analog: 1. A method of telephony transmission in which the signals from the source (for example, speech in a human conversation) are converted into an electrical signal that varies continuously over a range of amplitude values analogous to the original signals. 2. Not digital signaling. 3. Used to refer to applications that use loop start signaling.
answer supervision: A telephone system feature that returns a momentary drop in loop current when a connection has been established. When call progress analysis detects a transient loop current drop, it returns a connect event.
ASCIIZ string: A null-terminated string of ASCII characters.
asynchronous function: A function that allows program execution to continue without waiting for a task to complete. To implement an asynchronous function, an application-defined event handler must be enabled to trap and process the completed event. Contrast with synchronous function.
automatic gain control: See AGC.
bit mask: A pattern which selects or ignores specific bits in a bit-mapped control or status field.
bitmap: An entity of data (byte or word) in which individual bits contain independent control or status information.
board device: A board-level object that can be manipulated by a physical library. Board devices can be real physical devices, such as a D/4x voice board, or emulated devices.
bps (bits per second): Serial digital stream data rate.
buffer: A block of memory or temporary storage device that holds data until it can be processed. It is used to compensate for the difference in the rate of the flow of information (or time occurrence of events) when transmitting data from one device to another.
bus: An electronic path that allows communication between multiple points or devices in a system.
busy device: A device that is stopped, being configured, has a multitasking or non-multitasking or I/O function active on it.
cadence: A pattern of tones and silence intervals generated by a given audio signal. Once established, it can be classified as a single ring, a double ring, or a busy signal by comparing the periods of sound and silence to establish parameters.
cadence detection: A firmware or voice driver feature that analyzes the audio signal on the line to detect a repeating pattern of sound and silence.
call progress analysis: The process used to automatically determine what happens after an outgoing call is dialed.
CCITT: International Telephone and Telegraph Consultative Committee, a part of the ICU (International Telecommunications Union) responsible for formulating telecommunications standards.
channel: 1. When used in reference to an Intel Dialogic expansion board that is analog, an audio path, or the activity happening on that audio path (for example, when you say the channel goes off-hook). 2. When used in reference to an Intel Dialogic expansion board that is digital, a data path, or the activity happening on that data path. 3. When used in reference to a bus, an electrical circuit carrying control information and data.
channel device: A channel-level object that can be manipulated by a physical library, such as an individual telephone line connection. A channel is also a subdevice of a board. See subdevice.
CO: Central Office. The telephone company facility where subscriber lines are linked, through switches, to other subscriber lines (including local and long distance lines).
configuration file: An unformatted ASCII file that stores device initialization information for an application.
data structure: C programming term for a data element consisting of fields, where each field may have a different type definition and length. The elements of a data structure usually share a common purpose or functionality, rather than being similar in size, type, etc.
ddevice: A computer peripheral or component that is controlled through a software device driver. An Intel Dialogic voice and/or network interface expansion board is considered a physical board containing one or more logical board devices, and each channel on the board is a channel device.
device channel: An Intel Dialogic voice data path that processes one incoming or outgoing call at a time (equivalent to the terminal equipment terminating a phone line).
device driver: Software that acts as an interface between an application and hardware devices.
device handle: Numerical reference to a device, obtained when a device is opened using xx_open( ), where xx is the prefix defining the device to be opened. The device handle is used for all operations on that device.
device name: Literal reference to a device, used to gain access to the device via an xx_open( ) function, where xx is the prefix defining the device to be opened.
Dialogic tone set: The Intel Dialogic tone sets supplied with the Learn Mode API. They contain tone definitions for most PBXs and networks. There is no consolidation data.
digital: Information represented as binary code.
digitize: The process of converting an analog waveform into a digital data set.
downloaded code: Program instructions and routines that 1. run at the board level and were previously resident on the board in EPROM and 2. are now loaded during board initialization to a reserved section of shared RAM.
driver: A software module that provides a defined interface between a program and the hardware.
DSP: 1. Digital signal processor. A microprocessor with an architecture that is optimized particularly to perform mathematical algorithms that manipulate digital signals. 2. Digital signal processing.
DTMF: Dual Tone Multi Frequency. Refers to a method of encoding digits over analog telephone lines.
dynamic link library (DLL): A file in the Intel Dialogic system release that contains the Intel Dialogic library functions. Compare Library.
emulated device: A virtual device whose software interface mimics the interface of a particular physical device, such as a D/4x voice board that is emulated by a D/240SC voice board. On a functional level, a D/240SC voice board is perceived by an application as six emulated D/4x voice boards. See physical device.
