Return-Path: Received: by massis.lcs.mit.edu (8.7.4/NSCS-1.0S) id JAA05441; Tue, 4 Mar 1997 09:06:11 -0500 (EST) Date: Tue, 4 Mar 1997 09:06:11 -0500 (EST) From: ptownson@massis.lcs.mit.edu (TELECOM Digest Editor) Message-Id: <199703041406.JAA05441@massis.lcs.mit.edu> To: ptownson@massis.lcs.mit.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V17 #56 TELECOM Digest Tue, 4 Mar 97 09:05:00 EST Volume 17 : Issue 56 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Re: NH-NYNEX Rant of the Month (Blake Droke) Significance of Area Codes (Tad Cook) Re: Sprint, Contracts and Trustworthiness (Joel M. Hoffman) LAN/WAN Networking and Cabling Help (Peter Guenther) Re: NYNEX Confirms 646 For Manhattan (ulmo@q.net) 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 America On Line. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * ptownson@massis.lcs.mit.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: Post Office Box 4621 Skokie, IL USA 60076 Phone: 847-329-0571 Fax: 847-329-0572 ** Article submission address: ptownson@massis.lcs.mit.edu Our archives are located at hyperarchive.lcs.mit.edu. The URL is: http://hyperarchive.lcs.mit.edu/telecom-archives They can also be accessed using anonymous ftp: ftp hyperarchive.lcs.mit.edu/telecom-archives/archives (or use our mirror site: ftp ftp.epix.net/pub/telecom-archives) A third method is the Telecom Email Information Service: Send a note to tel-archives@massis.lcs.mit.edu to receive a help file for using this method or write me and ask for a copy of the help file for the Telecom Archives. ************************************************************************* * 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. 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Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Blake Droke Subject: Re: NH-NYNEX Rant of the Month Date: Mon, 03 Mar 1997 20:05:50 -0800 Organization: T-Net Reply-To: blaked@netten.net Dave Nye wrote: > Here's my NYNEX rant of the week ... three actually. > Get CTC to get NYNEX to install a FR line and 32 Centrex lines into a > POP location for us. They say, 45 business days, *grumblebitchmoan* > Okay says I. 45 business days go by, Saturday I wake up in a cold > sweat thinking that for some reason CTC and/or NYNEX forgot to put the > order in for the FR line ... even though I've checked with CTC > twice. Monday arrives, I get a call from the NYNEX tech; he's ready to > install the Centrex lines. I say great! I'll be right there. He > works on getting things done and I mention that the FR T-1 would be > installed today as well so he had to make room on our 100 pair cable > patch board, etc. He calls for me to check on the fate of the NYNEX > T-1 guy after a few hours of waiting, they don't have an order. Panic > sets in and I call CTC (Computer Telephone) and ask why the NYNEX guy > can't find a record of the order. He finally fesses up that he didn't > make the order, I go a tad balistic and tell him that this is only the > 6th POP we've done in a few months and we always get 32 centrex lines > and a FR link ... why did he think this was different??? Actually this sounds an awful lot like Bellsouth to me. If I place an order with Bellsouth, I sometimes ask them to put in a second order, just to fix whatever the screw up the first time around. Most orders I place are far more simple than yours, (Like, disconnect 1, one & only one line, or remove one simple feature from a group of lines). But simple only seems to make it worse. About two months ago, I did a traffic study and realized we could get by with one less line. I ordered them to disconnect the line. I called Bellsouth, and they said it would be disconnected the next day. One week later it was still working. I call again. They say they have no record of my disconnect notice, so I put in another order and say I won't pay for the line after the original disconnect date, they agreed. The next day, they disconnect the line. Maybe its my fault for not being specific enough, but I thought that when you have a line disconnected, that is in a hunt group, it should be understood that it should also be removed from the hunt group. (I know better now.) Well the line was disconnected, but if the lines before it were busy, the rolled over to the now disconnected line, with a recording of "We're sorry (yes they are), the number you've dialed has been disconnected. Well it wasn't a terrible disaster, because that line wasn't receiving many calls, but I still didn't want it to seem like we'd gone out of business if one did come in. So I call Bellsouth, the business office says its not their problem, call repair. I call repair, it takes 1.5 hrs to explain what is wrong. They say they'll check it out. Next day, I have a voice mail from Bellsouth repair saying they've fixed the hunt group problem. Great!!! (Ah, but you know they couldn't do right the 1st, 2nd or 3rd time.) What they'd done was remove and other ACTIVE