Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!netsys!vector!telecom-gateway From: comcon!roy@uunet.uu.net (Alaska's leading Cyberpunnk) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: Buggy lines Message-ID: Date: 9 Jul 89 09:41:52 GMT Sender: news@vector.Dallas.TX.US Organization: Computer Connection Lines: 32 Approved: telecom-request@vector.dallas.tx.us X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@vector.dallas.tx.us X-TELECOM-Digest: volume 9, issue 228, message 4 of 7 In article , claris!wet!epsilon @ames.arc.nasa.gov writes: > I have one of those GE multiline phones with the line-monitoring > LEDs; each day around 0200 (the exact time varies) they flicker > briefly. (415-337) Counting RENs? :-) > > -=EPS=- That's the ESS switch running diagnostics on your line. Several years ago, just after deregulation, I bought onne of those El Cheapo Profundo 1-piece phones at a grocery store. I plugged it, and dutifully called the PhoneCo office to report my FCC registration number. The woman didn't have any idea why I would want to tell her such a thing, but she agreed to copy it down and forward it to somebody Generally in Charge of A Lot of Things. The very next day, I heard someone banging about behind the apartment, and looked out to see a telephone man working in the box outside. I picked up the phone, and there was no dial tone, so I asked him if he had disconnected my phone. He told me he unhooked it to check the line, because the "computer said you had some trouble out here"... seems the little tortured-cricket ringer doesn't couple to the line the same way a coil does, and it makes your phonne pair appear unterminated _and_ of uneven length(!?) Oh, he did hook it back up....:-) Roy M. Silvernail Sub-Arctic Programmer-at-large UUCP: uunet!comcon!roy (spif sig Real Soon Now) [my account, my opinions]