jphone : Java Glossary

When I was a kid growing up in West Vancouver in the 1950s, phones had no dials. You picked up the phone and said I’d like to talk to Robbie Jones please and the operator connected you. Modern technology is eventually going to get us back to the level of convenience we used to enjoy.

Java makes possible intelligent telephones. Here is a description of an user-friendly phone dubbed the JPhone.

Software features

1. variable fidelity. You pay only for the bandwidth you need. This means that you can hear every nuance when your loved ones overseas kiss you over the phone, but save money with low fidelity when they have to take a bathroom break.
2. It has features first pioneered by the MiniTel system in France. It replaces the paper white pages and yellow pages for directory lookup. Customers look up numbers themselves. It becomes not only a phone, but a cheap computer terminal for everyone.
3. It has call blocking for long distance, 900 numbers etc. without the appropriate password. This lets parents have a little more control over their kids and lets businesses protect themselves from employees or walk-in customers. With Java-powered monitoring, more flexible rules are possible, e.g. allow you to phone a 900 number consulting service, so long as the bill stays under $50/day. You might allow houseguests to make calls up to $50 in total during their stay. You might allow a homeless person staying at your place only $10 in long distance. If you are on a bulk plan, you might limit by time.
4. You can order fancy features by downloading Java software into your JPhone. It is a fully functional little computer, capable of running Applets/Weblets downloaded from the party you call. You might use it for something as trivial as selecting which pizza you want off a menu. Downloaded Weblets are an opportunity for companies to entertain callers with novelties.
5. The BusTel (pronounced buzz-tell) button is white with a red heart symbol. When you press it, it exchanges electronic business cards with the other party and displays the information on the electroluminescent panel. You initially program in the electronic business card by phoning a service bureau computer. The electronic business card looks very much like an Internet email header with named fields followed by a colon, e.g. Surname: GivenName: BusName: HomePhone: WorkPhone: DayPhone: NightPhone: Fax: Email: Apt: Street1: Street2: City: Postal: Country: Web: etc. etc. The BusTel/Heart key could also be called the trust key. You tap it once to exchange business cards. You tap it twice and key a P.I.N. number to also include charge card or debit card info.
6. You can program the memories, caller id associations and ringing sound while a recorded/synthesised voice talks you through the process. For simple tasks you follow the insntuctions on the electroluminescent panel. You can also phone a human who will patiently ask you questions about what you want to do then set up your phone for you remotely. This way even techopeasants will be able to get full power out of their JPhones.
7. Assign phone numbers to individuals, not residences. When the phone rings, the distinctive sound lets you know who it is for. The traditional call forwarding redirects all calls for everyone using that phone; the JPhone service would track individuals and allow selective redirect.
8. It has a built-in phone directory of alphabetical names and numbers. This way you could dial by using the up/down arrow keys to select, or by hitting a 4-digit code short dialing code. This long list would be backed up by your phone provider and could be updated using a separate computer. If you redirected your calls to someome else’s phone, your calling list would follow you automatically.
9. The configuration information stored in the phone is kept alive during a power failure by a battery backup. Service providers would also automatically backup/restore for you so if your phone loses the information. The number of your service provider would live in EAROM, where it could not get lost. Having some of the services come from outside the JPhone encourages evolution of new services.
10. Various custom features currently only seen in PBX (Private Branch exchange) systems now become possible for the standard residential JPhone. Instead of memorising arcane codes, the JPhone guides you step by step through menus. These menus adapt to your usage so the things you do most commonly are easiest to get at.

    Money is like manure, it’s no good unless you spread it around.
    ~ Thornton Wilder (1897-04-17 1975-12-07 age:78) and Jerry Herman (1931-07-10 age:86), Horace Vandergelder in Hello Dolly

11. An Ethernet port that allows your computer to automate any function you can do by hand from the phone’s keypad. A lawyer could use the information that the JPhone provides for automatically generating time billings. The phone knows the start and stop times and who you are talking to. A clerk at a catalog store could use the Jphone to request the caller id or BusTel information and instantly bring up your record before the clerk even answered the phone. The port would also allow your phone to act as a cable modem.
12. The JPhone may run off the usual copper wire to the telephone company CO (Central Office) using ADSL (Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line technology), or it might run off a coax cable modem to an ISP (Internet Service Provider). In either case, it can does routinely does advanced compression (for efficiency) and encryption (for privacy).

