Re: Modem as a service?

[Henry Yen <henry () AegisInfoSys com>]

On Mon, Dec 07, 2015 at 11:54:17AM -0600, Larry Sheldon wrote:
> I'll join the confusion--I thought the OP wanted to test for power 
> availability at the distant site by seeing if a modem there would answer 
> the phone there.  That it HAD to be a modem in that case makes no sense 
> to me.
>
> I'm of the line now and have been for a while and maybe y'all don't do 
> things the way we did--we always had an answering machine (two or three 
> in some places*) that always answered on the first ring and gave some 
> kind of status report that was updated hourly on on event).  If it did 
> not answer, the power was out.

At a client wiring closet, the super-conscientious rack maintainer one day
decided that it was good practice to replace consumer-standard batteries
during his quarterly cleaning rounds.

Answering machines have replaceable batteries. Modems do not.

-- 
Henry Yen <Henry.Yen () Aegis00 com>               Aegis Information Systems, Inc.
Senior Systems Programmer                       Hicksville, New York
(800) AEGIS-00 x949                             1-800-AEGIS-00 (800-234-4700)