The THC Hack/Phreak Archives: PCVMB.TXT (241 lines) Note: I did not write any of these textfiles. They are being posted from the archive as a public service only - any copyrights belong to the authors. See the footer for important information. ========================================================================== From: ccampbel@dsd.es.com (Colin Campbell) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: Voice Response Technology Organization: Evans & Sutherland Computer Corp., Salt Lake City, UT Reply-To: ccampbel@dsd.es.com (Colin Campbell) In article I wrote: > I am looking for smaller scale hardware that would enable me to write > a voice response application similar to phone registration systems > used by universities or account query systems used by banks and credit > card companies. Here is a summary of the responses I received: Date: Mon, 16 Dec 91 10:16:04 EST From: David Wood The Autovox call processing system includes a full "application generation" programming language along with integration with Paradox databases. It is PC-based. This might be what you are looking for. Contact: Liberty Communications (412)221-8810 Ask for Steve. I believe that their toll-free number is 800-876-7656. Dave Wood Date: Mon, 16 Dec 91 11:42:53 EST From: Mark Kern I just finished up a proposal for a VRU (Voice Response Unit) to be installed at our University. I can tell you right now that this is a pretty specialized market, and that the companies marketing these systems design the hardware and software themselves. The key to the whole system is the VRU which can be either PC bassed or proprietary. This unit is responisible for maintaining any number of telephone lines tied to a single pilot number which the user can dial into. The VRU also includes on the average, about one hour of voice recording time in RAM. The VRU uses this memory to store all the voice prompts needed during the interaction with the user and is also responsible for running the program that performs this interaction. The VRU can also handle the student records themselves, updating the host Mainframe during off-hours, or the VRU can just send the packets to the Mainframe on a real-time basis. The former method is better, since you don't tie up the Mainframe, but can also add to your costs in that you need large storage capacity on the VRU itself. It is also very important that the VRU be able to recover from a system failure by itself, with little or no operator intervention. If the power should go out, once power is back, the unit should be able to restore itself in under five minutes. The average cost of a VRU, including software, is about $40,000 for the base unit. Some companies that you might want to contact are : Perception Technology (617)821-0320 Syntellect (602)789-2800 Our school's telecommunications division has already implemented a test system using a PC based VRU, but the PC proved to be too limiting to handle the tasks needed to register 4800 students. Hope this helps. Mark Edward Kern NET : mek4_ltd@uhura.cc.rochester.edu GEnie : M.KERN1 Date: Mon, 16 Dec 91 12:43:53 -0500 From: rv01@gte.com (Robert Virzi) I know of at least three systems that would allow you to build small voice response systems. Two are IBM-based and the other mac-based. For the IBM machines their are two boards, the Watson board and the Dialogic d-40 board. The Watson boards (sorry, don't know the manufacturer) come in multi- and single-line varieties. I guess this is a critical point, as the other two boards are only single-line, to the best of my knowledg. I have used the Dialogic stuff and been unipressed. It seems a little flakier than need be, and you have to write your own C code to support the application. I am working with someone using the Watso board, and he is reasonably happy with it. Same story as the dialogic, however, in that you have to write your own application code from scratch. This isn't all that easy, especially if you aren't familiar with telephony applications. For the mac, their is a system called TFlex or teleflex, which has a very nice visual programming language. This makes building applications very easy, even if one is not familiar with telephone applications. It has a lot of built in routines, and the whole system can be programmed using visual icons. I believe it is only