Note: Descriptions are shown in the official language in which they were submitted.
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SYSTEN FOR GENERATINa ~UP'T-
ANNOUNCEMENTS Wl...~.. A PREMISES
UxlN~ SWITCH AND PREMISE8 PHONF OR SPT~F~
This application is related to commonly assigned
copending patent application entitled System For
Generating Aural Announcements Within A Premises, filed on
December 8, 1995, by the same inventor, the disclosure
which is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety.
F~ Al ~ of Tho Tn~nt-~ ~n
This application relates to a system for generating
aural announcements within a premises using an
announcement controller for generating aural announcement
signals to a premises phone or a speaker over a second
comml]n;cation channel without interfering with baseband
services to the local exchange carrier.
Ra~l~ , -.. l nf T~ ~ ; ~~
Time is a precious commodity, and a telephone can be
a curse or blessing depending on who calls, how long they
want to talk, and the schedule of the one called, i.e.,
whether they are too busy to accept a call. Sometimes,
one may be tempted to let the phone n ring off the hook"
unless a close family m~mher, business associate or an
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expected call is incoming. However, it is difficult to
distinguish one call from the other to ensure that the
desired person has called. Even sophisticated caller
identification systems sometimes require that the called
party look at a phone display for identifying the caller.
It would be advantageous if an aural announcement system
could state the identification of the caller through a
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speaker system or a premises phone without requiring
visual identification. Such a system would be advanta-
geous if it could use the existing wiring of the premises
phone line without interfering with the existing baseband
services with the local exchange carriers. It would also
be advantageous if any speakers used in the system could
be connected to the existing phone wire system, such as
through RJ-ll jacks. It would also be advantageous if
aural announcements could be generated to a premises phone
without interrupting existing baseband services. Such
aural announcements could also be first recorded in an
answering machine and generated through the existing phone
wire system to a premises phone or a speaker.
SYm~--v ~ The ~-v~ o~
The present invention now provides a system for
generating aural announcements such as caller
identification within a premises using the existing wiring
of the premises phone system without interfering with the
existing base band service with the local exchange
carrier. In accordance with one aspect of the present
invention, a premises phone is connected within a premises
phone line that forms first and second c~mml~n;cation
channels. The first communication channel is adapted for
connecting to a phone network. An announcement controller
is connected within the phone line. The announcement
cont~oller includes signal generating means for generating
aural announcement signals along the second cs~mllnication
channel exten~; ng between the premises phone and the
announcement controller. A premises phone is connected
within the phone line for receiving the announcement
signals generated by the announcement controller.
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In another aspect of the present invention, a switch
is operatively connected between the premises phone and
the announcement controller for switching the announcement
controller into the second co~mt]n;cation channel for
transmitting aural announcement signals along the second
comml~n;cation channel to the premises phone. The
announcement controller can be an answering machine.
Recorded messages can be later played as announcements to
the premises phone.
In still another aspect of the present invention, a
speaker is connected within a premises phone line that
forms first and second communication channels. The first
csmmlln;cation channel is adapted for connection to a phone
network. An announcement controller, which could include
answering machine functions, is connected within the
premises phone line for generating aural announcements
along the second csmmlln;cation channel to the speaker for
playing corresponding aural announcements. No switch and
premises phone is necessary. For example, a "hermit" may
desire only a speaker with no chance to co~mlln;cate via a
premises phone.
In another aspect of the present invention, the
announcement controller receives incoming calls from a
phone network along the first comml]n;cation channel and
generates aural announcement signals relating to caller
identification. The premises phone or speaker would
rece~ve the aural announcements. In another aspect of the
present invention, the switch interconnects between the
second co~ml]n;cation channel for transmitting aural
announcement signals to the premises phone. The
announcement controller may also include a database having
stored therein a plurality of caller identifications
corresponding to received aural announcement signals for
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each caller identification. If the database does not
include the calling number, an aural announcement such as
"Caller Not Identified," can be generated to the speaker
or premises phone, or the switch operated to connect to
the premises phone. The premises phone could ring and the
aural announcement could be played through the premises
phone.
In still another aspect of the present invention, the
announcement controller includes a microphone operatively
connected to the signal generating means for receiving
aural announcements from a premises user for generating
announcement signals along the second comml~n;cation
channel, such as to the speaker. In still another aspect
of the invention, the first commnn;cation channel
comprises a twisted wire pair and a carrier signal
extending along the twisted wire pair having a first
frequency range. The second co~mlln;cation channel
comprises a subcarrier signal ext~n~; ng along the twisted
wire pair having a second frequency range.
