TELECOM Digest Thu, 16 Jun 94 03:29:00 CDT Volume 14 : Issue 293 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Re: Optical to Electrical Converters Wanted (Paul A. Lee) Re: Optical to Electrical Converters Wanted (David Kirsch) Re: v.35 (T1) Board for Linux Available Soon (Jan Allbright) Re: Calling Number ID for Cellular Users (John Gilbert) Re: Demand Linux Support for v.35 (56kb - T1) Interface! (Morten Reistad) Re: Cell One/Boston <-> Manchester/Nashua New Connection (John R. Covert) Re: Nine Track IBM Standard Labels (Tony Harminc) Re: Average Data Speed of Wire Telegraphy Wanted (Wes Leatherock) Re: Calling Card Suggestion (Garrett Wollman) Re: AT&T Mail to Charge for Internet Reception in Canada (Danny Burstein) Re: Pointers Wanted to TDD Specifications Please (Jon Sreekanth) Re: Information WANS Requested (Richard Layman) Re: New Player in the 800 Game (Doug McDonald) Re: Pac Bell's "ISDN Anywhere" (Pete Farmer) Re: International Callback Services (Gene Retske) Re: Can I Use Deactivated Cellular Phones For Emergency Calls? (B. Roberts) Internet Access in France - State of the Art (Jean-Bernard Condat) TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of public service systems and networks including Compuserve and GEnie. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available at no charge to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu * The Digest is edited, published and compilation-copyrighted by Patrick Townson of Skokie, Illinois USA. You can reach us by postal mail, fax or phone at: 9457-D Niles Center Road Skokie, IL USA 60076 Phone: 708-329-0571 Fax: 708-329-0572 ** Article submission address only: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu ** Our archives are located at lcs.mit.edu and are available by using anonymous ftp. The archives can also be accessed using our email information service. For a copy of a helpful file explaining how to use the information service, just ask. ************************************************************************* * TELECOM Digest is partially funded by a grant from the * * International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in Geneva, Switzerland * * under the aegis of its Telecom Information Exchange Services (TIES) * * project. Views expressed herein should not be construed as represent-* * ing views of the ITU. * ************************************************************************* Additionally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help is important and appreciated. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Paul A. Lee Subject: Optical to Electrical Converters Wanted Date: Thu, 16 Jun 1994 04:00:00 GMT Organization: Woolworth Corporation In TELECOM Digest Volume 14 Issue 282, Carl Silva wrote: > ...who provides optical to electrical converters? Try contacting the following firms: Opticom Corporation 5505 Morehouse Drive, #150 San Diego, CA 92121 619 450-0143 619 450-0155 FAX Math Associates Inc. 5500 New Horizons Boulevard Amityville, NY 11701 516 226-8950 516 226-8966 FAX Optelecom 9300 Gaither Road Gaithersburg, MD 20877 301 840-2121 301 948-6357 FAX Please note that I am simply aware of the product lines of these firms; I don't have any direct experience with them or their products. Paul A. Lee Voice 414 357-1409 Telecommunications Analyst FAX 414 357-1450 Woolworth Corporation CompuServe 70353,566 INTERNET ------------------------------ From: dkirsch@coolhand.East.Sun.COM (David Kirsch - SunNetworks Manager) Subject: Re: Optical to Electrical Converters Wanted Date: 15 Jun 1994 15:28:35 GMT Organization: Sun Microsystems, Inc. Reply-To: dkirsch@coolhand.East.Sun.COM You might try Canoga Perkins ... they have some of these type products. 21012 Lassen St. Chatsworth, CA 91311 818.718.6300 Try Paul Stennes, VP Sales/Marketing David K. ------------------------------ From: jallbrig@hpindda.cup.hp.com (Jan Allbright) Subject: Re: v.35 (T1) Board for Linux Available Soon Date: 16 Jun 1994 07:05:54 GMT Organization: Information Networks Division: Hewlett Packard Humm ... I thought T1 ran at 1.544 Mbps ... ------------------------------ From: johng@ecs.comm.mot.com (John Gilbert) Subject: Re: Calling Number ID for Cellular Users Organization: Motorola, LMPS Date: Thu, 16 Jun 1994 00:51:27 GMT In article , Lynne Gregg wrote: > Steve, I like the way you think! McCaw operations will start offering > Calling Number ID Service to its Digital cellular subscribers > beginning in September. When