The two basic technologies in the engineering of a telephone network, namely, transmission and switching.

Transmission allows any two subscribers in the network to be heard satisfactorily. Switching permits the network to be built economically by concentration of transmission facilities. These facilities are the pathways (trunks) connecting the switching nodes. Switching establishes a path between two specified terminals, which we call subscribers in telephony. A commercial switching system satisfies, in broad terms, the following user requirements: 1. Each user has need for the capability of communicating with any other user. 2. The speed of connection is not critical, but the connection time should be relatively small compared to holding time or conversation time. 3. The grade of service, or the probability of completion of a call, is also not critical but should be high. Minimum acceptable percentage of completed calls during the BH may average as low as 95%, although the general grade of service goal for the system should be 99% (equivalent to p = 0.01). 4. The user expects and assumes conversation privacy but usually does not specifically request it, nor, except in special cases, can it be guaranteed. 5. The primary mode of communication for most users will be voice (or the voice channel). 6. The system must be available to the user at any time the user may wish to use it. NUMBERING, ONE BASIS OF SWITCHING A telephone subscriber looking into a telecommunication network sees a repeatedly branching tree of links. At each branch point there are multiple choices. Assume that a calling subscriber wishes to contact one particular distant subscriber. To reach that distant subscriber, a connection is built up utilizing one choice at each branch point. Of course, some choices lead to the desired end point, and others lead away from it. Alternative paths are also presented. A call is directed through this maze, which we call a telephone network, by a telephone number. It is this number that activates the switch or switches at the maze branch point(s). Actually, a telephone number performs two important functions: (1) it routes the call, and (2) it activates the necessary equipment for proper call charging. Each telephone subscriber is assigned a distinct number, which is cross referenced in the telephone directory with the subscribers name and address;

in the local serving exchange (switch), this number is associated with a distinct subscriber line. If a subscriber wishes to make a telephone call, she lifts her receiver off hook (i.e., takes the handset out of its cradle) and awaits a dial tone that indicates readiness of her serving switch to receive instructions. These instructions are the number that the subscriber dials (or the buttons that she punches) giving the switch certain information necessary to (a) route the call to the distant subscriber with whom she wishes to communicate and (b) set up the call charging equipment. A subscriber number is the number to be dialed or called to reach a subscriber in the same local (serving) area. Remember that our definition of a local serving area is the area served by a single switch (exchange). The thinking that follows ties that switch capacity in total lines to the number of digits in the telephone number. If we had a switch with a capacity of 100 lines, it could serve up to 100 subscribers and we could assign telephone numbers 00 through 99. If we had a switch with a capacity of 1000 lines, it could serve up to 1000 subscribers and we could assign telephone numbers 000 through 999. If we had a switch with a capacity of 10,000 lines, it could serve up to 10,000 subscribers and we could assign telephone numbers 0000 through 9999. Thus the critical points occur where the number of subscribers reaches numbers such as 100, 1000, and 10,000. Early telephone switchboards were operated manually using a jack for each line and two plugs on a long flexible wire, called a cord pair, for making the connection. The cord pairs appeared in rows on a shelf in front of the operator, and the jacks (called line appearances) were mounted on a vertical panel. To make a connection, the operator picked up a cord, plugged it into the jack corresponding to the line requesting service, obtained from the calling party the name or number of the desired party, then plugged the other end of the cord pair into the correct outgoing line jack. Many thousands of cord switchboards are still in operation, a tribute to the versatility and ease of programming of the control system, and the personal touch it provides. However, not every subscriber appreciated the personal touch.

In 1889, a Kansas City, Missouri, undertaker, Almon B. Strowger, began to suspect that potential clients who called the operator of the local manual exchange and requested an undertaker were more often than not being connected to a firm down the street. This suspicion was reinforced when he learned that the telephone operator was the wife of the owner of the other funeral parlor in town. In the best tradition of pioneer America, Mr. Strowger invented a mechanism substitute for the biased operator that could complete a connection under direct control of the calling party. This simple device is variously called the Strowger, two-motion, or step-by-step switch. It was patented in 1891 and became the basis of a very large fraction of the installed telephone switching systems in the world. As of 1978, 53% of the Bell System exchanges in service (over 23,000,000 subscribers) used Strowger switching, even though the Bell System did not begin installing Strowger switching until about 1918. The Strowger switching system has the following significant limitations: 1. Because several switches are operated in tandem and the switches (except for the first one) are shared among many incoming lines, it is possible for a call to become blocked partway through the dialing sequence, even though the called line is free. 2. It is not possible to use tone dialing (DTMF) telephones directly. (They may be used if the central office is equipped with a conversion device.) 3. The switch requires the successful sequential (step-by-step, time related) operation of several relays, and a sizable voltage and current is switched each time a switch is stepped. Consequently, the mechanical reliability of the switches is low, they require large amounts of maintenance by skilled people, and they generate large amounts of electrical and mechanical noise. 4. Since the switching network is hard-wired, it is difficult to make changes in the switching arrangement Common Control (Hard-Wired) 10.3.1 Overview. We call common control any control circuitry in a switch that is used for more than one switching device. For purposes of this discussion, common control is defined as providing a means of control of the interconnecting switch network, first identifying the input and output of the terminals of the network that are free and then establishing a path between them. This implies a busy-test of the path before setting the path up. Common

