Return-Path: Received: by massis.lcs.mit.edu (8.7.4/NSCS-1.0S) id IAA03567; Thu, 1 May 1997 08:23:27 -0400 (EDT) Date: Thu, 1 May 1997 08:23:27 -0400 (EDT) From: editor@telecom-digest.org Message-Id: <199705011223.IAA03567@massis.lcs.mit.edu> To: ptownson Subject: TELECOM Digest V17 #106 TELECOM Digest Thu, 1 May 97 08:23:00 EDT Volume 17 : Issue 106 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Re: Where Are the Numbers? (Fred R. Goldstein) Re: Where Are the Numbers? (John Rice) Re: Where Are the Numbers? (nwdirect@netcom.com) Re: Where Are the Numbers? (Anthony S. Pelliccio) Re: Where Are the Numbers? (Brian Wohlgemuth) Re: Where Are the Numbers? (Steve Ligett) Re: Where Are the Numbers? (Stanley Cline) Re: Where Are the Numbers? (John Dearing) Re: Where Are the Numbers? (John R. Levine) Re: Where Are the Numbers? (Greg Monti) 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: * subscriptions@telecom-digest.org * 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: 847-727-5427 Fax: 773-539-4630 ** Article submission address: editor@telecom-digest.org ** Our archives are available for your review/research. The URL is: http://telecom-digest.org (WWW/http only!) 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Your help is important and appreciated. A suggested donation of twenty dollars per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above. 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: fgoldstein@bbn.|nospam.|com (Fred R. Goldstein) Subject: Re: Where Are the Numbers? Date: 30 Apr 1997 15:58:25 GMT Organization: BBN Corp. In article , nwdirect@netcom.com says ... > How can they force the issue? Very simply. Charge the current prices > to do it this way and quadruple the price if they want to hog an > entire prefix. The problem now is that the telcos are practically > giving the prefixes away. I heard that anyone can have an entire > prefix for around $10,000 a month, a dollar a number. At those rates > it is easy to pay for an entire prefix. You overestimate the price. NYNEX/MA used to charge $29/month per hundred numbers. Now it's $1/month, or $100/month for an entire prefix! Don't ask me why or whose idea that was. However, you don't have to get numbers from them; any certificated CLEC can order up prefices too, as can Radio Common Carriers (pagers, cellphones, etc.). > With the proliferation of new phone companies, each taking several > prefixes and using just a very small portion of the prefixes assigned > to them will just exacerbate the problem. The way we are going now it > is quite possible that we could exhaust all the available area codes > within the next 11 years. We need a federal law or FCC ruling to stop > this insanity before it is too late. The current system is wasteful because it requires a separate prefix for each carrier in each exchange area (rate center). This could be fixed by allowing *shared* prefix codes, wherein each block-of-1000 numbers could be assigned to a different CLEC. This would require an upgrade of tandem-switch (and probably some local CO) software, but wouldn't generally affect billing. A much worse proposal was to have each CLEC split one prefix among multiple exchanges; that would affect billing software EVERYWHERE. Related: The whole "overlay" "fairness" thing is temporary: With number portability, a CLEC's clients could take their "Bell" numbers to the CLEC switch. So 7-digit dialing in an overlay area would be nondiscriminatory; the "overlay" NPA would be hidden. Of course the CLECs would need to be able to get their non-bulk-number subscribers some numbers in the old NPA, but some of these could be reserved for them. I therefore think the FCC screwed up this one, applying a 1997 rule to the long term. Fred R. Goldstein k1io fgoldstein"at"bbn.com BBN Corp., Cambridge MA USA +1 617 873 3850 Opinions are mine alone; sharing requires permission. ------------------------------ From: rice@SPAMBLOCKR.ttd.teradyne.com (John Rice) Subject: Re: Where Are the Numbers? Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 19:16:04 GMT Organization: Teradyne Telecommunications > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Something I have also wondered about is > why all the lines in a hunt group on a switchboard (or any multi-line > phone for that matter) have to have actual, dialable numbers assigned > to them. It seems like a waste of numbers for a switchboard with > thirty or forty incoming trunks on it to have a number for each trunk. > Usually people just dial into the first line. Couldn't quite a few > numbers in each area code be salvaged in that way, by making the back > lines in a hunt group just be 'circuits' which were hunted down as > needed? Give them non-dialable numbers like 012-3456. PAT] They don't. Most of the newer digital switches allow rotaries to have only a pilot number. I've run into this in GTD-5s and others. You'll see evidence of this on Caller-Id, sometimes. However, some telcos assign discrete numbers to all lines of the rotary, anyway, to facilitate testing when line problems are reported, and to use for automated line testing