Digital was launched by Cellular One in > New York, Calling Number ID was heralded as one of several enhanced > services to come. Caller ID service is among several services that have been available to analog subscribers on narrow band AMPS (NAMPS) systems since 1991. See the April 1991 issue of {Communications} magazine for more on NAMPS. John Gilbert johng@ecs.comm.mot.com KA4JMC ------------------------------ From: mrr@Hadrian.Boers.no (Morten Reistad) Subject: Re: Demand Linux Support for v.35 (56kb - T1) Interface! Date: 16 Jun 1994 01:47:56 +0200 Organization: OBI A/S Personal employee account In article kruckenb@sal.cs.utah.edu (Joseph Kruckenberg) writes: > [Soapbox on] > Over the past few days, I've been in discussion with a company called > SDL (sdl@world.std.com) which builds a v.35 board for the PC. [clip] > you let them know of your interest. Now that gated has been ported to > Linux, Linux is a very viable alternative to the traditional > computer/router gateway. With a v.35 interface, you could achieve > speeds of 56kb up to 3Mb/sec (with their dual-port version), while > still keeping your costs below a few thousand dollars (the SDL boards > are priced at about $550) by avoiding the purchase of a router. Wow. What is so special about a synchronous, plain V.35 card? Why does it have to cost as much as the rest of the PC? All the cards I have seen are fully equipped with a processor requiring downloaded code; roms and what have you. The complexity of this is not much greater than a vanilla asynch board for a PC. OK, you have to pull forward a few extra pins and make an ugly cable for V.35, but the card should not require more than a USRT and some driver chips. After all; rather braindamaged ethernet cards run just fine at twice this speed over a plain ISA bus. And a plain sync card just has to push frames, no CSMA, transceiver, etc. These things should cost $50, not $550. Have a nice day! ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 15 Jun 94 09:02:33 EDT From: John R. Covert 15-Jun-1994 0854 Subject: Re: Cell One/Boston <-> Manchester/Nashua New Connection DREUBEN@EAGLE.WESLEYAN.EDU wrote: > I think the Manchester 00445 system in New Hampshire is also linked up > now, although the serivce was so poor I couldn't really try it. I know > that hitting *28 or *29 got me dead air for two seconds, and then the > switch hung up on me, as it if were processing the call but just > didn't want to send confirmation tones back to me. Previously, this > used to get an error recording. This just started working, with fits and starts. On the days on which *28 did not return a confirmation tone, it was not working. It started working for the first time about three weeks ago on Friday, did not work all the following week until that Friday, and then was broken again the following week for a few days but has been working since. The connection, for now, is actually only Boston->Nashua/Manchester. It is no longer possible to call a Boston customer roaming in New Hampshire via the Merrimack roamer port (345-ROAM). What seems to happen if the Boston phone is active in NH is that the roamer port goes on-hook after the number is dialled. Customer service claims this will always be the case now; it will be necessary to send all calls via Boston. /john ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 15 Jun 94 15:21:57 EDT From: Tony Harminc Subject: Re: Nine Track IBM Standard Labels aoj@access3.digex.net (aaronjones) wrote: > I'm trying to deal with Bell Canada's SYGMA (Bell's Computer Systems > Group) to exchange information on 9-track magnetic tapes. They > require that the tapes that we ship to them have (drum roll please) ... > "Standard IBM Labels" > Bell SYGMA has said that we should contact IBM for the format of these > labels. I've tried to do so and failed most miserably (sigh). I did > get to talk to a rather large number of nice people at IBM, but > unfortunately none of them were able to help me. The "official" answer is that you need a copy of the IBM publication commonly called "Tape Labels". There are several editions for the various operating systems, but the basic information in all of them is the same. A fairly recent version is "MVS/ESA Magnetic Tape Labels and File Structure Administration", publication number SC26-4511. Any IBM office should be happy to order you a copy for an appropriately outrageous price, or -- if someone is in a good mood -- copy the few relevant pages. Now it may be