EPROM: Electrically Programmable Read Only Memory.
event: An unsolicited or asynchronous communication from a hardware device to an operating system, application, or driver. Events are generally attention-getting messages, allowing a process to know when a task is complete or when an external event occurs.
firmware: A set of program instructions that are resident (usually in EPROM) on an expansion board.
frequency detection: A voice driver feature that detects the tri-tone Special Information Tone (SIT) sequences and other single-frequency tones from 300Hz to 2100Hz.
global tone detection: A feature that allows the creation and detection of user-defined tone descriptions on a channel by channel basis.
hook state: A general term for the current line status of the channel: either on-hook or off-hook. A telephone station is said to be on-hook when the conductor loop between the station and the switch is open and no current is flowing. When the loop is closed and current is flowing the station is off-hook. These terms are derived from the position of the old fashioned telephone set receiver in relation to the mounting hook provided for it.
hook switch: The name given to the circuitry that controls the on-hook and off-hook state of the Voice telephone interface.
I/O: Input/Output
idle channel: A channel that has no functions active on it.
idle device: A device that has no functions active on it. See busy device.
interrupt request level: A signal sent to the central processing unit (CPU) to temporarily suspend normal processing and transfer control to an interrupt handling routine. Interrupts may be generated by conditions such as completion of an I/O process, detection of hardware failure, power failures, etc.
IRQ: See interrupt request level.
library: A file in the Intel Dialogic system release that contains links to the DLL.
loop: The physical circuit between the telephone switch and the voice processing board.
loop current: The current that flows through the circuit from the telephone switch when the voice device is off-hook.
loop current detection: A voice driver feature that returns a connect after detecting a loop current drop.
loop start: In an analog environment, an electrical circuit consisting of two wires (or leads) called tip and ring, which are the two conductors of a telephone cable pair. The CO provides a voltage (called "talk battery" or just "battery") to power the line. When the circuit is complete, this voltage produces a current called loop-current. The circuit provides a method of starting (seizing) a telephone line or trunk by sending a supervisory signal (going off-hook) to the CO. .
MF: Multifrequency. An in-band signaling transmission scheme similar to DTMF but used mainly within the Central Office (see CO).
micro channel bus: The communication channel or architecture in a computer used to interface the host processor to add-on adapter boards.
off-hook: The state of a telephone station when the conductor loop between the station and the switch is closed and current is flowing.
physical device: A device that is an actual piece of hardware, such as a D/xx voice board; not an emulated device. See emulated device.
pointer: A memory address to either a function or data.
polling: The process of repeatedly checking the status of a resource to determine when state changes occur.
resolution: Granularity of measurement.
resource: Functionality (e.g., voice-store-and-forward) that can be assigned to call. Resources are shared when functionality is selectively assigned to a call (usually via an SCbus or CT Bus time slot) and may be shared among multiple calls. Resources are dedicated when functionality is fixed to the one call.
ring detect: The act of sensing that an incoming call is present by determining that the telephone switch is providing a ringing signal to the voice device.
route: Assign a resource to a time slot.
sampling rate: Frequency with which a digitizer takes measurements of the analog voice signal.
shared resource: see Resource.
signaling: The transmission of electrical signals on the telephone network. The voice software supports the following signaling methods: DTMF, MF, R2 MF, Socotel, global tone detection and generation, and dial pulse detection and generation.
silence threshold: The level that sets whether incoming data to a voice board with call-progress analysis is recognized as silence or non-silence.
SIT: Special Information Tone. Detection of a SIT sequence indicates an operator intercept or other problem in completing the call. See also Frequency Detection.
string: A data element consisting of a collection of contiguous ASCII characters.
subdevice: Any device that is a direct child of another device. Since subdevice describes a relationship between devices, a subdevice can be a device that is a direct child of another subdevice (as a channel is a child of a board).
time slot: In a digital telephony environment, a normally continuous and individual communication (for example, someone speaking on a telephone) is (1) digitized, (2) broken up into pieces consisting of a fixed number of bits, (3) combined with pieces of other individual communications in a regularly repeating, timed sequence (multiplexed), and (4) transmitted serially over a single telephone line. The process happens at such a fast rate that, once the pieces are sorted out and put back together again at the receiving end, the speech is normal and continuous. Each individual pieced-together communication is called a time slot.
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