In still another aspect of the present invention, the
first commlln;cation channel can comprise a first twisted
wire pair and the second comml1n; cation channel can
comprise a second twisted wire pair. A second twisted
wire pair is sometimes found in some premises, but not
always used. Thus, it may be available for use as a
second commlln;cation channel.
Des~;rt~ of T~- n~w~n~ The foregoing and other
features and advantages of the present invention will be
appreciated more fully from the following description,
with reference to the accompanying drawings in which:
Figure 1 is an environmental view of the system in
accordance with one aspect of the present invention that
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generates aural announcements within a premises using a
switch and premises phone.
Figure 2 is an environmental view of the system in
accordance with one aspect of the present invention where
aural announcements are generated to a speaker in a system
without a switch and premises phone.
Figure 3 is a high level block diagram of an
announcement controller of the present invention which
includes answering machine functions.
Figure 4 is a high level flow chart depicting one
sequence of possible steps where the announcement
controller receives an incoming call from the phone
network along the first commlln;cation channel and then
generates aural announcement signals relating to caller
identification along the second commlln;cation channel to a
speaker or a premises phone.
r~et~ ~ l ~ n~ n of T~
Referring now to Figure l! there is illustrated
generally at 10 a system of the present invention for
generating within a premises 12 aural announcements using
the existing premises phone line (shown by the dashed
lines 13) without interfering with baseband services with
a local exchange carrier. As illustrated, the premises
phone 14 is connected to a phone network 16 by a local
exchange carrier 18 and first commlln;cation channel 20.
As illustrated, an announcement controller 22, in
accordance with the present invention, is connected
between the premises phone 14 and the phone network 16
along the first comm-ln;cation channel 20. The
announcement controller 22 includes a signal generator 24
for generating aural announcement signals along a second
commlln; cation channel 26 extending between the premises
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phone 14 and the announcement controller 22, and to the
premises phone 14 operatively connected to the phone line
13. The premises phone 14 receives the generated analog
speech signals forwarded from the signal generator 24 of
the announcement controller 22 along the second
communication channel 26, converted to the first
commllnication channel by switch 30. As illustrated, the
announcement controller 22 can be designed to include
answering machine functions 27, so that messages can be
recorded. Afterward, later portions, or the complete
message, or an aural announcement indicating there is a
recorded message, can be generated to the premises phone.
In accordance with one aspect of the present
invention, a switch 30 is operatively connected between
the premises phone 14 and the-announcement controller 22.
- The switch 30 is operatively connected between the
premises phone 14 and the announcement controller 22 for
switching between 1) the second co-mmlln;cation channel 26
for transmitting aural announcement signals to the
premises phone 14, and 2) the first commlln;cation channel
20 for receiving from the phone network 16 the incoming
phone signals on the first commlln;cation channel 20. The
announcement controller 22 could generate a signal to the
premises phone 14 via the switch 30 causing the premises
phone 14 to ring. Once answered, the aural announcement
is generated to the premises phone.
In one embodiment of the invention, the first
communication channel 20 comprises a twisted wire pair 34
(Figure 3) and a carrier signal extending along the
twisted wire pair of a first frequency range such as the
conventional baseband signal of 300 Hz to 3 kHz. The
second comm~ln;cation channel 26 can comprise a subcarrier
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signal extending along the twisted wire pair and having a
second of a frequency range of about 300 to 400 kilohertz.
In still another embodiment of the invention, the first
communication channel 20 can comprise a first twisted wire
pair 34 and the second commtlnication channel 26 can
comprise a second twisted wire pair 36 such as shown in
greater detail in Figure 3. In some premises, a second
twisted wire pair 36 is part of the conventional wiring
within a premises 12, but r~m~i n.C unused.
As shown in Figure 1, at least two premises phones
can also be used in the system of the present invention
and are illustrated in the home premises environment and
connected to the local exchange carrier 18 via the
commlln;cation channel 20. As illustrated, a base station
37 is connected to the first commlln;cation channel 20 and
works with a hand-held cordless telephone 38. One switch
30 can be used for the entire premises, or as shown in
Figure 1, can be used for one premises phone 14, and a
switch 30' can be used for another premises phone 14 so
that each premises phone can be individually controlled
relative to the announcement controller 22.
Referring now to Figure 2, there is illustrated
another aspect of the present invention where no switches
are used. The illustrated embodiment also does not
include a premises phone, but in some instances, a
premises phone could be included in the system. For
example, a hermit may not desire a premises phone, or the
capability for speaking to someone. He may just want to
hear announcements generated from an announcement
controller 22, or recorded messages. The announcement
controller would be located in one location and speakers
connected through various phone jacks in the house. An
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Infrared Sensor or receiver on the announcement controller
could receive control signals that initiates the
controller for signal generations.
