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From: uucp@ut-sally.UUCP.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom
Subject: Submission for comp-dcom-telecom
Message-ID: <8705160006.AA19272@sally.utexas.edu>
Date: Fri, 15-May-87 20:06:25 EDT
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Posted: Fri May 15 20:06:25 1987
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Path: ut-sally!utah-cs!utah-gr!uplherc!nrc-ut!nrcvax!ihm
From: ihm@nrcvax.UUCP (Ian H. Merritt)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom
Subject: Re: where has everyone gone and other stuff
Message-ID: <914@nrcvax.UUCP>
Date: 14 May 87 19:13:54 GMT
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Reply-To: ihm@minnie.UUCP (Ian Merritt)
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Organization: The Frobboz Magic Telecommunications Equipment Co., Inc.
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>
>
>*** line eater biscuit ***

A rubber biscuit?

>
>There has been some talk in this group lately about the need for
>adding more digits to the public phone numbers because we will soon
>run out of unused numbers. So, I was thinking about how the phone
>system is handled here at the big 'B' and came up with some
>questions and comments:
>
>Background; Most all the phones in the company are on pbx or
>            centrex, with more going to pbx everyday.
>
	.
	.
	.

>So, one of my questions is, " How many other companies have there
>phone networks setup in a similar way? If the answer is 'lots', then
>it would seem that there's a good case to make these 'semi-private'
>networks truely private and in the process, free up a lot of numbers
>in the public network.

The answer is 'Lots'.

>
>So how would people on the public network call people on a private
>network? Well, one way that comes to mind is to run the private
>network like many small and medium companies run there phone systems;
>( many small firms with a pbx, a single number on the public network
>is called that gets an operator at the company and then tells the
>operator to whom they wish to speak.)

>This could work the same way a large company as follows:
>There would be a few access numbers (seven digit) allocated in the
>public network to get onto the private network. From there, a
>special dial tone or recorded message could instruct the caller to
>enter additional digits that would then ring through to the person
>they with to talk to. The big hole I see in this sort of thing is
>that it would work great for me calling on my tone phone connected
>to an ECO. However, there may be serious problems if someone were to
>call from say New York state where the COE might be some old
>cross-bar type thing and the instrument a rotory dial type.

Such systems are already in use.  If you are interested in seeing one,
call 818-701-3000.  What is called an 'automated attendent system' is
in use there at Valley Cable TV.  I think they are running a ROLM
system.  The solution to the problem you mentioned is that the system
connects an operator if it doesn't hear any digits with some time
after completing its message.  You can Touch-tone over any part of the
message if you already know the answer and don't want to wait for the
rest.  Rotary customers are going away anyway; pretty soon the
[dis]service will likely no longer be offered.  The only problem with
this vs. centrex or DID (Direct Inward Dialing) is that answer
supervision is returned on initial connect, before you ring your
target party.  With the latter two systems, you don't pay unless
somebody answers the target extension.

>
>And even if such a system could be set in place, would the savings
>in numbers on the public network be enough? Or would all the
>available numbers still be used up soon anyway?

This would delay the issue by a substantial amount of time.  It would
be (is) worthwhile, and it is underway.  I don't think, however, that
it will ever be a total replacement for Centrex and DID, and as such
it will not have quite as profound an effect on the availability of
numbers.

There is quite a bit of number-space left in an as-yet untapped, but
planned scheme of using area-codes of the NNX form, i.e. no longer
restricting them to N0X/N1X format as they have traditionally been.
This was planned even before they started using N0X/N1X for local
prefixes, first in LA, then NY and Chicago.

>
>Some of you in the know might comment further on this...


And so I have...
				Cheerz--
						--i