Display Features

1. The more expensive versions of the phone would have various sizes of flat panel colour displays. The most basic version would likely use a blue electroluminescent display. Without sufficient resolution, some of the features below would not be possible.
2. The display has four main functions:
   1. Displaying menus, phone numbers and other textual data.
   2. acting as a whiteboard on which you can scribble. Your combined scribblings are visible to both parties. You can also think of it as legacy FAX (Facsimile) receiver.
   3. acting as webcam.
   4. acting as a GUI (Graphic User Interface) display for Applets/Weblets.
3. The JPhone displays the last number dialed. In case you dial a wrong number you can check that you dialled correctly and avoid the embarrassment of phoning the same number again. The JPhone display the digits as you hit them, to let you check you got them right. The panel also shows a list of numbers you recently dials out and a list of recent incoming calls. You see name and or number.
4. Various models come with various sizes of display. This is transparent to the software. Users with small displays just do more scrolling.
5. You see a running call duration and a running cost of the call. This could be useful to both businessmen and people at home, who sometimes lose track of the time when they are on the phone. This makes it easier to pay your host fairly when they let you make a long distance call on their phone. Alternatively, you could pay by billing the call to your own number. Such third party calls would be password validated.
6. 900-type service on any phone. A consultant could set up a telephone tech support service where people call with questions and get billed just by hitting the heart key a couple of times. Consultants could afford to take on one-shot phone clients since billing would be totally automated. The customer could even see the time and money meter running on his display.

Keypad Features

1. Big buttons. This helps avoid misdialing and makes it easy even for old folks to see the numbers. Buttons are labeled both with numbers and alpha, with numbers much bigger. Even young people can benefit from such a phone with faster and more accurate dialing.
2. No overloading of buttons. One button, one function.
3. Perhaps the keys should have distinctive shapes and textures so you could even use the phone in the dark or if you are blind. In any case, the distinctive shapes or textures would give subliminal tactile feedback that you had dialed correctly. Possibly the keys should have Braille patterns, particularly if various designers insist on being creative with the standard key layout.
4. Red 911 button labeled 911 — with no confusing symbols. The 911 button should be at the top of the phone set off from the rest of the buttons.
5. A green redial button is labeled again.
6. The quick rapid dial select key should be blue and placed next to redial. It should have a little lightning bolt symbol on it. To rapid dial, you hit quick then a digit.
7. The violet setup configuration menu key should be set off by itself. It is violet to subliminally discourage people from accidentally touching it. Most people don’t like that colour.
8. Perhaps it is time to add check digits to phone numbers which are checked locally by the JPhone. This helps prevent misdialing. You can avoid unpleasant confrontations when you dial a wrong number.
9. Unlisted numbers could have a password to make it harder for telephone solicitors or patient paparazzi to get through by random dialing. If your number and password leaked out, you would just need to change your password, (which you could do yourself) not get a new phone number. I always thought it odd that you must pay extra to persuade the phone company not to make a million or so copies of your name, address and phone number (but no postal code) on slips of paper and deliver them to people who have no intent of ever telephoning you.
10. Optionally, you can dial, then wait for a confirming display of the name of the caller you are about to call before you confirm the call and allow ringing to proceed.
11. Even local calls should be allowed to be dialed with full area and country codes to support standard-format computer databases of phone numbers since there is no way end users or even portable computers can be expected to know which exchanges are considered local.
12. Yellow button labeled flash to provide a timed hook flash for handling a call waiting.
13. Up down arrow keys are used for scrolling the display. The line in the center of the display is automatically the selected line.

Sound and Ringer Features

1. Adjustable volume would be nice for older folks and the hard of hearing. It is also useful where background noise is high.
2. choice of 10 interesting organic ringing noises selected by twirling a rotary dial on the bottom of the phone. This way there would be no confusion which phone is ringing in a multi-phone situation. These noises would be distinct from the noises used by convention for phones on TV, movies or VR (Virtual Reality). You could also download custom sounds as AU files. You might use the call of a loon when you are outside, or a waterfall sound when you are inside. These sounds would be less startling than the traditional. Ideally you could download and install any sound you wanted off the Internet. You might select frogs, insect, birds or other non-distracting, but distinctive sounds for multi-phone office use.
3. Variable ringer volume.
4. Some people startle easily, especially when sleeping. Every time the phone rings they get a nasty jolt of adrenalin. Optionally, the sound should start out quiet and gradually get louder.
5. Distinctive ring depending on who the call was for, see programming features for more details. Rings sounds may also be coded in other ways — e.g. emergency, or low priority.
6. If you don’t want to accept calls, you can disable the ringer easily. There should be visible feedback the ringer is disabled so that you don’t forget to turn it back on. The display flashes when there is an incoming call to further help you notice and to make it usable by the deaf. "do not disturb" mode can direct your calls immediately to an answering machine on the first ring without making any sound. The answering machine may be a virtual one provided by your JPhone service provider. If you tend to ramble on and on in your greeting message, telling everyone all the news about all your relatives, somebody without time to hear all the juicy details can interrupt you and leave a message. You can, of course, leave different greeting messages for different callers so you don’t tell just anyone the latest news.
7. You can program which calls can get through to your pager.
8. You can configure every caller to be handled in a custom way.