lines from the hunt group, and left the disconnected line in the group. About 20% of our incoming calls were now getting the disconnected message when they call us. Well I call repair, scream yell, rant, etc. They say they don't see a problem, it looks right in the computer (Which it did), but I couldn't convince them that the CO wasn't right. Three days go by, I call BS repair and customer service once every hour. I finally get their attention. They make a change, they remove the disconnected line from the hunt group, totally rearrange the rest of the group. Now calls are routing to the wrong depts, but at least instead of a disconnect message, most callers just get a busy signal. So I call everyone at BS whose number I can find, scream, yell, rant, etc. Finally someone takes action and after a week the problem is resolved. They graciously offer $100 off our next months bill. How nice. It's not the money, I couldn't care less about $100. I don't want a credit, I want decent service. When your business relies on phone service, (and how many don't) you should be able to expect better than this. Competition is now available here in the Memphis area, but it will do me no good. Several companies said they'd give me better rates than Bellsouth, but since I'm in a unprofitable area of town, they won't run their on wires in, they'll re-sell BellSouth to me. Great, imagine the chaos the next time they screw up something, and I have to go through a middle man to Bellsouth, who won't care, because, I'm not really their customer. So for now, I'm stuck with them, and all I can hope for is a $100 credit. ------------------------------ Subject: Significance of Area Codes Date: Tue, 4 Mar 1997 00:06:54 PST From: tad@ssc.com (Tad Cook) The Orange County Register, Calif., Life on the Line Column By Stephen Lynch, The Orange County Register, Calif. Knight-Ridder/Tribune Business News Mar. 4--By 2001, California will have a mind-numbing 26 area codes, up from 13. Four years after that, it will probably have 30. The result sounds like an algebra problem: The `area' represented by 213, which once covered the Los Angeles basin, will be a mere three miles in diameter, an island in a gerrymandered sea of 818, 310, 562, 626 and 323. "The geographical significance of area codes is going away," acknowledges Bruce Bennett, the code administrator for the state. So it is that somewhere, in a war room straight out of "Dr. Strangelove," a dark-suited crowd is now discussing the future of telephone numbers. The Industry Numbering Committee, a group representing every major American telecommunications company, is thinking ahead to 2025, when, by some estimates, the one-plus-area-code-plus-seven-digit-numbering system we know and love will exhaust itself. This is bad news for people with bad memories. Proposed are 22 solutions, including 4-digit area codes or eight-digit phone numbers. "It's not too early to start talking about this," Bennett says. "We need to come up with a feasible plan." Surprisingly, telephone officials knew back in 1947 -- when the modern dialing system was first developed -- that this day would come. Before then, numbers were divided into "exchanges," two-digit codes that matched the name of a community. As phone use skyrocketed, officials designed a three-digit area code system to supplement exchanges, forever relegating songs such as "Pennsylvania 6-5000" to the realm of nostalgia. Taking into account population growth, but not the rise of cellular phones and modems, technicians estimated that the area code system would last 75 years. Even as telephone companies started using area codes with numbers other than 0 or 1 in the middle (the first was Illinois' 630, in January 1995), Bennett says that original prediction may still hold true. The INC is estimating how much it would cost to, say, bump up phone numbers to eight digits, expanding the cache of numbers and forever relegating songs such as "Jenny, Jenny (867-5309)" to the realm of nostalgia. Another proposal would divide the nation into eight regions, the number of which you would dial first. So instead of 1-714-555-7929, you'd dial 6-714-555-7929, with six being the region code for the Southwest. Under such a system, local calls would be a 10-digit dial, but the same area codes can be used in multiple regions. Slightly more radical is the idea of number portability. Individuals would be assigned a 10- or 11-digit phone number, much like a Social Security number, which would follow them around wherever they move. The problem, Bennett says, is that this takes "area" completely out of "area code," and people would be confused about how much each call would cost. "A significant change in billing would be needed," he says. "Like mailing a letter -- it's 32 cents whether you mail something across the street or across the nation." Of course, unpredictable factors could make this all irrelevant. Video phones, for instance, could use an