Received: by bu-cs.BU.EDU (5.58/4.7) id AA03802; Thu, 19 Jan 89 02:55:27 EST Message-Id: <8901190755.AA03802@bu-cs.BU.EDU> Date: Thu, 19 Jan 89 2:27:20 EST From: The Moderator Reply-To: TELECOM@bu-cs.BU.EDU Subject: TELECOM Digest V9 #20 To: TELECOM@bu-cs.bu.edu TELECOM Digest Thu, 19 Jan 89 2:27:20 EST Volume 9 : Issue 20 Today's Topics: Drastic errors in "Supplementary" article in V9#15 Re: Supplementary Code Numbers Re: Supplementary Code Numbers The Moderator Please Explain NT1U Boxes SL/IP over X.25 Re: 1+ dialing and new AC for SF Bay Area? Re: Fraudulent use of 900 #'s [Moderator's Note: In this issue of the Digest, The Moderator is expected to take his medicine like a man-child. Honest, I was just testing to see how much of this Digest you *actually read* every day! Regards issues 16 and 17, I assume everyone now has received them. P. Townson] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: covert%covert.DEC@decwrl.dec.com (John R. Covert) Date: 18 Jan 89 00:12 To: telecom@bu-cs.bu.edu Subject: Drastic errors in "Supplementary" article in V9#15 The article "Supplementary Code Numbers" which appeared in V9#15 was one of the most inaccurate articles I've seen in Telecom in its 9 volume history. Although it's true that X10 codes were used on the public network for TWX at one time in the past, not all of the codes shown in the article were ever used, nor were they in the places the article indicates. The X10 codes, and the associated equipment, have been completely removed from the U.S. public switched telephone network. Telenet's use of 909 within their public packet switch network has absolutely no impact on any current or future use of 909 on the public switched telephone network. The article pretends to discuss AUTOVON, but most of the description given is more applicable to FTS, the Federal Telecommunications System, than to AUTOVON, which is the military's network. The two networks are separate. FTS does use the same prefixes in the DC metro area for both on and off-net numbers, but Autovon doesn't. For example, the public network number for the Pentagon is 202 69x-xxxx, but the Autovon number is 22x-xxxx. All the 22x codes are assigned in 202 -- in fact 202 is almost completely full. And Autovon's internal use of area codes includes the use of "312" which has nothing to do with Chicago at all. >codes 210,211,310,311,400,500,511,600,711 and 811 will be next in line for >assignment. Wrong. At that point, we'll start using XX0 codes that are indistinguishable from NXXs, and 1+NPA+ dialing will be required on a nationwide basis. /john ------------------------------ From: goldstein%delni.DEC@decwrl.dec.com (Fred R. Goldstein dtn226-7388) Date: 18 Jan 89 09:08 To: telecom@bu-cs.bu.edu Subject: Re: Supplementary Code Numbers The recent posting about special "area codes" was, uh, rather less than stunningly accurate. Indeed it probably contained almost zero correct information! Please allow me to clarify. [lots of stuff about 410, 510, etc. and TWX deleted] Western Union's Telex II services do NOT use area codes! While the olde AT&T TWX did indeed use four NPAs, WUD has a separate network, using its own central offices. The service codes are an artifact, not part of the numbering plan! The only exception is 610, the Canadian code, which is still reserved in the North American Numbering Plan. (WUD does not serve Canada; the two networks aren't as fully separated up there.) >Telenet's data network uses conventional area code numbering in the way >its switches route calls. Again, there is a lot of telco central office >equipment tied up with hardwired connectons between Telenet and its customers >who have direct connect PADS, etc. Telenet also has gateways into telex and And Telenet has nothing to do with the telco numbering plan! They, like many other customers, lease private line facilities ("Special Access") from the local telcos. >TWX (or Telex II). 'Area Code' 909 is assigned for billing purposes to the >activities of Telenet. If you use the Telenet network, via indials or >whatever, that any connection of the form @C 909xxx is a connection to >the Telenet headquarters offices in Reston, VA. They do NOT have 909 reserved for them, nor does anyone else. Since 909 is vacant, it is often used for local purposes, but Telenet doesn't own it any more than Digital, Boston University or the Portal System!. (We had to use it to spoof some dumb PBXs that needed a "home area code", to handle on-net calling. 909 will be the last one assigned, so it was a logical choice.) All those codes are NOT assigned. 700, 800 and 900 are assigned. The Administrator of the North American Numbering Plan, a job currently assigned to Bellcore, will assign Service Access Codes 200, 300, 400, 500 and 600 as they see fit. They may be used for non-Local Exchange Carrier numbers. In particular, ISDN standards specify that telephone-style numbers can be used for data services as well, so data carriers like Telenet might be assigned prefix codes in 700, 900 or the vacant SACs for their customers. Re: Autovon, FTS, FTS-2000, etc. These are private networks, that again don't own public area codes. Calls from private networks like these to the public network typically use an area code, but that's a matter of local convention. The new FTS-2000 will have internally-assigned "area codes" to dial between the AT&T and Sprint portions. >When the present unassigned area codes of the conventional format have all >been used, sometime around 1992-1995, area codes 210,211,310,311,400,500,511, >600,711 and 811 will be next in line for assignment. No, while n10 may become available (except 610), n11 is reserved for special local functions (i.e., 911) and n00 is reserved for Service Access Codes (i.e., 800, 900). When area codes run out, new ones will be of the format nn0; i.e., they will assign Area Code 260. And the whole country will have 1+ dialing to disambiguate it. The definitive reference is, of course, the