JP2005136680A - Ip telephone set - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an IP telephone set for notifying a caller which line is used to call. <P>SOLUTION: This IP telephone set is configured to enable a user to call through a public telephone line network and an IP network, and provided with a line judging means which detects an MODEM sound emitted by an MODEM connected to the public telephone line network or the IP network, and judges the route of a line which is being used at present by the IP telephone set according to the type of the MODEM sound and a notifying means which notifies the route of the line judged by the line judging means to the caller. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2005,JPO&NCIPI

Description

The present invention relates to an IP telephone, and more particularly to an IP telephone capable of making a call on two lines of an IP network and a public telephone line network and notifying which caller is using which line to call. About.

  In recent years, with the development of communication technology, when using a telephone, a so-called IP telephone (IP telephone is a type of network that can be used for telephone calls using an IP network (IP network) instead of a conventional public telephone network). Some or all of them refer to voice services provided using IP network technology).

  When making a call using an IP telephone, there are three ways of using the line as shown in FIG. The first route A is a route for making a call to a destination telephone through an IP network through a modem connected to the IP telephone. In this case, the other party's telephone must be in an environment in which an IP telephone can be used in the same manner as the caller (that is, an environment in which a modem or IP telephone is possessed).

  In the case of the second route B, when the other party's telephone is not in an environment where the IP telephone can be used and only a general telephone is possessed, it is not possible to make a call directly to the other party only through the IP network. Therefore, after the modem via the IP network, it is a route for calling the other party's telephone via the public telephone line network through a gateway connecting the IP network and the public telephone line network. In this case, the other party's telephone does not need to be an IP telephone but may be a normal telephone.

  In the third route C, when the other party's telephone is, for example, a mobile phone or a specific telephone number such as 110 or 119, the direct route through the public telephone line network without going through the IP network. This is a route to call the other party's telephone.

  In this way, unlike ordinary telephones that only use a public telephone line network, IP telephones have the feature that call charges vary depending on the type of line being used because three types of routes are used. Yes. Therefore, it is a serious problem from the viewpoint of the charge that the caller knows whether the IP network is used or the public telephone line network is used.

JP-T-2001-513603

  However, in the conventional IP telephone, as shown in Patent Document 1, the IP telephone that detects the call state of the other party (whether the other party is talking or is available) and notifies the caller is Although it exists, since it is assumed that only the public line network is used in the first place, there is no telephone set that can determine the type of line used. In other words, there is no IP telephone that notifies the caller whether the IP telephone uses the IP network or the public telephone line network.

  Accordingly, the present inventor notifies the caller of which line the IP telephone is currently using to make a call, that is, whether the IP telephone is used or a public telephone line. Invented an IP phone capable of

The invention of claim 1
An IP telephone that can be called via a public telephone line network or an IP network, detects a modem sound emitted by a modem connected to the IP telephone, and is used by the IP telephone depending on the type of the modem sound. An IP telephone having line determining means for determining the route of the line being connected, and notifying means for notifying the caller of the route of the line determined by the line determining means.

  According to the present invention, it is possible to notify the caller on the spot of the currently used line type that did not exist in the conventional telephone.

The invention of claim 2
The IP telephone has an LED, and the notification means notifies the caller of the type of the route of the line used by the color and / or blinking and / or brightness of the LED. It is.

  According to the present invention, it is possible to visually notify the caller of the type of the line by the coloring, blinking, and the like.

The invention of claim 3
The IP telephone has a display device, and the notification means is an IP telephone that displays the type of the route of the line being used on the display device.

  According to the present invention, it is possible to notify the caller in detail of the line type via a display device such as a liquid crystal display.

The invention of claim 4
The notifying means is an IP telephone for notifying the route type of the line being used by voice through a receiver.

According to the present invention, it is possible to audibly notify the caller of the line type by voice through the receiver.

According to the present invention, the caller can grasp which line is to be used. As a result, for example, when the IP telephone system secures the line so that the telephone network is automatically connected to the public telephone network because the IP network is congested, the IP telephone sets the IP network line once by placing the handset. Until it is secured, it can be repeated. Therefore, the room for selecting the burden of the line charge by the caller increases.

