DIGITAL SWITCHING SYSTEM CONNECTING BUSES WITH INCOMPATIBLE PROTOCOLS AND TELEPHONE ANSWERING SYSTEM AND PRIVATE AUTOMATIC BRANCH EXCHANGE WITH INTEGRATED VOICE AND TEXTUAL MESSAGE RECORDING

摘要

A digital switching system connecting buses withincompatible protocols and a telephone answering systemand private automatic branch exchange with integratedvoice and textual message recording is disclosed. Thedigital switching system (10) in accordance with theinvention permits a digital switching matrix (12) havingan input bus and an output bus to connect information onthe input bus selectively to information on the outputbus in response to control signals applied to switches ofthe switching matrix. A plurality of informationsystems (18, 20 and 22) each having a different busprotocol are electrically connected to the input andoutput buses of the switching matrix to permitinformation transmitted on a conductor of any of theinformation buses to be received by another conductor ofany of the information buses through the input bus, theswitching matrix and the output bus. A host processorcontrols the plurality of information systems.Furthermore, the host processor may be used to commonlycontrol textual message and voice message recordingsystems within a telephone answering system and commonlycontrol telephony functions and textual message and voicerecording systems within a PABX.