thanks. Scott O'Connell - Datagram Corp. UUCP: {akgua hplabs!hp-sdd sdcsvax nosc}... 3297 Sweetwater Springs Blvd #8 ...crash!pnet01!scotto San Diego, CA 92078-1477 ARPA: crash!pnet01!scotto@nosc 800/235-5030 INET: scotto@pnet01.CTS.COM ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 8 Jun 87 08:38:51 EDT From: Simson L. Garfinkel To: KFL@AI.AI.MIT.EDU Cc: KFL@AI.AI.MIT.EDU, Telecom@XX.LCS.MIT.EDU Subject: Re: Horror stories wanted Date: Sat, 6 Jun 87 17:33:46 EDT From: "Keith F. Lynch" What is wrong with a hotel allowing access to only one carrier? Because only having one carrier may be a violation of federal regulation. Specifically, anti-trust laws and the like. ------------------------------ To: seismo!comp-dcom-telecom@seismo.CSS.GOV From: harvard!huma1!janowsky@seismo.CSS.GOV (Steve Janowsky) Subject: Re: phonevision Date: 8 Jun 87 18:24:43 GMT In article <8706052153.AA20677@jade.berkeley.edu> SPGDCM@CMSA.BERKELEY.EDU (Doug Mosher) writes: .> .> MINX adds what they call "voice and full-motion video" to PC communication .> networks. It appears that you add a Datapoint monitor-camera combination to .> some sort of IBM PC; presumably the same monitor is used at other times for .> high quality color graphic monitor use. .> .> I have no idea what quality; certainly some teleconferencing video is .> limited scan, like 2 per second or whatever; their term "full-motion" .> is interesting. I believe that data compression techniques allow something like "full-motion" video. When you're speaking (for example) your lips move but most of the tv screen remains constant -- and thus only the lips need to be re- transmitted. Of course this is a gross oversimplification, but... Steve Janowsky (janowsky@huma1.harvard.edu ...harvard!huma1!janowsky) ------------------------------ From: hplabs!well!rogue@seismo.CSS.GOV (L. Brett Glass) Subject: X.25 PAD Sought Date: 3 Jun 87 23:15:33 GMT I am setting up a network link for a public-service organization that is looking for an inexpensive, possibly used, X.25 PAD. It need not have the ability to originate calls. Please send recommendations, information, etc. to one of the addresses below: {lll-crg|ptsfa|hplabs|hoptoad}!well!rogue well!rogue@!LLL-LCC.ARPA glass (BIX) ------------------------------ From: hplabs!well!shibumi@seismo.CSS.GOV (Kenton Abbott Hoover) Subject: Re: Cellular Fraud Date: 3 Jun 87 18:46:53 GMT It would seem that one should build a box which, when one is not sending a call keeps the original serial number/phone number/etc. number combination, but when one is to send simply picks a new series of numbers from any scavaged off the airwaves (that just happen to belong to other senders). I would think that the cost of the electronics to do this would be about 2 times one unit plus 10%. Have I missed something? -- Kenton ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* Date: Mon, 22 Jun 87 13:46:36 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-to: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #18 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU TELECOM Digest Mon, 22 Jun 87 13:46:36 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 18 Today's Topics: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Re: Horror Stories digit graber Addresses of Government Officials Re: Intra-lata credit calls Submission for comp-dcom-telecom COMPUDUNIT Further Horrors ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: ihnp4!ll1a!ll1!uucp@ames.arpa Date: 16 Jun 87 22:14:01 GMT To: ll1a!ihnp4!ptsfa!ames!comp-dcom-telecom@ames Subject: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Path: ll1!nesac2!jec From: jec@nesac2.UUCP (John Carter ATLN SADM) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: Horror Stories Message-ID: <1250@nesac2.UUCP> Date: 16 Jun 87 17:03:04 GMT Article-I.D.: nesac2.1250 Posted: Tue Jun 16 13:03:04 1987 References: <12309401739.23.MYERSTON@KL.SRI.Com| Distribution: world Organization: NESAC Lisle, Illinois Lines: 33 | |What is wrong with a hotel allowing access to only one carrier? | |Or with a hotel not even HAVING any phone service? (The latter | |may be a good selling feature!) If a hotel customer doesn't like | |what the hotel provides, he can always find another hotel. | | ...Keith | | ||Because only having one carrier may be a violation of federal | ||regulation. Specifically, anti-trust laws and the like. | | I agree with Keith. This is the same "the world owes me a living" | mentality that demands the highest of quality from a faceless "Ma | Bell" while resisting any increases in cost. It is best exemplified | by the socialist fools at Consumer Reports. If the hotel can choose | who will provide mattresses, room TVs, etc why not telephone service? | If they abuse the customers they will lose business. Makes sense to | me! | +HECTOR+ | ------- But it's the only room available within 10 miles of the meeting, using their carrier means the call is on your hotel bill, your company provides you with a credit card for a different carrier, and your company won't pay for calls made on another carrier and charged to your hotel bill. And there's no place to put the T1100+ if you try to use the pay phone for E-mail. -- John Carter AT&T Communications - Atlanta RWC USnail: 3001 Cobb Parkway, Atlanta GA 30339 E-mail: ...ihnp4!cuea2!ltuxa!ll1!nesac2!jec Voice: 404+951-4642 (The above views are my very own. How dare you question them? :-) ------------------------------ From: dolqci!mgrant@seismo.CSS.GOV Date: Wed, 17 Jun 87 14:51:44 edt To: To: telecom@xx.lcs.mit.edu Subject: digit graber A while ago someone asked about a device to decode touchtones on the line and display them on some sort of display. The "Model TPM-32 DTMF/Dial Pulse Digit Display Unit" by Motion Technology seems to do the trick for a mear $249.00. It can be ordered from: Specialized Products Company 2117 W. Walnut Hill Lane Irving, TX 75038 I just noticed the thing in their most recent catalog. I'm in no way affiliated with them. -Mike ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 17 Jun 87 18:11 CDT From: Mike Linnig Subject: Addresses of Government Officials To: telecom@BUIT1.BU.EDU If you feel the need to write someone about the changes to the FCC's access charge policy... The following is a portion of a list of government officials found on the arpanet a year or so ago. The names might have changed, but most of the addresses are probably still good. Mike Linnig ---------- MAILING ADDRESSES OF GOVERNMENT OFFICIALS ---------- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Telephone # | Organization | Notes ---------------|-----------------------------|--------------------------------- 202 456 1414 | White House Office | President Ronald Reagan | 1600 Pennsylvania Ave N.W. | | Washington, DC 20500 | ---------------|-----------------------------|--------------------------------- 202 632 6600 | Federal Communications | Chairman | Commission | Mark S. Fowler | 1919 M St N.W. | Commissioners | Washington, DC 20554 | James Quello | | Henry M. Rivera | | Mary Ann W. Dawson | | Dennis R. Patrick ---------------|-----------------------------|--------------------------------- 202 523 3598 | Federal Trade Commission | Chairman | Pennsylvania Ave at Sixth | James C. Miller III | St N.W. | | Washington, DC 20580 | ---------------|-----------------------------|--------------------------------- 202 275 2812 | General Accounting Office | Comptroller General | GAO Bldg | Charles A. Bowsher | 441 G St N.W. | | Washington, DC 20548 | Fraud Waste and Abuse Hotline | | 1-800-424-5454 (outside DC) | | 633-6987 (DC area) ---------------|-----------------------------|--------------------------------- 202 395 3000 | Office of Management and | Director | Budget | James C. Miller III | Old Executive Office Bldg | | 17th and Pennsylvania Ave | | N.W. | | Washington, DC 20503 | ---------------|-----------------------------|--------------------------------- 202 224 3121 | Officer of the House | Speaker of the House | U.S. Capitol | Thomas P. O'neill (Mass) | Washington, DC 20515 | Room 2331 202-225-5111 | | | | Majority Leader | | James C. Wright, Jr. (Tex) | | Room 1236 202-225-5071 | | | | Minority Leader | | Robert H. Michel (Illinois) | | Room 2112 202-225-6201 ---------------|-----------------------------|--------------------------------- 202 224 3121 | Officers of the Senate | President of the Senate | U.S. Capitol | V.P. George Bush | Washington, DC 20510 | Old Executive Office Bldg | | 202-224-8391 | | | | Majority Leader | | Robert Dole (Kan) | | Room SH141 202-224-6521 | | | | Minority Leader | | Alan K. Simpson (Wyoming) | | Room SH709 202-224-3424 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------ To: comp-dcom-telecom%linus@mitre-bedford.ARPA From: apollo!rees.UUCP@seismo.css.gov (Jim Rees) Subject: Re: Intra-lata credit calls Date: 17 Jun 87 14:47 GMT I've noticed that when I make an intra-lata call in Michigan (formerly Michigan Bell), and charge it on my calling card, the charge shows up on the NE Tel portion of my bill (my home service is from NE Tel), but it not listed as anything special. I assume that NE Tel is doing the billing on behalf of Michigan Bell, but it doesn't say that on the bill. But why should my AT&T card number allow Michigan Bell to bill NE Tel? AT&T wasn't involved in the call. Or is the card acting as a NE Tel card at the time? If so, why should Michigan Bell honor the card? I think the technology has outpaced the regulation, as usual, but it's nice that these calls still work. ------------------------------ From: cmcl2!phri!dasys1!patth@seismo.CSS.GOV (Patt Haring) Date: 17 Jun 87 14:39:03 GMT To: comp-dcom-telecom@seismo.CSS.GOV Subject: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Path: dasys1!patth From: patth@dasys1.UUCP (Patt Haring) Newsgroups: comp.edu,cat.mag,comp.dcom.telecom Subject: COMPUDUNIT Keywords: mystery story writing project Message-ID: <553@dasys1.UUCP> Date: 17 Jun 87 14:39:02 GMT Organization: The Big Electric Cat Lines: 16 Re: MYSTERY WRITING ANYONE? If anyone is interested in participating in a mystery story writing project via telecommunications, they should contact me Michael Blyth at 718-816-5742. The project titled COMPUDUNIT will consist of using an existing writing curriculum to write your own WHODUNIT MYSTERY! Funding for this program is provided by Learning Link. Participants will try writing a collective Whodunit using the same COMPUDUNIT curriculum guide. Writing starts in Sept. 1987. Don't miss it, call today. -- Patt Haring {allegra,philabs,cmcl2}!phri\ Big Electric Cat Public Unix {bellcore,cmcl2}!cucard!dasys1!patth New York, NY, USA {philabs}!tg/ ------------------------------ Date: Thu 18 Jun 87 11:06:42-PDT From: HECTOR MYERSTON Subject: Further Horrors To: telecom-request@BUIT1.BU.EDU Cc: myerston@KL.SRI.Com WERNER@R20.UTEXAS.EDU writes> >> This is the same "the world owes me a living" >> mentality that demands the highest of quality from a faceless "Ma >> Bell" while resisting any increases in cost. It is best exemplified >> by the socialist fools at Consumer Reports. >just to let you know that this "fool" thinks that you are all wet ... >if society allows monopolies, we have a right to demand that prices go >down and quality goes up when technology improves ... of course, your >disregard for the value of the work (and the need for it) of Consumers >Report make me expect that I am talking to deaf ears ...to bad. >not that I think that CR is infallible ...far from it! You missed both points. Society did NOT "allow monopolies" society BROKE UP the monopoly allowing the user (in this case the hotels) to choose which Long Distance carrier to use. The original poster was complaining about the Hotel blocking access to OTHER carriers. We can't have our cake (by breaking up the Bell System) and eat it too (demand that hotels provide some sort of equal access to one and all). A discussion of CR probably belongs in Net.fussbudget. But, since you ask, here is my rationale. CR is OK for testing toasters and the like although they over-emphasize the manufacturer and government responsibilities for user stupidity ("Unsafe if turned on while in the bathtub"). They have recently chosen to expand into social engineering and liberal politics. Their views on such things as Telecommunications policy have no more validity than that of any other left-wing journal. Besides, they insist in numbering their pages in mid-19th century style. I am replying here as ARPANET does not recognize your address. ------- ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* Date: Wed, 24 Jun 87 0:08:16 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-to: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #19 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU TELECOM Digest Wed, 24 Jun 87 0:08:16 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 19 Today's Topics: Query about FAX format Incoming Phone Calls Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Re: Intra-lata credit calls FCC proposes tax for "Enhanced Services" ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 22 Jun 87 13:43:16 EDT From: Richard Furuta To: telecom@xx.lcs.mit.edu Subject: Query about FAX format Cc: furuta@brillig.umd.edu Can someone provide me with information about what kind of interfaces are in use by FAX machines? What signalling tones are used? What encoding of the page is transmitted? Is any of this compatible with computer communication equipment? What would it take to make your average everyday Unix-style computer behave as if it were a FAX machine (transmit and/or receive)? Please send me a copy of your responses directly. I am on Telecom but boy am I ever behind in my reading! Thanks. --Rick furuta@mimsy.umd.edu seismo!mimsy!furuta ------------------------------ Date: 22 Jun 87 22:43 PDT From: William Daul / McDonnell-Douglas / APD-ASD Subject: Incoming Phone Calls To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU This may end up sounding like a really dumb question but... If all the lines in a neighborhood are being utilized and someone tries to call into that area to a phone that is NOT being used what (if anything) will happen? Will they get a busy signal? Thanks, --Bi// ------------------------------ From: jack!man!nu3b2!rwhite%ucsdhub.UUCP@sdcsvax.ucsd.edu Date: 24 Jun 87 01:00:19 GMT To: man!comp-dcom-telecom Subject: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Path: nu3b2!rwhite From: rwhite@nu3b2.UUCP (Robert C. White Jr.) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: Intra-lata credit calls Summary: It's who pays that counts. Message-ID: <765@nu3b2.UUCP> Date: 24 Jun 87 01:00:19 GMT References: <8706112109.AA03207@jade.berkeley.edu> <35867a62.b8ab@apollo.uucp> Organization: National University, San Diego Lines: 21 Its like the roaming agreement on a celular telephone. when you make a calling card call, the call is billed through the "normal" route. Company "A" bills AT&T for the call and AT&T normally reaches you through your local operating company [which is why the firs ten numbers on your card are most probably your phone number.] The sematnics of a billing depend on the operating company in question. I think you will find that all the call detail listed is AT&T long-lines provided, at least on that one page, and that the fact that this bill is forwarded through is listed someware insignificant [like on the back of the summary page or something] This whole thing is noraml, AT&T always does it that way. Robert. Disclaimer: My mind is so fragmented by random excursions into a wilderness of abstractions and incipient ideas that the practical purposes of the moment are often submerged in my consciousness and I don't know what I'm doing. [my employers certainly have no idea] ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 23 Jun 87 23:57:47 EDT From: jsol (Jon Solomon) To: telecom Subject: FCC proposes tax for "Enhanced Services" Thanks to Keith Peterson at SIMTEL for forwarding information he received on the info-modems list. What he forwarded was a couple of postings to some USENET newsgroups, describing what the FCC wants to do, and ways which people can (if they choose to) inform the FCC of their views on it. The submission is too large to post, so I have made it available for FTP access from XX.LCS.MIT.EDU in the file FCC.THREAT.1 I will post a copy of this to the USENET readers, and BITNET users should send me mail if they want a copy. (mail to telecom-request@buit1.bu.edu) Enjoy, --jsol ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* Date: Thu, 25 Jun 87 23:30:19 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-to: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #20 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU TELECOM Digest Thu, 25 Jun 87 23:30:19 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 20 Today's Topics: FCC news release on PDN surcharge Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Re: Incoming Phone Calls CSCNET Re: Incoming Phone Calls Re: Addresses of Government Officials Re: FCC Surcharges for Telenet/Tymnet/CompuServe/MCIMAIL/etc. Information tax ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed 24 Jun 87 20:06:16-PDT From: David Roode Subject: FCC news release on PDN surcharge To: Telecom@buit1.bu.edu Following is the FCC access charges news release of June 10, 1987. (This is not the official text of the Commission's Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM).) FCC PROPOSES ELIMINATION OF INTERSTATE ACCESS CHARGES EXEMPTION FOR ENHANCED SERVICE PROVIDERS The Commission has proposed elimination of the exemption from interstate access charges currently allowed enhanced service providers, effective January 1, 1988. Charges for intrastate service would not be affected. Enhanced services add value to, or enhance the use of, basic transmission service. Examples of enhanced services, which the Commission defined in its Computer II and Computer III procedings, include computer-based applications such as protocol processing, information retrieval systems and voice or message services. In its access charge proceeding, the Commission provided for exemptions for a number of groups. These exemptions have gradually been eliminated. In the pre-access environment, enhanced service providers and WATS resellers were paying local business exchange service rates for their interstate access, rather than the higher charges that other common carriers (OCCs) were paying and the even higher amounts assessed to MTS and WATS through the divisions of revenues and settlements processes. The Commission decided that the immediate imposition of interstate access charges on enhanced service providers and resellers could affect their ability to provide service during the time they were adjusting to the new access charge rules. Consequently, the Commission granted enhanced service providers, as well as resellers, a temporary exemption from payment of interstate access charges. In proposing to eliminate this exemption, the Commission said it was concerned that the charges currently paid by enhanced service providers did not contribute sufficiently to the cost of the exchange access facilities they use in offering services to the public. Concerns about rate shock might justify a temporary, but not a permanent, exemption from access charges. Enhanced service providers have had ample notice of the Commission's ultimate intent to apply interstate access charges and ample opportunity to adjust their planning accordingly. Moreover, it said, the potential financial impact on enhanced service providers of eliminating their exemption is substantially smaller than it was at the time the exemption was granted. In particular, the Commission noted that the common carrier line charge has decreased dramatically with the introduction of subscriber line charges. END ------- ------------------------------ From: ucsdhub!jack!man!nu3b2!rwhite@sdcsvax.ucsd.edu Date: 25 Jun 87 07:25:29 GMT To: man!comp-dcom-telecom Subject: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Path: nu3b2!rwhite From: rwhite@nu3b2.UUCP (Robert C. White Jr.) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: Incoming Phone Calls Summary: busy signal,sort of. Message-ID: <775@nu3b2.UUCP> Date: 25 Jun 87 07:25:29 GMT References: Organization: National University, San Diego Lines: 39 In article , WBD.MDC@OFFICE-1.ARPA (William Daul / McDonnell-Douglas / APD-ASD) writes: > This may end up sounding like a really dumb question but... > > If all the lines in a neighborhood are being utilized and someone tries to call > into that area to a phone that is NOT being used what (if anything) will > happen? Will they get a busy signal? It is not a dumb question, but there is something I don't think you understand. EVERY phone number is on it's own DEDICATED pair running all the way to the Central Office Switch servicing that area [often but not always the entire prefix {first 3 of the standard 7 digits} the only common execption to this is those who have purchased a "foregn exchange" If every circut comming into a CO [Central Office] is busy, and you are calling from another CO, or your CO's swithch is not capable of compleeting enough connections to support your outgoing call you will recieve the "fast" busy signal . This is the "Circut Overload/Insufficient Access Rights" signal and is heard mostly on mother's day /snicker ;-). Any other busy signal or condition is either a mundane destination busy [Or system all f**ked up signal] All the lines in a CO can be busy, all the connections in a CO switch can be busy, but the only way all "the lines going into a neighborhood" can be busy is if every number has at least one instrument "off-hook" If it often takes several minutes for the tone generator to give you dial-tone, call your Opperating Company and tell them to buy a bigger switch!!! Robert. Disclaimer: My mind is so fragmented by random excursions into a wilderness of abstractions and incipient ideas that the practical purposes of the moment are often submerged in my consciousness and I don't know what I'm doing. [my employers certainly have no idea] ------------------------------ To: TELECOM@buit1.bu.edu Subject: CSCNET From: johnso%tp5@rand-unix.ARPA (A. Ross Johnson) Date: 24 Jun 87 22:32:35 PDT (Wed) I have just noticed that CompuServe now offers foreign access via CSCNET. The nodes are limited in number, but this does provide the short-term traveler with access to U.S. networks without a local foreign data network account. Have subscribers to this list utilized CSCNet for foreign access to U.S. networks? What is the experience. The surcharge on CompuServe is evidently $20/hour, which is generally less than what one would pay to local networks in Germany and Britain (and probably elsewhere) for the same service. There will be local ld charges, e.g. so far the only node in Germany is evidently in Frankfurt, that will offset the savings. Ross Johnson If I receive many replies, I will summarize to this group. ------------------------------ From: moss!ihlpf!ahl@RUTGERS.EDU (A Little) Subject: Re: Incoming Phone Calls Date: 25 Jun 87 14:52:49 GMT To: > > If all the lines in a neighborhood are being utilized and someone tries to > > call into that area to a phone that is NOT being used what (if anything) will > > happen? Will they get a busy signal? > > I believe that they will get a re-order tone. This is a "fast-busy", Most local offices TRY to design their networks so that blocking will not occur. A classic example of the above scenario is an area near a high school and a majority of the students get home at 3:00 and want to call their friends. A well designed office will distribute lines from this area throughout the network. The respondant was correct, though, that if all circuit are used, reorder tone will result. Andy inhp4!ihlpf!ahl ------------------------------ Date: 25 Jun 86 08:15 EST From: C0144%CSUOHIO.BITNET@WISCVM.WISC.EDU To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: Re: Addresses of Government Officials Outside of the usual public carriers, does anyone have any idea if the pubic officials mentioned earlier have Internet addresses? Surely, there must be at least *1* person at the top levels of our government with enough initiative to venture into our realm. Of course, actually reading the mail is a different story. :-) -Dave +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ From the North Coast Dave Chatfield, Dept. of Computer Services _____ of America...._-! Cleveland State University ! --___ ___-- ! ! ------(*) ! BITNET: C0144@CSUOHIO ! Cleveland ! ARPA: C0144%CSUOHIO.BITNET@WISCVM.WISC.EDU ! ! USENET: davec!ncoast.UUCP ! O H I O ! BBS: Assistant Sysop, PC-OHIO 216-381-3320 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 25 Jun 87 17:58:38 EDT From: Michael Grant To: ROODE@bionet-20.arpa, telecom@buit1.bu.edu Subject: Re: FCC Surcharges for Telenet/Tymnet/CompuServe/MCIMAIL/etc. Cc: BIONET@bionet-20.ARPA, Cimbala@bionet-20.ARPA, If they add these fees, it seems like it's going to be the same price to dial up directly to the service long-distance. Am I missing something? -Mike ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 25 Jun 87 20:48:09 EDT From: "Keith F. Lynch" Subject: Information tax To: ROODE@BIONET-20.ARPA Cc: KFL@AI.AI.MIT.EDU, Telecom@BUIT1.BU.EDU > Is it fair to have voice pay more than data for the identical services? It is not the identical service. A T1 line (1.544 million baud) can support 44 full duplex voice conversations. It can support over 1200 1200 baud links. And that is worst case, where both ends of the link are sending 1200 baud solid without pause. Actual usage tends to be about 1/10 of this, and this feature is taken advantage of by packet nets such as telenet, tymnet, etc. If this was not the case, how could services such as PC PURSUIT afford to sell time for less than six cents per hour? Presumably they are multiplexing over some existing common carrier and already paying the access charges and long distance charges, anyway. Five dollars per hour for a 1200 baud line? Only if voice lines are charged $1400 per hour! Why should they pay less for the same service? Seriously, if anyone can find any possible justification for this proposed 8000% tax, I would very much like to hear it. ...Keith ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* Date: Tue, 30 Jun 87 0:21:34 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-to: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #21 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU TELECOM Digest Tue, 30 Jun 87 0:21:34 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 21 Today's Topics: Re: Incoming Phone Calls Area Code split, Chicago area Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Re: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Clarksville, Md. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To: From: pttesac!vanam@lll-tis.arpa.ARPA (Marnix van Ammers) Subject: Re: Incoming Phone Calls Date: 28 Jun 87 18:20:51 GMT In article WBD.MDC@OFFICE-1.ARPA (William Daul / McDonnell-Douglas / APD-ASD) writes: >This may end up sounding like a really dumb question but... > >If all the lines in a neighborhood are being utilized and someone tries to call >into that area to a phone that is NOT being used what (if anything) will >happen? Will they get a busy signal? Me and my friend who both work in the phone company and have experience with ESS happened to read this and before reading the followups decided that unless there was a problem with the office (poor load balancing), nothing would happen. That is, the incoming call would complete with no problem. If there were poor load balancing, some of the people in the neighborhood would start getting no-dial-tone or slow- dial-tone at times. On incoming calls to a very busy office with poor load balancing, callers could get re-order tone (120 ipm busy tone). -- Marnix (ain't unix!) A. van\ Ammers Work: (415) 545-8334 Home: (707) 644-9781 CEO: MAVANAMMERS:UNIX UUCP: {ihnp4|ptsfa}!pttesac!vanam CIS: 70027,70 ** So what *is* a deterministic finite automaton ? ** ------------------------------ Date: 29-Jun-1987 0028 From: covert%covert.DEC@decwrl.dec.com (John R. Covert) To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu Subject: Area Code split, Chicago area In 1990, Chicago, currently 312, will split. The inner area will remain 312; the outer area will be 708. This leaves only 903, 908, 909, and 917 available for assignment. (508 is assigned to Massachusetts, 719 to Colorado, and 407 to Florida.) /john ------------------------------ From: moss!asr2!skipt@RUTGERS.EDU Date: 29 Jun 87 13:28:40 GMT To: moss!cbosgd!comp-dcom-telecom@rutgers.EDU Subject: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Path: asr2!skipt From: skipt@asr2.UUCP (Skip Tourville) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Summary: it this really true? Message-ID: <109@asr2.UUCP> Date: 29 Jun 87 13:28:39 GMT References: <8706250758.AA04222@sdcsvax.UCSD.EDU> Organization: AT&T Conversant Systems, Columbus, OH Lines: 15 >From a recent article: > ....... EVERY phone number is on it's own DEDICATED pair running > all the way to the Central Office Switch servicing that area [often Is this really true? (For residential service I mean) In areas where there is a large concentration of directory numbers it might be useful to run a digital trunk to a remote switching unit. If the number of digital channels is less that the number of directory numbers, some blocking would occur under heavy load. I think I have heard of such arrangements. Skip ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 29 Jun 87 19:31:49 EDT From: Carl Moore (VLD/VMB) To: telecom@BRL.ARPA Subject: Clarksville, Md. I made it down to Clarksville, Maryland recently. The setup I knew for there as of several years ago was (in area code 301): 286--no local service to Balt. or DC 531 (Columbia service)--local to Baltimore city, not beyond it 988 (Ellicott City service)--local to Baltimore metro area so I assumed that 286, with the smallest calling area, would show up on pay phones. But recently, I noticed 286 popping up in Washington area directory as Berwyn, part of Washington metro area; so the question I put forth in a recent Digest was what was now on the Clarksville pay phones. Answer: 531. This suggests that Clarksville area is changing from rural to suburban-bedroom. (Use 596--Columbia with Laurel service--for local service to DC.) ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* Date: Sat, 25 Jul 87 19:05:34 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-to: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #22 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU TELECOM Digest Sat, 25 Jul 87 19:05:34 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 22 Today's Topics: PDN surcharge Re: copper pairs back to the CO Dedicated lines to CO novatel 390 sales calls and directory listings Bell PA as L.D. Carrier ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, 30 Jun 87 15:07 MST From: Paul Dickson Subject: PDN surcharge To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU > Enhanced services add value to, or enhance the use of, basic transmission >service. Examples of enhanced services, which the Commission defined in its >Computer II and Computer III procedings, include computer-based applications >such as protocol processing, information retrieval systems and voice or >message services. How does the FCC define "basic transmission service"? If it's a voice connection between to two points, then services like PC-pursuit shouldn't be considered an "enchanced service". The bits per second data rate of these data serives are far lower than voice communications. I wouldn't mind paying the surcharge if I got with it a 19.2Kbps data rate or greater. Paul Dickson Dickson%pco @ BCO-Multics.ARPA ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 30 Jun 87 17:16:19 EDT From: Michael Grant To: moss!asr2!skipt%RUTGERS.EDU@buit1.bu.edu, Subject: Re: copper pairs back to the CO >> ....... EVERY phone number is on it's own DEDICATED pair running >> all the way to the Central Office Switch servicing that area [often ... In some circumstances, especially if you order up many phone lines, the telco will install a T1 line to a room or closet you provide them. They then break that T1 line upto 24 voice channels. I have heard of this being done to offices and apartment complexes in areas where the copper wire back to the CO is at a premium. -Mike Grant ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 1 Jul 87 11:04:32 edt From: df1b+@andrew.cmu.edu (David R. Fulmer) To: telecom@xx.lcs.mit.edu Subject: Dedicated lines to CO Cc: > ....... EVERY phone number is on it's own DEDICATED pair running > all the way to the Central Office Switch servicing that area [often Ah, but this is not always true. In some areas where the local telco didn't plan ahead for enough expansion they sometimes multiplex several subscriber's lines onto one wire pair. This way they don't have to lay new cable if the area outgrows their original estimates. A freind has this. He has both a voice line and a line running his BBS, but only one wire pair running to the CO. This doesn't have much to do with the original discussion about all pairs being busy, but I though it was worth posting anyway. . . Dave Fulmer !seismo!andrew.cmu.edu!df1b df1b+@andrew.cmu.edu (arpa) r750df1b@cmccvb (bitnet) ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 7 Jul 87 18:24 EDT From: Kovalcik@MIT-Multics.ARPA (Richard Kovalcik, Jr.) Subject: novatel 390 To: telecom@AI.AI.MIT.EDU Cc: rk@AI.AI.MIT.EDU I am looking for someone familiar with the "dealer setable" options on the novatel 390 cellular phone and / or with access to the dealer instruction manual. I am especially interested in descriptions of the "dealer setable" options. Please contact me if you can help. ------------------------------ From: SPGDCM%UCBCMSA.Berkeley.EDU@jade.berkeley.edu Date: Fri, 10 Jul 87 17:15:57 PDT To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu Subject: sales calls and directory listings MSG:FROM: SPGDCM --UCBCMSA TO: NETWORK --NETWORK 07/10/87 17:15:56 To: NETWORK --NETWORK Network Address From: Doug Mosher Title: MVS/Tandem Systems Manager (415)642-5823 Office: Evans 257, Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA 94720 Subject: sales calls and directory listings To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu I just got some interesting info from the sales rep at Pacific Bell when I called asking how I could reduce my receipt of sales calls. On the one hand, I could only choose between being "listed" (so my friends and apparently businesses can all find me) or "unlisted" (so neither can, and paying an extra fee). Also I cannot order a directory line such as "NO SALES CALLS". HOWEVER, another very nice option exists. There is another directory, the "reverse directory", which is ordered by physical address. This is used by almost all sales callers, since they choose neighborhoods, based in good part on demographics (certain neighborhoods or streets tend to be rich/poor/full of homeowners/people living in salt air and needing window repairs/etc/etc). Normally if you are "listed" you're listed in both, and "unlisted", unlisted in both. BUT: It is FREE to be de-listed in the reverse directory only, and still appear in the regular one. Comes out every 6 months so it takes awhile for you to see the effect of delisting; I imagine some organizations use old ones so it might fade over an even longer period. The salesperson believed that 9 out of 10 sales callers use the reverse. In published brochures I now remember the telco claiming that the reverse directory is used also by police, fire, etc. Hmmmm, betcha I'll still show on the 911 screens even though I de-listed. Thanks, Doug sales calls and directory listings ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 11 Jul 87 01:01:45 PDT From: jimmy@PIC.UCLA.EDU (Jim Gottlieb) To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu Subject: Bell PA as L.D. Carrier Cc: A May 1987 bill insert from Bell of Pennsylvania suggests that customers use the PIC code of 1-0-B-P-A when calling to South Jersey in order to "automatically save 10% off AT&T's regular long-distance rates for these calls..." I remember hearing that there is some deal that lets Bell of PA (and, I think, New York Tel.) handle inter-LATA traffic into parts of New Jersey. That's OK. What puzzled me was the following sentence: "If you've already chosen Bell of Pennsylvania as your long-distance company, there's no need to dial '1-0-B-P-A.'" Now, I do sleep eight hours a night so I may have missed something, but I do know that BOCs can not be long-distance carriers. How could some- one have Bell of PA as their primary carrier? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Jim Gottlieb "It's easier to apologize than to ask permission. When in doubt, do it." Internet: jimmy%pic@ats.ucla.edu UUCP: sdcsvax!sdcrdcf!ucla-cs!pic.ucla.edu!jimmy ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* Date: Sat, 25 Jul 87 19:41:15 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-to: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #23 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU TELECOM Digest Sat, 25 Jul 87 19:41:15 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 23 Today's Topics: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom distributed key system info wanted Incompatibility with 5ESS? NYSE stock quotes, etc, SCA data transmission in FM Bands BOC Support ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Gerry Wheeler Date: 14 Jul 87 18:57:39 GMT To: comp-dcom-telecom%watmath.waterloo.edu@RELAY.CS.NET Subject: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Path: mks!wheels From: wheels@mks.UUCP (Gerry Wheeler) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: distributed key system info wanted Keywords: distributed key system Message-ID: <281@mks.UUCP> Date: 14 Jul 87 18:57:38 GMT Distribution: na Organization: Mortice Kern Systems, Waterloo, Ont. Lines: 58 We are going to have our operations distributed between two buildings, a short distance apart (but not adjacent -- the intervening public roads prevent running wires between buildings). We would like to find a telephone system which will span the two buildings transparently. For example, people using the intercom shouldn't have to know whether the destination is in the same building or not, and people in either building should be able to answer incoming calls (especially when the system is set for night service). We currently have an electronic key system with features such as hands free intercom, paging, and busy lamps on all stations, and we would like something similar. We expect a maximum size of 16 to 20 stations total, and maybe 5 CO lines. So far, we have seen three solutions. One is to run all the CO lines into building A, which would have a (electronic) key system. Then, using several single line interfaces, station outputs would run from system A to building B, likely via leased lines. The phones in building B would be standard desk phones. They would be able to access the system's features by dialling special codes, but they wouldn't have features like hands-free intercom, busy lamps, etc. The second solution is to put another (electronic) key system in building B, which would see the station lines from system A as CO lines. Unfortunately, this does not give the desired transparency. For example, the two intercom systems remain completely independent. The third solution we have seen is to use electronic systems which are designed to be tied together. The IBM-Rolm Redwood system is one of these. The two systems operate as equals, rather than master/slave. However, even then there are failings in the transparency of operation. For example, the intercoms are not integrated, and calling an extension on the other system still involves going through local dial tone, getting remote dial tone, and dialling the remote extension. It would seem technically feasible to have two electronic systems which pass data and voice back and forth over leased lines, such that they share a common view of the world. By continually updating each other as to the status of their stations and lines, all stations' indicators would reflect the status of the whole distributed system. In addition, when calling a remote station, the originating system could send data to the remote system indicating which tie line is being used for voice, and to which extension it should be routed. In such a system stations connected to either system would have equal access to all other stations, and features like busy lamps would operate correctly for all stations and lines. (As a bonus, if this system could also provide a few 9600 bps serial lines between the buildings, we would really be set!) If someone could point us in the direction of a system to integrate the two buildings, for a reasonable cost, we would be most appreciative. Of course, responses on unreasonable systems will be read with interest too. We'll summarize whatever information we get. -- "Network XXIII. Where two's company, and three's an audience." -- Max Headroom Gerry Wheeler {seismo,decvax,ihnp4}!watmath!mks!wheels Mortice Kern Systems Inc. ------------------------------ Date: Tue Jul 14 15:01:27 1987 From: mcb@lll-tis.ARPA (Michael C. Berch) Subject: Incompatibility with 5ESS? To: telecom@xx.lcs.mit.edu The Pacfic Bell CO (Millbrae, California: 415-697) where I live is finally installing a new switch, replacing the one installed in 1954. We will finally get stuff like international direct dial, etc., that normal people have had for a while now. PacBell sent out the following letter (excerpted): "Dear Customer: As part of our plan to expand and improve telephone service, [...] we will be making some changes in the central office equipment serving your area. [...] We are informing you in advance of this change because there is a possibility that our new equipment may affect some customer telephone equipment. [...] If you have [equipment other than a standard Touch-Tone or rotary-dial telephone] please contact your equipment vendor prior to our change date. Your vendor will need to know these facts: Pacific Bell is installing #5 ESS equipment in the Millbrae Central Office. Installation is planned for September 19, 1987. Your vendor can tell you if any adjustments are necessary to make your equipment compatible with our installation. [...]" ----- Hmmm. I didn't know that a 5ESS was not downwardly compatible with anything you might plug into the network. What sorts of things might cause problems or be incompatible? Are they talking about older PBXs, or what? Michael C. Berch ARPA: mcb@lll-tis.arpa UUCP: {ames,ihnp4,lll-crg,lll-lcc,mordor}!lll-tis!mcb ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 20 Jul 87 04:53:38 PDT From: To: ames!comp-dcom-telecom Path: ptsfa!nonvon!root From: root@nonvon.UUCP (root) Newsgroups: sci.electronics,misc.invest,misc.wanted,rec.audio,sci.crypt,comp.dcom.telecom,rec.ham-radio,rec.ham-radio.packet Subject: NYSE stock quotes, etc, SCA data transmission in FM Bands Keywords: NYSE quotes, SCA, FM, Data Message-ID: <620@nonvon.UUCP> Date: 19 Jul 87 23:50:06 GMT Organization: NONVON Systems Computer Research Group Lines: 21 Looking for information on recieving or decoding the data transmissions that occur on many Public Service FM radio stations (KQED, KQEC, KMET, etc). Any help/information at all would be appreciated. Info is modulated on the SCA subcarrier for many background music applications. Special reciever circuitry is used for reception. Althouh most stations transmit music, some, like KQED, transmit data, and this is specifically what I'm looking for... the baud rate, encoding method, etc. Please e-mail responses, and *IFF* there is any interest, I will disburse what I get. Thank You, Alex P Novickis UUCP: {ihnp4,ames,qantel,sun,amdahl,lll-crg,pyramid}!ptsfa!nonvon!apn {* Only those who attempt the absurd ... will achieve the impossible *} {* I think... I think it's in my basement... Let me go upstairs and check. *} {* -escher *} ------------------------------ Date: 21 Jul 87 18:32 PDT From: William Daul / McDonnell-Douglas / APD-ASD Subject: BOC Support To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Could someone please send me the name of the organization that was created to support the BOCs. I think it was mentioned way back when...the company was suppose to make sure that the BOCs would always be able to talk with one another...in the national interest...as well as other services. Thanks for any pointers, --Bi// [I believe you are referring to Bell Communications Research, or Belcore. --JSol] ------------------------------ To: ucbvax!BUIT1.BU.EDU!jsol Date: Thu, 23 Jul 87 07:43:08 EDT From: ulysses!heh Could you please post the following note for me? Thanks. I'm looking for *ANY* product in the market with a VME or SCSI interface that interfaces with telephone lines or that does digital voice recording and transmission. This product (hardware/firmware/software) is expected to do any of the following: initiate and answer calls, recognize and generate touch tone, digitize, store, and play back voice files, and to carry on dialogues with voice input and touch-tone control. Products I'm looking for are similar to the Natural Microsystems' Watson board or Dialogic Corp's Dialog board for PCs, and the Voice Power board for AT&T UNIX PC 7300, but I'd like to use Sun workstations. Any information is appreciated. Thanks in advance. Harlan Husmann {ihnp4,ucbvax,vax135,seismo}!ulysses!heh (201)582-4834 ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* Date: Sat, 25 Jul 87 20:05:49 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-to: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #24 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU TELECOM Digest Sat, 25 Jul 87 20:05:49 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 24 Today's Topics: Long Distance Carriers ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sat, 18 Jul 87 18:03:15 cdt From: John Reece To: comp-dcom-telecom@seismo.CSS.GOV Path: pollux!john From: john@pollux.UUCP (John Reece) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Long Distance Carriers Message-ID: <321@pollux.UUCP> Date: 18 Jul 87 22:42:46 GMT Reply-To: john@pollux.UUCP (John Reece) Distribution: world Organization: Department of Electrical Engineering; S.M.U.; Dallas, TX Lines: 444 The following is a list of long distance carrier access numbers of the form 10XXX. An asterisk indicates that the number is used but the name of the company is not available. 001 MidAmerican LD (Republic Telecom) 002 AmeriCall LDC 003 RCI Corporation 004 * 005 * 006 * 007 Tel America 009 * 010 * 011 Metromedia Long Distance 012 Charter Corporation (Tri-J) 013 Access Services 014 * 015 * 018 * 020 * 021 Mercury 022 MCI Telecommunications 023 Texnet 024 Petricca Communications Systems 028 Texnet 030 Valu-Line of Wichita Falls 031 Teltec Saving Communications 033 US Sprint 035 * 036 Long Distance Savers 039 Electronic Office Centers of America (EO/Tech) 040 * 042 First Phone 044 Allnet Communication Services (LDX, Lexitel) 050 * 051 * 053 American Network (Starnet) 054 * 055 * 056 American Satellite 057 Long Distance Satellite 058 * 059 COMNET 060 Valu-Line of West Texas 061 * 062 * 063 COMNET 065 * 066 * 069 V/COM 070 National Telephone Exchange 072 * 077 * 080 AMTEL Systems 081 * 082 * 084 Long Distance Service (LDS) 085 WesTel 086 * 087 * 088 Satellite Business Systems (MCI) 089 Telephone Systems 090 WesTel 092 * 093 Rainbow Communications 095 Southwest Communications 098 * 099 AmeriCall 120 * 121 * 122 RCA Global Communications 123 * 124 * 131 * 133 * 137 All America Cables and Radio (ITT) 142 First Phone 146 ARGO Communications 170 * 177 * 188 Satellite Business Systems 200 * 201 PhoneNet 202 ExecuLines 203 Cypress Telecommunications (Cytel) 204 United Telephone Long Distance 205 * 206 United Telephone Long Distance 210 * 211 RCI 212 Call US 213 Long Distance Telephone Savers 214 Tyler Telecom 215 Star Tel of Abilene 216 * 217 Call US 218 * 219 Call USA 220 Western Union Telegraph 221 * 222 MCI Telecommunications (SBS) 223 Cable & Wireless Communication (TDX) 224 American Communications 225 * 226 * 227 ATH Communications (Call America) 228 * 229 Bay Communications 230 * 231 * 232 Superior Telecom 233 Delta Communications 234 AC Teleconnect (Alternative Communication) 235 * 236 * 237 Inter-Comm Telephone 238 * 239 Woof Communications (ACT) 240 * 241 American Long Lines 242 Choice Information Systems 243 * 244 Automated Communications 245 Taconic Long Distance Service 246 * 247 * 248 * 249 * 250 Dial-Net 251 * 252 Long Distance/USA 253 Litel Telecommunications 255 All-State Communications 256 American Sharecom 258 * 260 Advanced Communications Systems 263 Com Systems (Sun Dial Communications) 264 * 265 * 266 * 267 * 268 Compute-A-Call 269 * 270 * 271 * 272 * 275 * 276 CP National (American Network, Starnet) 277 * 278 * 280 * 282 * 283 * 284 American Telenet 285 * 286 Clark Telecommunications 287 ATS Communications 288 AT&T Communications 295 * 298 Thriftline 299 * 300 * 301 * 302 Austin Bestline 303 MidAmerican LD (Republic Telecom) 304 * 307 * 310 * 311 SaveNet (American Network, Starnet) 312 * 313 * 314 * 318 Long Distance Savers 321 Southland Systems 322 American Sharecom 323 * 324 First Communication 326 * 330 * 331 Texustel 332 * 333 US Sprint 335 * 336 Florida Digital Network 337 * 338 Midco Communications 339 Communication Cable Laying 341 * 342 * 343 Communication Cable Laying 345 AC Teleconnect (Alternative Communication) 348 * 350 Dial-Net 353 * 355 US Link 357 Manitowoc Long Distance Service 358 * 362 Electronic Office Centers of America (EO/Tech) 363 Tel-Toll (Econ-O-Dial of Bishop) 366 * 369 American Satellite 370 * 372 * 373 Econo-Line Waco 375 Wertern Union Telegraph 379 * 382 * 385 The Switchboard 390 * 393 Execulines of Florida 399 * 400 American Sharecom 401 * 404 MidAmerican LD (Republic Telecom) 405 * 411 * 412 Penn Telecom 414 * 415 * 421 * 422 * 424 * 426 * 428 Inter-Comm Telephone 432 Lightcall 435 Call-USA 436 Indiana Switch 440 Tex-Net 441 Escondido Telephone 442 First Phone 443 * 444 Allnet Communication Services (LDX, Lexitel) 445 * 450 * 452 * 455 Telecom Long Distance 456 ARGO Communications 457 * 458 * 462 American Network Services 464 Houston Network 465 Intelco 466 International Office Networks 468 * 469 GMW 470 * 472 Hal-Rad Communications 475 * 480 Chico Telecom (Call America) 482 * 484 * 486 * 488 United States Transmission Systems (ITT) 497 * 500 * 505 San Marcos Long Distance 511 * 512 * 515 Burlington Telephone 523 * 529 Southern Oregon Long Distance 532 Long Distance America 533 Long Distance Discount 535 * 536 Long Distance Management 537 * 538 * 539 * 543 * 547 * 550 Valu-Line of Alexandria 551 Pittsburg Communication Systems 552 First Phone 555 TeleSphere Networks 556 * 565 * 566 Cable & Wireless Communication (TDX) 567 Advanced Marketing Services (Dial Anywhere) 579 Lintel System (Lincoln Telephone LD) 580 * 584 * 585 * 587 * 588 * 590 Wisconsin Telecommunications Tech 599 Texas Long Distance Conroe 600 * 601 Discount Communications Services 602 * 606 Biz Tel Long Distance Telephone 607 * 610 * 616 * 622 Metro America Communications 626 * 627 * 628 * 634 Econo-Line Midland 638 * 646 Contact America 647 * 652 * 654 Cincinnati Bell Long Distance 655 Ken-Tel Service 658 * 660 Tex-Net 661 * 666 Southwest Communications 669 * 675 Network Services 678 * 680 Midwest Telephone Service 682 Ashland Call America 684 Nacogdoches Telecommunications 685 * 687 NTS Communications 688 * 689 * 698 * 700 Tel-America 704 Inter-Exchange Communications 707 Telvue 709 Tel-America 711 * 717 Pass Word 722 * 723 * 724 * 726 Procom 727 Conroe-Comtel 728 * 729 * 733 * 734 * 735 Marinette-Menominee Lds 736 * 737 National Telecommunications 738 * 741 ClayDesta 742 Phone America of Carolina 743 Peninsula Long Distance Service 747 Standard Informations Services 753 * 755 Sears Communication 757 Pace Long Distance Service 759 Telenet Communication (US Sprint) 760 American Satellite 765 * 766 Yavapai Telephone Exchange 767 * 770 * 771 Telesystems 774 * 776 * 777 US Sprint 778 * 782 * 785 Olympia Telecom 786 Shared Use Network Service 787 Star Tel of Abilene 788 ASCI's Telepone Express Network 789 Microtel 792 Southwest Communications 800 Satelco 801 MidAmerican LD (Republic) 805 * 808 * 818 * 821 * 822 * 823 * 824 * 825 * 826 * 827 TCS Network Services 833 Business Telecom 834 * 835 * 836 * 837 * 838 * 839 Cable & Wireless Communication (TDX) 847 VIP Connections 850 TK Communications 852 Telecommunicatons Systems 853 * 855 * 857 * 859 Valu-Line of Longview 862 * 864 * 866 Alascom 868 * 870 * 872 Telecommunications Services 874 Tri-Tel Communications 876 * 878 * 879 Thriftycall (Lintel Systems) 880 * 881 Coastal Telephone 882 Tuck Data Communications 883 TTI Midland-Odessa 884 TTI Midland-Odessa 885 The CommuniGroup 887 * 888 Satellite Business Systems (MCI) 889 * 895 Texas on Line 897 Leslie Hammond (Phone America) 898 Satellite Business Systems (MCI) 899 * 900 * 909 * 910 Montgomery Telamarketing Communication 911 * 915 Tele Tech 919 * 927 * 933 North American Communications 936 Rainbow Commuinications 937 Access Long Distance 938 Access Long Distance 945 * 950 * 951 Transamerica Telecommunications 955 United Communications 957 * 958 * 960 Access Plus 963 Tenex Communications 969 Dial-Net 977 * 983 * 985 America Calling 986 MCI Telecommunications (SBS) 987 ClayDesta Communications 988 Western Union Telegraph 991 Access Long Distance 992 * 995 * 996 * 999 * ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* Date: Sat, 25 Jul 87 20:09:52 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-to: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #25 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU TELECOM Digest Sat, 25 Jul 87 20:09:52 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 25 Today's Topics: SS# & Utilities -- a story ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: 21 Jul 87 16:42:59 GMT From: hao!gatech!spaf@ames.arpa (Gene Spafford) Subject: SS# & Utilities -- a story To: security@RUTGERS.EDU [This is the last message to be published this weekend. A total of 4 digests were sent out with approximately 11 or 12 messages going to individual recipients. TELECOM was nonfunctional for some time due to several catastrophe's including my vacation and our network connection going down several times. Things look more stable now. NOTE: Telecom is available as comp.dcom.telecom on usenet, it would lessen the load on the ARPANET/MILNET backbone if readers who receive TELECOM in their mailbox and who read netnews; switch to reading TELECOM as a newsgroup. Send your delete requests to telecom-request@buit1.bu.edu. --jsol] As a matter of principle, I'm one of those people who won't give out my social security number when applying for utilities or credit cards. The reasons why have been discussed numerous times in various security-related groups. It is my understanding that it is against the law to force someone to give his/her social security number unless it is a government agency; although I've often run into occasional resistance, a few moments of explanation has usually resulted in things working out okay. Then there's today. I'm moving to W. Lafayette Indiana in two weeks and I called to establish my phone service there. Indiana is served by GTE for phone service. I did not anticipate any problems since I have an excellent credit history, as could be verified by a quick check with the local Southern Bell folks. After the rep at GTE took all my information down, she asked for my SS#. I explained that I don't give that out. She informed me that I would be required to pay a $75 deposit if I refused to give my SS#. So, I asked to talk to her supervisor. Her supervisor repeated that I would have to give my SS# to waive the deposit. I asked if they could simply call Southern Bell or take a credit card #, or they could call Purdue and verify my employment. He said that wasn't enough -- I had to supply my SS#, no other option. I enquired as to why they needed it -- he said it was for a credit check and to verify future disconnect requests. I explained that they could do that self-same credit check without the SS# *and* I don't give out my SS# precisely because I don't want it used as a verification number on my account. He insisted I either supply the number or pay the deposit. He also asked why I was being so stubborn -- it was even on my driver's license, wasn't it? (It isn't -- and hasn't been. In Georgia, you have always had the option of having a different ID, and now the licenses are being issue with those as default. The guy at GTE claims that the Indiana licenses are *required* to have the SS# on them -- anyone know if this is true? It shouldn't be...) I explained that having done some work in computer security, and personal experience, I know how that number can be abused. He said I was the only person he'd ever run into to refuse to give the SS# (!). I then asked him if the requirement for a SS# was written policy -- I wanted a copy to examine. He informed me that such information was private to the company and I couldn't have a copy -- didn't I trust him? I then asked if that policy was on file with the state Public Service Commission. At that he (rather loudly) asked if I wanted service with GTE or not? I asked him very calmly if he was threatening to deny me service -- he quieted down. I next explained that I wanted to see a copy of the written policy because it would be interesting to include in an article I might write on improper use of SS#s. He became very quiet. I offered to find the name and number of someone at Southern Bell who could verify my 9 years of service here. He said to call back with that information (thankful to get rid of me, I guess). The lady I talked to at Southern Bell was very helpful. She informed me that all the Southern Bell operators are told not to force a SS# because it is against both policy and law, but if someone won't provide it they are to get a bank account # or credit card number (both of which I am willing to give in circumstances such as this). She was more than willing to talk to the supervisor at GTE and give him a credit reference, if only he'd call. She said she'd also fill him in on policy. *AND*, most interestingly, Southern Bell had somehow obtained my SS# through other means and it was on file, but she marked it so that it was not to be given out to anyone, specifically not anyone with GTE Indiana. :-) Back to GTE. I called the supervisor (collect, of course) and gave him the name and number of the lady at Southern Bell. He was very curt and said he'd probably still require a deposit. He hung up on me. 20 minutes later the original GTE operator called me back and cheerily informed me that my service would be turned on August 4 with *no* deposit required! Questions --------- 1) Do many of you (net-readers) withhold your SS# in similar circumstances? Do you have these kinds of confrontations too? 2) Anyone know if other people at GTE Indiana are such jerks, or is this an isolated instance? 