Telephonic communications – Special services – Conferencing
Reexamination Certificate
2000-11-16
2003-09-30
Matar, Ahmad F. (Department: 2642)
Telephonic communications
Special services
Conferencing
C379S205010
Reexamination Certificate
active
06628768
ABSTRACT:
The present invention relates to a multiline subscriber telephone system, and a method of operating such a system, which implements an incoming call-waiting feature for an incoming call on an external telephone line which is in use on a conference call without requiring that the conference call be suspended while the incoming call is answered.
FIG. 1
is a block diagram of a subscriber telephone system. In
FIG. 1
, a plurality of bidirectional external telephone lines
5
are coupled to corresponding terminals of a telephone system termed customer premises equipment (CPE)
30
. The CPE
30
is also bidirectionally coupled to a plurality of handsets
20
. The handsets
20
may be coupled to the CPE
30
via standard phone wires, or via wireless radio transceivers in the CPE
30
and the handsets
20
, or via a combination of wired and wireless links.
For example, current multiline business phone systems can link up to four external telephone lines to up to twelve corresponding handsets. These handsets may be, for example, wireless handsets operating over a radio frequency (RF) link in the 900 MHz unlicensed frequency band. In general, when a user wishes to place an outgoing call, he picks up one of the handsets
20
. The CPE
30
senses this, and connects that handset to an unused one of the external phone lines
5
. The user hears a dial tone and makes the outgoing call in the usual manner. When an incoming call arrives on one of the external phone lines
5
, the CPE
30
assigns one of the handsets
20
to that phone line.
There are many known techniques for assigning the incoming phone call to a handset. For example, the assignment may be a permanent assignment in which each handset
20
is assigned to a corresponding one of the external telephone lines
5
, or the CPE
30
may simply route the incoming call to any unused handset
20
, or all incoming calls may initially be routed to a single handset
20
(e.g. a receptionist), or all of the handsets
20
may ring in response to all incoming calls. Any technique for assigning the incoming call to one or more handsets may be used. The handset
20
assigned to receive the incoming phone call rings, the user picks up the handset
20
and responds to the incoming call in the usual manner.
There are several known features which may be provided by a telephone system
10
such as is illustrated in FIG.
1
. For example, the system
10
can provide internal users of the system with an intercom feature. This feature may be implemented by allowing one internal user to call another directly through the CPE
30
without using any of the external telephone lines
5
. This feature may also allow several internal users to form an internal conference call amongst themselves, also through the CPE
30
without using an external telephone line
5
, all in a known manner.
Another example is the ability to form a conference call by allowing more than one of the handsets
20
to be connected to a single external telephone line
5
, thus enabling more than one local user to talk to the party at the other end of the external telephone line
5
. This feature may be implemented by allowing a user to place an outgoing call over one of the external telephone lines
5
in the manner described above, and then allowing the user to attach other internal users to that telephone call by connecting their handsets
20
in common to the external telephone line
5
connected to the outside party, all in a known manner.
A known feature, which is provided by the telephone transmission system to which the external telephone lines
5
are coupled, is “call waiting”. This feature provides an alert signal to a subscriber handset which is currently engaged in a telephone call when an incoming call is attempting to connect to that subscriber's handset. In response to the alert signal, the handset provides an indication of an incoming phone call to the subscriber, in the form a beep. In response to this indication, that subscriber may temporarily suspend the current telephone call (i.e. put it on “hold”) and answer the incoming telephone call. When the newly received telephone call is complete, the subscriber may reconnect to the original telephone call.
In a normal consumer arrangement where a standard telephone is attached to the external telephone line, no special circuitry or equipment is necessary to implement this feature, because this feature is provided by the central office. In a multiline subscriber telephone system in which a plurality of handsets
20
are connected to a plurality of external telephone lines
5
, the CPE
30
need not provide any services for this feature other than connecting a handset
20
to an external telephone line
5
. However, because the multiline telephone system may also provide other functions in conjunction with the ‘call waiting’ feature, and/or enhancements to the ‘call waiting’ feature, the CPE
30
in such a system may include circuitry to interact with the central office, and provide the ‘call waiting’ feature.
Another known feature which is provided by the telephone transmission system is “caller identification (ID)”. This feature is implemented by the central office. ‘Caller ID’ inserts information about an incoming telephone call to a subscriber when the subscriber's handset receives the indication of an incoming call. The information about the incoming telephone call includes the telephone number from which that call is made. That information may be displayed at the called handset
20
, and used to determine who is calling and what action to take. This information may also be supplied to a computer system, which can look up previously stored data related to the calling telephone number and display that data to the called party.
There are two modes of ‘caller ID’. In mode I ‘caller ID’, the telephone being called is available to receive incoming telephone calls (i.e. on-hook). Information about the incoming phone call is transmitted from the central office to the handset being called as a part of the ring signal between the first and second rings. There must be apparatus at the location of the called handset which is capable of extracting this information and either displaying it, or supplying it to a computer system, as described above. The user of the called handset can consult the information displayed, or from the computer system, and decide whether to accept the incoming call and pick up the handset, or not.
Mode II ‘caller ID’ may be used in conjunction with the ‘call waiting’ feature described above. In mode II ‘caller ID’, the telephone being called may be engaged in a telephone call (i.e. off-hook). Information about the incoming call, including the calling telephone number, is sent along with the alerting signal which indicates that an incoming call is attempting to connect to the currently busy handset. As with mode I ‘caller ID’, there must be apparatus which can extract this information, and either display it, or supply it to a computer system. The subscriber receives the ‘call waiting’ beep, as described above, and can view the information relating to the incoming telephone call. Based on that information, the subscriber can decide whether to suspend the present telephone call and accept the new incoming call, or not.
One combination of the above known features is conference calling and ‘call waiting’. Referring again to
FIG. 1
, more than one local handset
20
can be simultaneously talking to an external party via one of then external telephone lines
5
when an incoming call arrives for that external telephone line. In currently known systems, when the CPE alerting signal (CAS) arrives from the central office, one, several, or all of the local handsets
20
produces a beep indicating that a call is waiting. In response, one of the handsets may take control and put the current conference call on hold to answer the incoming call. The controlling handset is connected, over the external telephone line, to the caller of the incoming call. This, however, puts the entire conference call on hold. None
Kapadia Maneck Behram
Knutson Paul Gothard
Ramaswamy Kumar
Fried Harvey D.
Kolodka Joseph J.
Le Karen
Matar Ahmad F.
Thomson Licensing S. A.
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