From editor@telecom-digest.org Thu Apr 8 19:52:35 2004 Received: (from ptownson@localhost) by massis.lcs.mit.edu (8.11.6p2/8.11.3) id i38NqZt06691; Thu, 8 Apr 2004 19:52:35 -0400 (EDT) Date: Thu, 8 Apr 2004 19:52:35 -0400 (EDT) From: editor@telecom-digest.org Message-Id: <200404082352.i38NqZt06691@massis.lcs.mit.edu> X-Authentication-Warning: massis.lcs.mit.edu: ptownson set sender to editor@telecom-digest.org using -f To: ptownson Approved: patsnewlist Subject: TELECOM Digest V23 #171 TELECOM Digest Thu, 8 Apr 2004 19:53:00 EDT Volume 23 : Issue 171 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson VoIP Security: Stakes Get Higher As Deployments Grow (VOIP News) Cut-Rate Calling, by Way of the Net (VOIP News) Canada Likely to Regulate VoIP (VOIP News) Official CRTC News: CRTC initiates Proceeding on VoIP (VOIP News) Re: RJ11 Line 1/2 Splitter - Do These Still Exist? (Paul A Lee) Re: RJ11 Line 1/2 Splitter - Do These Still Exist? (David S. Roland) Re: ACLU Suit (was Re: David Nelson) (Lisa Hancock) Re: IBM System/360 40 Years Old Today (Randolph J. Herber) Re: Missed Words and VOIP (Hank Karl) Re: Wal-Mart Mix Up Balancing Credit Cards (Charles Cryderman) Re: Livewire: When You've Got to Google Better, Ask Expert (J Bartley) Re: Radio Signals (Miikka Kiprusoff) All contents here are copyrighted by Patrick Townson and the individual writers/correspondents. Articles may be used in other journals or newsgroups, provided the writer's name and the Digest are included in the fair use quote. By using -any name or email address- included herein for -any- reason other than responding to an article herein, you agree to pay a hundred dollars to the recipients of the email. =========================== Addresses herein are not to be added to any mailing list, nor to be sold or given away without explicit written consent. Chain letters, viruses, porn, spam, and miscellaneous junk are definitely unwelcome. We must fight spam for the same reason we fight crime: not because we are naive enough to believe that we will ever stamp it out, but because we do not want the kind of world that results when no one stands against crime. Geoffrey Welsh =========================== See the bottom of this issue for subscription and archive details and the name of our lawyer; other stuff of interest. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: VOIP News Date: Thu, 08 Apr 2004 11:50:45 -0400 Subject: VoIP Security: Stakes Get Higher As Deployments Grow Reply-To: VoIPnews@yahoogroups.com http://www.tmcnet.com/it/0404/Featuresiemens.htm BY JOEL A. POGAR With the world awash in VoIP headlines over the past few months, mainstream media are declaring 2004 to be the year of Voice over Internet Protocol, or VoIP for short. Lost in the noise, however, are real concerns about VoIP security; concerns that should be growing as VoIP implementations carry more and more of our voice communications. VoIP technology has come a long way in recent years, no longer the 'science project' one RBOC CTO called it just two years ago. Vast improvements in quality of service and reliability have made its deployment practical across enterprise and public networks alike. With the convergence of voice and data networks, come cost-saving benefits, communication flexibility, and the promise of new productivity-enhancing applications. ANOTHER MOUNTAIN TO CLIMB But VoIP security still has a ways to go. By itself, VoIP does not introduce any new vulnerabilities security experts haven't seen before; it only poses new security issues they have to manage. In a traditional analog environment, physical access to a switch or wiring closet was usually needed to intercept communications between two parties. Today sending packetized voice over a data network can make voice communication more accessible and easier to intercept, especially given the range of malicious toolsets any hacker can find on the Internet. Full story at: http://www.tmcnet.com/it/0404/Featuresiemens.htm How to Distribute VoIP Throughout a Home: http://michigantelephone.mi.org/distribute.html If you live in Michigan, subscribe to the MI-Telecom group: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MI-Telecom/ ------------------------------ From: VOIP News Date: Wed, 07 Apr 2004 22:17:43 -0400 Subject: Cut-Rate Calling, by Way of the Net Reply-To: VoIPnews@yahoogroups.com http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/08/technology/circuits/08stat.html?ex=1082001600&en=95d3f3f62e6024b4&ei=5062&partner=GOOGLE Cut-Rate Calling, by Way of the Net By DAVID POGUE VERY time an important piece of our lives goes electronic, much is gained, but something is lost, too. Audiophiles say that compact discs don't sound as warm as vinyl records. Home theaters are neat, but don't offer the communal fun of a movie theater crowd. And no matter how efficient e-mail may be, it can't touch the