Blue Book (Notes on BOC Intra-LATA Networks, published by Bellcore). And the authority to change it nominally lies with the FCC and courts, but the sanctioned forum for reaching industry consensus is now ANSI T1S1.4. The numbering plan is not settled yet, since ISDN will require lots of non-LEC numbers to be made available to other carriers. fred ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 17 Jan 89 10:00:58 EST From: harvard!ima.ISC.COM!johnl (John R. Levine) To: telecom@bu-cs.BU.EDU Subject: Re: Supplementary Code Numbers Does anybody other than Telenet recognize area 909? And is Telenet's 950 number good for anything? Signed, Confused ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 18 Jan 89 08:46:31 PST From: HECTOR MYERSTON Subject: The Moderator To: telecom@bu-cs.bu.edu Cc: myerston@KL.SRI.COM Patrick Townson is a much more "activist" moderator than those in the past, more notes comments etc. Unfortunately the notes often contain quick, top-of-the-head reactions which are erroneous or incomplete. For example, the recent posting on Nevada Telephone Books is 100% accurate for Northern Nevada. However, the majority of phones in the state are in the Las Vegas area served by Centel which publishes a large, conventional phone book. On the other hand....Patrick is doing an outstanding job in getting the Newsletter out, a public service for which he deserves our gratitude and support. To paraphrase the outgoing president: "Moderate, but verify". :-) ------- ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 18 Jan 89 09:17:36 EST From: Jeff Spyker Subject: Please Explain NT1U boxes To: TELECOM@bu-cs.bu.edu We have recently become a test site for ISDN with Chesapeake and Potomac (Bell Atlantic) with the installation of an on-site optical remote module to a 5ESS at the CO. The installation of AT&T ISDN 7506 stations is proceeding with NT1U boxes on the wall. Here's the question.... besides the obvious two wire to four wire conversion...what else does this interface do? There are quite a few chips and support components inside to only do wire conversion. thanks. ------------------------------ From: To: pacbell!ames!comp-dcom-telecom@ames.arc.nasa.gov Date: Wed Jan 18 15:38:16 1989 Subject: SL/IP over X.25 Does anyone use SL/IP with X.25? Particularly, with PADs? It appears that the only way to put any TCP computer on any X.25 network is to rig up one or more serial lines between the computer (call it Fred) and the PAD (call it Paddy) in a "milking machine" arrangement, with Fred pretending to Paddy that Fred is one or more terminals, and Fred running a modified version of SL/IP through Paddy to other Fred/Paddy combos. Why would anyone do this? Well, unless you spend a VAST amount of money and time to get your X.25 board/machine combination certified around the world, you can't do wide-area TCP any other way in many countries like West Germany that have criminalized modems. Isn't there a SL/IP committee somewhere? Are they working on SL/IP II? Will it run over X.25? Jerry O. Merlaine pacbell.com!belltec!jom ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 18 Jan 89 10:21:41 EST From: Carl Moore (VLD/VMB) To: wales@cs.ucla.edu Cc: telecom@bu-cs.bu.edu Subject: Re: 1+ dialing and new AC for SF Bay Area? It might help to type in the text of that short MCI announcement. Requiring leading 1+ where you have been starting immediately with the area code could indicate that N0X/N1X prefixes are coming shortly. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 18 Jan 89 15:18:54 CST From: Will Martin -- AMXAL-RI To: telecom@bu-cs.bu.edu Subject: Re: Fraudulent use of 900 #'s Sharon Deetz of Southwestern Bell, St. Louis, writes: >Now exactly who do you think ends up paying for telephone fraud???? >The telephone company. When a teenager runs up $2,000 in 900# calls >and the parents complain, the phone company ends up footing the bill... (By the way, Hi, There! I can look out my office window and see the 1010 Pine SWBell building -- I'm in the building at Tucker & Olive, 14th floor, 2 blocks away from you! This note is probably going to travel about 3000 miles before you see it! :-) The thing about these 900 and 976-number charges is that the telephone company does NOT have to pay for them. First off, the charges are totally artificial -- there is no relationship between the charge for the call and the cost to provide the service. So to say that someone ran up "$2,000" in calls may actually mean that the teenager made two hundred calls, each billed at $10, but which cost the telco maybe 2 cents each in actual expended resources [wear and tear on the relays, using up some electrons in the wires or photons in the fiber cables, whatever... :-)]. The rest of the charge for the call is made up of the amortized assignment of a portion of the telco's overhead and of various development and suchlike costs being recovered on a per-call basis. Add to that the totally arbitrary charge the telco just turns over to the provider of the 900 or 976 service; this probably has even less of a relationship to real costs than the telco's charge for the call! Secondly, when a customer refuses to pay for these 900 or 976 calls, the telco can turn around and just not pay that service-provider that amount, deducting it from the payments made the next month to that company or individual. That is, given the example cited, the telco just cancels the $2000 billing, and then turns around and subtracts $2000 from the $50,000 it was to pay "Dial-A-Porn" or whatever it was the next month, and pays them only $48,000. (Agreed, actually they would deduct only the amount that would have been paid to the service provider, maybe 75% of the $2000 or whatever... details... :-) In any case, though, the telco is NOT out any really noticeable amount of money. It is all just bookkeeping and the juggling of figures. Regards, Will Martin ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest *********************