addressing system similar to the Internet. You type, or speak, a person's name, and the computer interprets that as a numerical location and connects you. Or the International Telecommunications Union could set a global dialing standard, as they did with toll-free services last month (companies can now get an 800 number with 8 digits that works from about 20 different countries). Then again, such systems get unwieldy, as a recent ITU discussion illustrated. Because of its expanding phone bank, dialing Germany from another country can require punching 15 digits. Compared with that, California's calling outlook seems positively elementary. THE LINK To read about the North American Numbering Plan, the system that has governed the United States, Canada and the Caribbean since 1947, visit http://www.bellcore.com/NANP/ -- it includes a list of all area codes, new and old. The Industry Numbering Committee's home page is at http://www.atis.org/atis/clc/iccf/inc/inchom.htm ------------------------------ From: joel@exc.com (Joel M. Hoffman) Subject: Re: Sprint, Contracts and Trustworthiness Date: 2 Mar 1997 02:09:21 GMT Organization: Excelsior Computer Services > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: You are talking typical Sprint business > tactics. [...] Sprint's > attitude has always been that contracts apply to customers, not the > other way around. I've always been amazed that after the Free Friday > fiasco, where they bait-and-switched how many ever thousands of people > into changing their long distance service fraudulently that various > attorney's general did not get a cease and desist order against the > company and or start a class action lawsuit. Sprint is really getting The problem is that the courts won't touch it. Sprint has argued that the courts have no jurisdiction over FCC matters, and in the few cases where Sprint was sued, the judges threw the case out for lack of jurisdiction. But, and here's the catch, the FCC won't do anything either. I filed a complaint with the FCC, called them every Friday for 8 monhts, and finally got someone to look at the complaint. A month later, the FCC sent a complaint letter to Sprint. Sprint answered, "we have already addressed Mr. Hoffman's concerns." So the FCC sent me a letter than they were CLOSING THE CASE. After nine months! I didn't even have a chance to reply to Sprint! So it looks like Sprint is right. Its contracts only apply to us, not to them. Joel (joel@exc.com) [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Ask the FCC to order Sprint to supply more precise details on *how* they 'addressed your concerns.' I used the FCC rather successfully against MCI back in 1975-76 with MCI's early 'Execunet' service, but it did take a lot of correspondence. Sprint is hoping you will grow tired and give up. Show them otherwise. And remember, the one thing they do understand is money. Refuse to give them any. Keep a freeze on all accounts payable to Sprint. PAT] ------------------------------ From: Peter Guenther Subject: LAN/WAN Networking and Cabling Help Date: Sun, 02 Mar 1997 07:50:31 +1000 Organization: C3Plus/Andrew Boon Pty Ltd Reply-To: pguenther@h130.aone.net.au Andrew Boon Pty Ltd have just completed establishment of some new WWW pages to help network planners; architects and property services managers; corporate communications users and managers; schools; and people looking for leads and case studies on the latest technologies. In summary, the following have been provided:- http://www.andrewboon.com.au Home page, menu links to other pages and index outlining services offered http://www.andrewboon.com.au/html/BOONSCS1.html Structured Cabling System Starter Guide:- Provides guidelines for planning the establishment of a computer network using a structured cabling approach. Incorporates latest Australian standards, inter building link planning, Fast Ethernet, and system administration. Includes sample spec for simple jobs and budget guidelines. Has links to Web Sites with good structured cabling briefing data. http://www.andrewboon.com.au/images/100BaseT.GIF Fast Ethernet Topology diagram. http://www.andrewboon.com.au/html/COMBRIEF.html Provides a standard brief for communications services which can be used by "property services" type people when briefing architects or consultants. Use of the brief will ensure all site strategic and connectivity issues are addressed, not just the cabling of a building extension in isolation. http://www.andrewboon.com.au/html/Firesyst.html Case study of Tasmania Fire Service's new integrated touch screen telephone/radio multi region dispatch control system, featuring radio over compressed voice channels on frame relay. http://www.andrewboon.com.au/html/ISPguide.html Internet Starter Guide:- Choosing a modem, internet service provider and internet software can be less straightforward than it seems. This document covers a host of issues to be considered, without making any