equipment. ------------------------------ From: nwdirect@netcom.com Subject: Re: Where Are the Numbers? Organization: Netcom On-Line Services Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 21:11:19 GMT Greg Monti (gmonti@mindspring.com) wrote: > Also, each time a new phone company starts up in an area, whether it > is a landline company, a new competitor, a cellular or PCS company, it > must be assigned a block of numbers, usually 10,000 numbers (one > prefix) to begin serving its customers. So, here we are in Spearfish, > with maybe 500 access lines connected to the 307-643 central office. > And two cellular carriers move in and want blocks of numbers. The A > and B carriers have 100 customers each. And they also have one prefix > apiece. So the small town has 3 prefixes (30,000 numbers) serving 700 > paying customers. Tough. That's just the way it is. Why can't they just be given 1,000 numbers and not necessarily in a block? With computers these days a company can easily keep track of their number inventory. There is no need for them to have a contiguous block. With the crisis we have today we need to change some of our thinking and the way we do things. A town with one prefix and 500 customers should NEVER get another prefix, never ever, unless that prefix has no more usable numbers. When we stop wasting what we have the problem will resolve itself. >> And yet Florida has 10 [area codes] and says they need more??! > Don't forget, BellSouth is not the only phone company in Florida. It > does not serve the boom-towns of Tampa-St Pete (which are GTE), or > Fort Myers Naples (served by Sprint) or Tallahasse (I forget who > serves them). There are plenty of other companies serving Florida, > too, all of which are outside of the 6 million lines counted by > BellSouth. Tallahassee is served by GTE. But it doesn't matter which company serves a particular rate area if there is only one. The problem is when there is more than one. Then the waste begins. Let us take another scenario. In large metro areas it is expected that more than 100 companies will set up to compete. That is at least 100 new prefixes under the current lunacy. Since each metro area generally has more than one rate area, they will need one prefix for each rate area. If they have six or more rate areas one or more splits are automatic. Here is the killer though: Usage is NOT increasing at all (or only a little). Waste IS! Is anyone in the industry awake? I think not! Having one split now and another one in three years is not necessary, period. * Internet Access Providers - Web Presense Providers - BBSes * * http://www.thedirectory.org/ - largest directory on the web * * tens of thousands of listings - over 7,500 Access Providers * * Telephone Prefix Locations - "The BBS Corner" - Web Banner Creation * ------------------------------ From: kd1nr@anomaly.ideamation.com (Anthony S. Pelliccio) Subject: Re: Where Are the Numbers? Date: 30 Apr 1997 15:57:37 -0400 Organization: Ideamation, Inc. In article , Telecom Moderator wrote: > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I would think area code 401 serving > Rhode Island is mostly wasted. Certainly quite a few exchanges are > in use there, but I'll bet there are lots and lots of unused numbers. > Ditto 406 for Montana and 208 for Idaho. Is there any reason the > entire North American continent has to stay as a group in country > code 1? In reality 401 is filling up nicely with enough space for future expansion. By your reasoning you'd give away what capacity we have left and then when we NEED it, we're screwed. I do agree with loaning some of 401 to the southeast part of MA though. Hell, we just ought to annex the Attleboro's. Tony Pelliccio, KD1NR kd1nr@anomaly.ideamation.com Boston has the combat zone, Providence *IS* an erogenous zone. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 30 Apr 97 10:54:16 EST From: Brian Wohlgemuth Subject: Re: Where Are the Numbers? > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Something I have also wondered about is > why all the lines in a hunt group on a switchboard (or any multi-line > phone for that matter) have to have actual, dialable numbers assigned > to them.] One reason why telcos assign TN's to every line in a Hunt Group is for billing purposes. If "Customer A" has 10 lines in hunt coming into his office, he might use the last few lines to make outgoing calls, and therefore, billing would need to be assigned to those TN's. On a PBX, however, TN's are assigned in the CO to ring through on each of the trunks to the customers premises. The TN's reside in the software, and are dedicated to the customers PBX. Some of these PBX's buy groups of up to 10,000 numbers, but rarely use more than 30%-50% of them. Brian Wohlgemuth brian.wohlgemuth@telops.gte.com Business Sales Consultant GTE Telephone Operations ------------------------------ From: steve.ligett@Dartmouth.EDU (Steve Ligett) Subject: Re: Where Are the Numbers? Date: 30 Apr 1997 15:33:42 GMT Organization: steve.ligett@dartmouth.edu > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Something I