Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!samsung!usc!apple!bionet!hayes.ims.alaska.edu!accuvax.nwu.edu!nucsrl!telecom-request From: john@bovine.ati.com (John Higdon) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Ancient ANI Message-ID: <13860@accuvax.nwu.edu> Date: 21 Oct 90 07:06:22 GMT Sender: news@accuvax.nwu.edu Reply-To: John Higdon Organization: Green Hills and Cows Lines: 36 Approved: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 10, Issue 750, Message 9 of 9 The confusion over ANI persists. So you asked for it--a story (oh NO!). Back in the telecom dark ages (the year was 1960 and I was in high school), an insert came with the phone bill. It was an invitation to attend an open house sponsored by Pacific Telephone at the Central Office on Foxworthy Avenue in San Jose. Never missing an opportunity to see things telephonic, I showed up when the doors opened at 6:00 PM. At the time, the office was a small #5 crossbar facility with one marker group. In one area of the building was a windowed enclosure that contained very large reels of wide (a couple of inches) paper tape. Periodically, there would be some ka-chunking and one reel or another would move slightly. Holes were being punched in the tape. This was the heart of AMA, Automatic Message Accounting which was, as the guide put it, "the cash register of the office". All toll and long distance was being recorded on these tapes for later translation by the business office for billing purposes. The key element of this system was, as explained by the guide, -- ah but first picture the surroundings, then I'll tell you. Eisenhower was president, vacuum tubes were still king, and many areas of the country, if not most, had yet to even have DDD available. The inside of the office was a din of mechanical noises as the evening's residential traffic was being processed. And the key element of AMA? ANI -- Automatic Number Identification. No digital technology here. The first 1ESS was still undergoing testing back east. And yet the term "ANI" was uttered and explained by a Pacific Telephone employee. ANI is NOT Caller-ID. OK? John Higdon | P. O. Box 7648 | +1 408 723 1395 john@bovine.ati.com | San Jose, CA 95150 | M o o !