specific recommendations on ISP, software or hardware. Topics include registration, tariff plans, startup problems with software, billing problems, user identity issues, newsgroup filtering, newsfeeds, E-mail difficulties, and Web Page hosting. Primes readers on how to ask right questions and make informed decisions. http://www.andrewboon.com.au/html/LUXYHOME.html Planning considerations for audio visual and automation systems for luxury homes. http://www.andrewboon.com.au/html/CeBIT961.html http://www.andrewboon.com.au/html/CeBIT962.html http://www.andrewboon.com.au/html/CeBIT963.html http://www.andrewboon.com.au/html/CeBIT97.html http://www.andrewboon.com.au/html/CeBIT964.html Other pages linked to the home page give an extensive run down on communications and computer networking products seen at CeBIT 96 with a particular focus on advanced cabling products, ISDN, DECT, video/TV and TETRA; CeBIT 97 contact details, and a paper on German Telephone Network developments and CeBIT, highlighting unusual network features, outlining the road traffic information system, and providing an overview of the CeBIT trade fair. Peter Guenther, Senior Engineer Comms/Andrew Boon Pty Ltd Consulting Engineers PO Box 308, North Hobart TAS 7002, AUS. Ph +61 3 6224 8277 fax +61 3 6224 8150 Web Home Page:- http://www.andrewboon.com.au ------------------------------ From: ulmo@Q.Net Subject: Re: NYNEX Confirms 646 For Manhattan Date: Sat, 01 Mar 1997 18:55:59 -0500 Organization: PANIX Public Access Internet and Unix, NYC NYNEX is right in chosing overlays, both for the specific case of NYC and in general. I: * Grew up in the Greater San Francisco Bay Area (which includes a bay larger than it); crunches included 408 & 415, and recent splits included 415/510. * Lived in West Hollywood, a small city with two area codes: 310 and 213, and many nearby area codes including 818; both 310 and 818 were recent splits. * Live in Manhattan, which has 212, 718, and 917, both 718 and 917 being recent, one a split, one an overlay; I have had 212 and 917 nearly from the start. Opinions: - In the specific case of Manhattan and the surrounding islands, there is a unique advantage of very well understood, very well defined boundaries, both geographical and political, since there are large bodies of water and people who know damn well where the hell they are, and at any given moment. For this reason, the 212/718 split was not as horrible as it would have been if it were in any other area, e.g., Los Angeles, San Francisco, etc. (Even San Francisco doesn't have large bodies of people on islands.) However, the next useful split will not have this advantage at all: it would have to be far more similar to the disasterous splits that happened in Los Angeles (the worst of which is 213/310; what kind of boundary is "La Cienega" anyway? Perhaps "cienega" means something in Spanish that I don't know?? Like "Area Code Boundary", and I just didn't know it?) - Geographic area codes where you must know what area code you're in to call your own area code or another nearby area code are rediculously difficult to live with. NYNEX must in any case start to accept numbers dialed that start with the normal area code dialing sequence within the same area code. NYNEX seems to be behind most other local phone providers in this respect, including MFS Intelenet (an affiliate of WorldCom, according to a February 1997 letter I just received from WorldCom), and California's Pacific Bell. - Similarily, even when 1+area code is always allowed, the advantage of not having to dial the area code is outweighed by the difficulty of figuring out when you can if the difference is geographic, since knowing your location is extremely difficult (work, school, home, spouse, recreation, transportation, opera, etc. can all be in a different area code). This is compounded by the horrible expense of updating many existing numbers and the resulting legacy of non-updated numbers that are wrong. This difficulty also exists with overlays, however it is more likely that the posted number on the telephone will be correct, so the person may ascertain this efficiency more reliably. It can be argued that in the case where people haven't marked the phone # on the calling device that the geographic distinction is clearer, but from experience I can tell you it is very difficult to remember where one is at while making a cyber connection of any sort (audio, visual, or otherwise, including POTS). - The expense to everyone in geographic splits, is, as NYNEX points out, a HORRIBLE expense. I still run into lots of situations where 718 hasn't been properly applied to a phone number and this causes problems (718 split from 212 before I moved here). I never have problems with the 917 overlay of this type (except when someone pages me with a 7 digit telephone number, but they don't deserve a callback, and furthermore neither method fixes that problem in my experience). This is experiencial