have also wondered about is > why all the lines in a hunt group on a switchboard (or any multi-line > phone for that matter) have to have actual, dialable numbers assigned > to them. It seems like a waste of numbers for a switchboard with > thirty or forty incoming trunks on it to have a number for each trunk. > Usually people just dial into the first line. Couldn't quite a few > numbers in each area code be salvaged in that way, by making the back > lines in a hunt group just be 'circuits' which were hunted down as > needed? Give them non-dialable numbers like 012-3456. PAT] We have a hunt group of 150 modems. We "publish" three numbers in that hunt group for users to use. However, at about 4 a.m. each day, we have a computer dial each of the 150 lines as part of our maintenance procedures. If modems, etc., never failed, we wouldn't need those phone numbers (and my life would be much simpler). ------------------------------ From: roamer1@RemoveThis.pobox.com (Stanley Cline) Subject: Re: Where Are the Numbers? Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 19:34:12 GMT Organization: An antonym for Chaos Reply-To: roamer1@RemoveThis.pobox.com On Tue, 29 Apr 1997 00:38:48 -0400, in comp.dcom.telecom Greg Monti wrote: > Without exception, all 307-643 numbers MUST be in the Spearfish > central office (or in a rural switching office which is connected to This isn't always true. I've seen (usually *adjacent*) COs share the same NXX -- for example, town A gets NXX-[1000 to 4999] and B gets NXX-[5000 to 99999]. > and within about 10 miles of) it. Even if all of the numbers in > 307-643 cannot be used because the population of the area is not large > enough, those numbers cannot be used anywhere else. This cannot be If the ratecenters are adjacent or have become remotes of another CO, I don't see any reason why NXX-sharing could not be done. In fact, in Ringgold, GA which had three NXXs serving different areas of the Ringgold Telephone service area, after the three small COs wer cut over to a single DMS-100, the same three NXXs now can serve *anywhere* in the Ringgold Telephone area -- all calls are rated/routed from the location of the DMS, not the old COs and now remotes! > Also, each time a new phone company starts up in an area, whether it > is a landline company, a new competitor, a cellular or PCS company, it > must be assigned a block of numbers, usually 10,000 numbers (one Wireless carriers don't always get a whole NXX in less populated areas -- they often get a block of numbers in an existing NXX. For example: Cellular carrier wants to serve Copper Basin, TN (there is no B-side service there.) They wouldn't have to get a whole new NXX; they could simply get a block of numbers in 423-496 [or 706-492 or 704-494 which are also local and inside any cellular coverage] (assuming a contiguous block were available, of course.) In general, cellular numbers act like RCF lines or PBX DIDs, in that calls to those numbers *forward* to a port on the wireless MTSO which may be 200 miles away! > Fort Myers Naples (served by Sprint) or Tallahasse (I forget who > serves them). There are plenty of other companies serving Florida, Sprint serves the entire Tallahassee LATA. > too, all of which are outside of the 6 million lines counted by > BellSouth. I'm sure BellSouth didn't count all the NXXs used by CLECs (Intermedia, MFS, etc.), wireless carriers (BellSouth *Mobility*, ATTWS, GTE Mobilnet, 360, US Cellular, Palmer, etc.), paging companies, the BellSouth-reserved 780/203/930* NXXs, and the like. (*780=BellSouth internal, 203=ZipConnect, 930=UniServ) The biggest number-wasters -- without a doubt -- are paging companies and CLECs. Not all of them -- just some of them. Stanley Cline (Roamer1 on IRC) ** GO BRAVES! GO VOLS! CLLI MRTTGAMA42G NPA 770 ** scline(at)mindspring.com mailto:roamer1(at)pobox.com ** http://www.pobox.com/~roamer1/ From/Reply-To may be changed -- NO SPAM! http://spam.abuse.net/spam/ ------------------------------ From: jdearing@netaxs.com (John Dearing) Subject: Re: Where Are the Numbers? Date: 1 May 1997 02:08:22 GMT Organization: Philadelphia's Complete Internet Provider Our esteemed Moderator opined: > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Something I have also wondered about is > why all the lines in a hunt group on a switchboard (or any multi-line > phone for that matter) have to have actual, dialable numbers assigned > to them. It seems like a waste of numbers for a switchboard with > thirty or forty incoming trunks on it to have a number for each trunk. > Usually people just dial into the first line. Couldn't quite a few > numbers in each area code be salvaged in that way, by making the back > lines in a hunt group just be 'circuits' which were hunted down as > needed? Give them non-dialable numbers like 012-3456. PAT] I believe what you are talking about are called "Coded Terminals". You have a single published number say 222-1234 which has multiple "terminals" and can accept as many incoming (or outgoing) calls as there are terminals. It's frequently used for Telethon-like applications where you have