joy of receiving a handwritten letter on fine stationery, thoughtfully composed and concluding with the words "check enclosed." So stand back. The latest life component to make a radical, Internet-driven shift is ordinary home telephone service. This development is annoyingly called voice-over-Internet protocol, or VoIP, which means "calls that use the Internet's wiring instead of the phone company's." When you sign up, you get a little box that goes between your existing telephone and your broadband modem (that is, your cable modem or D.S.L. box, a requirement for most of these services). At that point you can make unlimited local, regional and long-distance calls anywhere in the United States for a fixed fee of $20 to $40 a month (plus the cost of your broadband Internet service, of course). Overseas calls cost about 3 cents a minute. These figures aren't subject to inflation by a motley assortment of tacked-on fees, either; voice-over-Internet service is exempt from F.C.C. line charges, state 911 surcharges, number-portability service charges and so on. Now, nerds have been making PC-to-PC Internet calls for years, using their computers' microphone and speakers. But VoIP is different: you dial and talk using a conventional phone. The computer doesn't even have to be on. The gold rush began last year when a startup called Vonage offered a $35-a-month calling plan. Soon it was joined by a crowd of similarly little-known services with names like VoicePulse, Packet 8, Broadvox and VoiceGlo. Recently, though, some much bigger names began taking the technology seriously [.....] [Comment: And now one more paragraph from the article, with comments inserted, and followed by a short plug:] While you're contemplating the drawbacks of Internet calling, consider this: most VoIP adapters accommodate only one handset per line [Comment: Huh? All VoIP adapters I know of will handle at least three standard phones on a line, and sometimes more as long as you are careful not to draw too much ringing current]. Many Internet phone customers wind up buying cordless phone systems that permit several handsets to communicate with a single base station.] (Some fans hire an electrician to install the adapter where the phone lines enter the house, so that it affects all phone jacks, but that's a complex and iffy approach.) [Comment: No it isn't! Many people do it themselves, perhaps by going to "How to Distribute VoIP Throughout a Home" at http://michigantelephone.mi.org/distribute.html and following the instructions there.] Full story at : http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/08/technology/circuits/08stat.html?ex=1082001600&en=95d3f3f62e6024b4&ei=5062&partner=GOOGLE How to Distribute VoIP Throughout a Home: http://michigantelephone.mi.org/distribute.html If you live in Michigan, subscribe to the MI-Telecom group: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MI-Telecom/ http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ------------------------------ From: VOIP News Date: Thu, 08 Apr 2004 11:53:09 -0400 Subject: Canada Likely to Regulate VoIP Reply-To: VoIPnews@yahoogroups.com http://www.cbronline.com/currentnews/84220d4727e2b75a80256e700032e261 While hands-off regulators in the US are currently of the view that voice over IP should be subject to minimal government oversight, to the north their Canadian counterparts are coming to the opposite conclusion. Full story at: http://www.cbronline.com/currentnews/84220d4727e2b75a80256e700032e261 ------------------------------ From: VOIP News Date: Thu, 08 Apr 2004 13:44:21 -0400 Subject: Official CRTC News Release: CRTC Initiates Proceeding on VoIP Reply-To: VoIPnews@yahoogroups.com http://www.crtc.gc.ca/eng/NEWS/RELEASES/2004/r040407.htm CRTC initiates proceeding on VoIP Services; issues preliminary view OTTAWA-GATINEAU In a public notice issued today, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) has provided its preliminary views on the regulatory framework applicable to the voice communications services using Internet Protocol that are referred to below, and has initiated a proceeding to examine the regulatory requirements for the provision of these services. In Telecom Public Notice CRTC 2004-2, Regulatory framework for voice communication services using Internet Protocol, the Commission invites interested parties to comment on the Commission's preliminary views and on any other pertinent matters, as well as to participate in a public consultation. Voice communications services using IP, or Internet Protocol, now allow subscribers to make voice calls over a broadband connection, for example with a conventional phone-set attached to an adaptor or an IP telephone. In light of the availability of voice communication services using IP and calls from carriers for the clarification of the regulatory rules, the Commission considers that there