Referring now in greater detail to Figure 3,
different components of the announcement controller 22,
which includes answering machine functions 27 are
illustrated in the block diagram. As illustrated, the
announcement controller 22 has a main processing system,
indicated generally at 40, which includes a microprocessor
42 connected to a digital bus 44. The announcement
controller 22 typically includes a housing 45 (shown by
black outline in Figure 2) contA;n;ng the processing
system 40 and other components. The announcement
controller 22 also includes a memory 46 for storing
digital information. Part of the memory 46 can be RAM 48
for fast retrieval, as well as a hard storage device such
as an EPROM 50. The memory 46 is connected to the digital
bus 44.
Data such as phone numbers are stored in the memory
46. Data is read from memory 46 when instructed by the
microprocessor 42. An analog - to - digital (A/D)
converter 54 may be included within the announcement
controller 22 for converting incoming analog signals to
digital data for storage within memory 46 and further
processing by the microprocessor 42. Such signals could
incl~de telephone messages.
In accordance with one aspect of the present
invention, a microphone 60 can be mounted to the housing
45 and connected to a microphone controller and amplifier
64 for generating aural announcement signals corresponding
to what is spoken through the microphone 60 and through
the second co~mlln;cation channel 26 to the speaker 28 or
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through the switch 30 to the premises phone 14 (Figure 1)
or directly to the speaker 28 (Figure 2). An on-off
button 66 may be operatively connected to the microphone
60 so that upon depression of the button 66, the
S microphone 60 will receive sounds and convert them by the
associated circuitry 64 for generation and transmission
through the second com.munication channel 26.
In accordance with another aspect of the present
invention shown in Figure 1, the switch 30 is responsive
to the generated signals of the second comm~n;cation
channel 26 and switches into the second commllnication
channel and signals into the premises phone 14. Thus, it
is evident that the present invention can be used as an
intercom system. In the embodiment illustrated in Figure
2, it is possible that the speaker 28 could be plugged
into the conventional RJ-ll connector at a desired
location within a premises and the announcement controller
22 could be positioned within the kitchen or other derived
location. The button 66 is pushed, and the caller states
"Come Eat." Other speakers could be wired in different
parts of the premises.
Incoming phone calls are forwarded to the
announcement controller 22 which then identifies the
caller and conducts a database look up in memory 46 to
determine if there is a message corresponding to the
caller-identification. For example, if the premises
user's mother has a certain caller I.D., the aural message
can be stored in memory ~Your Mom Is Calling~. When the
microprocessor 42 conducts the corresponding comparison,
it then retrieves the recorded digital message ~Your Mom
Is Calling", and then forwards the corresponding data
signal to the A/D converter 54 and signal generator 24,
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which forwards an analog signal through the second
communication channel 26 to the speaker 28 (Figure 2) or
through the switch 30 to the premises phone (Figure 1).
In accordance with another aspect of the present
invention, the announcement controller could also include
circuitry 90 which allows recording of messages.
The flow chart of Figure 4 illustrates the various
steps of one aspect of the system for generating aural
announcements within a premises. For purposes of
understanding, the blocks of the flow chart are numbered
with numerals starting in the two hundred series.
In block 200, an incoming call is transmitted along
the first communication channel 20 to the announcement
controller 22 (Block 202). The announcement controller 22
then identifies if there is a caller I.D. associated with
the incoming call (Block 204). If there is no caller ID
association, the microprocessor 42 retrieves a message
from the memory database 46 and forwards the signal
through the A/D converter 54 to the speaker (in the
embodiment of Figure 2) stating" Caller Unidentified"
(Block 206). In the embodiment of Figure 1, the message
is generated through the switch to the premises phone
(Block 207) If there is a caller I.D. association, then
the microprocessor searches the memory database 46 (Block
208) to determine if the caller I.D. is present in the
database (Block 210). If the caller I.D. is not present
in the database, then the microprocessor 42 retrieves a
message from the database and generates a signal to the
A/D converter 54 corresponding to "Caller Unidentified"
(Block 212). If the caller I.D. is present in the
database, then the corresponding message is retrieved
(Block 214) and the appropriate signals are sent to the
second communication channel to the speaker where the
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message is delivered (Block 216), or alternately to the
premises phone via the switch (Block 217). The message
could be "Bob Is Calling".
It should be understood that the above description is
only one preferred embodiment of the invention. Numerous
other arrangements may be devised by one skilled in the
art without departing from the spirit of the invention.