3) Anyone know if Indiana does, in fact, *require* that the SS# be on the driver's license? 4) Should I bother to follow-up on this further? That is, should I bother contacting the Public Service commission in Indiana about the treatment I received? (I'm currently not sure it is worth the effort). Too bad we don't have a choice of phone companies as well as long distance carriers -- I'd keep Southern Bell. -- Gene Spafford Software Engineering Research Center (SERC), Georgia Tech, Atlanta GA 30332 Internet: spaf@gatech.gatech.edu uucp: ...!{decvax,hplabs,ihnp4,linus,rutgers,seismo}!gatech!spaf ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* Date: Tue, 18 Aug 87 18:26:42 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-to: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #26 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU TELECOM Digest Tue, 18 Aug 87 18:26:42 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 26 Today's Topics: modem/Contel SL1XT problem charging schemes ISDN What number am I dialing from? Bell of PA as a LD carrier Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Re: SS# & Utilities -- a story BBS project !! ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To: uw-beaver!comp-dcom-telecom@beaver.cs.washington.edu From: uw-nsr!stewart@beaver.cs.washington.edu (Stewart Castaldi) Subject: modem/Contel SL1XT problem Date: 24 Jul 87 22:59:03 GMT We have recently moved our computer which required that our telephone lines be attached to a different PBX. This new PBX is a Contel SL1XT. We have seven modem lines, 1 dial-out and 6 dial-in. The dial-in lines are on a hunt group so that if the first line is busy when it is dialed then the call will automatically be transfered to the first non-busy line. It appears that the first line on the hunt group is being taken off hook or disconnected approximately every half hour. Users complain that carrier drops or garbage character strings are encountered about every 30 minutes. The accounting files show that the line is going off hook and then the modem is timing out and hanging up at approximately 10 and 40 minutes past the hour on a very regular basis. Has anyone on the net experienced these problems or know of problems with the Contel SL1XT? -- Stewart Castaldi Dial: (206) 543-5418 University of Washington WD-12 Inet: stewart@nsr.acs.washington.edu Seattle, Washington 98195 UUCP: uw-nsr!stewart ------------------------------ To: munnari!comp-dcom-telecom@uunet.UU.NET From: munnari!trlamct.oz!andrew@uunet.UU.NET (Andrew Jennings) Subject: charging schemes Date: 24 Jul 87 05:43:40 GMT We're doing some work that involves working out data charging schemes. So far we've encountered the following schemes : data rate (independent of distance) rate & distance rate & distance with special inter-city rates distance to your local "center" Are there any more elaborate schemes out there ? We figured that if these cover all the US schemes then this probably covers all possible. -- UUCP: ...!{seismo, mcvax, ucb-vision, ukc}!munnari!trlamct.trl!andrew ARPA: andrew%trlamct.trl.oz@seismo.css.gov Andrew Jennings Telecom Australia Research Labs (Postmaster:- This mail has been acknowledged.) ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 26 Jul 87 17:28:44 EDT From: Marc Davidson <443185%UOTTAWA.BITNET@wiscvm.wisc.edu> Subject: ISDN To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Is anybody out there involved in ISDN trials? like the one being put on by (I think ) Mountain Bell in Phoenix. Bell Canada is going to be starting one in Ottawa in September, they will be using Northern Telecom's DMS-100 switch and will be providing Basic Rate Access lines in the beginning and later on, probably next year, Primary Rate Access lines. Intercity ISDN is expected by 1989. I was wondering what type of services are being offered by the present ISDN trials in North America, is there any Broadband ISDN services yet? In particular, the concept that you can take 'your' terminal from one physical network outlet and then walk over to another physical outlet and plug 'your' terminal in and still be recognized by the network, is an interesting one. In Ottawa, that type of service will be provided behind any NT1 (Network Termin ating equipment), but not behind another different NT1, it should be offered globally (within the same switch) in the near future. It would be interesting if you could do this sort of thing, but at much larger distances...say the othe r side of the world. I would appreciate it if anybody could send me further info on ISDN (in general). Thanks, Marc Davidson Undergrad CO-OP student Electrical Eng. University of Ottawa, Ottawa Canada Bitnet: JMD2F@UOTTAWA, 443185@UOTTAWA Telex/Dialcom: 20:GOC009, 22:PES001 Telno: (613) 722-7833 "Duntish: Mentally incapacitated by a severe hangover" ...Douglas Adams ------------------------------ Date: Sun 26 Jul 87 16:05:05-PDT From: Vic Christensen Subject: What number am I dialing from? To: telecom@XX.LCS.MIT.EDU At least at MIT (and I assume the surrounding area), the number to get the mechanical voice to tell you what umber you're dialing from is (200) 222-2222, if I recall correctly... Vic Christensen ------- ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 27 Jul 87 08:48:20 EDT From: prindle@nadc.arpa (Frank Prindle) To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu Subject: Bell of PA as a LD carrier It is quite simple - if you choose (with Bell of PA) to make Bell of PA your primary "long distance" carrier, the longest distance you can call with 1+ is three south Jersey counties! A lot of people in PA, back when the ballots were being distributed, didn't understand this (Bell of PA did nothing to make it clear) and ended up with an apparently useless phone (since Bell of PA also didn't explain 10xxx-1+ dialing either). Fortunately, Bell of PA "allowed" these poor unfortunates to re-select a primary carrier without charge! I doubt anyone really uses Bell of PA as a primary now. Frank Prindle Prindle@NADC.arpa ------------------------------ From: moss!twitch!uucp@RUTGERS.EDU Date: 27 Jul 87 14:40:33 GMT To: moss!cbosgd!comp-dcom-telecom@rutgers.EDU Subject: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Path: twitch!homxb!hrs From: hrs@homxb.UUCP (H.SILBIGER) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: SS# & Utilities -- a story Summary: State requires SS# on driver licences. Message-ID: <504@homxb.UUCP> Date: 27 Jul 87 12:02:58 GMT References: <8707260009.AA03268@buit1.bu.edu> Distribution: world Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories, Holmdel Lines: 55 > > > As a matter of principle, I'm one of those people who won't give out > my social security number when applying for utilities or credit cards. > The reasons why have been discussed numerous times in various > security-related groups. It is my understanding that it is against > the law to force someone to give his/her social security number unless > it is a government agency; although I've often run into occasional > resistance, a few moments of explanation has usually resulted in > things working out okay. > > Then there's today. I'm moving to W. Lafayette Indiana in two weeks > and I called to establish my phone service there. Indiana is > served by GTE for phone service. I did not anticipate any problems > since I have an excellent credit history, as could be verified by > a quick check with the local Southern Bell folks. After the rep > at GTE took all my information down, she asked for my SS#. I explained > that I don't give that out. She informed me that I would be required > to pay a $75 deposit if I refused to give my SS#. So, I asked to > talk to her supervisor. > said he'd probably still require a deposit. He hung up on me. >........ ......... > > Questions > --------- > > 1) Do many of you (net-readers) withhold your SS# in similar circumstances? > Do you have these kinds of confrontations too? > > 2) Anyone know if other people at GTE Indiana are such jerks, or is > this an isolated instance? > > 3) Anyone know if Indiana does, in fact, *require* that the SS# be > on the driver's license? > > 4) Should I bother to follow-up on this further? That is, should > I bother contacting the Public Service commission in Indiana > about the treatment I received? (I'm currently not sure it is > worth the effort). > > Too bad we don't have a choice of phone companies as well as long > distance carriers -- I'd keep Southern Bell. > > -- > Gene Spafford > Software Engineering Research Center (SERC), Georgia Tech, Atlanta GA 30332 > Internet: spaf@gatech.gatech.edu > uucp: ...!{decvax,hplabs,ihnp4,linus,rutgers,seismo}!gatech!spaf The State of New Jersey requires SS# for all licences, registrations, etc. It has been challenged, but the practice was upheld. Herman Silbiger ...!ihnp4!homxb!hrs ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 27 Jul 87 14:30 EDT From: PERRY%nuhub.acs.northeastern.edu@RELAY.CS.NET Subject: BBS project !! To: telecom@XX.LCS.MIT.EDU pP-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- PKpPATTENTION BBS USERS, PROGRAMMERS !!! -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- BBS USERS: I'm now in the process of doing research and starting to develop a ShareWare BBS program. The goal of my project is to build the "Ultimate" BBS! Now is your chance to give your input into this project! I want to hear your ideas! What complaints to you have about the BBSes you call? What do you like about them? What don't you like about these systems? You have some ideas for features? Great! Don't limit yourself. Please let me know (no matter how exotic or complex the idea!) Please mail me any ideas, questions, or comments at the address below. Thanks again. Your comments and ideas are sought and greatly appreciated! THANKS!! ------------------------------- PROGRAMMERS: I need YOUR HELP NOW! I'm writing a ShareWare BBS program. My goal is to create the "Ultimate" BBS: A BBS with many fea- tures, that is easy to use, easy to maintain, and that is very flexible. I am requesting opinions of users of BBSes (as you can see above) and will try to take them into account. I know some- thing about communications and programming but I can use all the help I can get on this large undertaking. Any information about modems, communication routines, questions, or comments would be greatly appreciated. (See below for my Address) I know BASIC and Turbo Pascal. Would C be a better language to use for this? (It would be nice if I could make this BBS run on as many machines as possible) Any comments, questions, suggestions (including source code), or requests to be involved will be greatly appreciated!! (See below for my Address) THANKS!! ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- USnail: Jeffrey F. Perry NOTE: Please send responses directly to 67 Angelica Drive me. (I don't read this list) Framingham, Ma 10701 ARPANET: PERRY%NUHUB.ACS.NORTHEASTERN.EDU@RELAY.CS.NET -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* Date: Tue, 18 Aug 87 18:34:54 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-to: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #27 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU TELECOM Digest Tue, 18 Aug 87 18:34:54 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 27 Today's Topics: 911 Surprises Submission for comp-dcom-telecom TV satellite transponder cost??? re: NYSE stock quotes, etc, SCA data transmission in FM Bands re: NYSE stock quotes, etc, SCA data transmission in FM Bands SS No., private payphones, Sprint, waiting, sales calls ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 27 Jul 87 14:30:54 CDT From: Paul Fuqua To: risks@CSL.SRI.COM, telecom@XX.LCS.MIT.EDU Subject: 911 Surprises Tarrant County (Fort Worth) is about to start a 911 emergency telephone service, the second in the state, prompting quite a few newspaper articles about aspects of their service and that of Harris County (Houston), which started in January 1986. The details I found most interesting were the problems that had to be overcome in both systems (quoted without permission from the Dallas Morning News): For instance, Harris County found initially that people dialing a seven-digit number with 911 in it would sometimes reach the emergency operator by mistake. Telephone company computers were so quick, they would pick up the 911 and transfer the call before waiting for a fourth digit. [There are no other magic three-digit calls in this area: for 411, one dials 1411, and all other numbers are seven digits. - pf] ... In the beginning, 911 operators were deluged by calls from children trying out the system and from people who put the 911 number on the speed-dialing function on their telephones and hit the number by mistake. Misdirected calls also come in from cordless phones whose batteries are low -- a situation that seems to mistakenly trigger calls to 911 ... ... Another problem Tarrant County is working on is establishing street addresses for rural homes. The [911] district is working with the U.S. Postal Service and telephone companies to assign street addresses to more than 9,000 locations in Tarrant County so that a recognizable address will appear on the screen -- not just a rural route and box number. [The director] was surprised when the effort met some resistance. ... "Some people have said, `I'm not going to use 911 so I don't need my address changed.'" Tarrant County will start up their system on August 2, despite the failure of equipment to automatically transfer the address information from the emergency operator to the appropriate agency. Dallas County (Dallas) expects to start their own service next April; the goal is that the whole state will have 911 by 1995. pf Paul Fuqua Texas Instruments Computer Science Center, Dallas, Texas CSNet: pf@ti-csl UUCP: {smu, texsun, im4u, rice}!ti-csl!pf Someday (maybe): pf@csc.ti.com ------------------------------ From: humu!uhccux.UUCP!todd%nosc.UUCP@sdcsvax.ucsd.edu (The Perplexed Wiz) Date: 28 Jul 87 02:19:53 GMT To: humu!comp-dcom-telecom Subject: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Path: uhccux!todd From: todd@uhccux.UUCP (The Perplexed Wiz) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: TV satellite transponder cost??? Keywords: TV satellite transponder cost Hawaii Message-ID: <706@uhccux.UUCP> Date: 28 Jul 87 02:19:52 GMT Distribution: na Organization: U. of Hawaii, Manoa (Honolulu) Lines: 18 A friend is trying to get information on the lowest possible cost of satellite transponder time for television distribution to, from, and within Hawaii. This television station is the local PBS station in Honolulu, Hawaii. He is interested in specifics of satellite brokers and classification of channel allocation (e.g., preemptable, unprotected, protected). Are long term leases or purchases of transponders possible??? Please send any information to me and I will forward it... thanks...todd -- Todd Ogasawara, U. of Hawaii Center for Teaching Excellence UUCP: {ihnp4,seismo,ucbvax,dcdwest}!sdcsvax!nosc!uhccux!todd ARPA: uhccux!todd@nosc.MIL INTERNET: todd@uhccux.UHCC.HAWAII.EDU ------------------------------ Date: 27 Jul 87 13:54 PST From: KJBSF%SLACVM.BITNET@wiscvm.wisc.edu To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: re: NYSE stock quotes, etc, SCA data transmission in FM Bands Date: 27 July 1987, 13:49:41 PST From: Kevin J. Burnett x3330 KJBSF at SLACVM To: TELECOM at BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: re: NYSE stock quotes, etc, SCA data transmission in FM Bands In article <620@nonvon.UUCP> root@nonvon.UUCP writes: > Looking for information on recieving or decoding the data transmissions >that occur on many Public Service FM radio stations (KQED, KQEC, KMET, etc). >Any help/information at all would be appreciated. I believe that the current edition of Radio-Electronics magazine has an article about decoding the SCA signals on FM stations. I don't recall what exactly they said about it, but I think they had a decoder that you could build yourself. (that's the July issue) --- Kevin J. Burnett KJBSF%SLACVM.BITNET@Forsythe.Stanford.EDU Santa Clara University '88 ------------------------------ From: SPGDCM%UCBCMSA.Berkeley.EDU@jade.Berkeley.EDU Date: Tue, 28 Jul 87 15:02:34 PDT To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu Subject: SS No., private payphones, Sprint, waiting, sales calls MSG:FROM: SPGDCM --UCBCMSA TO: NETWORK --NETWORK 07/28/87 15:02:30 To: NETWORK --NETWORK Network Address From: Doug Mosher Title: MVS/Tandem Systems Manager (415)642-5823 Office: Evans 257, Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA 94720 Subject: SS No., private payphones, Sprint, waiting, sales calls To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu SS# and government and business My understanding is that the fed govt and fed agencies, grant recipients, etc. are restrained in their use of the SS#, and also have some policies relating to what info they can ask you for, and notifications about how that data will be used. They must tell you: what data is required from you, what it will be used for, and what are the consequences of your refusal to tell them. I get lots of little forms from e.g. the IRS going into these matters; for example, briefly, "tell us your SS#, we use it to verify your taxes, we are authorized by acts xxx and yyy to require this, consequence for refusal is... (something bad, can't remember what)." Unfortunately these laws all refer to govt agencies. I do not know of laws that permit or prevent any private uses of government-supplied numbers. I occasionally try to refuse this and that private use. The reactions vary from