is a need to set out its views on the regulatory regime applicable to the provision of those services. In the Commission's preliminary view, voice communications services using IP that provide universal access to and/ or from the Public Switched Telephone Network and utilize telephone numbers that conform to the North American Numbering Plan (referred to in the PN as VoIP services) have characteristics that are functionally the same as circuit-switched voice telecommunications services. Consistent with its principle of technological neutrality, it is the Commission's preliminary view that its existing regulatory framework should apply to VoIP services, including its determinations related to forbearance. The Commission also considers on a preliminary basis, that to the extent that VoIP services provide subscribers with access to and/or from the Public Switched Telephone Network, along with the ability to make and/or receive calls that originate and terminate within the geographic boundaries of a local calling area as defined in the incumbent local exchange carriers' (ILECs) tariffs, they should be treated for regulatory purposes as local exchange services, and be subject to the regulatory framework governing local competition, established in Local Competition, Telecom Decision CRTC 97-8, 1 May 1997 and subsequent determinations. In this public notice, the Commission also expresses preliminary views on the following three matters: (i) the applicability of existing tariffs, and requirements to file tariffs; (ii) the provision of 9-1-1 and enhanced 9-1-1 service, message relay service and privacy safeguards; and (iii) the applicability of the national contribution collection mechanism as introduced in Changes to the contribution regime, Decision CRTC 2000-745, 30 November 2000. Call for comments and Public Forum. The Commission invites written comments on its preliminary views provided in today's public notice, as well as on any other matters that may be pertinent to the regulatory framework for VoIP services. Those who wish merely to file written comments in this proceeding may do so by submitting their comments in writing to the Commission by April 28, 2004. Parties who wish to participate more fully in the proceeding must notify the Commission by April 16, 2004. They may file comments, copying all other parties, by April 28, 2004, take part in the public consultation to be held May 19-20, 2004 in Gatineau, Quebec, and file reply comments, copying all other parties, by May 28, 2004. Please read today's public notice for more information on how to participate in this proceeding. The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission is an independent public authority that regulates and supervises broadcasting and telecommunications in Canada. Reference document: Telecom Public Notice CRTC 2004-2 General Inquiries: Tel: (819) 997-0313, TDD: (819) 994-0423, Fax: (819) 994-0218 Toll-free # 1-877-249-CRTC (2782), eMail: info@crtc.gc.ca TDD - Toll-free # 1-877-909-2782 Copies of today's documents are available through our Internet site (http://www.crtc.gc.ca) or by contacting the public examination room of any CRTC office. These documents are available in alternative format upon request. ------------------------------ From: Paul A Lee Subject: Re: RJ11 Line 1/2 Splitter - Do These Still Exist? Date: Thu, 8 Apr 2004 14:58:39 -0400 Organization: Rite Aid Corporation In TELECOM Digest V23 #166, Alex wrote (in part): > Many years ago, I used to find the RJ11 splitters that > seperated the two pairs of lines into Line 1 and Line 2 for > dual-line phone jacks. > Does anyone know of a supplier that still produces or sells > these splitters? Allen Tel #AT267C-WE, about $4 at Graybar Electric, will break out the two lines on an RJ14 jack into two RJ11 jacks. Paul A Lee Voice: +1 717 730-8355 Sr Telecom Engineer [Voice & Transmission] Fax: +1 717 975-3789 Rite Aid Corporation, Telecomm, 30 Hunter Lane, Camp Hill, PA 17011-2410 ------------------------------ From: David S. Roland Subject: Re: RJ11 Line 1/2 Splitter - Do These Still Exist? Date: Thu, 08 Apr 2004 14:35:58 -0600 How many do you need? Alex wrote: > Hi all, > Many years ago, I used to find the RJ11 splitters that seperated the > two pairs of lines into Line 1 and Line 2 for dual-line phone jacks. > Now'days, I'm having trouble locating one. I've even talked to folks > from SBC and they say the splitters aren't common anymore and are hard > to find. > Does anyone know of a supplier that still produces or sells these > splitters? I'm not talking about a y-splitter where one analog line > is split to two, but one that physically splits the two pairs of > lines. > Thanks in advance. > Alex. <<---- Ask me about the (Rabbit) Residential Information Appliance ---->> Advanced Intelligent Networks Corporation Box 31195 Aurora, Co. 80041 Telecommunication