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Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!cubsvax!wu1!rf
From: rf@wu1.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.flame
Subject: Re: Telecommunications and the Phone Com - (nf)
Message-ID: <234@wu1.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 11-Jan-84 14:24:55 EST
Article-I.D.: wu1.234
Posted: Wed Jan 11 14:24:55 1984
Date-Received: Fri, 13-Jan-84 06:45:12 EST
References: <4766@uiucdcs.UUCP>
Organization: Western Union Telegraph, Mahwah, NJ
Lines: 26

In the USA, the telephone companies are required only to meet
the standards set out in the tariffs they file with the Federal
Communications Commission and the state utility commissions.
Strangely, divestiture hasn't changed this, though all the
telcos are filing new tariffs.  ATT Comm. Serv. (formerly ATT
Long Lines) files one set of tariffs and each of the local
telcos (formerly ATT subsidiaries) file one.  The current
tariffs are on file with the FCC -- a letter to them is in order
if you're interested in legal details, but new tariffs are due
soon.

The existing tariffs contain few specifications relating to data
communications; the new ones are said to have more.  The tariffs
are in any event *minimum* standards; the various telcos have
"objectives."  These are set out in *Notes on the Network*
published by ATT.  The various transmission parameters affecting
datacomm performance are set in in Bell System Technical
Reference 41008, *Transmission Parameters Affecting Voiceband
Data Transmission -- Description of Parameters*.  Tech. Ref.
41009 describes the techniques used to measure these parameters.
For a 1971 measurements of transmission performance, refer to
Tech. Ref. 41005, *Data Communications Using the Switched
Telecommunications Network.*

				Randolph Fritz
				Western Union Telegraph