a bunch of people all calling the same number. In a similar vein, I have also wondered why each outgoing trunk attached to a PBX almost always has an individual phone number. I have seen a (very) few sites that had just a single number for the outbound trunks with each trunk identified with a "terminal" number, ter-1 ter-2, etc. In these cases nobody is going to be calling these numbers anyway, they're just for outgoing calls and usually aren't connected to equipment that is expecting an incoming call anyway. Just think of all the thousands and thousands of numbers that could be recouped. John Dearing : Philadelphia Area Computer Society IBM SIG President Email : jdearing@netaxs.com U.S.Snail : 46 Oxford Drive, Langhorne PA 19047 (USA) Voice Phone : +1.215.757.8803 (after 5pm Eastern) [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: It is true as some writers have pointed out that the 'back lines' occassionally need to be addressed directly for trouble testing purposes, etc however this testing can also be done with a 'line simulator' type device. You plug in the line in question to this device and can ring it and do everything a 'true' incoming call can do. One thing telco might consider is having a surcharge for multiple lines in a hunt group which require actual numbers to be assigned. When new service is installed, telco could offer some discount if 'actual telephone numbers do not need to be assigned to the hunt lines'. It would be a decision by the customer. PAT] ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 30 Apr 97 16:09 EDT From: johnl@iecc.com (John R. Levine) Subject: Re: Where Are the Numbers? Organization: I.E.C.C., Trumansburg, N.Y. > prefix) to begin serving its customers. So, here we are in Spearfish, > with maybe 500 access lines connected to the 307-643 central office. > And two cellular carriers move in and want blocks of numbers. The A > and B carriers have 100 customers each. And they also have one prefix > apiece. So the small town has 3 prefixes (30,000 numbers) serving 700 > paying customers. Tough. That's just the way it is. Actually, most cellular carriers hook up to the network as PBXes, not as central offices, so cell carriers can and do use blocks of numbers from regular exchanges. My cell number here is in 607-279, an Ithaca landline exchange, and when I had a Vermont cellular number, it was in 802-296, a White River Junction landline prefix. This caused some trouble setting up my long distance service, since at the IXC I chose, the cellular department sent me to the landline department, and vice versa. (Solution: pick another IXC with more clues and lower rates.) CAPs are indeed gobbling separate prefixes, since their switches are all set up to be peers with the incumbent telco's switches. I've heard a proposal to modify phone routing in dense areas so the call can be routed by seven digits rather than six, e.g. 555-1XXX could be MCI, 555-2XXX could be AT&T, and 555-3XXX could be MFS, all at the same billing point so it wouldn't break the billing software, and only relatively nearby switches and tandems that routed to that prefix would have to know to do something strange. It probably won't happen, since it's not all that much easier than full portability which is already mandated. John R. Levine, IECC, POB 640 Trumansburg NY 14886 +1 607 387 6869 johnl@iecc.com, Village Trustee and Sewer Commissioner, http://iecc.com/johnl, Finger for PGP key, f'print = 3A 5B D0 3F D9 A0 6A A4 2D AC 1E 9E A6 36 A3 47 ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 23:59:17 -0400 From: gmonti@mindspring.com (Greg Monti) Subject: Re: Where Are the Numbers? At 04:09 PM 4/30/97 EDT, John R. Levine wrote: > Actually, most cellular carriers hook up to the network as PBXes, not > as central offices, so cell carriers can and do use blocks of numbers > from regular exchanges. I guess I exaggerated a little on the Spearfish, Wyoming example. In smaller towns, cellular often shares a block of numbers with the landline carrier. In any place with significant population, those blocks are 10,000 numbers (whole prefixes). > CAPs are indeed gobbling separate prefixes, since their switches are all > set up to be peers with the incumbent telco's switches. I think ultimatly, cellular and beeper companies will also want their switches to be peers, not subordinate to landline switches. In larger cities, I assume they already are. > I've heard a proposal to modify phone routing in dense areas so the > call can be routed by 7 digits rather than six, e.g. 555-1XXX could be > MCI, 555-2XXX could be AT&T, and 555-3XXX could be MFS, all at the > same billing point so it wouldn't break the billing software, and only > relatively nearby switches and tandems that routed to that prefix > would have to know to do something strange. > It probably won't happen, since it's not all that much easier than > full portability which is already mandated. Hmmm. Thanks for the update. Greg Monti Jersey City, New Jersey, USA gmonti@mindspring.com ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V17 #106 ******************************