that you are facing a bureaucratic rather than a technical problem at Bell, and there may therefore be a bureaucratic response. It is perfectly valid not to have labels on an IBM tape. This is often loosely called "label type NL" (i.e. No Labels). So if you ship your tape to Bell, with the specifications (on paper) that it has Label Type NL, LRECL (Logical Record Length) ll (where ll is the (fixed) length of each record), BLKSIZE bb (where bb is the size of physical blocks the records are grouped into), plus the actual layout of data within each record, then you may be OK with no labels. There are operational reasons why their life is easier if you do have standard labels, so you might want to write them anyway. They are quite simple, 80-byte records. Tony Harminc ------------------------------ From: Wes.Leatherock@tranquil.nova.com (Wes Leatherock) Date: 15 Jun 94 09:52:14 -0600 Subject: Re: Average Data Speed of Wire Telegraphy Wanted Organization: Fidonet Quoting nduehr@netcom.com (Nathan N. Duehr): Quoting wes@oubbs.telecom.uoknor.edu (Wes Leatherock): WL> Press operators were, I think probably the elite of operators WL> sending in the wire telegraph days. Perhaps those working for WL> brokerage wire houses could also put in a claim to this, but WL> I'm not sufficiently familiar with them to be able to judge. nd> Don't forget the railroad ops ... they had their fair share of nd> traffic as well! I certainly didn't mean to ignore them. They were generally outstanding operators and most of them were very fast and exceptional under pressure. But I'm not sure they had the steady, continuous stream of traffic that press and probably wire house operators had. You're probably better informed on this than I am, and I'd be interested in knowing more. Wes Leatherock wes.leatherock@tranquil.nova.com wes@oubbs.telecom.uoknor.edu ------------------------------ From: wollman@ginger.lcs.mit.edu (Garrett Wollman) Subject: Re: Calling Card Suggestion Date: 15 Jun 1994 22:31:35 GMT Organization: MIT Laboratory for Computer Science In article , Carl Oppedahl wrote: > Huh? I memorize my card number. Then it does not matter what is or > is not written on it since I don't carry the card. Why would any one > carry the card around? Well, since you asked ... I don't often have a need to use my calling card, as I am very rarely away from a free phone in circumstances where I actually would /want/ to make a phone call. So, I have a calling card account mainly for security -- that is to say, I keep the account because some day I might get lost in darkest Somerville and want to call a cab to bring me back into civilization. Under these circumstances, I'm not likely to remember the number, since I never use it, and those circumstances in which I'm likely to need it are precisely the ones that would send my memory on the fritz. Furthermore, there are a lot of people (of which I am one) who simply are unable to memorize numbers except as a process of using them. For example, when I lived in Vermont, I at one time had a calling card number ending in 2644. I can tell you that now not because I memorized the number (indeed, I don't even remember which phone it was attached to), but because I remember the hand motions involved in dialing it. (That's how I remember all of those numbers which I actually use regularly.) Garrett A. Wollman wollman@lcs.mit.edu ------------------------------ From: dannyb@panix.com (danny burstein) Subject: Re: AT&T Mail to Charge for Internet Reception in Canada Date: 15 Jun 1994 09:40:22 -0400 [good article/bad news piece about how ATT Mail in Canada will soon start charging for -reciept- of internet mail deleted] I've been waiting for this shoe to drop. I've been a long-time customer of a competitor of theirs here in the US (not on this account, but a different address) and expect it to happen there anyday. This other system charges only for the -sending- of msgs with -no- online time fee, and no charge for receiving msgs. They also have an 800 number for logging in (at no fee). In the old days, when their system was a standalone, this made sense since any message you read was paid for by -someone- on their system. But once the internet gateway came about, all bets were off. So currently it is possible to pay just the annual fee ($25) and log in, via an 800 number, and get hours of email reading/day. Obviously at some point they will have to do something ... dannyb@panix.com (or dburstein@mcimail.com) ------------------------------ From: jon_sree@world.std.com (Jon Sreekanth) Subject: Re: Pointers Wanted to TDD Specifications Please Date: Thu, 16 Jun 1994 05:55:37 GMT In article josephc@cco.caltech.edu (Joseph Chiu) writes: > After looking through various journals and computer-rags (all the way > back to mid-80's!), and looking around at FAQ's and such, I'm still > stumped in my search for technical information on TDD's. The closest thing to an official TDD spec is an older draft standard by EIA. Here is an excerpt of a letter from TIA: May 16, 1988. In 1981, the EIA Engineering Committee TR41 undertook the writing of a voluntary industry standard for telecomm devices for the deaf. ... As commercial interest in these devices has diminshed, we now find ourselves in a situation where only two manufacturers remain in the market, and they seem unwilling or unable to agree on the terms of the standard. .. Accordingly, ... (TR41) voted to abandon PN 1663 and directed me to place the existing document Draft 9 in the public domain ... EIA and its successor organizations will no longer maintain this draft, but will continue to make copies available to qualified persons and organizations for a reasonable period of time ... -------------- So the summary is: Telecommunications Industry Association, TIA, at 202-457-4936 can provide PN 1663, Draft 9, if you ask nicely. Jon Sreekanth Assabet Valley Microsystems, Inc. Fax and PC products 5 Walden St #3, Cambridge, MA 02140 (617) 876-8019 jon_sree@world.std.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 16 Jun 1994 00:50:09 EDT From: Richard Layman Subject: Re: Information WANS Requested Matthew Scott Weisberg had a query about linking city government agencies in a WAN. Here are some suggestions for resources. Public Technology Inc. is a technical consulting group for local governments. It is a nonprofit group created by the National League of Cities, the Intl. City/County Management Assn., and the National Assn. of Counties. They provide assistance to local governments on telecommun- ications, cable, computing, utilities and other issues. They are at: 1301 Pennsylvania Ave. NW, Washington, DC 20004, 202-626-2400. Another option to consider besides an RBOC is the local cable company. I have read articles in publications concerning local government about this. I think San Jose may have used a cable company for such a project. {Governing Magazine} runs a column on information technology and a yearly feature on leading telecommunications-computing projects in government. {Government Technology}, based in Sacramento, is a monthly tabloid (similar to {NetworkWorld}) for local and state government IT/telecom peopole and may be a good resource as well. Richard Layman, Marketing Director, Computer Television Network rlayman@cap.gwu.edu ------------------------------ From: mcdonald@aries.scs.uiuc.edu (Doug McDonald) Subject: Re: New Player in the 800 Game Date: Wed, 15 Jun 1994 15:27:10 GMT Organization: UIUC In article telecom@eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Digest Editor) writes: > I had a very pleasant conversation earlier today with Steve Betterly > about a new 800 service available to small and medium size users. Sounds interesting and perhaps popular. That brings up the question: what happens when 800 fills up? Will they just add 820, 830, 840, etc? Doug McDonald [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I don't know what they will do. Has anyone yet announced the code to be used when 800 runs out of space? PAT] ------------------------------ From: petef@well.com (Pete Farmer) Subject: Re: Pac Bell's "ISDN Anywhere" Date: Wed, 15 Jun 1994 17:54:43 -0800 Organization: Tetherless Access Ltd. In article hardiman@cbnewst.att.com writes: > PacBell runs an ISDN BBS. > 510-277-1037 for pokey old modems. > 510-823-4888 for speedy new BRI or SDS 56/64K access Pac Bell also has a gopher server: gw.pacbell.com I think this has much of the same information that's on their BBS. Peter J. Farmer Internet: petef@well.com VP, Marketing Voice: 415-321-5968 Tetherless Access Ltd. Fax: 415-321-5048 ------------------------------ From: gretske@delphi.com Subject: Re: International Callback Services Date: Wed, 15 Jun 94 22:36:01 -0500 Organization: Delphi (info@delphi.com email, 800-695-4005 voice) As info, my company, Transglobal Telecom, has recently begun offering "non code calling" calback type services. If we can be of assistance, call me at 800-633-3882. Gene Retske ------------------------------ From: bruce.roberts@greatesc.com (Bruce Roberts) Subject: Can I Use Deactivated Cellular Phones For Emergency Calls? Date: Wed, 15 Jun 1994 10:41:00 GMT Organization: The Great Escape - Gardena, CA - (310) 676-3534 John R. Covert writes CC> Remember that in some areas 911 is STRICTLY reserved for life-and-death CC> emergencies. Los Angeles is particularly strict about enforcing this, I'm CC> told. In Massachusetts, 911 or *SP from cellular doesn't go to 911, Cellular 911 calls in Los Angeles (at least on AirTouch [PacTel]) go to a special, cellular/mobile phone operator who will take traffic problems and up. We have this number (which I can't recall at the moment) programmed into the auto-dialer on our Amateur Radio repeater/phone patch because they deal very well with half duplex radio calls and "yes, I'll give you my number and, yes, I know it doesn't even come close to matching the number you have in your 911 database" conversations. They will take information and pass it on or connect you with any police department, fire department or the California Highway Patrol. An excellent service in my humble opinion. TTFN -br- Bruce Roberts, bruce.roberts@greatesc.com * RM 1.3 01036 * Redundancy is prohibitively disallowed again. ------------------------------ From: cccf@altern.com (cccf) Subject: Internet Access in France - State of the Art Date: Thu, 16 Jun 94 7:46:56 GMT INTERNET IN FRANCE For a long time, I dream to have an Internet address. For an US guy, it's easy to answer to this request. For me, France-born teenager, I must have a friend that give me an email box on the computer of a rich university. At this time, a lot of controls stop like a solution. The second solution is to access via my free videotex terminal called Minitel on a gatheway connected to an UUCP or Internet node. The cost is between FF 1.25 (for 3615 Internet) and FF 9.46 (for 3619 USnet) per minute ... but for email and news only. Some videotex services don't like ftpmail requests or more than 520-caracters messages (like 3617 Email) and refuse sending my mails :-8 The third solution is to buy a commercial access: MCIMail have an "experimental connection with Internet" at this time; AT&T give you an address in Netherlands and CompuServe ask for my parent's MasterCard number :-] Some good associations (like French Data Network, Fnet or Frmug) send me a little package with a good service, but the guys that don't live in Paris paid a lot of money for an incredibly expensive phone call (FF 0.73 all 12 seconds) to access to the service. The only solution is 3619 USnet (a joke developed by Intelmatique, a subsidiary of France Telecom that gives you a user-ID on Delphi domain), the really crazy Audiotel service called FranceNet (that stop the service all 20 minutes), the last baby born today and called World-net or, at least, the uncredible 3619 Inet that give you an email box on "on101"-domain in the USA. Internet is a real *problem* at this time in France, not a solution. This message cost me FF 25.00 to be send to you. A little expensive, no? Listing of (Un-)useful Addresses Altern (3616) Valentin Lacambre, 29 rue de Cotte, 75012 Paris Tel.: (1) 42 79 81 38 Email: sysop@altern.com Calvacom (RCI-Calvacom) 175 rue J.-J. Rousseau, 92138 Issy-les-Moulineaux Cedex Tel.: (1) 41 08 11 00, Fax: (1) 41 08 11 99 Email: rci1@calvacom.fr CompuServe Centre Atria, Rueil 2000, 92566 Rueil Malmat, 92410 Ville d'Avray Tel.: (1) 47 50 62 48, Fax: (1) 47 50 62 93 Email: sales@teaser.com EUnet France SA 52 av. de la Grande Armee, 75017 Paris Tel.: (1) 53 81 60 60, Fax: (1) 45 74 52 79 Acc}s Utopia: (1) 39 63 50 22 ou NUA 17827026961 Email: contactne@rain.fr USNet (3619) Intelmatique SA, 16-18 rue du Dome, 92300 Boulogne- Billancourt Tel.: (1) 47 61 47 61, Fax: (1) 46 21 22 40 Email: jperd@delphi.com World-NET SCT, 20 av. Daguerre, 77500 Chelles Tel.: (1) 60 20 85 14, 3617 SCT, Fax: (1) 64 21 65 35 Email: info@World-net.sct.fr Jean-Bernard Condat, General Secretary hc, Chaos Computer Club France Internet: condat@altern.com [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Yes, I know it is expensive for you to participate in this Digest, which is one of the reasons I always appreciate hearing from you with news from France. Perhaps someday things will improve for you there. In the meantime, do the best you can to stay in touch with us. PAT] ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V14 #293 ******************************