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Trunk- The communications channel, usually a physical line, between a telephone system and the telephone company central office. In brief, a business phone line.
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Station/Extension- Simply another word for telephone. For example, the telephone station may be one of many extensions on a Voice over IP based or traditional PBX system.
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Port- An interface location on a communications system that provides a point of access for peripheral equipment; such as stations, trunks,T1/PRI circuits, voice mail, IP sets, etc. Total port capacity is one way of measuring the growth capability of a telephone system.
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T1/PRI Line- A digital transmission link from the telephone company central office capable of handling up to 1.544 Mega bits per second. A T1/PRI circuit can handle voice, data or both (an “integrated” circuit). If the configuration is for voice only, a full T1 represents 24 telephone lines. A PRI circuit differs from a conventional T1 in that it provides caller ID information, and represents the equivalent of 23 phones lines. The 24th "line” is used exclusively for transmitting the caller ID data to the telephone system.
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DID (Direct inward Dialing)- When a call is received over the DID circuit (the only type of circuit currently available for this feature is a T1/PRI line, analog DID circuits have gone the way of rotary dial phones) it is preceded by a packet of information containing the number that was dialed. The on premises phone system decodes this information and routes the call to the extension that has been programmed to coincide with the number dialed. The benefit to the consumer is a pooled access group for incoming calls so that dedicated lines are not required to provide numerous individual telephones with direct access availability.
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VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol)- Voice over IP (also referred to as IP Telephony and Internet Telephony), in simplest terms, is utilizing the internet to carry voice communications instead of the traditional, circuit switched technology that has been in place for well over 100 years. This technology is available now and represents the future of telecommunications. Learn more about Voice over IP.
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Unified Messaging- Unified messaging (sometimes referred to as email integration) is the handling of voice, email and fax messages as objects in a single mailbox that a user can access either with a regular email client (such as, but not limited to, MS Outlook) or by telephone. The PC user can open and play back voice mail messages, assuming their PC has multimedia capabilities, right from their Outlook In-Box.
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CTI (Computer Telephony Integration)- CTI is a set of technologies for integrating computers and telephone systems. A user with a CTI-enabled computer will be able to dial the telephone, answer the telephone, and hang-up the telephone, all from his/her PC. CTI enables users to dial the phone from address books (such as MS Outlook) stored on their computer. A CTI-enabled computer will also display information from the telephone system, and use caller ID data to open a contact file in an address book (again, such as Outlook) as the call is coming in.
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Station Message Detail Recording (SMDR or Call Detail Recording)- Information recorded by a PC attached to the phone system, providing cost accounting information such as the number of calls, both local and long distance, made from an extension during a certain time period.
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Uniform/Automatic Call Distribution (UCD/ACD)- A feature that handles incoming call traffic, sending calls to the first available station within predefined groups. If all stations are busy then a recorded message is played and the call is put in queue until a station becomes available. This feature can also provide reports on call volume, hold time, and the comparative productivity of the members in the predefined groups.
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