Telephonic communications – Diagnostic testing – malfunction indication – or electrical... – Using portable test set
Reexamination Certificate
1999-07-28
2001-10-02
Tieu, Binh K. (Department: 2643)
Telephonic communications
Diagnostic testing, malfunction indication, or electrical...
Using portable test set
C379S022020, C379S024000, C379S027020, C379S027030
Reexamination Certificate
active
06298118
ABSTRACT:
TECHNICAL FIELD
The present invention relates to communication line testing systems and, more particularly to a system and method for enhancement of communication line test signals.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Testing of communication lines, such as telephone lines and network cables is a vital function for operation of communication systems. Typically. testing involves determining the operational status of a communication line. For instance, for a twisted pair telephone line, operational status would include the length of the twisted pair line, the number and location of any taps or splices on the line, and the level of attenuation that the line imposes upon a communication signal traveling across the line.
To determine operational status of a communication line, test equipment is typically placed on both ends of the line. In the case of a twisted pair telephone line, one end is generally located at a central office site, and the other end is usually located either at a residential or commercial establishment. Prior art dual-ended testing systems and methods that use testing equipment on both ends of a communication line are inherently more costly and logistically complex to implement than a single-ended testing system that requires testing equipment on only one end of a communication line. However, prior art systems have focused on dual-ended testing rather than single-ended testing because of difficulties imposed by single-ended testing.
Both dual and single-ended testing share some similar problems related to testing. Some testing problems are caused by anomalous signals being introduced by the test equipment itself on to the communication line being tested. Other measurement problems are caused by signal noise. These and other conditions adversely affect accuracy of measurements. Other related difficulties that users of the test equipment face involve poor presentation by test equipment of the test results. The poor presentation of test data is in part caused by factors that corrupt the test measurements that produced the test data. As a result, users are forced to waste time manipulating controls to obtain meaningful pictures of the test results. Often after much adjustment of controls the users have to settle for less than desirable views of somewhat suspect test data.
These problems have been obstacles to adoption of single-ended testing as a general test method for more than time domain reflectometry. Even time domain reflectometry still suffers from presentation problems. Other test measurements, such as those involving signal power measurements including signal attenuation or signal-to-noise ratios, have not found favor with single-ended testing because the problems caused by such things as anomalous signals or noise are potentially compounded for single-ended testing given the doubling of travel of a test signal compared to dual-ended testing. Test signals are harder to recover by the further attenuation involved, and anomalous signals and noise can have even greater corrupting influence on measurements.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
A communication line tester system and method in accordance with the invention allows for effective measurement and presentation of communication line characteristics. The communication line tester includes a transmitter, an analog-to-digital converter and a main processor. The transmitter is electrically coupled to the communication line. The analog-to-digital converter is electrically coupled to the communication line. The main processor is electrically coupled to the analog-to-digital converter. The main processor includes a pseudo-random code processor configured to generate pseudo-random coded signals for transmission by the transmitter on to the communication line and to decode pseudo-random coded signals received by the main processor from the analog-to-digital converter.
The main processor may alternatively or additionally include a multiple waveform based distortion removal processor configured to remove distortion produced by undesired but unavoidable non-linear operation of the tester components from signals based on a plurality of signals received from the analog-to-digital converter, the distortion removal based on a plurality of coded signals generated by the pseudo-random code processor. The main processor may also include an even-order distortion removal processor, a display presentation processor, a baseline distortion removal processor, and an open/short processor.
REFERENCES:
patent: 5193108 (1993-03-01), Stocklin
patent: 5235629 (1993-08-01), Butler et al.
patent: 5577099 (1996-11-01), Clement et al.
patent: 5619489 (1997-04-01), Chang et al.
patent: 6064721 (2000-05-01), Mohammadian et al.
patent: 6144721 (2000-11-01), Stephens
Dorsey & Whitney LLP
Fluke Corporation
Tieu Binh K.
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