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You will find below our library of terms and definitions used in the Internet
Telephony Industry: |
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Term |
Definition |
|
ATA |
An
Analog Telephone Adaptor (ATA) is a device used to
connect a standard telephone to a network so that the user
can make calls over the Internet. Internet-based long
distance calls can be substantially cheaper than calls
transmitted over the traditional telephone system. With
FreeTEL Networks, ATA will be used to make long distance
calls free for life. |
|
Broadband |
The use of cable to provide data transfer using analog
(radio-frequency) signals. Digital signals must be passed
through a modem and transmitted over one of the frequency
bands of the cable. Multiple channels carry data on a single
physical cable. Cable TV is an example of broadband
transmission. The term is commonly associated with high
speed data transfer connections. |
|
Call Waiting |
A phone service feature that notifies a telephone user that
another incoming call is waiting to be answered. This is
typically provided by a short tone on the phone, or by use
of the caller ID feature. This would be a typical feature
included with your VoIP Phone Service.
|
|
Dialup |
A dialup connection can be initiated manually or
automatically by your computer's modem or other devices. In
our case, the dialup connection is used by the FTS-P200 to
connect to the Internet allowing VoIP calls. |
|
DSL |
Acronym of
Digital Subscriber Line: DSL is a technology for
bringing high-bandwidth information to homes and small
businesses over ordinary copper telephone lines. xDSL refers
to different variations of DSL, such as ADSL, HDSL, and
RADSL. Assuming your home or small business is close enough
to a telephone company central office that offers DSL
service, you may be able to receive data at rates up to 6.1
megabits (millions of bits) per second (of a theoretical
8.448 megabits per second), enabling continuous transmission
of motion video, audio, and even 3-D effects. More
typically, individual connections will provide from 1.544
Mbps to 512 Kbps downstream and about 128 Kbps upstream. A
DSL line can carry both data and voice signals and the data
part of the line is continuously connected. DSL
installations began in 1998 and will continue at a greatly
increased pace through the next decade in a number of
communities in the U.S. and elsewhere. Compaq, Intel, and
Microsoft working with telephone companies have developed a
standard and easier-to-install form of ADSL called G.lite
that is accelerating deployment. DSL is expected to replace
ISDN in many areas and to compete with the cable modem in
bringing multimedia and 3-D to homes and small businesses. |
|
Ethernet |
Ethernet is a packet based transmission protocol that is
primarily used in LANs |
|
Gateway |
A gateway is a network point that acts as an entrance to
another network. On the Internet, a node or stopping point
can be either a gateway node or a host (end-point) node.
Both the computers of Internet users and the computers that
serve pages to users are host nodes. The computers that
control traffic within your company's network or at your
local Internet service provider (ISP) are gateway nodes. |
|
IP Telephony |
General term for the technologies that use the Internet
Protocol's packet-switched connections to exchange voice,
fax, and other forms of information that have traditionally
been carried over the dedicated circuit-switched connections
of the public switched telephone network (PSTN). Also
commonly referred to as IP Phone Service, VoIP Phone
Service, and Broadband Phone Service |
|
ISP |
An ISP (Internet Service Provider) is a company that
provides individuals and other companies to access the
Internet and other related services such as Web site
building and virtual hosting |
|
LAN |
Acronym of
Local Area Network: LAN is a group of computers and
associated devices that share a common communication line
or wireless link and typically share the resources of a
single processor or server within a small geographic area
(for example, within an office building). Usually, the
server has applications and data storage that are shared in
common by multiple computer users. A local area network may
serve as few as two or three users (for example, in a home
network) or as many as thousands of users (for example, in
an FDDI network). |
|
Modem |
A modem modulates outgoing digital signals from a computer
or another digital device to analog signals for a conventional
copper twisted pair telephone line and demodulates the
incoming analog signal and converts it to a digital signal
for the digital device. In recent years, the 2400 bit-per-second modem that could carry e-mail has become obsolete.
14.4 Kbps and 28.8 Kbps modems were temporary landing places
on the way to the much higher bandwidth devices and carriers
of tomorrow. From early 1998, most new personal computers
came with 56 Kbps modems. By comparison, using a digital
Integrated Services Digital Network adapter instead of a
conventional modem, the same telephone wire can now carry up
to 128 Kbps. With Digital Subscriber Line (DSL) systems, now
being deployed in a number of communities, bandwidth on
twisted-pair can be in the megabit range. |
|
NIC |
An adapter circuit board installed in a computer to provide
a physical connection to a network |
|
PSTN |
Acronym of
Public Switched Telephone Network: PSTN is the
world's collection of interconnected voice-oriented public
telephone networks, both commercial and government-owned.
It's also referred to as the Plain Old Telephone Service
(POTS). It's the aggregation of circuit-switching telephone
networks that has evolved from the days of Alexander Graham
Bell ("Doctor Watson, come here!"). Today, it is almost
entirely digital in technology except for the final link
from the central (local) telephone office to the user.
In relation to the Internet, the PSTN actually furnishes
much of the Internet's long-distance infrastructure. Because
Internet service providers ISPs pay the long-distance
providers for access to their infrastructure and share the
circuits among many users through packet-switching, Internet
users avoid having to pay usage tolls to anyone other than
their ISPs. |
|
RJ-11 |
The most common telephone jack is the RJ-11 jack. The RJ-11
jack is likely to be the jack that your household or office
phones are plugged. |
|
RJ-45 |
The RJ-45 is a single-line jack for digital transmission
over ordinary phone wire, either untwisted or twisted. The
interface has eight pins or positions. For connecting a
modem, printer, or a data PBX at a data rate up to 19.2
Kbps, you can use untwisted wire. For faster transmissions
in which you're connecting to an Ethernet 10BASET network,
you need to use twisted pair wire. (Untwisted is usually a
flat wire like common household phone extension wire.
Twisted is often round.) There are two varieties of RJ-45:
keyed and un-keyed. Keyed has a small bump on its end and
the female complements it. Both jack and plug must match. |
|
Router |
A device that connects multiple networks together and
forwards packets (of data) between them |
|
Session Initiation Protocol |
A standard protocol for initiating an interactive user
session that involves multimedia elements such as video,
voice, chat, gaming, and virtual reality. |
|
Telephone |
A device that converts your speech into an analog signal
suitable for transmission over a phone line. |
|
VoIP |
Acronym of
Voice Over IP: Any technology providing voice
telephony services over IP, including codec's, streaming,
protocols and session control. The major advantage of VoIP
is lower cost, by avoiding dedicated voice circuits.
Currently VoIP is being deployed on internal corporate
networks, and, via the Internet, for low cost international
calls. Such as FreeTEL Networks offers lifetime VoIP service
for free. |
|
WAN |
Acronym of
Wide Area Network: WAN is a geographically
dispersed telecommunications network. The term distinguishes
a broader telecommunication structure from a local area
network (LAN). A wide area network may be privately owned or
rented, but the term usually connotes the inclusion of
public (shared user) networks. An intermediate form of
network in terms of geography is a metropolitan area network
(MAN). |
|
Wireless |
References the transmission of information (data, voice etc)
over electromagnetic waves rather than over a wire
connection |
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