agency doesn't care (like once I refused to provide a thumbprint and found to my surprise that it was optional) to agency insists. Credit bureaus and credit granters love to require the SS#. In many cases I get the feeling I will lose out on a private service (such as a credit card or a loan) if I protest/refuse. This becomes most painful with monopoly services such as a local telco. I would imagine the best path of resistance for such would be the closest thing you can find to a regulatory agency such as local PUC. I would expect them to be completely bureaucratic about it: if the written tarriffs require an SS# you'd have no complaint, if they don't, you would have a complaint. Private Pay phones In the SF bay area there are now various private pay phones. I am sorry to see that there seems to be no requirement for them to identify a responsible person or company. If you lose out there is not a clear path to complain to. I suppose some companies may discover that the occasional psychopathic user physically destroys offensive devices; though admittedly this may happen even if they identified a number to call. I think all public vending devices including phones should be required to identify either an owner or a servicing agency. Many of these phones here cost $.25, though Pac Bell's are $.20. I was very surprised when I needed to use a non-bell payphone yesterday and had only 3 dimes. The bad news: rejected my third dime; the good news, allowed the call on .20 though posted price was .25. This model also allowed free 611 and 911 calls. I am interested in any info readers have about how 911 and 611 calls are routed to the proper general service and private companies on these devices . ??Or perhaps Pac Bell can supply their own private, separately priced pay phones?? US Sprint I just received my new "FON" credit card from them. They say it replaces the previous travelcard service. Umph... I used to pay nothing extra to call while travelling, and I called various local 950-0777 numbers to place calls. Now I call an 800 number (at least this is uniformly available, while the 950 service was here and there but not everywhere). But now I pay .55 extra per tone call (and, as before, there is a 1.55 extra 800 number for rotary calls). Do any readers know of alternate carriers, preferably nationwide, which provide cheaper travel calling? I may be stuck with the unilateral raise from 0 to .55 if all other choices are more expensive. Sprint has incidentally gotten at least two months behind in their billing as a result of merging with US Telecom. In the worst way: they still bill you but don't credit your payments till 3 months later, very unfortunate. Waiting Demons The increasing use of staging equipment for company service lines, such as airlines and US Sprint, is a bore. Takes 10-30 minutes to filter through the queue; speaker phone becoming a necessity. Anyone know of devices to assist the caller (for example a device to wait for some sort of change in the line, and emit a loud tone, or even better, speak into the phone a message such as "now that you have answered let me summon the caller"? Automated sales calling I received my second most-pernicious automated sales call yesterday on my ans. machine. The caller's tape gives a long pitch, then asks you for your number or address. They avoid identifying themselves in any way so you can't complain to them or about them. My "cause for action" essentially is that they are tying up my answering machine for minutes without my permission, and to no value to them, since even if I loved their product when listening to the message, there is no way to contact them. Does anyone know of regulations affecting this, or to whom I could try to complain? If action could really be gotten, I could hope to be present some day, and give them my number, then report them once they contact me and give some sort of identification (though maybe they stay anonymous even then). There's an underlying issue of public responsibility here, in both vending machines and anonymous telephone business. Where are the regulators when we really need them? Thanks, Doug >SS No., private payphones, Sprint, waiting, sales calls ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* Date: Tue, 18 Aug 87 18:41:09 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-to: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #28 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU TELECOM Digest Tue, 18 Aug 87 18:41:09 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 28 Today's Topics: State Line, Pa. (2 of them) Bell of PA as default carrier / Sprint FONcard and Schlage key card Modem problems Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Recognizing answering machines (and other messages) Re: (none) Has India X.25 network to the rest of the world? Universal Custom Calling proposal ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 29 Jul 87 1:30:14 EDT From: Carl Moore (VLD/VMB) To: telecom@BRL.ARPA Subject: State Line, Pa. (2 of them) There is a State Line, Pa. (Bedford County) with phone prefix 814-767 (don't know what mailing address is used), NOT to be confused with State Line, Pa. 17263 (Franklin County) for which I don't know the phone prefix (area 717). ------------------------------ Date: 29-Jul-1987 2252 From: covert%covert.DEC@decwrl.dec.com (John R. Covert) To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu Subject: Bell of PA as default carrier / Sprint FONcard and Schlage key card From:MONTI, National Public Radio 29-JUL-1987 16:46 Subj: Bell of Pa as a default carrier In case nobody else responds to the guy who wondered how Bell of Pennsylvania could be anybody's default long distance company, here's the obvious answer: If a Pennsylvania customer selects BPA to be his default long distance carrier, he may direct dial using 1 + area code (if necessary) calls only withing his own home LATA. If he's in the Philadelphia LATA, he may also call the limited number of New Jersey counties to which BPA is allowed to carry toll traffic. If he tries to dial, using 1 + AC, to a phone outside those two limited areas, he will probably get a recording saying he can't use BPA for this call. He'll then have to know somehow about the existence of 10XXX or have a travel card for a non-AT&T long distance carrier. He'll have to use one of those two methods to make that call. For some weird Philadelphian who rarely or never makes toll calls outside his LATA and the New Jersey special privilege corridor, this might actually be a viable level of service to have. I wouldn't have it. The reason an AT&T card wouldn't work here is because if the subsciber dials, say, 0-312-NXX-XXXX, the call would be routed to the "operator assisted or credit card" level of the DEFAULT long distance carrier for that phone, which would be BPA, which would get him an intercept recording just as if he had dialed 1-312-NXX-XXXX. Greg Monti, National Public Radio, 2025 M Street NW, Washington, DC 20026 202-822-2459 ------------------ From:MONTI, National Public Radio 29-JUL-1987 16:52 Subj: Sprint FONcard and Schlage key card Just found a good reason not to carry around the fancy new US Sprint FONCard. Its metal foil inlay which makes it shiny silver in color messes up the ability of the Schlage card-entry system to read my security card. I remember being told when the Schlage system was first installed that any substantial metal object in the same pocket or wallet would invalidate the reading of your card. To enter the office I either need to remove the Schlage card and present it to the detector by itself or remove the US Sprint FONCard and present the whole wallet to the detector. If Sprint never implements the magnetic stripe feature on the back of the FONCard, I might as well just write the card number on a piece of paper and carry that in my wallet. The new number is 14 digits and bears no relation to the old Sprint travel service number I have nor to my home phone number. Oh well, guess this is progress. Greg Monti, National Public Radio, 2025 M Street NW< Washington, DC 20036 202-822-2459 via VAX1:: ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 30 Jul 87 06:45:25 edt From: thinder@nswc-wo.ARPA To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: Modem problems Cc: thinder We have recently installed a group of Racal Vadic 4224E modems to serve as dial in access to our local area network and to selected host machines. Prior to this installation these connections were handled by Ven Tel MD212 modems with no problems. Soon after cut over we received complaints from a few users that they could no connect to the LAN using a variety of PC's/ terminals and modem combinations. After investigation it "seems" that the problem is related to our modem/phone line and "ring". If a user dials into the rotary and the modem answers without any ring, the users modem may not "see" the connection. It is not consistent, sometimes a line will answer with a ring then a tone nine times in a row, then on the 10th time fail, the reverse also occurs. To further compound the problem, one line that is connected to a VAX and Racal Vadic modem ALWAYS provides one ring and then the modem tone. I have more information about the connection, including the cabling and specifications of the network devices. Rather than list all this information I will respond to any questions concerning the problem directly. Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thomas K. Hinders Naval Surface Weapons Center Silver Spring MD (301) 394 4225/1802 thinder@nswc-wo.arpa or thinder@nswc-oas.arpa ------------------------------ From: mnetor!spectrix!rmc@uunet.UU.NET To: comp-dcom-telecom@uunet.UU.NET Date: Thu Jul 30 10:46:21 1987 Date: 30 Jul 87 14:46:18 GMT To: mnetor!uunet!comp-dcom-telecom Subject: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Responding-System: spectrix.UUCP Path: spectrix!rmc From: rmc@spectrix.UUCP (Russell Crook) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Recognizing answering machines (and other messages) Keywords: answering machines recognition autodialers Message-ID: <299@spectrix.UUCP> Date: 30 Jul 87 14:46:16 GMT Distribution: na Organization: Spectrix Microsystems Inc., Toronto, Ontario, Canada Lines: 24 Dumb question time: Given that you have a computer-driven system to do call-ahead (i.e., have a system that will call ahead to a number with a prerecorded message, and then listens to the line for some sort of response): is it (realistically) possible for this system to recognize if it has encountered: 1) an out of service number (by recognizing certain aspects of the recording?) 2) an answering machine (i.e., is the "beep" standardized) 3) pulse (versus touchtone) signals 4) anything else (busy, blocked call, etc.) The intent is confirmation of time and place with a customer. Some of these I know are easily done, and readily available in existing stuff. However, 1) and 2) are (I believe) much tougher to handle. Does anyone know of something that handles most of these cases? (If so, I would like the approximate cost, even if it is only a guess). Please reply by mail (if there is sufficient response, I will post). Thanks in advance Russell Crook (...!seismo!{mnetor,utzoo}!spectrix!rmc) ------------------------------ To: sdsu!comp-dcom-telecom From: pnet01.CTS.COM!adamsd%sdsu.UUCP@sdcsvax.ucsd.edu (Adams Douglas) Subject: Re: (none) Date: 31 Jul 87 16:36:22 GMT Regarding using Sun workstations with voice mail equipment. Try contacting the following company: Linker Systems 13612 Onkayha Circle Irvine, CA (zip?) 714-552-1904 It was my impression at SigGraph that this company is working on similar interfacing. ------------------------------ To: comp-dcom-telecom@uunet.UU.NET From: enea!sal.UUCP!dk@uunet.UU.NET (Danny Kohn) Subject: Has India X.25 network to the rest of the world? Date: 9 Aug 87 03:59:26 GMT I am working with a NGO with one of it's offices in Bombay-India. We have some difficulty finding out if there is some Data Network available (we need X.28 connection). Is there someone out there who would know the current status of X.25/X.28 in India? Danny Kohn UUCP: dk!sal@enea.se ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 3 Aug 87 00:47:49 PDT From: jimmy@PIC.UCLA.EDU (Jim Gottlieb) To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu Subject: Universal Custom Calling proposal Cc: It has been reported that Southwestern Bell plans to introduce a new calling card that, come Signalling System #7, will allow peo- ple to program pay telephones with the same custom calling features that they use at the home or office. What I've been wondering for a long time is why telcos don't just give many of these features away in order to stimulate more cal- ling. Why not give all payphones 3-Way? This would encourage more calls to be made. Why not give all cellular phones 3-Way and Call Waiting. Since you pay airtime for both calls, they would rake in the bucks. 3-Way (and 4-way and 5-way and...) calls seem to be the ones that last the longest. I think some telco should be brave and try giving 3-way (and maybe Call Wait- ing and Call Forwarding) to all customers. With the right publi- city, they would more than make in additional calls/length of calls the money they would lose from not charging for such ser- vices, and make up the costs of installing more 3-port conference circuits. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Jim Gottlieb "It's easier to apologize than to ask permission. When in doubt, do it." -- Grace Hopper, U.S. Navy, Retired Internet: jimmy%pic@ats.ucla.edu UUCP: sdcsvax!sdcrdcf!ucla-cs!pic.ucla.edu!jimmy ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* Date: Tue, 18 Aug 87 18:51:18 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-to: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #29 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU TELECOM Digest Tue, 18 Aug 87 18:51:18 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 29 Today's Topics: Re: SS# & Utilities -- a story Int'l Collect Calls Re: SS# & Utilities -- a story Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Need recommendation for 3-4 line phone system Submission for comp-dcom-telecom X.PC and MNP protocol drivers Telephone Interface Modules In-use indicator for phone line Awful tones when hitting wrong number FCC access charges New articles in archive ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, 4 Aug 87 12:48:50 EST From: abp@j.cc.purdue.edu (Jeffrey J Wieland) Subject: Re: SS# & Utilities -- a story In article <8707260009.AA03268@buit1.bu.edu> spaf%ames.arpa@gatech.UUCP (Gene Spafford) writes: >[This is the last message to be published this weekend. A total of 4 ... >As a matter of principle, I'm one of those people who won't give out >my social security number when applying for utilities or credit cards. >The reasons why have been discussed numerous times in various >security-related groups. It is my understanding that it is against ... >Questions >--------- > >1) Do many of you (net-readers) withhold your SS# in similar circumstances? >Do you have these kinds of confrontations too? My wife, who also has had some minor problems, but nothing like this. >2) Anyone know if other people at GTE Indiana are such jerks, or is >this an isolated instance? When my mother went to have her telephone line and billing changed to her own name, she was also informed that she would have to pay a "deposit". She was able to persuade them otherwise (20 years as a high school teacher pays off sometimes). GTE in West Lafayette can be pretty nasty (and slow), probably due to the large number of students here at Purdue. >3) Anyone know if Indiana does, in fact, *require* that the SS# be >on the driver's license? Indiana does NOT require the SS# to be on your driver's license. You can be issued a number with a "Z" prefix instead. My wife has one of these. >4) Should I bother to follow-up on this further? That is, should >I bother contacting the Public Service commission in Indiana >about the treatment I received? (I'm currently not sure it is >worth the effort). Couldn't hurt. >Too bad we don't have a choice of phone companies as well as long >distance carriers -- I'd keep Southern Bell. > >-- >Gene Spafford >Software Engineering Research Center (SERC), Georgia Tech, Atlanta GA 30332 >Internet: spaf@gatech.gatech.edu >uucp: ...!{decvax,hplabs,ihnp4,linus,rutgers,seismo}!gatech!spaf Jeff Wieland abp@j.cc.purdue.edu ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 7 Aug 87 15:55:24 PDT From: broder@vaxa.isi.edu (Ben Broder) To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu Subject: Int'l Collect Calls I have a friend who has received a phone bill containing several somewhat confusing items. They appear to be collect calls from El Salvador. However, none of the calls have a time of day and some do not even have an originating phone number. Although she does have friends in El Salvador, she insists that no one accepted collect calls on those days. Is it possible that these calls were really calls billed to a third number (my friend's) that for some technical reason appear as collect calls? Thanks for any help, Ben Broder (broder@vaxa.isi.edu) ------------------------------ From: sundc!hemaneh!tj@seismo.CSS.GOV (Central Area MTS) Subject: Re: SS# & Utilities -- a story Date: 6 Aug 87 03:01:12 GMT To: In article <8707260009.AA03268@buit1.bu.edu>, spaf%ames.arpa@gatech.UUCP (Gene Spafford) writes: > Questions > 1) Do many of you (net-readers) withhold your SS# in similar circumstances? > Do you have these kinds of confrontations too? I too withhold my SS# as a general principle. There are a lot of places here in Dallas that misuse it from 7/11 to the local cable tv company. For the most part, I've been able to refuse all of them. I did give in on the cable tv people once and used my roommate's SS# instead. > 2) Anyone know if other people at GTE Indiana are such jerks, or is > this an isolated instance? It seems that many public utlities have this attitude, though not all. > 4) Should I bother to follow-up on this further? That is, should > I bother contacting the Public Service commission in Indiana > about the treatment I received? (I'm currently not sure it is > worth the effort). I don't see why not. It seems that it has only taken a few of us refusing to make a general policy change in the phone company. When i first moved to Dallas 4 years ago, Southwestern Bell was quite insistant about it. When I recently moved and changed service, they did not even try to press the issue when I said no. The depressing thing is that people like 7/11 ask for it on their movie club applications. Perhaps a letter the the Southland Corp?... As someone who has worked on accounting sw, I can understand the convenience of using the SS# as an index for customers, However, it makes things much too easy to get to information about a person. Although, did you know that it is perfectly legal to posses more than one SS#? So long as you are not trying to defraud anyone, only confuse, it's ok. Cal Thixton /* these are my opinions */ Sun Microsystems Dallas {ucbvax,decvax,decwrl,ihnp4}!sun!{,texsun!}tj {ut-sally,convex,smu}!texsun!tj tj@sun.com -- Cal Thixton Sun Microsystems Dallas {ucbvax,decvax,decwrl,ihnp4}!sun!