single-line, however. TFlex can be flakey in terms of getting it running. Once running, though, it seems reasonably robust. Those are the choices I know about. Good luck! Bob Virzi Date: Mon, 16 Dec 91 20:38:27 CST From: "Andrew Luebker" You might want to look into computing-devices for the disabled. I think there are some voice-control PC products for people with physical handicaps. Date: Mon, 16 Dec 1991 23:50:04 -0600 From: Tron MindTech is working on a product that will do this. It has three parts, the ring detector which connects to the phone outlet and it detects rings and picks it up, the voice play back and a simple voice digitizer (11 kHz MACE compression). You can program this thing to function as a voice mail system. I don't know if MindTech has released it yet. You can try to call them at 708 655-2105 or fax them at 708 655-2104. Be prepared, they might give you a bunch of we don't know what you are talking about, if they do so just tell them Chuan told you about it. Hope this helps. Chuan Date: 17 Dec 91 08:21:39 EST (Tue) From: dave@westmark.westmark.com (Dave Levenson) Check out Diaglogic Corp, Parsippany, NJ. They offer a family of voice-response hardware for the AT-buss, with drivers for both UNIX and MS-DOS. They probably have everything you need to build the voice-response system you want. We use their hardware as the basis of a voice-response banking application we market in the NYC area. Dave Levenson Internet: dave@westmark.com Westmark, Inc. UUCP: {uunet | rutgers | att}!westmark!dave Warren, NJ, USA Voice: 908 647 0900 Fax: 908 647 6857 Date: Tue, 17 Dec 91 09:51 EST From: gerry@dialogic.com (Gerry Lachac) See my .signature. We make all this equipment, Voice Store And Forward, Voice Recognition, Fax, etc. All cards for PC compatibles and Microchannel. Keep in mind that we make hardware, and supply development kits consisting of libraries, device drivers, and sample code. We sell to VARs who make things like voice mail systems, and application generators. If you don't want to do things from scratch, you may want to talk to one of our VARs. (As a matter of fact that list that was posted today from the magazine contained a number of our VARs) gerry % EMAIL: gerry@dialogic.com % USMAIL: Dialogic Corp. % 300 Littleton Rd Parsippany, NJ % PHONE: (201)334-1268 ext 193 From: george@brooks.ICS.UCI.EDU (George Herson) Date: 16 Dec 91 14:05:57 GMT Vendors of call processing equipment are listed in a trade periodical {Networking Management}, 11/91, p52, "When hello isn't enough." The only one of the vendors I've contacted so far is Intervoice, which designs its hardware for PS/2s. I don't know which computers the others support; the article doesn't say. The numbers refer to those to circle on the magazine's "reply card." I assume that you don't need the card, you can just send your list of numbers to Networking Management, 1421 S. Sheridan, P.O.Box 21728, Tulsa OK 74121-9977 for more info, before 2/29/92. AT&T Bridgewater, N.J. #265 Applied Voice Technology, Kirklan, Wash. #266 Aristacom International Inc. Alameda, Calif. #267 Aspect Telecommunications San Jose, Calif. #268 Brite Voice Systems Wichita, Kan. #269 Centigram Corp. San Jose, Calif. #270 C-T Link Boston, Mass. #271 DEC Littleton, Mass. #272 Digital Sound Corp. Carpinteria, Calif. #273 Dytel Corp. Schaumburg, Ill. #274 Hewlett-Packard Co. Cupertino, Calif. #275 IBM Corp. White Plains, NY #276 InterVoice Dallas, Texas #277 Microlog Germantown, Md #278 Northern Telecom Santa Clara, Calif. #279 Octel Communications Milpitas, CA #280 Perception Technology Canton, Masss. #281 AB Preseco Solna, Sweden #282 Rockwell International Downers Grove, Ill. #283 Rolm Corp. Santa Clara, CA #284 Simpact Associates San Diego, CA #285 Syntellect Inc. Phoenix, AZ #286 Teknekron Infoswitch Fort Worth, TX #287 Unifi Communications Billerica, Mass #288 Willow Telecommuting Systems Inc. Richmond Hill, Ont., Canada #289 Viking Electronics Inc Hudson, Wis. #290 Voicetek Corp. Chelmsford, Mass #291 VMX Inc. San Jose, Calif. #292 George Herson george@brooks.ics.uci.edu voice: (714)856-2174 fax: (714)857-0424 ----- Colin Campbell Internet: ccampbel@dsd.es.com Evans & Sutherland UUCP: !uunet!dsd.es.com!ccampbel Salt Lake City, UT 84108 (801) 582-5847 --- Fred-Uf 1.8(L)[BETA] * Origin: Megabyte BBS, UUCP, Fidonet, IMEx, total messaging