Application and System Software Office: (720) 858-8200 ------------------------------ From: hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com (Jeff nor Lisa) Subject: Re: ACLU Suit (was Re: David Nelson) Date: 8 Apr 2004 10:34:30 -0700 Organization: http://groups.google.com Carl Moore wrote > I see a story today that the American Civil Liberties Union > has filed suit against the Transportation Security Administration > over "no-fly" list. Balancing civil liberties against public safety is always a tough call. I don't know where to draw the line. I believe, for example, that telephone calls (voice and data, including the Internet) ought to be sacrosanct and immune from monitoring from both government and private interests. But on the other hand, if the government had the power to monitor phone calls and used it to learn about and prevent 9/11, would it be worth it for the government to have that power? I think so. The FBI was once chastised for spying on anti-war groups. But, interestingly, people didn't seem to mind when they used the same tactics against KKK type groups. Preventing the murders and brutality of such groups is a good thing. And, some "peace groups" were quite violent -- blowing up buildings and killing people in the name of "peace". So where do we draw the line? How do we protect freedom and public safety at the same time? Sadly, a lot of people who venture an opinion on this subject have ulterior motives. Many advocates of "civil liberties" are actually interested in "freedom" to do subversive and destructive activities that will hurt others. They want to achieve their political objectives by shoving them down other people's thoughts. This applies to both the 'right' and 'left'. Many advocates of "public safety" have their economic or political agenda at work too. It's ironic had advocates of one position suddenly shift depending on the underlying issue. For example, some who usually applaud extreme "civil disobediance" suddenly object to it when it's practiced against abortion clinics (and vice versa). People tend to focus on the government, but the powers of the private sector are of interest, too. A major employer demanded and received the _home_ telephone records of its employees to search out leaks to a newspaper. Your employer can eavesdrop all he wants while you're at work. But should he be allowed to check up on your private life, too? ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 08 Apr 2004 17:06:40 +0000 (GMT) From: herber@dcdrjh.fnal.gov (Randolph J. Herber) Subject: Re: IBM System/360 40 Years Old Today Organization: Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory My first computer systems were IBM 7040, 7044, 7090, 7094 and 1401. After about a year, I encountered my first IBM System 360 machines and since then have have worked with most of the S/360 line (models 22, 30, 40, 44, 50, 62, 65, 67, 75, 85 and 91) and many of the S/370 and S/390 lines which are follow-on architectures. I have worked also on the RCA Spectra 70/45 with similar architecture and on many of the Amdahl machines from the V6 to the 5890 models which were capable of running the IBM S/360, S/370 and S/390 operating systems. In article , Jeff nor Lisa wrote: > It was 40 years ago today (4/7/64) that IBM announced its System/360 > line of mainframe computers, introducing an architecture still used > today and breaking new ground. > S/360 was built with the idea of teleprocessing and soon it was used > for considerable data communication. The Bell System's had a lot of > business from this, both dial-up and private lines. I don't think > S/360's precedessors, such as the 7090, did much teleprocessing except > in very specialized circumstances. The S/360 architecture of channels > and interupts worked well with teleprocessing requirements. The > growth of S/360 fueled Bell System work in modems and data > transmission. The IBM S/360 architecture is not well suited to character mode teleprocessing as the CPU cost for handling an I/O interrupt is quite high. TSS typically used about 10 000 instruction executions to handle an I/O interrupt and OS (yes, IBM named their flagship mainframe operating system simply 'Operating System,') typically required about 30,000 instruction executions to handle an I/O interrupt. This is why IBM teleprocessing on the IBM S/360 architecture machines has always used either block mode terminals such as the 3270 terminals or front-end communications processors such as the IBM 3705 to present to the mainframe processor character mode terminals such as for example the DEC VT100 the appearance of being block mode terminals. At AT&T Bell Labs, using both IBM and Amdahl mainframes, running AT&T UNIX/370, IBM AIX/370 and Amdahl UTS (all AT&T UNIX System 5 variants) and a number of communication processor types (IBM System 1, IBM 3705, Amdahl 4705, DEC PDP-8 and