EP0251296A2
Expired / Lapsed
EP
⏱️ 0.0 years remaining
Portable communication terminal for remote data query
Assignee: Wang Laboratories Inc
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Filing: 1987-06-30
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Granted: —
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Expires: 2007-06-30
Abstract
Abstract A portable terminal suitable (11) for brief queries to a central database can be employed with any available telephone for communication over the public telephone network. Message characters are entered through the keyboard (26), stored in memory (52) in digitally coded form, and displayed in a display window (32). A speaker (16) is acoustically coupled to the telephone mouthpiece (100). After dial-up connection to a host (106), a stored message is recalled and transmitted; the stored digitally coded data is converted to a code employing unique sequential pairs of standard DTMF tones, provided by a tone generator (53) to the speaker. The message can be composed off-line, stored, and edited using special function keys including insert and delete. Telephone numbers can be dialed through the terminal keyboard, and are transmitted in standard DTMF coding. Telephone numbers can be stored as messages, or can be embedded in text messages. Host response is transmitted in audio coding (recorded or synthetic speech) to the telephone earpiece, or in DTMF coding to a microphone connected to the earpiece (102); DTMF coded response data is converted in the terminal to digitally coded form for storage.
Inventors
- 👤 Douglas C. Dayton
- 👤 Richard Bergeron
- 👤 Donald R. Shriner
Bibliographic Details
Application Number
—
Jurisdiction
EP
Data Source
google_patents
Last Synchronized
2026-10-24 11:19
CPC Classifications
H; H04; H04M; H04M11/00; H04M11/06; H04M11/066; H04M1/00; H04M1/26; H04M1/27; H04M1/274; H04M1/2745; H04M1/275
Claims Analysis
Total Claims: 10
Claim 1
Independent Claim
188 words
A portable communications terminal (11) comprising a keyboard (26) providing alphanumeric character keys for entering alphanumeric input signals corresponding to alphanumeric characters, and a Store key (13) and a Send key (15) for entering corresponding input signals, storage means (52) for storing digitally coded representations of characters corresponding to said alphanumeric character key input signals, a DTMF tone generator (53), output means (16) connected to said generator, and controller means (50) connected to said keyboard (26), said storage means (52), and said tone generator (53), and responsive to an input signal corresponding to actuation of said Store key (13) for storing digitally coded representations of alphanumeric characters corresponding to subsequent alphanumeric input signals in said storage means as a message string (19), characterized in that said controller means (50) is thereafter responsive to an input signal corresponding to actuation of said Send key (15) for accessing said stored message string (19), and responsive to each successive digitally coded representation, for causing said generator (53) to generate two successive DTMF tones comprising a sequential pair uniquely corresponding to said corresponding alphanumeric character, for transmission by said output means (16).
Claim 2
Dependent Claim
188 words
A portable communications terminal (11) comprising a keyboard (26) providing alphanumeric character keys for entering alphanumeric input signals corresponding to alphanumeric characters, and a Store key (13) and a Send key (15) for entering corresponding input signals, storage means (52) for storing digitally coded representations of characters corresponding to said alphanumeric character key input signals, a DTMF tone generator (53), output means (16) connected to said generator, and controller means (50) connected to said keyboard (26), said storage means (52), and said tone generator (53), and responsive to an input signal corresponding to actuation of said Store key (13) for storing digitally coded representations of alphanumeric characters corresponding to subsequent alphanumeric input signals in said storage means as a message string (19), characterized in that said controller means (50) is thereafter responsive to an input signal corresponding to actuation of said Send key (15) for accessing said stored message string (19), and responsive to each successive digitally coded representation, for causing said generator (53) to generate two successive DTMF tones comprising a sequential pair uniquely corresponding to said corresponding alphanumeric character, for transmission by said output means (16).
Claim 3
Dependent Claim
70 words
The terminal of claim 1, further characterized in that said controller means (50) is responsive to actuation of said Send key (15) for accessing said storage means (52) and for deriving a count of characters represented in said stored message string (19), and thereafter for causing said generator means (53) to generate tone pairs uniquely corresponding to a start character and to a count header representing said derived character count.
Claim 4
Dependent Claim
73 words
The terminal of claim 1, further characterized in that said controller means (50) is responsive to actuation of said Send key (15) for accessing said storage means (52) and for deriving a count of characters represented in said stored message string (19) and thereafter for causing said generator means (53) to generate a sequence of tone pairs uniquely corresponding to a start character and to a count header representing said derived character count.
Claim 5
Dependent Claim
97 words
A communications system (106, 104, 103, 102, 11) comprising the terminal of claim 1, a telephone handset (103) acoustically coupled to said speaker (16), and a host computer (106) connected to said telephone handset through a dial-up telephone line (104), characterized in that said host computer (106) provides stored signals representing the correspondence between a digital representation of said alphanumeric characters and said unique DTMF tone pairs for decoding of received said transmitted DTMF tone pairs, said host computer being responsive to said decoded message text for transmitting data to said telephone handset (103) in audio coding.
Claim 6
Dependent Claim
123 words
The terminal (11) of claim 1, further characterized in that the terminal includes transmitting means (53) for transmitting on a telephone connection (104) in response to an operator-entered signal a transmission sequence of DTMF tones corresponding to said message string, said sequence of tones including a header sequence and a message sequence transmitted subsequent to transmission of said header sequence, said header sequence being indicative of the number of characters in said message string, and said message sequence being composed of a sequence of non-overlapping sequential pairs of DTMF tones, each of said non-overlapping pairs corresponding to one of the characters of said message string, and the order of transmission of said non-overlapping pairs corresponding to the order of characters in said message.
Claim 7
Dependent Claim
48 words
The terminal (11) of claim 1 further characterized in that the terminal includes labeling means for receiving entry of a character string defining a message label, for associating said message label with said message string (19), and for storing said message label in association with said message string.
Claim 8
Dependent Claim
39 words
The terminal (11) of claim 1 further characterized in including header count means for transmitting prior to transmitting a stored message string a sequence of DTMF tones indicating the count of alphanumeric characters included in said stored message string.
Claim 9
Independent Claim
52 words
A method of communicating a sequence of alphanumeric characters, characterized in providing a DTMF tone generator, and controlling said DTMF tone generator, responsive to signals representing said alphanumeric character sequence to generate and transmit a sequence of DTMF tones in which non-overlapping sequential pairs of tones uniquely correspond to an alphanumeric character.
Claim 10
Independent Claim
52 words
A method of communicating a sequence of alphanumeric characters, characterized in providing a DTMF tone generator, and controlling said DTMF tone generator, responsive to signals representing said alphanumeric character sequence to generate and transmit a sequence of DTMF tones in which non-overlapping sequential pairs of tones uniquely correspond to an alphanumeric character.
References Cited (Backward Citations)
No citation records indexed.
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