Home Phone System That Syncs To Computer? 405
An anonymous reader writes 'In comparison to the advanced technology in today's smart phones, the standard home phone is painfully backwards. My current setup is a Panasonic system that has 4 cordless phones over one base station. Setting the time on one phone changes the time on all the phones; however, this is not the case for the phone book. Each entry must be manually copied (pushed) to each handset. Is this as far as home phone technology has come? What I would like is a phone system that I could sync to my computer so I could update the phone book over all the units (if not sync with Address Book or Outlook), keep a log of caller IDs, or even forward me new voicemail notifications. Does anyone know if such a system exists?'
Huh? (Score:5, Funny)
What's a "landline"? :-)
Re:The overkill solution (Score:3, Funny)
Re:The Tech That Oughtta Be (Score:2, Funny)
survived a drop in a toilet and kept on working
Given the relatively low cost of a replacement handset, I can assure you that 99% of all phone owners who drop a handset into the toilet never find out one way or another if the handset survived the experience. But it brings up a question. Do you often talk on the phone at home while using the toilet, and if so do you flush mid-conversation, wait on the toilet until the conversation is over, or (hopefully remember to) come back later to flush?
Re:The overkill solution (Score:4, Funny)
Time for overkill solution number 1:
1) Buy a SIP to POTS adapter 2) Install asterisk on your Linux server (You do have a Linux server right?) 3) Create a web app, preferably Ruby on Rails, that connects to Asterisk over the management port and dials a phone number and rings it back to your home phone line 4) Profit until the system breaks and the wife wrings your neck because she can't call to make her beauty salon appointment!
Enjoy!
If you don't want to kill it that much, you could switch to a VOIP service for your home number. But your solution does have that cool Dr. Seuss/Rube Goldberg vibe, so don't let me discourage you.
Re:The Tech That Oughtta Be (Score:3, Funny)
Obviously, he drops his in the toilet, thus ending the conversation and solving the problem gracefully.
Re:The Tech That Oughtta Be (Score:3, Funny)
Doesn't matter, he was talking shit anyway.
Re:The Tech That Oughtta Be (Score:5, Funny)
Understandable. He was pissed off.
Re:iPhone (Score:1, Funny)
I don't trust a phone that I don't have to manually crank.
Re:The Tech That Oughtta Be (Score:5, Funny)
Dang, I just noticed. I wasted post number 30 million on a bad pun. Sorry about that, folks.
Re:Regular phones are so backwards... (Score:4, Funny)
More bonus points if the handset still smells like cigarettes even though no smoker has used it in 25 years.
Re:no. it does not. (Score:3, Funny)
He has no horse sense.
Re:Huh? (Score:1, Funny)
Never had a job where you mattered eh?
Re:Huh? (Score:1, Funny)
Re:Huh? (Score:5, Funny)
I have a landline in my house. It has an answering machine [1] attached to it. Attached to the answering machine is a telephone [2] with a spiral cord [3] connecting the handset to the base. No seriously. On the side of the handset there's a volume knob [4] and a switch that selects between "Pulse" and "Tone" [5].
[1] An answering machine is an ancient device that records incoming messages onto a "cassette tape".
[2] A telephone is a device that connects via a "landline" to the switching station or the operator or something like that.
[3] A spiral cord is a strange cord that is perpetually tangled. Used to connect a telephone base to the handset.
[4] A volume knob is an analog electric device that increase or decreases the volume of the earpiece speaker.
[5] Pulse dialing used a series of pulses to generate the digits in a telephone number. Many phones had a place for a "label" where one could insert a written (or typed) phone number list.
God. I feel old.
Re:The overkill solution (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Huh? (Score:1, Funny)
Hey! Slashdotters know what a mom is. She's the one who owns the basement.
Re:no. it does not. (Score:3, Funny)
it can always get me home from any bar in any area.
Yeah, but if you get cited for too many RUI/RWI's they can impound your horse or at least issue you a pink saddle to publicly shame you.
Re:Huh? (Score:1, Funny)
...and Jeeze! I've been having problems with my 1947 Raytheon AN/PRC-6 hand sets... sun flares, jammers on the grassy knoll?
Re:Huh? (Score:2, Funny)
We didn't get a touch-tone phone in the house til I was in about grade 10. That was maybe 13 years ago. In junior high school I had this flyer-delivery route and you were supposed to confirm that you did all the deliveries at the end of every day by going through this touch-tone menu they had set up. Well we had a pulse-dialing push-button phone, so that's what I used. I don't think it ever worked with their system. But nobody ever complained. Another wierd thing was how we often didn't get most of the flyers delivered somehow, and they ended up getting burned in the firepit in the backyard. Wierd how that happened. I think they kept sending me too many. The other funny thing was nobody ever complained about that either. I wonder why.
Anyway, yeah I'd go for a cordless phone computer syncing thing. Then I could get a flyer route again to pay for it.
Re:no. it does not. (Score:3, Funny)
Re:The Tech That Oughtta Be (Score:4, Funny)
Re:no. it does not. (Score:2, Funny)
Re: Really... (Score:1, Funny)
Try the fish.
"You can lead a fish to water, and you can make him (or her, I didn't check) sink." There, tried the fish.