DEC PDP-11, sometimes with custom I/O cards), we (meaning AT&T, IBM and Amdahl and including I) spent considerable time, money and effort learning how to use character mode terminals with IBM S/360 architecture mainframes effectively, efficiently and economically in the UNIX mode of terminal I/O where each character typed might require central CPU action. It was not easy; it was solved. What the IBM mainframe architecture was, is and probably will continue to be good at is very high bandwidths to memory and I/O (both storage and communications), a truly general purpose instruction set and a very extensive set of operating systems, applications and libraries. As for the IBM 7040, 7044, 7090 and 7094 machines, which shared a similar but not common architecture, they actually were quite good at block mode I/O including communications and were commonly used by the US military for signal processing (of course, the DSPs of today are _much_ more capable as the 704x were about 500KIPS and about 250 KFLOPS and the 709x about double that). But, because they are word-oriented machines with word addressing, they are extremely poor at character processing. But, you still see today some artifacts of those machines, just as the size of the Hollerith tabulating cards' size was determine by the size of the US dollar note in the 1880's as they were designed for the 1890 US census. These machines had a 36-bit word size and a 6-bit character size (BCDIC (no E; that came with the IBM S/360 and its 8-bit character) and no lower case) which resulted in 6 characters per word. This caused the statement number field in Fortran to be 5 characters with the continuation character in the fixed, low-order position of that word and the card sequence number field starting in column 72 as these were also word boundaries. Similarly, many of the characteristics of COBOL derived from the architecture of the IBM 1401 which is a variable-length field, character-oriented machine. Instructions are variable length from 1 to 8 characters. The first character is the operation code following optionally by any combination of the following in the stated order: source address with indexing if implemented, destination address with index if implemented and a modifier character. There were rules for implied addresses if an instruction used an address or addresses and those addresses were not present. But, these machines were slow: each character processed, even the characters in the instructions, required 11 microseconds of CPU time. The machine could have 1 to 16 one thousand decimal character memory banks. > Today we take all the following for granted, but it was a major > technological and software achievement for IBM to achieve the > following features in 1964. Yes, it was. What made it such a success was this was the first architecture from IBM that was available with a very wide price and performance range were the vendor promised that if one wrote their programs to a certain not particularly difficult standard then the program would execute correctly across the entire range and where the architecture was reasonably good for I/O, numerical computation, data movement and character processing. It was one of the very first such architectures in the world. IBM received several surprises with these machines. Operating System proved to be much harder than they expected to write (at one time IBM had over 2000 programmers working on its development). They already shipped some machines to customers before they learned just how hard it was to write that operating system. This resulted in Basic Processing System, Tape Operating System and Disk Operating System before Operating System/PCP was sent to the customers. IBM at that time mostly leased their systems. They expected that the switch over to System 360 would occur as the leases on the older machines expired over a span of about five to seven years. The customers surprised IBM: they canceled their leases even with penalty clauses over about a 18 month span. To fund both the Operating System development, the lease turn-over and the expanded manufacturing of the new machines, IBM ``bet the company.'' They raised by various means about USD 4 000 000 000 at a time when IBM was worth about USD 7 000 000 000! If they could not pay off the loans and bonds, IBM would be bankrupt. IBM had to make it work! And, IBM did. The rest is history. > The success of S/360 and its successors in the marketplace made > computers a commonplace item in industry and government. The > principles of its architecture and operating system, described below, > were included in the PC. > S/360 had several advantages: > 1) A uniform machine for both science and business applications. > Science/engineering requires high speed numeric processing, typically > using fixed binary words. Business requires character manipulation, > typically