  FIG. 1 shows the appearance of an IP telephone 1 (referred to as an IP telephone that can use an IP telephone) used in the present invention. 1A is a perspective view of the IP telephone 1, FIG. 1B is a front view when the IP telephone 1 is viewed from the front, and FIG. 1C is a side view when the IP telephone 1 is viewed from the side. FIG. 1D is a plan view of the IP telephone 1 as viewed from above.

  The IP telephone 1 is provided with an IP telephone main body, a handset 2, and a push button 4 for inputting a telephone number, like the normal IP telephone 1. Furthermore, in the IP telephone 1 of the present invention, there are a line discriminating means 10 for discriminating which line the caller uses to call and a notifying means 11 for notifying the caller of the type. FIG. 1 shows a case where notification by the notification means 11 is performed via the LED 3. FIG. 6 shows an enlarged view of a portion where the LED 3 is provided in the IP telephone 1.

  Further, a system configuration diagram including the system configuration of the IP telephone 1 is shown in FIG. As described above, the IP telephone 1 has the line discrimination means 10 and the notification means 11 in addition to the IP telephone 1 main body, the receiver 2, and the push button 4.

  When the caller inputs the telephone number of the other party's telephone 6 from the push button 4 of the IP telephone 1, the line discriminating means 10 uses the IP line network by detecting the modem sound emitted from the modem 5. Are you calling (route A), are you calling using the IP network and public telephone network (route B), are you using only the public telephone network (route)? C) means for performing the determination.

  The modem 5 secures a line for calling the destination telephone 6 based on the telephone number input by the IP telephone 1. Also, the line to be used is appropriately changed according to the telephone number and the traffic situation of the IP network line. For example, if the input phone number is a mobile phone number, the modem 5 makes a call to the other party's telephone 6 directly via the public telephone line network without going through the IP network. In the case of a telephone number assigned for an IP telephone starting from “050”, the modem 5 makes a call to the other party's telephone 6 only through the IP network. If the telephone number is a normal telephone number, the telephone 6 is called via the IP network and the gateway and further through the public telephone line network. In addition to changing the line by telephone number, for example, when the IP network is congested (when there is a lot of network traffic), not only route A but also route B and route C are used as appropriate.

  Therefore, the user cannot actually grasp which line the modem 5 is using in practice, so that the line discrimination means 10 detects the modem sound emitted from the modem 5. Determine with. For example, in the case of the route A, the modem 5 emits a sound such as “Puppu” as the ringing tone, and in the case of the route B, the modem 5 emits a sound such as “Puppu” as the ringing tone. Further, in the case of route C, the modem 5 is silent (the modem 5 does not emit sound). Therefore, by detecting this ringing tone, the currently used line can be determined.

  The notification unit 11 is a unit that notifies the caller of the type of the line determined by the line determination unit 10 by using a display device such as the LED 3 or a liquid crystal, voice, or the like. For example, when this notification is performed by the LED 3 as shown in FIG. 1, the LED 3 is controlled so as to change one or more of its color, blinking, and brightness. For example, when the route A is used, the LED 3 is blinked in blue during a call and further blue is lit during a call. When the route B is used, the LED 3 blinks in orange during a call, and lights up in orange during a call. When route C is used, blinking and lighting are not performed during a call or during a call.

  That is, the line type is notified to the user according to one or more types among the lighting, blinking, and brightness of the LED 3 shown in the enlarged view of FIG.

  Further, in addition to the LED 3 shown in FIGS. 1 and 6, the notifying unit 11 may have a display device using liquid crystal or the like, for example, in the IP telephone 1. The line type may be notified by displaying “IP network and public telephone line network in use” or “public telephone line network only in use”, or the above line type is notified by voice through handset 2 You may do it.

  The line discriminating means 10 and the notifying means 11 in the present invention as described above can also be realized by configuring a circuit on a semiconductor chip, and an example of the circuit is shown in FIG. This chip is provided inside the main body of the IP telephone 1.

  Next, regarding the notification of the line type to the caller in the IP telephone 1 of the present invention, the flowchart of FIG. 4, the external view of the IP telephone 1 of FIG. 1, and the line usage method of the IP telephone 1 of FIG. This will be described with reference to the system configuration diagram of FIG.

  When making a call, the caller removes the handset 2 in the same manner as a conventional telephone (S100) and presses the push button 4 of the IP telephone 1 to input the telephone number of the other party's telephone 6 (see FIG. S110).

