JPS6020670A - Automatic answering telephone set - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To inform a user of the number of messages not yet listened by counting the number of sound recorded messages in a tape and outputting the counted value in voice when the tape is reproduced by remote control. CONSTITUTION:When a sound recording switch 15 while absence is made on, a tape 10 for reply message reproduction is started and a tape 11 for business message sound recording is rewound to become waiting state for sound recording while absence, and a business message counter 18 is cleared. When a call signal detecting circuit 2 detects ringing tone, reply message is sent, and if it is not an operation signal from an owner, sound records the business message in the tape 11, and when completed, sound records a pause sound from a pause sound generating circuit 16 in the tape 11, and after counting up the business message counter 18, returns again to waiting state. When the call is an operation signal from an owner, numerical value of the business message counter 18 is converted to voice by a voice synthesizing circuit 17 and sent to the owner, and then the tape 11 is reproduced and transmitted.

Description

[Detailed Description of the Invention] (Field of Application) The present invention relates to an answering machine that can be remotely controlled via a telephone line, and more particularly to an answering machine that has a function of notifying the owner of the number of recorded messages. It is.

(Background) Figure 1 shows a conventional answering machine (hereinafter abbreviated as the device).
It is a block diagram showing an example.

In the figure, 1 is a telephone line, 2 is a calling signal detection circuit, 3 is a relay, 4 is a coupling transformer, 5 is a reproduction amplifier,
6 is a recording amplifier, 7 is a recording/reproducing switch, 8.9 is a recording/reproducing head, 10 is a tape for playing back a response message, 11 is a tape for recording a business message, 12 is a tape drive circuit, 13 is a remote control signal detection circuit, 14 is the central command unit (hereinafter referred to as CP)
(abbreviated as U), 15 is an answering machine switch, and 16 is a separation sound generation circuit.

Next, the operation will be explained. Now, when the answering machine switch 15 is turned on, the CPU 14 uses the tape drive circuit 12 to cue the beginning of the response message playback tape 10, rewinds the business message recording tape 11, and enters the answering machine standby state. Make it.

In this state, when the first calling signal arrives from the telephone line 1, the calling signal detection circuit 2 detects the signal and sends a detection signal to the CPU 14.

The CPU 14 thereby closes the p-relay 3 and connects the telephone line 1 and the coupling transformer 4 to enable signal transmission and reception.

At the same time, the tape drive circuit 12 drives the tape 10 for reproducing a response message (a message recorded in advance by the owner of this device to convey to the caller), and the recording/reproduction switch 7 is switched to the reproduction side (solid line side). . Thereafter, the response message is reproduced and transmitted to the caller through the recording/reproducing head 8, the reproduction amplifier 5, and the coupling transformer 4.

When the sending of the response message is completed, the CPU 14 stops the response message reproduction tape 10.

Subsequently, the tape drive circuit 12 drives the tape 11 for recording the business message (the caller's business message), and the recording/reproducing switch 7 is switched to the recording side (the dotted line side). As a result, the caller's message is transferred to the connecting transformer 4. The first message is recorded on the message recording tape 11 through the recording amplifier 6° and the recording/reproducing head 9.

When the recording of the caller's message is finished, CPU1
4 generates and records a delimiter sound on the message recording tape 11 by the delimiter sound generating circuit 16, and then stops the tape. Subsequently, the relay 3 is opened to complete one cycle of the answering answer recording function.

By repeating the above cycle, the caller's business is recorded one after another on the business message recording tape 11.

Next, when the owner calls the device through the telephone line 1 and sends a remote control signal, the remote control signal detection circuit 13 detects the signal and sends a detection signal to the CPU 14. CPU1
4 thereby sends a command to the tape drive circuit 12 to rewind and then reproduce the message recording tape 11.

This allows the owner to listen to recorded messages one after another.

However, the conventional device described above has a drawback in that the owner cannot know the number of incoming calls.

(Objective) An object of the present invention is to eliminate the drawbacks of the prior art described above and to provide a remote control function that is capable of notifying the owner of the number of unheard messages at the beginning of the remote control. There is a particular thing.

(Summary) The present invention is characterized by a counter that counts up each time a message is recorded on a tape for recording a message, and when the tape for recording a message is played back and listened to by remote control, the counter increases. The point is that a voice synthesis means is provided to vocalize the number indicated by .

(Example) The present invention will be explained below using examples. Figure 2 shows
1 shows a block diagram of an embodiment of the present invention.

In the figure, 17 is a speech synthesis circuit, 18 is a business message counter, and 19 is a speech synthesis data ROM.

20 is a data selector, 21 is a delimiter detection circuit, and 22 is a microcomputer. Further, symbols other than these indicate the same or equivalent items as in FIG. 1.

