Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!accuvax.nwu.edu!nucsrl!telecom-request From: Will Martin Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: User Control of Feature(s) Message-ID: <1974@accuvax.nwu.edu> Date: 8 Dec 89 15:36:23 GMT Sender: news@accuvax.nwu.edu Organization: TELECOM Digest Lines: 84 Approved: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 9, Issue 561, message 3 of 5 Another nice-to-have telecom capability, which can be added to the "wishlist" of features the telcos should offer, is dynamic user control of hunting and rotaries. When I am in the office alone, I should be able to turn off the rotary so that only one incoming call can hit at one time. Any others should get a busy signal. That is preferable to them getting a ring that isn't answered, if I am tied up on the preceeding call. You will note that this is just the opposite philosophy from "call-waiting", which assumes that later callers have the right to interrupt earlier ones. My opinion is just the reverse -- the first caller has priority and later callers should wait their turn. It might be that some local PBX or in-house telecom system does offer this sort of user control. Right now, we are on Centrex and do not have that capablity, as far as I can determine. You can get something almost like what I am thinking of with call-forwarding by forwarding (to a perpetual busy) any of the calls that arrive at the second number in the rotary. I would prefer a simple user-available command which, when entered from the first number in the group, would shut down the rotary to the next one. Another simple command would enable it again. You wouldn't have to enter the number (the next one in the rotary) in any case. [Are "hunt group" and "rotary" two terms for the same thing, or are they different? The recently-distributed "glossary" implies they are the same by defining only "rotary hunt". I'm using them as synonyms here.] I get the impression that this and a host of other improvements to the telecom system are not available due to a basic difference in design philosophy between me (and other reasonable sane people) and the telcos. :-) This might be something like the difference between computer systems like UNIX (which ironically was engendered in Bell Labs originally) and systems like IBM OS's. One puts maximum control in the user's hands, while the other limits the user capability much more and vests control in a separate administrator. Since the telcos want to charge you for eveyrhing possible, they tend to the latter approach, making sure you have to go through them for all sorts of minor changes, which they can then bill for. Obviously, this approach is why the aftermarket in-house telecom system is such a popular item now that deregulation has made it possible. However, I get the impression (not being terribly familiar with such products) that most of these systems merely move the administration functions down from the telco's offices to a little tin god within the business itself, as opposed to moving all possible control (while still keeping security and accountability in mind) down to the user him/herself. In my mind, the ideal system would let an administrator set things up and make changes, etc., for those customers who don't want to do it themselves, but the system would also let the user do things on their own that are now restricted to "superuser" types. For example, an office would have a specified group of telephone numbers and the users within that office, when entering system commands from an instrument with one of those numbers, could do things like set up their own preference for rotary hunting, enable/disable functions like call-forwarding or call-waiting, shift the intercom functions and reassign numbers to other instruments, etc. They couldn't affect other offices' numbers or instruments, except for such limited things as making one the destination for call-forwarding. To shift things between offices would require a "superuser" type to be involved, but intraoffice changes wouldn't require the administrator. Doing things like establishing a hunt sequence would require more effort by the user initially, but the system should remember such things and let them then be switched on and off by minimal-length commands entered directly from an affected instrument by anyone inside that office. Are there any systems on the market that incorporate this sort of design philosophy? I'd be interested in reading about any that do so, or even approach this attitude. We are going to be moving to a new office building in the near future, and part of that transition is a leap to a new, non-telco in-house telecom system. Unfortunately, I am sure it will not provide anywhere near the level of user-friendliness that I described above. (Being a GSA low-bidder system, I will be amazed if it works at all... :-) Regards, Will [Moderator's Note: Actually, part of the 'wishlist' was resolved some time back here in Chicago. Illinois Bell offers 'Centrex Mate' (?) which is a sort of do-it-yourself service representative thing. From a terminal, you connect with the IBT computer and make service changes yourself. This option is only available to centrex customers. PT]