Miscellaneous Features

1. Your service provider lets you look up numbers given whatever information you’ve got e.g. old phone number, street address, rough area of the city, postal code…
2. Available in 10 decorator colours.
3. desk or wall mount.
4. non-tangling, springy cord so you can wander off to the bathroom with the phone should the need arise.

Designing Techniques

1. Ask the designers to read Donald Norman’s

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2. Hone the design by using a prototype and log any confusion, awkwardness or error in using it. These dissatisfaction points need to be honed.
3. Have a fresh supply of JPhone virgins to use to test the JPhone. Give them no instruction on how to use it and see what features they can discover and use without fumbling.
4. Check that people after a little experience can use the JPhone blind-folded.
5. Let testers take the JPhones home and use them in real life situations. Give them a pad to put next to the phone and pay them for every noted irritation they jot down.
6. Drop the phones off desks and pour cups of coffee on them to ensure they are sufficiently durable.

Jobs

The JPhone will create many new entrepreneurial jobs where you directly work for more than one client, not jobs that require any great financial daring. For example:

1. Receptionist/butler to screen both telephone and physical callers. With JPhone technology, you can work for dozens of people out of your own home. With the JPhone, anyone can afford a human butler or receptionist.
2. Operator to help technopeasants, those who are infirm, idly rich or mentally challenged, deal with the complexities of the phone system. All they need do is talk to you. They may be technically adept, but simply prefer the human touch. Your job is something like a conventional waitress namely to make lonely people feel better with a little casual contact.
3. In comp.lang.java.programmer and comp.lang.java.advocacy we discussed the way you could use GPS (Global Positioning System) positioning, integrating accelerometers, miniature video cameras and voice activated cellphones to let you keep track of the whereabouts of your pet Dalmatian Fido and to trigger a call if he barked repeatedly or whimpered excessively to report a potential security threat or injury to himself. Somebody else needs to screen these calls or he will drive you nuts just to get attention. You can find old newgroup postings at Google Groups.

Courtesy

Strangers would not dream of barging into my home and demanding my attention by banging on a bell. That would be incredibly rude. Yet they think nothing of doing the same thing with the telephone. We need to find ways to make the JPhone behave like a butler to gently inform that a caller craves an audience at the earliest convenience.

People who would not dream of shoving others aside to get to the head of a queue, think nothing of it if they use the telephone as their instrument. The moment the imperious telephone rings, the shopkeeper drops all the real customers to cater to some potential one. This infuriates the paying customers. Phone callers should wait in line like anyone else and perhaps wait until all the real customers are dealt with.

The phone caller should have some way of knowing how long the queue is and be able to go off and do something else and have the phone ring when their turn in the queue is just about due. Making people wait on hold, tying up bandwidth all the while, to listen to low fidelity elevator music is not only boring, it is mildly sadistic. Surely we will find ways around these problems with an all-digital system.

With the traditional telephone, callers cannot appreciate just how irritated you are. You can’t get rid of them, even for a pressing bathroom emergency. They see none of your visual body language clues and continue to babble on inanely, blissfully unaware of how badly you want to disconnect. Perhaps with a video connection as well, your body languge will telegraph your discomfort.

Child Mode

A more elaborate child mode might offer a selection of sounds or games when you dial different numbers.

The Phone Store

Retail phone stores of the future might have the following features:

1. You pick up the handset to listen to a recorded voice describing the phone’s features. This let you get an idea of how good the quality of the earphone/loudspeakers is.
2. You can speak into the telephone then hear your own voice played back, so that you can judge the quality of the microphone/mouthpiece.
3. You can try out the various programmable features since the phone is plugged into a simulated miniature phone system. If you can’t figure out how to use them in the store, you will have even less chance at home without the salesperson to assist you.
4. The demonstrator models are labeled with the date they went into service. This will give you an idea of how durable each model is and how easy it is keep clean.
5. There is a computer terminal the public can use. It guides you through a multiple choice list of questions about how important various features are to you and your budget range. It then shows you a list of models that fit your criteria, highlighting the differences from your ideal specification. It shows you which are in stock, which can be shipped from warehouses and which can be built on special order.