Next, the operation of this embodiment will be explained with reference to the flowchart shown in FIG. When the answering machine switch 15 is turned on, the response message playback tape 10 is cued, the business message recording tape 11 is rewound, and
Be in a state where the answering machine is on standby. It is a conventional example that when the first ring signal arrives from the telephone line 1, a response message is reproduced and sent to the caller, and that the message is then recorded on the message message recording tape 11. It is almost the same as

Further, when the recording of the caller's message is completed, the delimiter tone generation circuit 16j generates a pre-delimiter sound and records this on the message tape, and furthermore, the owner, through the telephone line 1, When a remote control signal is sent, it is detected and the recorded messages are played back one after another, much like conventional devices.

Therefore, a description of the same operating parts as those of the conventional device will be omitted here, and only the features of this embodiment will be described in detail using FIG. 3.

Step S1: When the answering switch '15 is turned on, the message counter 18 is cleared.

Step S2... by the calling signal detection circuit 2,
A determination is made whether a ring tone is received. When the ringing tone is received, the process advances to the next step S3.

Step S3...A response message is sent.

Step S4: It is determined whether a remote control signal has been sent from the owner. If no, the process advances to step S5. If YES, proceed to step S7.

Step S5: Since the call is from a caller other than the owner, the message is transferred to the message tape 11.
When the recording is completed, the sound before the break is outputted from the break sound generating circuit 16 and recorded on the tape 11.

Step S6: Count up the message counter 18.

Then, it returns to the answering machine standby state again.

Step S7: The numerical value of the business message counter 18 is transmitted to the owner as a synthesized voice.

That is, when the owner calls this device through the telephone line 1 and then sends a remote control signal, the remote control signal detection circuit 13 detects the signal and sends a detection signal to the CPU 14. The CPU 14 uses the message counter 1 for this purpose.
An address signal is output to the data selector 20 so that the voice synthesis information data representing the count number 8 is sent from the voice synthesis ROM 19 to the voice synthesis circuit 17.

Thereby, the count number of the business message counter 18 is converted into a voice by the voice synthesis circuit 17 and sent to the telephone line 1 via the coupling transformer 4.

Therefore, the owner can know the number of messages prerecorded in the music to be played back from the business message tape 11.

Step S8: After this, the owner remotely controls the
The message recording tape 11 is played back. This allows the owner to listen to recorded messages one after another.

After that, other remote operations are performed and the device returns to the answering machine standby state.

Next, another embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to FIG.

In the embodiment shown in FIG. 3, the number of recorded messages is conveyed using a synthesized voice, whereas in this embodiment, the number of unheard messages is conveyed using a synthesized voice. In other words, the number of newly recorded messages that have been recorded since the owner listened to the message once can be known.

Step 5ll-817...Step 5l- in FIG.
Same as 87.

Step 818...A determination is made whether to play the newly recorded message. If YES, the process advances to step S19, then the process proceeds to step S24. Incidentally, this is determined by the signal that the owner responds to through the telephone line 1 in response to the answering machine's decision as to whether or not to reproduce a new message.

Step S19...The message counter 18 is ol'
A judgment is made whether or not. If yes, step S
If the answer to step S24 is NO, the process advances to step S20.

Step S20...The newly recorded business message is played back and sent.

Step S21: It is determined whether there is a pre-delimiter. When the pre-delimiter is issued, the process advances to step S22.

Step 822...The message counter 18 is decremented.

Step 823...A determination is made as to whether or not to reproduce the next message. If yes, return to step 819. If no, the process moves to step S24. In this case, as in step 818, the determination is made based on the response signal from the owner.

Step 824...Remote control other than the above is performed,
After that, it returns to the answering machine standby state.

(Effect) According to the present invention, after setting the device t to answering machine and going out,
When using remote control, you can first see the number of recorded messages. In addition, even if you stop playing the message by remote control, the message that is not being played is considered to be a newly recorded message, so the owner can always know the number of unheard messages. There is.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a conventional answering machine, FIG. 2 is a block diagram of an embodiment of the present invention, FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing the operation of the embodiment, and FIG. 4 is another embodiment of the present invention. 3 is a flowchart illustrating an example operation. 1...Telephone line, 2...Call signal detection circuit,
3... Relay, 4... Coupling transformer, 5... Playback amplifier, 6... Recording amplifier, 7... Recording/playback switch,
8, 9... Recording/reproducing head, 10... Tape for reproducing response message, 11... Tape for recording message message, 12... Tape drive circuit, 13... Remote control signal detection circuit, 14 ...Central command unit (CPU), 15
... Answering machine switch, 16 ... Separator sound generation circuit, 1
7... Voice synthesis circuit, 18... Message counter, 19... Data ROM for voice synthesis, 20...
・Data selector, 21... Patent attorney representing the delimiter detection circuit Michi Hiraki Talent 1 Figure 2

Claims (3)

[Claims] (1) An answering machine that can be controlled remotely via a telephone line includes a counter that counts up each time a message is recorded on a message recording tape, and a counter that counts up each time a message is recorded on a message recording tape. 1. An answering machine comprising a voice synthesizing means for converting the number indicated by the counter into voice when a message recording tape is played back and listened to. (2) The patent number telephone device is characterized in that the counter counts down by the number of business messages that have been played back and listened to. (3) The answering machine according to claim 1 or 2, characterized in that the voice synthesis means converts the business message into voice before reproducing the message.