{,texsun!}tj {ut-sally,convex,smu}!texsun!tj tj@sun.com ------------------------------ From: uumedis@cbosgd.mis.oh.att.com (UUCP) Date: 6 Aug 87 15:54:56 GMT To: comp-dcom-telecom@RUTGERS.EDU Subject: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Path: cbosgd!osu-eddie!mdf From: mdf@osu-eddie.UUCP (Mark D. Freeman) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Need recommendation for 3-4 line phone system Message-ID: <3910@osu-eddie.UUCP> Date: 6 Aug 87 02:28:13 GMT Distribution: na Organization: StrongPoint Systems, Inc.; Columbus, OH. (guest of Ohio State U.) Lines: 25 I hope this is the right group for this... We are moving into new office space next month, and will need a phone system. We will have three lines, which should alternate-answer. Additionally, we will have one data-only line which should not be on the main system at all. We need 5 phones, and redial an intercom features. Speed dialing and music on hold would be nice. Of course, cheap is a major requirement. One minor point: I hate phones on which the * and # keys are used by the phone for special features. Makes using voice mail systems a real pain in the ass. Any recommendations? -- < < < < < < < < < < < < < < < < < < < <> > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > Mark D. Freeman mdf@osu-eddie.uucp StrongPoint Systems, Inc. mdf@Ohio-State.arpa 2440 Medary Avenue ...!cbosgd!osu-eddie!mdf Columbus, OH 43202 Guest account at The Ohio State University (614) 262-3703 < < < < < < < < < < < < < < < < < < < <> > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > ------------------------------ From: ndmath!milo@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu (Greg Corson) Date: 7 Aug 87 20:17:16 GMT To: comp-dcom-telecom%seismo.css.gov@iuvax Subject: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Path: ndmath!milo From: milo@ndmath.UUCP (Greg Corson) Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac,comp.dcom.modems,comp.dcom.telecom Subject: X.PC and MNP protocol drivers Message-ID: <270@ndmath.UUCP> Date: 7 Aug 87 20:17:15 GMT Organization: Math. Dept., Univ. of Notre Dame Lines: 14 Does anyone know of a place where I can get Apple Macintosh compatable drivers (or source code) for either the X.PC or MNP communications protocols? I am looking for the drivers to incorporate in a terminal program I am writing. I don't mind it if I have to pay some kind of licensing fee to get the drivers but if somebody is willing to give them away it would be great. Greg Corson 19141 Summers Drive South Bend, IN 46637 (219) 277-5306 (weekdays till 6 central) ...seismo!iuvax!ndmath!milo ------------------------------ To: comp-dcom-telecom@decwrl.dec.com From: malcolm@spar.SPAR.SLB.COM (Malcolm Slaney) Subject: Telephone Interface Modules Date: 8 Aug 87 00:11:31 GMT Can anybody recommend a good source of telephone line interface modules? I have audio output now on my Sun and I would like to hook it to a phone line so I can really have some fun. It would be nicest if I could get ringing indications and have some way to take the phone off hook. Thanks. Malcolm Slaney Schlumberger Palo Alto Research malcolm@spar-20.arpa ------------------------------ Date: Sat 8 Aug 87 20:55:57-EDT From: "Adam Peller" Subject: In-use indicator for phone line To: telecom@XX.LCS.MIT.EDU Message-ID: <12324972488.16.OAF.G.PELLER@OZ.AI.MIT.EDU> Does anyone know how to build a circuit that will light up a LED if the phone line is being used (checks to see if the voltage is low)? thanks Adam Peller -- ADAMP%OZ@MC.LCS.MIT.EDU (Arpa) -- please send replies directly to me, I'm not on the mailing list ------- ------------------------------ To: tektronix!comp-dcom-telecom%reed.uucp@RELAY.CS.NET From: James Deibele Subject: Awful tones when hitting wrong number Date: 10 Aug 87 08:04:03 GMT Every once in a while, I'll dial a wrong number and get an incredibly horrible recording in my ear. The recording always starts off with three LOUD tones, which has caused me to wonder if the tones weren't to warn off TTY's for the deaf or something similar. Every time I hear once, I'm seriously tempted to throw the phone against the wall (and I would if we lived back in the days of the one BIG phone company, with leased phones, etc.). It doesn't seem to matter whether the local company is a GTE or Baby Bell, they still use the tones. Whazz going on? Thanks. -- A hunting we will go, | James S. Deibele (jamesd@percival) A hunting we will go, | TECHBooks (TM) We'll steal someone else's signature --- | FidoNet #105/3 or #105/4 And we'll never let it go. | (503) 760-3161 ------------------------------ From: khayo@cs.ucla.edu Subject: FCC access charges Date: 14 Aug 87 21:33:11 GMT +++ If you want to respond by mail, do not hit "r"; +++ +++ please note address correction in my .signature. +++ In the September issue of "Micro Times" (a free magazine circulating in So. Cal. & maybe elsewhere) there is a rather informative article on the FCC access surcharges for Enchanced Service Providers ("And Then There Were None", by Brock N. Meeks.) As expected, the author's conclusion is roughly that the local Bells are going to make a bundle at our (modem users') expense, and that "fairness" of the proposal is very questionable. The article also includes all the info about the preferred format of letters that you may want to send in response. I know that such package was posted here a while ago, but some of you may have missed it and the "Micro Times" version may be more up-to-date. The magazine is available in electronic form (I just tried it, it's there) on "Tele-Web" BB at (213) 372 4050 [300/1200, 7 bits, 1 stop bit, no parity, 24 hrs, multi-user] where you should type "GO MICRO" at a prompt. Also, on Compuserve there appeared a statement of CS's position regar- ding the matter, along with an example of a letter & addresses of all FCC Commisioners. I like to think that they responded to my repeated suggestions sent via "User Feedback" urging them to do just that. I have the CS package on disk & can post it here or email to those interested persons (if any) who don't have access to CS. Sincerely - Eric Behr ----------------------------------------------------------- I'm sick & tired of editing my incorrect address in the header. The *correct* one is khayo@MATH.UCLA.EDU; I have no connection with the CS Department, except that we breathe the same smog. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 18 Aug 87 18:12:10 EDT From: jsol (Jon Solomon) To: telecom Subject: New articles in archive Many articles around the FCC's new incentive to charge "enhanced services" for access to the local network are now available for anonymous FTP on host XX.LCS.MIT.EDU in directory . The files were too large to include in a digest, and are being made available to you in this method. Note that USENET users will as usual continue to get copies of these files mailed after this digest. The files are: pc.pursuit -- a look at the impending charges and their impact on pc pursuit users. docket.87-215 - the docket itself. fcc.policy - some more notes on the subject. There are some conversations in today's digests which may require that you read these documents. This is unavoiadable. --jsol ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* Date: Sat, 22 Aug 87 21:41:12 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-to: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #30 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU TELECOM Digest Sat, 22 Aug 87 21:41:12 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 30 Today's Topics: Periodic Line Noise Choice of long distance carrier Re: Why can't the world call 800 numbers? Re: Why can't the world call 800 numbers? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: 7 August 1987, 10:44:11 EDT From: Nicholas Simicich To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu Subject: Periodic Line Noise Someone who lives in or near Endicott, New York, is having the following trouble with their home dial in terminal. The terminal is a PC on a call back system--thus, the terminal is not always the originator of the noisy call, but may be, instead, in answer mode. The noise seems to occur no matter who is the originator. I believe that they are using 212A type modems. I'd appreciate a direct response as well as a copy to the net if your response is interesting (which it is, of course) as I'm a couple of months behind in my digest reading :-). -=-=-=- I get a consistent, periodic (once every 2.1 seconds, I timed it) one byte (X'7B' or X'FB'--not sure exactly which) inbound-only noise when talking to PCTERM (an internal call back system), a local BBS, and a university using either an internal package, PROCOMM 2.4.2, and MS-Kermit and anything else I could test on. Some connections are clear and remain clear (the one session which started clean and became dirty was explained by the Deposit Telephone Co. as a NY Telephone line-configuration exercise one weekend). The dirty ones stay dirty and it's impossible to do any work. I tried another modem--no luck. The Telephone Co. is stymied. Ideas? I've also been assured that there are no powerful radars nearby, etc. I've used a pure vanilla PC DOS system with the same results. The Deposit phone company claims that my exchange, 693, is fairly modern, and that the microwave circuit is not the problem. -=-=-=- Nick Simicich, NJS@IBM.COM, or, for bitnet, NJS at YKTVMX Collect:(all I know about the problem is above) (914) 737-1908 Contents: 100% personal opinion, sugar, salt, High fructose corn syrup... ------------------------------ Date: 19 Aug 87 16:55:00 EDT From: "KEPLER::HUI" Subject: Choice of long distance carrier To: "telecom" I would appreciate advice/recommendations on my upcoming choice of long distance carrier. I would also appreciate a copy (or pointer) to the last survey of long distance carrier rates in telecom-digest. (I've been offnet for several months.) My calling pattern is mostly from home (area code 301) to California (area codes 805, 707) and to West Germany. Calling is almost entirely during non-peak rate periods. Oh yes, home is Baltimore, MD. With respect to Germany, I would appreciate information on who supplies service (anyone other than AT&T yet?) and differencies in hours for minimum rate. Also the local phone company (C&P) charges extra (of course) for tone service. Does anyone know if they're actually equipped to NOT provide it if you don't order it? Many thanks for all responses. Please reply to me directly as arushton@stsci.arpa I'm not on the telecom mailing list yet. - A. Minick Rushton Space Telescope Science Institute ------ ------ ------------------------------ Subject: Re: Why can't the world call 800 numbers? Date: 21 Aug 87 19:02:53 EDT (Fri) From: jhc@mtune.att.com (Jonathan Clark) To: telecom@xx.lcs.mit.edu In article <2801@hoptoad.uucp> gnu@hoptoad.uucp (John Gilmore) writes: >[Since the Arpanet side seems to be losing, let's do it ourselves over >here on the Usenet. Be sure to include an Approved: header or your message >will get emailed to the dead moderator. -- John] > >From outside the US/Canada, the number is 201-592-2000. It drives me up the >wall that from my phone I can call every telephone in the world directly except >800 numbers in the U.S. Since many companies publish only their 800 numbers, >it means I can't call them at all. Was it really beyond AT'Ts capability to >arrange for 800 numbers to be free in the US/Canada, but billed at normal >rates when called from abroad, but at least make them work? Well, I'm not in the POTS bit of AT&T, but large pieces of the world can call 800 numbers. AT&T periodically puts out bulletins about 'International 800 service is now available to...'. The trouble is that having an internationally-diallable 800 number costs the person paying for the number more money upfront plus more money per call (I think), and typically they decide that this isn't worth it. It's the same deal (fundamentally) as having in-state only 800 numbers. I believe that it also costs less to have an *out-of-state* only 800 number, (which is why you see 'call 800-123 4567, in Nebraska call 987 6543') but don't quote me on that. I have no idea of the exact tariffs involved. -- Jonathan Clark [NAC,attmail]!mtune!jhc An Englishman never enjoys himself except for some noble purpose. ------------------------------ To: uunet!comp-dcom-telecom@uunet.UU.NET From: van-bc!sl@uunet.UU.NET (Stuart Lynne) Subject: Re: Why can't the world call 800 numbers? Date: 21 Aug 87 18:22:37 GMT In article <2801@hoptoad.uucp> gnu@hoptoad.uucp (John Gilmore) writes: >From outside the US/Canada, the number is 201-592-2000. It drives me up the >wall that from my phone I can call every telephone in the world directly except >800 numbers in the U.S. Since many companies publish only their 800 numbers, >it means I can't call them at all. Was it really beyond AT'Ts capability to >arrange for 800 numbers to be free in the US/Canada, but billed at normal >rates when called from abroad, but at least make them work? Actually AT&T at least does have 800 numbers in Canada, that usually connect to the same place. Unfortunately there are two problems: 1. They are different 2. They don't advertise them as effectively as the US ones For example to order my copies of the SYSVID all I had was the 800 number in the US. Through a bit of phone tag with various 555-1212 directory services in that part of the US I came up with a generic number for AT&T. They were able to give me the phone number to call to order. When I called them they said "oh, you don't have our 800 number in Canda?". They gave it to me, I called back on that. Interesting note, newer versions of the SYSVID now include the Canadian 800 number as well. -- {ihnp4!alberta!ubc-vision,uunet}!van-bc!Stuart.Lynne Vancouver,BC,604-937-7532 ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* Date: Sat, 22 Aug 87 21:42:22 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-to: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #31 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU TELECOM Digest Sat, 22 Aug 87 21:42:22 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 31 Today's Topics: GEnie's action alert on FCC modem fees proposal GEnie's how to communicate opposition to FCC modem fees proposal GEnie's letter format for filing comments on FCC modem fees proposal ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sat, 22 Aug 1987 02:31 MDT From: Keith Petersen To: Info-Modems@SIMTEL20.ARPA Cc: Telecom@XX.LCS.MIT.EDU Subject: GEnie's action alert on FCC modem fees proposal ACTION ALERT ============ THE FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION IS CONSIDERING THE IMPOSITION OF COSTLY NEW "ACCESS CHARGES" ON YOUR USE OF GENIE SERVICES ===================================== For 2 years, you and other GEnie subscribers have used your telephone to reach our service. Until now, your calls to us have been treated just like any other residential or business calls. Now, however, the Federal Communications Commission in Washington, D.C. is proposing to change all this. The FCC is considering a plan to make extremely expensive new "access charges" applicable to GEnie services provided to you over local telephone lines. The FCC's "access charge" scheme would drastically increase telephone company charges which we pay. In fact, our initial estimates suggest that GEnie Service costs would jump up by as much as $4.50 per hour of use for every one of our customers. Although ===== we have not yet considered the extent to which these cost increases would necessitate a price increase for GEnie Service, a cost increase of this enormous magnitude could require up to a doubling of our GEnie Service prices. THE "ACCESS CHARGE" PROPOSAL CAN BE PRVENTED IF WE ALL ACT TOGETHER TO COMMUNICATE OUR CONCERNS TO FEDERAL AUTHORITIES =============================== Right now the FCC plan is simply a proposal. It is not too late to prevent this mistake from occurring. Nonetheless, we all need to work together to head off this disastrous possibility. The FCC commissioners and their staff responsible for making the final decision seem convinced that such access charges are necessary and proper. We need your help in explaining why such increased charges would severely disserve the public interest. In evaluating its "access charge" proposal, the FCC will have to listen to your concerns if they are explained in terms of the proposal's practical effects on you or your business. Your views count. In addition, your elected congressmen will want to hear your concerns. Legislative representatives play a very helpful role in highlighting your interests for the FCC to consider. YOU NEED TO ACT NOW AND TO STAY INVOLVED UNTIL THE "ACCESS CHARGE" PROPOSAL IS REJECTED BY THE FCC =============================== The FCC requires that comments on its proposal be filed by September 24, 1987. Responses to these comments may be filed through October 26, 1987. The FCC may act on the matter as early as sometime in December. It is important for you to get busy now preparing your comments for submission to the FCC not later than September 24, 1987 -- whether in the form of a letter or a more formalized "pleading." Several significant facts ought to be included in expressing your views. Actually, they are pretty basic and easy to understand and communicate: (1) who you are; (2) how you use GEnie Service; and (3) how you or your business would be hurt if GEnie Service prices doubled due to access charges. These comments should be addressed to the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission. The address of the FCC is 1919 M Street, N.W.; Washington, D.C. 20554. Similar letters or comments should be sent to your state's U.S. Senators and the U.S. House of Representatives' members from your district. ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 22 Aug 1987 02:35 MDT From: Keith Petersen To: Info-Modems@SIMTEL20.ARPA Cc: Telecom@XX.LCS.MIT.EDU Subject: GEnie's how to communicate opposition to FCC modem fees proposal HOW TO COMMUNICATE YOUR OPPOSITION TO ACCESS CHARGES ============================ WHAT THE FCC PROPOSES AND HOW IT WILL AFFECT YOU: ================================================= On July 17, 1987, the Federal Communications Commission announced its intent to apply its carrier access charges to all enhanced service providers -- the FCC's technical name for services like GEnie. What this means is that all providers of such services, including GEnie, which use local telephone lines to reach services provided by means of interstate telecommunications facilities will be subject to significantly increased telecommunications costs. Currently, long-distance common carriers, such as AT&T and MCI, pay interstate access charges. No decision has been made yet to raise our prices if the FCC were to impose access charges on enhanced service providers. However, if this proposal is adopted, the prices of GEnie Service might have to be raised as much as 100%. GE, other enhanced service providers, their customers, and some of their respective trade associations will be opposing the FCC's proposal by lobbying and filing comments with the Commission. The Commission has asked for comments from the public on its proposal which are due on or before September 24, 1987. Responses to these comments are due by October 26, 1987. If both users and providers of services make clear to the FCC the adverse consequences that will follow if its proposal is implemented, there is a good chance that the proposal will be rejected. HERE IS WHAT YOU CAN DO: ======================== The Commission will be interested in knowing how its proposal will affect you, the user of GEnie services, whether you are a residential user or whether information services are an essential aid to carrying out your business. Generally, the Commission's stated policy is to make information, services like GEnie, available to all users, both large and small. The Commission apparently does not appreciate that these enormous cost increases would seriously hurt you -- the very persons the FCC wants to help. The best way to communicate your concerns to the FCC is to explain what implementation of its proposal would mean to you or your business. You can do this by writing a letter to the FCC Commissioners and important staff members. The discussion in item #4, "Writing Your Letters and Comments " explains a very effective technique for writing this type of letter to the Commission. You may also wish to file formal comments with the Commission for consideration by the FCC's Common Carrier Bureau Staff when considering this matter. This may sound like more work, but it is really just a more formal way to say exactly what you would say in your letter. The discussion in item #4 tells you how to do this. Additionally, Congress would be anxious to learn that the proposed FCC action might have such adverse effects on its constituents. Because the FCC is attuned to Congress' viewpoints, letters to your Senators and Representatives would also be effective in preventing the FCC proposal from taking effect. Finally, we ask that you send GE Information Services a copy of any letters or comments that you write in connection with this matter. ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 22 Aug 1987 02:39 MDT From: Keith Petersen To: Info-Modems@SIMTEL20.ARPA Cc: Telecom@XX.LCS.MIT.EDU Subject: GEnie's letter format for filing comments on FCC modem fees proposal WRITING YOUR LETTERS AND COMMENTS: ================================== GENERAL GUIDELINES FOR FILING WITH THE FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION ====================================== The FCC will read and consider your views in reaching a decision whether and how to impose access charges on enhanced service providers if you follow the following guidelines: 1. Letters: Type your letter on 8 1/2" x 11" paper and use the following format: * * * * * (YOUR LETTERHEAD OR NAME AND ADDRESS) (DATE) The Honorable Dennis R. Patrick, Chairman Federal Communications Commission 1919 M Street, N.W. Washington, D.C. 20554 Re: CC Docket 87-215 Amendments of Part 69 of the Commission's Rules Relating to Enhanced Services Providers ============================== Dear Chairman Patrick: [TEXT: Begin by describing who you are. Include any specific titles, duties, or responsibilities that would qualify you as someone who stands to be affected by the FCC's proposal. Of course, if you only use the GEnie service in a residential setting, explain that. The FCC will be interested. Explain why the use of the information services offering is important to you or to your business and what it allows you to do that you could not otherwise do. Secondly, explain that you are aware that the Commission has proposed to impose access charges on enhanced service providers. Explain that you fear that this regulatory action would adversely affect you or your business. Describe with as much detail as Possible what this would mean for you or your business. Close by urging the FCC not to adopt its proposal to apply access charges to enhanced service providers] Sincerely, [NAME] cc: The Honorable James H. Quello The Honorable Mimi Weyforth Dawson The Honorable Patricia Diaz Dennis Gerald Brock, Chief, Common Carrier Bureau Thomas Sugrue, Chief, Policy Division, Common Carrier Bureau William H. Tricarico, Secretary Federal Communications Commission * * * * * 2. If writing formal comments, use the following format and double space the text of your comments on 8 1/2" x 11" paper: * * * * * Before the FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION Washington, D.C. 20554 In the Matter of ) ) Amendments to Part 69 ) of the Commission's Rules ) CC Docket No. 87-215 Relating to Enhanced Service ) Providers ) ) To: The Common Carrier Bureau ) COMMENTS OF [YOUR NAME] ======================= [TEXT: Follow the same guidelines for your text as in the formatted letter in paragraph 1 above.] Respectfully submitted, [If writing for a company, the name of the company in CAPITAL letters] [NAME, TITLE (if applicable), and address) [DATE] * * * * * If your comments are ten or more pages long, there are three additional things you must do. (A word of caution: Your comments will be most effective if they are short and concise). First, attach a cover page with the heading used above at the top. In the center of your cover page type COMMENTS OF [YOUR NAME]." In the bottom left hand corner, put the date. In the bottom right hand corner type: (1) your name or your company's name if you are filing on their behalf; (2) your title, if applicable; and (3) your or your company's address, whichever is applicable. Second, behind the cover page, include a two- or three-paragraph summary of your comments, numbering the pages using small roman numerals. Three, behind the summary and continuing the small roman numeral page numbering, place a table of contents which includes the summary, table of contents, and any headings within the text of your comments. 3. Mail your letters and comments as soon as possible but please make sure they are post marked early enough to arrive at the FCC offices no later than September 24, 1987. This is the day that comments are due on the proposal. 4. Send two (2) copies of your letters to Chairman Patrick and to each of the other Commissioners and Staff members listed at the bottom of the formatted letter to: [NAME] Federal Communications Commission 1919 M Street, N.W. Washington, D.C. 20554 If you are writing comments, send the original and five (5) copies to: William H. Tricarico Secretary Federal Communications Commission 1919 M Street, N.W. Washington, D.C. 20554 5. If you are part of an organization or association that relies on information services for your activities, encourage other members to write, but do not use a form letter or comments if a number of you plan to write. The Commission frowns on these. LETTERS TO YOUR SENATORS AND HOUSE REPRESENTATIVE ================================================= 1. Type your letter and use the following format: * * * * * [YOUR LETTERHEAD OR NAME AND ADDRESS] [DATE] [NOTE: USE THE APPROPRIATE ADDRESS AS FOLLOWS] The Honorable United States Senate Washington, D.C. 20515 - OR - The Honorable United States House of Representatives Washington, D.C. 20510 Dear Senator (or Congressman ) [TEXT: Follow essentially the same format as that for your letter to the Federal Communications Commission: o Explain who you are and how you use information services. o Note your concern with the FCC's proposal to impose access charges on enhanced services providers. o Describe what effect this probably will have on your use of information services and, in turn, on your business or other activities. o If you have sent a letter or letters to the FCC, explain that you have done so and attach a copy of your FCC letter to the letter to the Congressman. o Close by urging the member of Congress to express his concern to the Federal Communications Commission.] Sincerely, [NAME] * * * * * 2. The sooner you send your letters to Congress, the more effect your opinions will have because your representatives will be able to exert pressure on the FCC before the agency begins considering its proposal in earnest. 3. Again, do not use form letters. Let your representatives know that you put some time and thought into this matter and that it will affect you personally. 4. You may also wish to send letters to the following chairmen of the subcommittees which will be most interested in the FCC's proposal: The Honorable Daniel K. Inouye Chairman Subcommittee of Communications Committee of Commerce, Science and Transportation United States Senate Washington, D.C. 20510 The Honorable Edward J. Markey Chairman Subcommittee on Telecommunications & Finance Committee on Energy & Commerce United States House of Representatives Washington, D.C. 20515 5. For your convenience, we have included a list of United States Senators ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* Date: Sun, 13 Sep 87 18:46:05 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-to: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #32 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU TELECOM Digest Sun, 13 Sep 87 18:46:05 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 32 Today's Topics: Phone Interfaces Comp.dcom.telecom submission Re: Choice of long distance carrier Submission for comp-dcom-telecom DSZ Rip-Off new Md. pay-phone instructions Graphics Package Wanted missing issues 26-29 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: spar!malcolm@decwrl.dec.com To: telecom@bu-it.bu.edu Subject: Phone Interfaces Date: 03 Sep 87 17:46:36 PDT (Thu) Can any body recommend an easy way to get a phone interface. I have an A/D and D/A box connected to my Sun and I would like to hook it to the phones. This is a company project (for a change) so I can easily justify up to a hundred dollars or so to guarantee that we don't burn out a phone line. At the very least I would like analog input/output, a ringing indication and maybe touch tone recognition. Does anybody have any recomendations? Thanks. Malcolm ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 8 Sep 87 16:57:26 PDT From: sdcsvax!ames!fai!stevem@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU To: amdahl!buit1.bu.EDU!jsol Subject: Comp.dcom.telecom submission I tried to send the following to the originator of the request by mail, but it bounced back to me: Subject: Re: Choice of long distance carrier In article <8708212245.AA09660@bu-it.bu.edu> you write: > >I would appreciate advice/recommendations on my upcoming choice >of long distance carrier. I would also appreciate a copy >(or pointer) to the last survey of long distance carrier >rates in telecom-digest. (I've been offnet for several >months.) My calling pattern is mostly from home (area code 301) >to California (area codes 805, 707) and to West Germany. >Calling is almost entirely during non-peak rate periods. > >Oh yes, home is Baltimore, MD. With respect to Germany, I >would appreciate information on who supplies service >(anyone other than AT&T yet?) and differencies in hours >for minimum rate. > >Also the local phone company (C&P) charges extra (of course) >for tone service. Does anyone know if they're actually >equipped to NOT provide it if you don't order it? > I tried Sprint first (about 4 years ago) at home. I constantly ran into recordings asking me to call back later since all circuits were busy (or even worse just a network busy signal). After that, I decided to try MCI. I found that most of the time my connections were very poor quality (either I couldn't hear the other party or vice versa). I then gave up on the CHEAP carriers and went back to AT&T because I want to be able to place a call and to be able to hear the other party. Just recently, I started having problems completing calls at work -- Lo and behold, I found out that the company had just switched to Sprint for long distance service. When I complained to our telecom department, they told me to dial 10288 and the number I was calling (this places the call over AT&T). My suggestion would be to go with AT&T -- if the two largest competitors of AT&T are in this bad of shape, what can you expect from the small ones? Incidentally, I don't find AT&T's rates that bad. I also subscribe to their "Reach Out America" plan which is a real good deal if you make your calls on the weekend. --- Steven A. Minneman (Fujitsu America Inc, San Jose, Ca) !seismo!amdahl!fai!stevem The best government is no government at all. --- Steven A. Minneman (Fujitsu America Inc, San Jose, Ca) !seismo!amdahl!fai!stevem The best government is no government at all. ------------------------------ From: caf%omen%reed%tektronix.tek.com@RELAY.CS.NET To: tektronix!comp-dcom-telecom%reed.uucp@RELAY.CS.NET Date: Wed Sep 9 03:28:10 1987 Date: 9 Sep 87 10:28:09 GMT To: reed!tektronix!comp-dcom-telecom Subject: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Responding-System: omen.UUCP Path: omen!caf From: caf@omen.UUCP (Chuck Forsberg WA7KGX) Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc,comp.dcom.telecom,comp.protocols.misc,or.general Subject: DSZ Rip-Off Message-ID: <584@omen.UUCP> Date: 9 Sep 87 10:28:09 GMT Distribution: na Organization: Omen Technology Portland OR Lines: 30 Keywords: dsz zmodem hack pirate A set of debug scripts designed to hack DSZ has been making the rounds of bulletin boards. The single purpose of these scripts is to disable the registration request printed by UNREGISTERED copies of DSZ. In other words, the only purpose of these debug scripts is to encourage nusers to avoid registering DSZ. The final insult is the message: - If you find this usefull, you may if you wish send $1.00 to MOBIUS c/o MOBIUS .aka. Servant of TSOTL, Pyroto Mountain P.O.Box 35103 Phoenix AZ 85069, or just Support your best Shareware. The $1.00 will also provide you with 60 minutes online time on my BBS as a contribution. - In other words, this gentleman suggests you Support Shareware by sending HIM $1.00 to support his piracy instead of registering DSZ with its author. - Since nobody is bothering to rip off FAST, DART, Blast, or Relay protocol drivers, at least one can say ZMODEM has "arrived". - If you see any of these files on a BBS, please inform the sysop of the pirate nature, and ask that they be removed. I would also appreciate any information of exactly who wrote these files, and who are conspiring to spread them. Chuck Forsberg WA7KGX Author of Pro-YAM communications Tools for PCDOS and Unix ...!tektronix!reed!omen!caf Omen Technology Inc "The High Reliability Software" 17505-V Northwest Sauvie Island Road Portland OR 97231 VOICE:503-621-3406:VOICE TeleGodzilla BBS: 621-3746 19200/2400/1200 CIS:70007,2304 Genie:CAF omen Any ACU 2400 1-503-621-3746 se:--se: link ord: Giznoid in:--in: uucp omen!/usr/spool/uucppublic/FILES lists all uucp-able files, updated hourly ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 11 Sep 87 9:31:17 EDT From: Carl Moore (VLD/VMB) To: telecom@BRL.ARPA Cc: cmoore@BRL.ARPA Subject: new Md. pay-phone instructions A C&P pay phone in Elkton which is on 301-398 prefix has new calling instructions. Maryland is running out of NNX prefixes, and apparently provision is being made to switch to NXX prefixes. Station-to-station: local--(7 digit) number toll-- 1 + area code + number All 0+ calls require area code. (Yes, "area code" can include 301.) ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 13 Sep 87 18:06:16 EDT From: Srivas@UDEL.EDU To: telecom@UDEL.EDU, info-graphics@UDEL.EDU, sun-users@UDEL.EDU, Subject: Graphics Package Wanted I am looking for graphics packages that may be used on a Sun for representing finite state machines. If you have, or know of someone who might have, developed software to graphically display finite state automata, please send me mail at ARPA: srivas@udel.edu BITNET: srivas@udel.edu CSNET: srivas%udel.edu@relay.cs.net UUCP: ...!ihnp4!berkeley -\ ...!allegra!berkeley -->!srivas@udel.edu ...!harvard -/ If you know of any publications that have information about graphically displaying finite state machines, please send me mail about them. Thanks. Srivas ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 13 Sep 87 18:44:05 EDT From: jsol (Jon Solomon) To: telecom Subject: missing issues 26-29 If you are missing issues 26-29 then please let me know so I can mail them to you. I have a correct set of issues within that range, and can mail you by return mail any of the issues of Volume-7 in that range. --jsol ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* Date: Fri, 18 Sep 87 22:18:20 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-to: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #33 To: TELECOM@BUIT1.BU.EDU TELECOM Digest Fri, 18 Sep 87 22:18:20 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 33 Today's Topics: Re: Phone Interfaces Re: Phone Interfaces Re: new Md. pay-phone instructions RingMaster service Question Re: TELECOM Digest V7 Sprint "Lawsuit"? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 14 Sep 87 16:11:43 EST From: Michael Grant To: spar!malcolm%decwrl.dec.com@buit1.bu.edu, telecom@bu-it.bu.edu Subject: Re: Phone Interfaces Well, we just bought this thing that answers the phone and lets you page people throughout the building. It basically answers the phone and connects the line to an amplifier. Maybe this device is what you want. It cost us $247.00. It's called a Page Adaptor by Valcom. Model V-9940. We got it from "The Telephone Man" in Springfield Virgina. They might have other things that solve your problem as well. By the way, this thing took almost 3 months to order from these people, so I hope you don't need it soon! ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 15 Sep 87 18:13:32 EDT From: pyrnj!romain@RUTGERS.EDU (Romain Kang) To: malcolm@hobbes.spar.cas.slb.com Subject: Re: Phone Interfaces Cc: This question recently came up on Pyramid's internal network. The most attractive box was made by SpeechPlus in Mountain View, CA. They call it a voice response system. In brief, it can answer the phone, transmit DTMF codes to a computer via an RS-232 port as ASCII digits, receive ASCII text via the same port and send it back down the phone line as high quality synthesized speech. It includes such features as: XON/XOFF flow control or DTR/CTS flow control DTR supervision for incoming calls (raise DTR when a call comes in) Notification of an incoming call by sending digits to the RS-232 port (DTR is strapped) Flash-hook the phone line to transfer a call to a human being DTMF generation to make outgoing calls List price is $3,900. ------------------------------ To: comp-dcom-telecom@RUTGERS.EDU From: westmark!dave@RUTGERS.EDU (Dave Levenson) Subject: Re: new Md. pay-phone instructions Date: 16 Sep 87 02:31:37 GMT In article <8709110931.aa20340@VGR.BRL.ARPA>, cmoore@BRL.ARPA (Carl Moore, VLD/VMB) writes: > A C&P pay phone in Elkton which is on 301-398 prefix has new calling > instructions. Maryland is running out of NNX prefixes, and apparently > provision is being made to switch to NXX prefixes. > Station-to-station: local--(7 digit) number > toll-- 1 + area code + number > All 0+ calls require area code. > (Yes, "area code" can include 301.) Maryland must be one of the few places left that hasn't adopted this dialing plan. I would expect most of the US to be on 1+ or 0+ ten digits before long. Because if the widespread use of this dialing plan, areas where it is not required generally permit it, for the benefit of travelers from other parts. -- Dave Levenson Westmark, Inc. A node for news. Warren, NJ USA {rutgers | clyde | mtune | ihnp4}!westmark!dave ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 16 Sep 87 14:04:30 EDT From: think!johnl@ima.ISC.COM (John R. Levine) To: telecom@xx.lcs.mit.edu Subject: RingMaster service BellSouth's operating companies South Central Bell and Southern Bell are introducing a new service called RingMaster. It assigns two or three numbers to the same phone line, and gives the different numbers different rings. That way if you run a business in your home you can know whether to answer "Hello" or "Thank You For Calling Schrod Bait Systems" without having to install and pay for two lines. You could also use it for a minor variety of toll evasion; when you leave the office, call the second number, let it ring four times, and hang up, so your housemate hears the ring and knows you're on the way without answering the phone and completing the call. Sounds like a clever way to get some revenue from CO equipment that has to be present anyway to support the dwindling number of party lines. -- John R. Levine, Cambridge MA, +1 617 492 3869 { ihnp4 | decvax | cbosgd | harvard | yale }!ima!johnl, Levine@YALE.something The Iran-Contra affair: None of this would have happened if Ronald Reagan were still alive. --- John R. Levine, Cambridge MA, +1 617 492 3869 { ihnp4 | decvax | cbosgd | harvard | yale }!ima!johnl, Levine@YALE.something The Iran-Contra affair: None of this would have happened if Ronald Reagan were still alive. ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 13 Sep 87 18:55 ADT From: (Zaphod Beeblebrox) Subject: Question To: telecom-request@xx.lcs.mit.edu One of the previous issues had a list of the 0 access numbers to use a different long distance carrier for you call.... could you please send me that list again....Thankyou ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 14 Sep 87 08:27 EST From: Howie Ducat Subject: Re: TELECOM Digest V7 To: The Moderator JSol Date: Mon, 14 Sep 87 08:18 EST From: Howie Ducat Subject: Sprint "Lawsuit"? To: Hi.. I recently received what I thought was my usual monthly SPRINT bill.. In actuality, it was some sort of legal gobbledegook about someone in Illinois winning a lawsuit against SPRINT.. and I seem to be entitled to SOMETHING from them, but I can not for the life of me figure out what it is... anyone have any idea?? Howie Ducat Brooklyn College Telecommunications ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest ********************* From jsol Fri Sep 25 22:51:23 1987 Received: by bu-it.bu.edu (3.2/4.7) id AA15789; Fri, 25 Sep 87 22:51:23 EDT Message-Id: <8709260251.AA15789@bu-it.bu.edu> Date: Fri, 25 Sep 87 22:11:19 EDT From: The Moderator (JSol) Reply-To: TELECOM@BU-IT.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V7 #34 To: TELECOM@BU-IT.BU.EDU TELECOM Digest Fri, 25 Sep 87 22:11:19 EDT Volume 7 : Issue 34 Today's Topics: sprint lawsuit Telephone Chip? Re: Sprint "Lawsuit"? phone # on pay phones Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Re: 0+ pay phone calls "Ringmaster service" AT&T, Baby Bells getting into data networks [This is the last digest to be sent from BU-IT.BU.EDU. All further digests will go through XX.LCS.MIT.EDU. All TELECOM pointers (including -REQUEST) now point to XX. Also, today is the only day that individual message readers will see a digest. Starting tomorrow we will resume sending individual messages. --JSol and Jim] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: SPGDCM%UCBCMSA.Berkeley.EDU@jade.Berkeley.EDU Date: Fri, 18 Sep 87 20:17:26 PDT To: telecom@bu-it.bu.edu Subject: sprint lawsuit MSG:FROM: SPGDCM --UCBCMSA TO: NETWORK --NETWORK 09/18/87 20:17:25 To: NETWORK --NETWORK Network Address From: Doug Mosher MVS/Tandem Systems Manager (415)642-5823 Evans 257, Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA 94720 Subject: sprint lawsuit To: telecom@buit1.bu.edu Here's what I know plus what I intuited from the sprint notice: In the past (and still now? not clear) sprint charged regular rates for little short "calls" that did not result in an answer. Like it takes say 30 seconds to place a call, hear four rings, no answer, and hang up. Not clear if they charged for all or many or some of these. Has to do with their not having as good a connection as AT&T technically, so they can't detect answers (as well or at all?). Somebody did a class action suit and won; now in the settlement they are asking each of us to choose either flat or estimated reimbursement IF WE HAD SUCH PROBLEMS. I can't remember if I had any, can't estimate how many, and find the whole thing a bother. I might be a real liar if I certify I had any or so many of them. And I figured the whole deal amounts to plus or minus say $3 for me. I actually threw it out. Now look, I am in favor of class action suits, and this is one more case where Sprint blew it (the other case was where they charged the wrong rates during holidays a year or so ago, and didn't even fix it in general when they knew about it; another class action suit slapped them BIG for that one.) But I am beginning to think that the results of such suits should be for the company to get punished, and for the money to go to: charity, public interest groups, education, or whatever. As this stands, then tiny dribs of money go to a mixture of those even more compulsive, or even less honest, than me, and those are weird folks I'll tell you. sprint lawsuit ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 19 Sep 87 20:27:11 edt From: sr16+@andrew.cmu.edu (Seth Benjamin Rothenberg) To: telecom@xx.lcs.mit.edu Subject: Telephone Chip? I know that Motorola makes a speakerphone-on-a-chip; does anyone know of a telephone-on-a-chip? It need not have a dialing circuit in it, as I won't be using it. Thanks Seth Rothenberg sr16@andrew.cmu.edu rochester!pt!andrew.cmu.edu!sr16 sbrst@cisunx sbrst@pittvms.bitnet ------------------------------ Date: 21 Sep 87 10:59:23 EDT (Monday) From: Wegeng.Henr@Xerox.COM Subject: Re: Sprint "Lawsuit"? To: howie%BKLYN.BITNET@WISCVM.WISC.EDU Cc: TELECOM@BU-IT.BU.EDU, Wegeng.Henr@Xerox.COM There are probably more knowledgable people on the net, but here's my 2 cents worth. I interpreted the letter to mean that several class action suits had been brought against Sprint over their well known practice of billing customers for any call that lasts over 30 seconds from the time that the phone starts ringing, whether the recipent answers the phone or not. I don't have the letter in front of me, but in general the proposed settlement contains two options: 1) credit for any call meeting the above description for which no credit has been previously granted, or 2) a small amount of credit (3 minutes, I think) for each year that the customer has subscribed to Sprint. Obviously this favors people who have saved all of their old bills and can therefore account for more than six unanswered calls per year. On the other hand, if you requested credit for the calls at the time you were billed (which I usually did) then the settlement doesn't really affect you. /Don ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 21 Sep 87 9:18:05 EDT From: Carl Moore (VLD/VMB) To: telecom@BRL.ARPA Subject: phone # on pay phones On a recent trip, I stopped at a pay phone on a roadside and made a call, but I also called the operator and asked what the number was (since it was not displayed; only the area code). I was told they are not allowed to give out the number for pay phones. Can anyone send me any reasons? (I can consolidate if necessary.) Does this have anything to do with the appearance of the word "coin" or similar expression in lieu of place name on a phone bill alongside call made to or from pay phone? ------------------------------ From: ssc-vax!clark@beaver.cs.washington.edu (Roger Clark Swann) Date: 21 Sep 87 14:33:16 GMT To: uw-beaver!comp-dcom-telecom@beaver.cs.washington.edu Subject: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom Path: ssc-vax!clark From: clark@ssc-vax.UUCP (Roger Clark Swann) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: 0+ pay phone calls Keywords: area codes Message-ID: <1444@ssc-vax.UUCP> Date: 21 Sep 87 14:33:15 GMT Distribution: na Organization: Boeing Aerospace Corp., Seattle WA Lines: 25 ------------------------------ In article <8709110931.aa20340@VGR.BRL.ARPA>, cmoore@BRL.ARPA (Carl Moore, VLD/VMB) writes: > A C&P pay phone in Elkton which is on 301-398 prefix has new calling > instructions. Maryland is running out of NNX prefixes, and apparently > provision is being made to switch to NXX prefixes. > Station-to-station: local--(7 digit) number > toll-- 1 + area code + number > All 0+ calls require area code. > (Yes, "area code" can include 301.) I remembered the above article when I needed to make a local pay phone call this past weekend. I wanted to bill the local to my calling card, so I used the 0+ followed by the numbers. On the first try I, included the area code as part of the local number I wanted to reach. This did NOT work, (got a re-order recording). On the second try I left off the area code and the call went right through. So, I guess that we in the Seattle area are behind the rest of the world for now. Check back in the year 2000 and maybe we will have caught up by then...:-) Roger Swann uucp: uw-beaver!ssc-vax!clark I disavow any knowledge of my actions. ------------------------------ To: TELECOM-request@BUIT1.BU.EDU Subject: "Ringmaster service" Date: Sat, 19 Sep 87 16:21:49 PDT From: David G. Cantor In Telecom, Volume 7, Issue 33 John Levine states BellSouth's operating companies South Central Bell and Southern Bell are introducing a new service called RingMaster. It assigns two or three numbers to the same phone line, and gives the different numbers different rings. This was available for years in General Telephone Country (GTE). GTE supported up to 10 parties with distinctive rings (5 ringing frequencies and ringing between either line and ground). You could request several numbers on the same line and you had to pay the sum total of the individual line costs (note that party line were substantailly less expensive than single-party lines). One common use, in a time when standards were different, was by an unmarried couple living together. Each, to the outside world, appeared to have his (her) own line. It avoided problems such as having another telephone ring while talking to one's parents, etc. dgc David G. Cantor dgc@math.ucla.edu ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 24 Sep 87 02:52:06 PDT From: hoptoad.UUCP!gnu@cgl.ucsf.edu (John Gilmore) To: telecom@xx.lcs.mit.edu Subject: AT&T, Baby Bells getting into data networks I picked up these messages from the Telenet PC Pursuit bulletin board system (type "C PURSUIT" to Telenet) and thought Telecom readers would be interested. I found the proposal for a separate data network particularly wierd, since it looks like you would just attach modems to it anyway. Presumably they would figure what kind of modem you had, decode the tones, and ship the data digitally (like Telenet does now). I don't see why this can't be done transparently using normal telephone lines and numbers, e.g. if during the call, they notice that recognizable modem tones are going down the line, and there is a local modem free on both ends, they could just stop sending 64KB/sec and start sending 1200B/sec or 2400B/sec or 9600B/sec. They might be able to do this right at the beginning of a call, by looking for echo-suppressor tones. Also, doesn't ISDN presume anybody, data or voice, can call anybody else, data or voice? I sure hope so... John Msg # 2474 Dated 08-29-87 01:16:42 From: PATRICK TOWNSON To: ALL Re: BELL TELCOS GOING ONLINE! Well, we knew it had to happen someday....Ameritech (the parent company for Illinois Bell, Michigan Bell, Indiana Bell and others) announced this past week that it will enter the up to now forbidden area of on-line computer information and network services. This is the first time a Bell Operating Company has said definitly it will offer "enhanced information services". Ameritech has paid five million dollars for a fifteen percent interest in , whose majority owners are Bell Canada and suprise!! ....GTE/Telenet. ....... Permission to aquire an interest in Inet of America was granted by the Justice Department last month, and Ameritech will begin work on the new venture as soon as Judge Harold Greene gives his okay. Judge Greene was the person who presided over the AT&T divestiture case. Approval is expected, and will take the form of a full lifting of the restriction against the various Baby Bells from entering this line. will offer EMAIL and other network services, including interconnection arrangements with various information data bases. Bell Canada has offered a similar service since 1985, and of course Telenet has offered network services for a few years now. What interested me the most was seeing that Telenet and Ameritech will be in this together. This message was prepared from the various press releases and newspapers reports on the subject appearing this past week. I specifically saw a report in the Chicago Sun- Times on Thursday 8/27, and the Wall Street Journal the same day. It then appeared in a couple of telephony industry trade journals this weekend. Is Telenet taking the old standard approach, "if you can't beat them, then join them"..???? I am sure it is far too early to say where this effects us as Pursuiters, since the newspaper accounts went on to say that the Ameritech/Bell Canada/Telenet deal would not be implemented for a couple of years....but seeing this article after weeks of reading about the dismal future of enhanced services when the new fees go into effect next year does give one reason to pause and reflect. Any Telenet execs out there wish to comment? Msg # 2698 Dated 09-03-87 21:15:26 From: PATRICK TOWNSON To: ALL Re: COMPUTER PHONE NETWORK I mentioned earlier that Ameritech (Illinois Bell, Michigan Bell, Indiana Bell, others) planned to join forces soon with Telenet and Bell Canada in a new national computer public network. While the details are by no means firm, here is speculation by a couple of Bell insiders -- people in senior management who tend to go out to lunch frequently with FCC Commissioners and staff members. First, a little background: For many years, AT&T operated a service called TWX, meaning yperiter Echange. It was in direct competion to Western Union Telex. TWX operated just like regular voice phones as far as dialing and network protocol. TWX had its own "area codes" of 410-510-610-710-810-910. You could not and still cannot access these "TWX area codes" from a regular phone. Neither can TWX machines make calls to the area codes used by voice phones. Other than the inability to jump between the voice network and the data network, everything else about TWX functioned as we know it today -- for example, dialing 610-555-1212 from a TWX machine gets Directory Assistance -- numbers of other TWX machines -- in that "area code", which in fact happens to be for Canada. An operator responds by typing manually at a TWX machine and looks up the number, etc. Pulling Zero gets a TWX operator who will assist in completing calls,handling collect and third number billings, etc. About twenty years ago, Western Union sued the Bell System and forced them to give up the TWX business, by selling it (naturally) to Western Union, which still runs the service today, but under the name "Telex II". Even though owned by Western Union, the network switching equipment for TWX/Telex II is still scattered in Bell central offices and AT&T Long Lines facilities, and Bell maintains the circuits. Now what does this have to do with computer and modem users? Well, the FCC is currently looking with some interest at an informal proposal by AT&T to MOVE ALL COMPUTER/DATA TRANSMISSIONS to their own little "semi-network", with their own area code and prefixes, etc. So the, uh, speculation goes, folks with modems would be required to have at least TWO phone lines on their premises -- unless they planned to not have a voice line -- and the second line would be to the data traffic. The dedicated line for the computer would have a "funny looking" area code (that is, not the one used in your area for voice). Otherwise it would be just a normal ten digit phone number. Every geographic area would have one or more prefixes assigned to it. (The prefix is the first three digits of your phone number). Long distance calls over the system would run about $7-8 per hour, as they do now, using the Reach Out Plans as the guidelines. Local calls on the same prefix would be around five cents a minute, again as they are now in communities with "user sensitive billing". There might or might not be some "local free calling zone". There would be a monthly access charge of course, just as you pay now for your voice line. Calls on this network could not jump over to the voice network or vice versa. In other words, an attempt to dial an area code and number from the data line would be intercepted, and the same would happen in reverse. The Knowledgeable Sources who talk about these things at lunch with their friends from the Commission seem to think the so-called area code will be "300" or "400", or both. Directory Assistance will be available to folks who choose to have listed numbers for their computer (300-555-1212). International access will be handled via "011", just as it is now on voice. Dialing zero, or possibly some three digit access code will connect with an operator's position, for handling collect calls, etc. Some people seem to think AT&T will have it all implemented possibly as early as 1989...about the time that Ameritech/Bell Canada/Telenet have their system ready to go. Of course this is all just talk....just a figment of someone's imagination at AT&T Long Lines, right? Of course. Msg # 2882 Dated 09-12-87 01:17:01 From: PATRICK TOWNSON To: ALL Re: BELLS NOW IN THE BUSINESS The Friday papers announced the Thursday ruling by Judge Harold Greene regarding the proposals by the various regional Bell holding companies wanting to handle data traffic. They got the OK to create and maintain a data network; but they may NOT create the actual data. That is, no BBS's, no data banks or other information services, etc....just handle the traffic; a lot like PCP does now, less this bulletin board. They still cannot go into long distance service, however they will no longer need a waiver to enter non-telephone related enterprises. The group which pushed hardest for the okay to handle data traffic was the consortium formed by GTE/Telenet, Ameritech and Bell Canada. These three organizations are now free to pursue in ernest their plans for ITNET, the name of the new data network being formed. Basically, Bell went away angry at not being allowed into the long distance market; some observors have noted however they were very pleased to get the go-ahead for handling data traffic. ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest *********************