evidence. Similarities: = Both overlays and splits cause the user to have to either always dial 1+areacode or check the area code before dialing. = Both cause someone to start giving out area codes for all numbers where this was not previously necessary. The social circles of Manhattan simply are not so small that they can all fit within 7 digits any more; any geographic split will necessarily split nearly all social circles. Other items: + For a long, unforseable time, people and signs will still give out numbers without area codes and assume the original area code (in Manhattan, that would be 212); for instance, "The 6th precinct is 741-4811". This is ok so long as people know their history and don't assume that a 7 digit number can be dialed as a 7 digit number. Most cell phone users are already used to this, but the 70IQ 88yo grandma on prozac with an income in the poverty level that just gave up her rent controlled 3 bedroom original construction apartment at $250/month to move across town to an uncontrolled $1800/month poorly reconstructed falling apart smelly studio apt (i.e., this won't happen) in an area with a different prefix and had a new installation put in that didn't use existing lines or somehow was in the new area code might not think to dial the area code during an emergency; this is if she dialed the non-emergency number during an emergency (the emergency number here, like much if not all of the USA, is 911). A comparison in West Hollywood is a sign on/near Formosa Ave. in 1994 that said to dial the law enforcement at 289-something but doesn't include the area code: the area code on that street is 213, but that law enforcement # (services contracted out to the (county) sheriff actually) are in area code 310, west of city hall. Which reminds me, West Hollywood's city hall is in 213, right? Most of the entertainment businesses are in 310. Most confusing. To think of all those owners constantly dialing 1 2 1 3 x x x x x x x for a building that's 3 blocks down the street. Of course, most of the city council probably lives in 310 ... but their subordinates probably live in 213 ... never mind. Suffice it to say, an area code mess. + In an overlay, having a phone number in the "new area code" can be deemed both a credit risk, since you don't have an "established number", and a credit plus, since you have activity, perhaps that of the chic, or that of business at work. Witness +1-888: many businesses look worse or better because of it. One can always say, "Oh, I split my personal and business line, and my *insert qualifier* line got the new #." Who can argue that it is a difficult decision whether to alert personal or business contacts of a new number, with someone who has a large number of both or some who are one-way contacts? Compare this to a split, where one can have any long-established phone number suddenly categorized more by geographic classism and nuance, and little else. + There is such a significant number of disgruntled NYNEX customers that numbers in the new area code may actually be more attractive, meaning "no longer dealing with NYNEX", despite whatever realities may exist. In addition, these disgruntled customers will probably quickly fill a new area code, leaving "competition" arguments in the dust. This situation is unique to Manhattan as far as I can tell. However, MFSI has had enough rotten service so as to be comparable to NYNEX; whether competition lives up to being better than NYNEX is definately a big question (NYNEX as a behemoth only does "good enough"; sometimes "good enough" is down-right rotten, back when there was no competition and lots of BS; these days "good enough" may be much, much better to be able to compete). + Number exhaustion and new number requests come in so fast around here that people will quickly get used to the new area code, and protests of competition will be unfounded. This is in comparison to other areas. + Those who do as they're told and include area codes on all their numbers will not be hurt by an overlay, whereas those who are uncooperative and don't include their area codes will have a slight although not large problem. If there is a split, those who did the correct thing will be punished, and those who were ignorant, stupid, arrogant or otherwise annoyingly not doing what they were supposed to will be rewarded by being ahead of the game. That is simply not fair. Finally, last opinions: * Variable length dialing would have been a better plan from the very, very beginning, but when the fixed-length number with 3-digit area codes was designed, this was sort of trodden over by the silly waste in that second digit. * I get tired of internationally-accessible websites that don't take my phone number without my having to strip it; the format I use and my cellular phone company (OmniPoint) also can use is +1212xxxxxxx. ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V17 #56 *****************************