My new phone with TeleVantage
Posted by Michael Dale on Mon, 06 Dec 2004 8:23 PMToday at work I setup my new phone (yes I now have a private phone number at work, how cool). Now this might not sound all that interesting but oh it is!
They use a system called TeleVantage which is a software-based business phone system (PBX). You install a piece of software on your computer which gives you complete control over the way your phone works.
You can record incoming calls (“This call maybe recorded for training purposes”), set your status to away so your pre-recorded message is played. You can do conference calls by simply dragging a contact to the program window.
You can even setup rules so you can make certain phone numbers automatically go to messages or transfer them to another line.
The whole thing is digital and is very cool, although it isn’t VoIP.
All the phone calls are aggregated at the central server and then travel over an ISDN connection, which is currently 10 multilinked connections that can be easily upgraded if needed (this is only used for the phone system, the internet is separate).
So over all it is a very cool system, plus it is easy to use (and if you feel like it the phone works like a normal old phone too).
Features etc can be found here: http://www.artisoft.com/prodtvphonesystemsoverview.html
Oh!!! And it's cool to hear you're new job is going well :)
Wow, snazzy. Does your computer talk to the aggregator, or have you got a direct link to the phone? /me doesn't quite understand how it works... sounds funky, though :)
Ah you have two connections. The phone uses either a standard RJ12 or RJ45 connector and plugs into the patch panel which then connects to the server.
The server is also connected to the local network, so your computer talks to the server which then talks to the phone.
You don't need to have your computer on to use the phone, it just adds all the extra features.
Yep, that makes sense... I just wasn't sure if you had an RS232 link to the phone or something, which then spoke to the server, or if your computer spoke to the server which does most of the functionality (which would make more sense in retrospect, given phones shouldn't have to be overly intelligent).
Yeah the system is pretty cool. It works with any old telephone, no new stuff is needed.
SACS uses a similar system - what a great idea!!!
Hands up if you love communication engineering! *puts hand up*