control may cover the entire switch or separate control of the originating and terminating halves. Markers are one of the basic elements of common control of a crossbar switch. We discuss markers in the section below. In common control signaling, the dialed digits are collected and stored until all the digits are dialed. The digits necessary to determine the talk paths connections within the callers central office are handled locally and remaining digits are retransmitted to the next office involved in the call. Crossbar, as the name implies, depends on the crossing or intersection of two points to make a connection. The switching matrix is shown in Figure 1-18a. It is called a crosspoint array. Its operation depends on energizing a vertical line and a horizontal line and the point where they intersect represents the connection made. Therefore, any one of the input lines shown (I 1 through 16) can be connected to any one of the output lines (01 through 010) by energizing a particular input line and a particular output line control. Control signals from transmission lines are detected and used to control the matrix to connect the proper lines for the path from the calling telephone to the called telephone. As shown in Figure 1-18b, the crossbar matrix is controlled by common control. Control signals from transmission lines are detected and used to control the matrix to connect the proper lines for the path from the calling telephone to the called telephone. Primarily due to the inflexibility and large maintenance costs associated with Strowger-type switching networks, the concept of common control was brought back, but with a new type of switching matrix called a crossbar. The common control can be assigned to an incoming call as required. It takes in the dialed digits, and then sets up the path through the switching matrix according to hard-wired or stored-program rules. These rules provide for variations in the handling of local and long-distance calls, for choosing an alternate route for a call in case the first route chosen is busy, and for trying the call again automatically in case of blocking or faults in the switching path. The common control element may be a relay-operated device called a marker or a stored program controlled digital computer.

An electromechanical version utilizes electromagnets to open and close contacts in the matrix. After many operations, the contacts may prove to be unreliable. A relay type of mechanism that has vertical and horizontal selector bars operated by electromagnets that close relay contacts to provide the matrix interconnection. When a horizontal select magnet is energized, its horizontal selecting bar rotates slightly on its axis. This moves a selecting finger up or down to allow either an upper or lower bank of horizontal contacts to complete a circuit to the vertical contacts when the appropriate vertical select magnet is energized. The vertical select magnet moves the vertical holding bar sideways to push on the selecting finger to close the respective horizontal contacts to the vertical contacts. For the other horizontal select magnets that have not been energized, the associated selecting fingers are in the middle position and pass between the horizontal contacts when the vertical holding bar pushes on the selecting fingers. Therefore, no crossbar connection is made at any other point. One crosspoint is at the in One crosspoint is at the intersection of each horizontal and vertical bar, as shown in Figure 1-18a. A crosspoint is provided for each wire of the wire pair so that both wires of the line are switched. Once connected, the switch path is maintained by the current flowing through the vertical select magnet coil. Reed relay switches, although also electromechanical devices, are more dependable because they are in a sealed envelope. They open or close depending on the polarity of the electrical impulses input. Another type of switch uses reed relays to make the connections. The reed relay is a small, glass-encapsulated, electromechanical switching device as shown in Figure 1-20. These devices are actuated by a common control, which selects the relays to be closed in response to the number dialed and sends pulses through coils wound around the relay capsules. The pulses change the polarity of magnetization of plates of magnetic material fitted alongside the glass capsules. The contacts open or close in response to the direction of magnetization of the plates, which is controlled by the positive or negative direction of the pulse sent through the windings. Because the contacts latch, no holding current is required for this type of crosspoint, but separate action is required by the common control to release the connection (unlatch or reset the relay) when one party or the other hangs up.

Reed relays have improved the reliability and maintainability of switches a great deal. Crossbar switches still provide much of the switching for long distance or long-haul telephone calls in the United States. In addition, reed relays are an important part of stored program controlled electronic switching systems. Division switching because each telephone conversation is assigned a separate physical path through the telephone system. The PCM time division multiplexed digital transmissions discussed previously are different because they place many interleaved conversations onto one telephone line. All of the step-by-step, crossbar, and reed relay switching is called space Most central offices now employ digital switching. This replaces the maintenance intensive electromechanical switches with reliable Semiconductors Stored-program control (SPC) is a broad term designating switches where common control is carried out to a greater extent or entirely by computerware. Computerware can be a full-scale computer, minimicrocomputer, microprocessors, or other electronic logic circuits. Control functions may be entirely carried out by a central computer in one extreme for centralized processing or partially or wholly by distributed processing utilizing microprocessors. Software may be hard-wired or programmable. Telephone switches are logical candidates for digital computers. A switch is digital in nature, as it works with discrete values. Most of the control circuitry, such as the marker, works in a binary mode. The switching matrix can be made up of electromechanical cross-points, such as in the crossbar switch, reed, correed or ferreed cross-points, or switching semiconductor diodes, often SCR (silicon-controlled rectifier). An SCR matrix is illustrated in Figure 3.14. The call store is often referred to as the scratch pad memory. This is a temporary storage of incoming call information ready for use, on command from the central processor. It also contains availability and status information of lines, trunks and service circuits, and internal switch circuit conditions. Circuit status information is brought to the memory by a method of scanning. All speech circuits are scanned for a busy/idle condition. The program store provides the basic instructions to the controller (central processor). In many installations, translation information is held in this store, such as DN to EN translation and trunk signaling information.

A typical functional block diagram of a basic (full-up) North American SPC system is shown in Figure 3.15. This is an expansion of Figure 3.13, showing, in addition, scanner circuitry and signal distribution. The installation adds many advantages and conveniences not found in more conventional switching installations. Several of these are: Rerouting and reallocation of trunks Traffic statistics Renumbering lines Changes in subscriber class Exchange status Fault finding Charge records All these functions can be carried out via the I/O equipment connect to the central processor. Modern switches usually have a dual PC with a printer