MAS.632 Conversational Computer Systems - MIT OpenCourseWare

242 VOICE COMMUHICATIOI WITH COMPUIERS
Except for the PBX, PX was a completely distributed environment. The connection
management decisions were made on individual workstations. Each
workstation implemented its own voice services and managed recorded voice
locally. In addition to the speaker built into the computer, the local telephone set
could be used as a speaker and microphone by the computer.
Phonetool is a telephone dialing tool that allows users to place calls from their
workstation; it was developed by Stephen Casner at the University of Southern
California's Information Sciences Institute. Phonetool runs under the Sunview
window system and uses a centralized telephone server to place calls. Phonetool
provides a pop-up speed-dial menu (see Figure 11.7), can redial the most recently
dialed number (which is displayed on the telephone icon), accepts numerical
input from the keyboard, and can dial a number displayed in another window
using mouse-based cut-and-paste interaction.
Phonetool places calls using a centralized server; a server is required because
of hardware interface limitations for access to the telephone switch (a Rolm PBX).
The server can place outgoing calls but it is not provisioned to receive them. Software
was written to allow a personal computer equipped with a special PBX
interface card and an Ethernet controller to function as a centralized server, i.e.,
Figure 11.7. Phonetool's speed dialing menu.
Courtesy of IEEE. © 1989 IEEE, used with permission.