  Upon receiving this telephone number input, the IP telephone 1 determines which line is to be used as appropriate in accordance with the congestion state such as the telephone number and network traffic of the IP network, and makes a call to the telephone 6 of the other party. .

  At this time, the modem 5 secures a line through any one of route A, route B, and route C. In this case, the modem 5 emits a modem sound corresponding to each route (or silence). For example, in the case of the route A, the modem 5 emits a sound such as “Puppu” as the ringing tone, and in the case of the route B, the modem 5 emits a sound such as “Puppu” as the ringing tone. Further, in the case of route C, the modem 5 is silent.

  The line determination unit 10 of the IP telephone 1 detects the modem sound emitted from the modem 5 to determine which route is currently being used for calling (S120).

  The notification unit 11 notifies the caller of the type of the line determined by the line determination unit 10 (S130). For example, as shown in the external view of FIG. 1, when the IP telephone 1 has the LED 3, notification is performed by changing one or more of the color, blinking, and brightness of the LED 3 according to the route.

  For example, when the route A is used, the LED 3 is blinked in blue during a call and further blue is lit during a call. When the route B is used, the LED 3 blinks in orange during a call, and lights up in orange during a call. When route C is used, blinking and lighting are not performed during a call or during a call.

  In addition, the notification method by the notification means 11 is not limited to the LED 3. For example, when the IP telephone 1 has a display device using liquid crystal or the like, the display device uses “IP network only”, “IP The line type may be notified by displaying “Using the network and public telephone line network” or “Only using the public telephone line network”, or the above line type is notified by voice through the receiver 2. Also good.

  Each means in the present invention is only logically distinguished in function, and may be physically or practically the same area.

  In implementing the present invention, a storage medium storing a software program for realizing the functions of this embodiment is supplied to the system, and the computer of the system reads and executes the program stored in the storage medium. Of course.

  In this case, the program itself read from the storage medium realizes the functions of the above-described embodiments, and the storage medium storing the program naturally constitutes the present invention.

  As a storage medium for supplying the program, for example, a magnetic disk, a hard disk, an optical disk, a magneto-optical disk, a magnetic tape, a nonvolatile memory card, or the like can be used.

  Further, by executing the program read by the computer, not only the functions of the above-described embodiments are realized, but also an operating system running on the computer is one of the actual processes based on the instructions of the program. It goes without saying that the case where the function of the above-described embodiment is realized by performing part or all of the processing and the processing thereof is also included.

Furthermore, after the program read from the storage medium is written in the nonvolatile or volatile storage means provided in the function expansion board inserted into the computer or the function expansion unit connected to the computer, the program is instructed. On the basis of the above, it is natural that the arithmetic processing device or the like provided in the function expansion board or the function expansion unit performs part or all of the actual processing and the functions of the above-described embodiments are realized by the processing.

According to the above-described invention, the caller can grasp which line is to be used. As a result, for example, when the IP telephone system secures the line so that the telephone network is automatically connected to the public telephone network because the IP network is congested, the IP telephone sets the IP network line once by placing the handset. Until it is secured, it can be repeated. Therefore, the room for selecting the burden of the line charge by the caller increases.

It is a figure which shows the external appearance of an IP telephone. It is a figure which shows the line utilization at the time of the call by an IP telephone. It is a system configuration figure showing an example of the system configuration of the present invention. It is a flowchart figure which shows an example of the flow of the process of this invention. It is an example of a circuit diagram. It is an enlarged view when LED is provided in the IP telephone.

Explanation of symbols

1: IP phone 2: Handset 3: LED
4: Push button 5: Modem 6: Destination telephone 10: Line discrimination means 11: Notification means

Claims (4)

An IP telephone that can be called via a public telephone line network or an IP network,
A line discriminating means for detecting a modem sound emitted from a modem connected to the IP telephone and determining a route of a line currently used by the IP telephone according to the type of the modem sound;
Notification means for notifying the caller of the route of the line determined by the line determination means;
An IP telephone, comprising: The IP telephone has an LED,
The notification means notifies the caller of the type of the route of the line being used by the color and / or blinking and / or brightness of the LED.
The IP telephone according to claim 1. The IP telephone has a display device,
The notification means displays the type of route of the line being used on the display device.
The IP telephone according to claim 1. The notification means notifies the route type of the line being used by voice through a receiver.
The IP telephone according to claim 1.