using single alpha-numeric characters grouped in varying > lengths. Companies could now use a single machine to do both kinds of > work efficiently. The floating point arithmetic was designed so that the instructions could be emulated by an 8-bit microprocessor reasonably efficiently which meant that the number of different normalizing shifts had to be minimized. By using hexadecimal radix, this meant there would be only one shift size: 4 bits and the remainder would be character movements. This permitted a major increase in the dynamic range of the floating point number which addressed some problems from the IBM 7090 10**38 dynamic range. Two unfortunate results from that decision is a significantly reduced significance as a hidden bit could not be used and because on average two bits of the mantissa could not be used because of the hexidecimal normalization resulting 21 bits of significance instead for example the 25 bits of DEC VAX or IEEE 754 32 bit floating point numbers. But, IBM did implement later 128 bit floating point numbers and instructions using a pair of 64 bit floating point numbers. The System 360 Model 30 used a 8 bit microprocessor (about the size of two large US refrigerators) and an internal program to emulate the entire System 360 instruction set. > 2) A uniform machine for both large and small applications. To keep > hardware costs down, small machines had limited storage addressing and > command sets. The architecture of S/360 made it possible for > economical small machines to be sold that were compatible with large > machines. This meant as customers grew and required more powerful > computers, they need not rewrite their applications. No, specifically, except for such models as the 22 and the 44, all machines _could_ have all instructions. Some models had optional floating point instructions, for example. But, those models could have them! If the instructions were not implemented in microcode or hardware, then it was practical to accept illegal operation code interrupts for those instructions and emulate them in the operating system supervisor program. (Remember the Intel 80387 floating point unit and how it was emulated in some personal computers?) > 3) Hardware emulation of earlier computers. This allowed customers to > continue using older applications until they got around to converting > them. (Many never bothered to convert). The use of hardware > (microcode) emulation allowed the old applications to run faster on > the new machine without change. In particular, the IBM 7040, 7044, 7090, 7094, 1401 1410, 1460 and 7080 (a 1460 implementation using 7090 techology and having channels). > 4) Multi-tasking. Computer CPUs were extremely fast, much faster than > mechanical printers, disks, and tapes. S/360 allowed for several > programs to run at the same time, making more efficient use of the > machine's full resources. For example, on-line programs could run > while batch jobs were running. Multi-tasking required a sophisticated > hardware approach to keeping applications separate and serviced. Also, multi-processing (multiple CPUs) and large numbers of channels. The later models on which I worked could have and use 256 channels. > 5) A sophisticated operating system: While earlier machines had some > control programs, S/360 had sophisticated support services. Simple > machines had none. Program memory isolation, dynamic program loading and large memory models come to mind. > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I remember when Amoco credit card > phased out their manual accounting operation and went with S-360 > in 1964 or so. Geeze, forty years ago ... :( PAT] Randolph J. Herber, herber@dcdrjh.fnal.gov, +1 630 840 2966, CD/CDFTF PK-149F, Mail Stop 318, Fermilab, Kirk & Pine Rds., PO Box 500, Batavia, IL 60510-0500, USA. (Speaking for myself and not for US, US DOE, FNAL nor URA.) (Product, trade, or service marks herein belong to their respective owners.) ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 8 Apr 2004 13:54:40 -0400 From: Hank Karl Subject: Re: Missed Words and VOIP Organization: Nine-9s On Wed, 7 Apr 2004 17:43:14 -0400, Hank Karl wrote: > Hi Pat, > You wrote: >> [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I have a Cisco ATA-186 and there is >> *no way* to run it to the head of the line, when used with (either) a >> Linksys router or (my present) NetGear router. The Cisco simply has >> to take a position on the router, or maybe I could get another router >> or 'cable splitter' or something to shove it into the cable modem >> *first* then run the line to the NetGear with everything else (less >> the ATA). Should I conclude from what you are saying, that the >> Motorola TA has that condition as part of it, i.e. it feeds into the >> cable, then also feeds 'the other way' not only to the telephone >> instrument but also allows a 