Q: How do I create an intercom group?
A: Creating this is easier than you think. All you do is program the key on a couple of digital sets and it starts working. The trick is knowing what group number to assign to a new one. If your system doesn’t have any intercom groups yet you can just start at group 1 and go from there. If you need to know what group numbers are available use overlay 20 and print the existing groups.
>ld 20
REQ: prt
TYPE: dig
CUST: 0
DGRP: Press Enter to print the list of groups only. Enter the group number to print a list of members in that group.
Once you see what group numbers are available, you can choose one not in use and start programming members. Be careful whether you program a V or R after the member number on the first one. Once a group has one member, it is either a Voice or Ringing group. All members will have to be the same type.
Here’s a helpful idea to make it easier for your users to remember the intercom numbers: make them the same as the last two digits of the users’ extension numbers. Many administrators use that trick and users appreciate it. Two things will keep you from following the convention, though. If two extensions have the same last two digits (like 5322 and 5222), you obviously can’t use the same number twice. Also you cannot begin an intercom number with the system’s SPRE (Special function PREfix). For example, if the SPRE is 1, you cannot use 1, 13 or 179 as intercom numbers.
Did you know you can program names for the group members? I wish you could program group names such as Executive or Accounts Payable. It is nice, though, to be able to assign names to the individual members. The name you program will appear on the display of the called station. Here’s how you do it.
>ld 95
REQ new
TYPE name
CUST 0
DIG (enter the group number, space, member number)
NAME (type the name as you want it to appear)
Press Enter until the prompt DIG appears again and continue entering more names. When all the names are input, press Enter until the REQ prompt appears again.
View the names in LD 95.
REQ prt
TYPE name
CUST 0
PAGE
DIG (enter the group number here to see the list of numbers and names in the group)
You can also assign names in LD 95 to other numbers in the system. For instance, you can (and should) give names to CDNs (Controlled Directory Numbers), ACD (Automatic Call Distribution) numbers and trunk route access codes. It helps you know what this number is for in the future, when you’ve forgotten setting it up. Unfortunately you cannot assign names to CDP (Coordinated Dialing Plan) numbers to help you remember their purpose.
You assign (and delete) names to these numbers in the same way as regular extensions in LD 95. Even less-known is that you can assign names to IDC (Incoming Digit Conversion) numbers. These are very useful to help remember why you created the IDC entries. To name an IDC entry, do this.
>ld 95
REQ new
TYPE name
CUST 0
DIG
DN
DCNO (this is the IDC table number)
IDC (this is the incoming number translated by the IDC table)
NAME (type the name here)
At the next IDC prompt you can continue to enter numbers and names within the same IDC table. At the next DCNO prompt you can enter another table number and program names for entries in those tables. When you finish, Enter through the prompts to the REQ prompt.
It would be nice if you could see the names when you print the intercom groups in LD 20 or print the IDC tables in LD 49, but you can’t. You will have to go to LD 95 to see them.
Q: I made an error while making some programming changes and deleted a set. I wasted an hour or more figuring out how the set had been programmed since I didn’t know how to undelete the set. Is there a command to undo a change in the PBX?
A: No, I don’t know of such a command in the command line interface. If you use a program like TM or Element Manager, it’s sometimes possible. Another solution could be to regularly make a file backup of the TNs in your system. You can use a program like Procomm Plus to print out all TNs while you capture the output to a file in your PC. Save the file where you can easily get to it when you are programming, and you can search it with just about any word processor to find the TN you need to see.
How often should you save such a backup? It depends on how often you make changes in your system. Some administrators do it monthly. If you use a PDA with the ability to read large files, you could copy the backup to it and have easy access to the information whenever you like.
Reach the author at philruffin@hotmail.com.
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