'pass through' to a router from there? >> That would be ideal, if all I had to do was swap TA boxes and >> re-arrange some wiring. PAT] > Yes, I suggest swapping TA boxes. The Motorola has two Ethernet > ports, one goes to your cable modem, the other to your router. > I don't think that putting the Cisco ATA before your router will do > much good, even if you could get two IP addresses from your ISP (one > for the router, the other for the Cisco ATA.) > See http://www.vonage.com/small_business/installation_multiple.php > Also see http://broadband.motorola.com/consumers/products/vt1000v/ > Hank Karl Eastern Regional Manager www.Nine-9s.com > +1 (203)207-0047 (v) Hank.Karl@Nine-9s.com > +1 (215)243-7320 (f) email my cellphone: page.Hank.Karl.2@Nine-9s.com > Representing: http://www.telchemy.com/ VQmon Voice over IP Quality > Monitoring software > http://www.telesoft-intl.com/ ISDN, T1 RBS, E1 R2 CAS, Frame Relay, > ML-PPP, X.25, > http://www.agoralabs.com/ elemedia(tm) H.323, Video Codecs, and Audio > Codecs http://www.tntss.com/ dynamicsoft(tm) SIP > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Well I do not intend to even ask for a > second IP address just to service the Vonage phone, since that would > cost me another fifty dollars per month, or more than double the > effective cost of my Vonage phone, and Cable One would not accept > 'next month free' coupons from Vonage, nor do they issue such things > on their own. If I find anyway in the various links which were given > here a couple issues ago about 'throttling' the other software when > Vonage wants to be there, or if somehow moving the ATA to the head of > the line makes a difference (like you, I cannot really imagine it > would unless the other things can be slowed down temporarily) then I > will do that. It is very rare I actually get incoming calls on Vonage, > and when I am going to make outgoing calls I can reach over to the Win > 98 and Win 95 and slow them down manually. Maybe I can get some sort > of 'cable splitter' (the Motorola TA perhaps?) and maybe the other > programs, while they splash and walk all over the internal LAN would > not do so on the cable itself. I really dunno now. PAT] Pat, I'm sorry if I wasn't clear enough. The Cisco and Motorola boxes are different. The Cisco is just a TA, and has one ethernet port which goes to a "downstream" port on your router. The Motorola TA is also a router. you put it between the cable box and your existing router. Its not exactly a "cable splitter". The router part of the Motorola TA should give priority to the traffic coming from its POTS ports. While the other programs will use as much bandwidth as they want, the Motorola TA should queue those messages up and give priority to the voice messages in the upstream direction. For example, if you send a file that takes a dozen or so 1500 byte IP packets over a 100baseT (or even 10baseT) connection from your PC to your Router to the Motorola TA, the Motorla TA should queue them up because your access link is limited to 500K upstream. When a voice packet is ready to go, it will be given priority and placed at the head of the queue (behind any other voice packet that may already be there). I don't know how they handle the downstream direction, but they have several options (like holding off on ACKs so downstream traffic is throttled.) I really recommend that you read this page: http://www.vonage.com/small_business/installation_multiple.php (note that AFIK you can't do this with the Cisco device). ------------------------------ From: Charles Cryderman Subject: Re: Wal-Mart Mix Up Balancing Credit Cards Date: Thu, 8 Apr 2004 14:43:57 -0400 In TELECOM Digest V23 #168 J Kelly inquired: > I'm curious about "blocking". Does anyone know what happens if I > call a hotel and reserve a room for sometime in the future, say six > months, and I use a debit card to guarantee the room, do they > generally block your card for the amount of that room? Or do they > not do anything with you card number until check in time. I only > have a debit card and I have an aversion to using it for hotel > reservations, but maybe I shouldn't be concerened about it. I have > used my PayPal debit card at check-in time and they blocked 5 days > worth of the room cost to it at that time. They did not unblock it > when I paid the total at the end of the week, only charged the final > amount. The blocked charge "falls off" the PayPal card after 10 > days if it isn't finalized by the merchant." I have tried to use a "debit card" to reserve a hotel room and retinal car and was told by both that banks do not permit "debit cards" to be used for those purposes. If you don't use a credit card they told me I couldn't have the reservations. Chip Cryderman [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I think your mistake here is when you talk to those people referring to your mode of payment as a 'debit card' instead of a 'credit card'. Instead, refer to your mode of payment as 'my VISA card' or 'Master Card' is . Since (when you are calling on the phone) they are not going to see the plastic or any logos on it, they won't know the difference. PAT] ------------------------------ From: John Bartley Date: Thu, 08 Apr 2004 11:53:04 -0800 Subject: Re: Livewire: When You've Got to Google Better, Ask an Expert This article only scratches the surface. The new Local Search at Google http://local.google.com When I enter BBQ and my zip code, it does find the best BBQ restaurant in town: Buster's Texas Style Barbecue (503) 652-1076 17833 SE McLoughlin Blvd Milwaukie, OR 97267 1.0 mi S - Directions It also lists, right next to that family restaurant: PORTLAND ESCORTS, ADULT GUIDE, ADULT ENTERTAINMENT ... Adult Help Wanted Wants YOU....! Post your Resume ... lovelyescorts.com - and more related pages. Lemme tell ya, Busters was underthrilled with their new virtual neighbor when I gave them a heads up. And, there is no reason for the adjacent listing, as that other 'enterprise' does not have a phyisical presence anywhere near Milwaukee ... it's in the next county up. On Thu, 8 Apr 2004 01:43:37 -0400, in comp.dcom.telecom wrote: > Livewire: When You've Got to Google Better, Ask an Expert > By Lisa Baertlein > SAN FRANCISCO, April 7 (Reuters) - When you search the Web, do you > find lots of information, but not the answer to your question? If so, > you're not alone. > Without a doubt, it has gotten much easier to tease the answers you > seek from the vast reaches of the Internet, but there is still plenty > of room for improvement. > For example, new local-search features on the major engines run by > Google Inc. and Yahoo Inc. (NASDAQ:YHOO) make it much easier for > people to find pertinent information about their favorite neighborhood > restaurant. > Still, users must know to narrow local searches by plugging in the > restaurant name along with a ZIP code or city and state. While such > searches often turn up less irrelevant noise than in the past, they > can still be clunky -- and at times deliver results about restaurants > thousands of miles away. > So how effective is Web searching? > - http://finance.lycos.com/home/news/story.asp?story=41030028 ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 08 Apr 2004 14:16:44 +0100 From: Miikka Kiprusoff Subject: Re: Radio Signals Reply-To: miikka@calgaryweb.net A list of AM radio stations in Calgary, Alberta: 660 - CFFR, "66-CFR" golden oldies 770 - CHQR, "QR77" all-talk 960 - CFAC, "The Fan 960" all-sports-talk 1010 - CBR, CBC Radio One 1060 - CKMX, "Great Music, Great Memories" 1140 - CHRB, community radio Which one of these blowtorches is the "very loud" rock station you speak of? I'm pretty sure neither CJAY nor CKIK or even CKIS ("Jack"), this city's "rock" stations, are making it all the way down to your neck of the woods, as they're FM stations. Of these, only CJAY would be considered "loud". On a trip to Scotland, I walked into a bed and breakfast that turned out to be owned by an ex-pat Calgarian. When I got there in early afternoon, he was listening, via the internet, to the morning show on CJAY. I walked in the door and the first thing I heard in this quaint bed and breakfast in Scotland was Gerry Forbes telling a fart joke. > Date: Wed, 7 Apr 2004 13:31:57 EDT > From: Carl Moore > Subject: Re: Radio Signals > Responding to a Nov. 2002 message: I have had cases where KYW > (Philadelphia news-radio, 1060 AM) got bounced to me in Michigan, > Ohio, West Virginia, and North Carolina. > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I've never heard KYW do that, but I do > on rare occassion get WLS (890 AM) from Chicago here in Independence > and I used to get KOA out of Denver a lot in Chicago. And when WAIT > (820 AM) in Chicago used to be a daytime only station, as soon as they > flipped the switch at night a station out of Toronto (CJ-something) > used to boom in almost every night. Here in Independence almost > nightly, in addition to KOA (Denver) we also hear some *very loud* > rock station out of Calgary, Alberta. We *used to get* WGN (720 AM) > out of Chicago here in Indy 24 hours it seems until the Cuban people > parked on that frequency and drove them away. Now 720 AM is just > heterodyne, 24 hours per day. Radio signals are funny creatures. [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: My recollection of hearing Calgary was about twenty years ago more or less. Have any of those stations changed their format in recent years? PAT] ------------------------------ TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of networks such as Compuserve and America On Line, Yahoo Groups, and other forums. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. 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