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iDriveX · Jun 27, 2004, 09:23 PM

I was thinking about Telephones the other day and two things came into my mind that I don't think OS X can do yet, and no third party apps have been written for it yet:

Item 1: Land Line Phone -
Plug a land line phone in through the modem jack on your Mac, when someone calls, the phone number is displayed on screen (integrated with Address Book) and the Caller ID of the person (must have caller ID from phone company). Then you can choose to either get up and get your phone and answer it or press an "answer" button to pipe it through your computer's external speakers and use the microphone to create a speaker phone functionality. Also you could press a "Take a Message" button and your Mac would answer the phone and play an Mp3 file of your choice, the Mp3 could be a song or a recording of your voice saying "Please leave a message" and then the Mac would record the message in mp3 format for you to listen to later.

Item 2: Bluetooth Cell Phone -
Pair the bluetooth phone with your mac like you do already. The phone rings, Address Book cross references the number with a name like it does already. Then when you click answer you would have a choice of piping the call through your mac in the same fashion described above or you could click answer and take the call on the cell phone. I know it's possible to send clear voice over bluetooth, there are headsets that do it already. Why not just make the Mac act like a headset. You could also do the voicemail feature on the mac for your cellphone when it is paired, that way if you didn't want to take the call, you would be able to listen to the message without having to dial your voicemail, just listen to it on the mac. Also you could have the Mp3s sent out to a private .mac folder that requires a password so that you could check your messages from any computer that has interest access and can playback mp3s. While most of you would say "Why not just dial your voicemail?" There are times where I leave my cingular wireless phone at home and you can only access your messages on a cingular wireless phone FROM your cingular wireless phone. You could also have this .mac feature for the landline phone too for people that can't call their voicemail machine at home because it doesn't have that functionality.

jokell82 · Jun 27, 2004, 09:54 PM

Excellent ideas, both of them.

greenG4 · Jun 27, 2004, 10:29 PM

There is this ...

iDriveX · Jun 27, 2004, 10:38 PM

Something like that, just without costing $129.00 and without requiring an additional USB adapter. This could be functionality built right into the OS, not requiring an additional phone book, everything you need is already built into OS X!

Diggory Laycock · Jun 28, 2004, 04:48 AM

Originally posted by iDriveX:
I was thinking about Telephones the other day and two things came into my mind that I don't think OS X can do yet, and no third party apps have been written for it yet:

Item 1: Land Line Phone -

The built-in Modem cannot do voice. You need OvoLab PhLink - which is v. cool and very AppleScriptable.

Item 2: Bluetooth Cell Phone -

The Mac As a BlueTooth Audio Gateway - yes, that would be cool - I would imagine that it would not be too hard (ha ha - armchair OS Coder!) since they already have the SCO connections working, and Echo-Cancelling in iChat.

People have brought this up on the Apple BT Dev. list - "but Apple Never Mentions Future Products" - They wouldn't even admit that they were working on Headset support.

Arkham_c · Jun 28, 2004, 08:26 AM

Apple's built in modems don't support caller ID either. If they did, we would all have written something to do caller ID on screen years ago. The USB dongle is the only way to get the info you need for the OS.

iDriveX · Jun 28, 2004, 02:10 PM

That sucks. I always figured that the modem COULD do voice because back in the day when I put in a wrong phone number in AOL, it would dial that number and you'd hear someone on the other end going "Hello? Hello?" Or when my mom was on the phone and I clicked connect, you could hear the people talking through the modem. I guess it just doesn't work the other way. What a shame Apple never developed an Apple modem that could do voice and included this functionality into iChat or something. Makes good sense.

macaddict0001 · Jun 28, 2004, 03:47 PM

actually the os just hides the sounds because the modem doesn't have a built in speaker.

iDriveX · Jul 5, 2004, 10:02 PM

So here's a follow up and is pure speculation:

In Tiger, Mac OS X 10.4's iChat, if you look in it's resources you find this:

[image]http://homepage.mac.com/idrivex/bluetooth.gif[/image]

Thinking about why a Bluetooth icon, that is identical to Address Book's Bluetooth icon would show up in iChat can lead me to only one conclusion: that you will be able to pair your phone with Address Book and iChat, and when it rings, you will be able to answer the call in iChat and use your Mac as a bluetooth speakerphone for the cell. Anyone else have any ideas of what this might be used for?

edit: lol, I have no idea how to do inline images.

zachs · Jul 5, 2004, 10:10 PM

Originally posted by iDriveX:
So here's a follow up and is pure speculation:

In Tiger, Mac OS X 10.4's iChat, if you look in it's resources you find this:

[image]http://homepage.mac.com/idrivex/bluetooth.gif[/image]

Thinking about why a Bluetooth icon, that is identical to Address Book's Bluetooth icon would show up in iChat can lead me to only one conclusion: that you will be able to pair your phone with Address Book and iChat, and when it rings, you will be able to answer the call in iChat and use your Mac as a bluetooth speakerphone for the cell. Anyone else have any ideas of what this might be used for?

edit: lol, I have no idea how to do inline images.

I noticed that as well. It's not implemented, but hopefully it will be soon.

Superchicken · Jul 5, 2004, 10:53 PM

What we need is, iPhone!

Apple really needs to capitalize on the iPod's teenage following. Most teens I know are likely to have cell phones. Imagine an Apple phone that made using your phone like using your Mac. Heck even I'd probably buy a cell phone, and I hate the things! Small 2 gig micro drive, nice interface, colour screen, and some fun stuff.

Also something for the home, that could link with an iPhone/ iPod phone, whatever it'd be called. Hook something via bluetooth or AirPort, that you can plug into the wall, have a cordless phone for at home, but let it link in with your cell phone so when you're home you can answer calls there on the same handset.

And it all needs to be as easy as Apple

waffffffle · Jul 6, 2004, 12:26 AM

Annoyingly, Apple's modems don't support voice or caller ID. That's why those software packages require (or include) expensive external hardware.

As for the bluetooth thing, check out Blue Phone Menu:

http://www.reelintelligence.com/BluePhoneMenu/

which I now use. it does most of what you're talking about.

I'm waiting for the Mac to have the ability to act as a bluetooth headset so that you can actually talk through your Mac on your phone, and maybe even iChat conference people in with the people on the phone.

Randman · Jul 6, 2004, 01:42 AM

Well, the bt functions are find for sending sms but if I get a call, I pick up the phone, or answer it via speaker or bt headset (Nokia 6600).
As for a landline, the phone is wireless so I just pick that up as well.

iDriveX · Jul 6, 2004, 02:03 AM

Originally posted by waffffffle:
Annoyingly, Apple's modems don't support voice or caller ID. That's why those software packages require (or include) expensive external hardware.

As for the bluetooth thing, check out Blue Phone Menu:

http://www.reelintelligence.com/BluePhoneMenu/

which I now use. it does most of what you're talking about.

I'm waiting for the Mac to have the ability to act as a bluetooth headset so that you can actually talk through your Mac on your phone, and maybe even iChat conference people in with the people on the phone.

I already use Salling Clicker and it seems to do everything that BluePhoneMenu does plus AppleScripting so that you can use your phone as a Bluetooth Remote Control. Only difference I can really see is that BluePhoneMenu is donation-ware. It could almost be called Salling Clicker Lite.

Gee4orce · Jul 6, 2004, 04:31 AM

Originally posted by iDriveX:
So here's a follow up and is pure speculation:

In Tiger, Mac OS X 10.4's iChat, if you look in it's resources you find this:

[image]http://homepage.mac.com/idrivex/bluetooth.gif[/image]
Anyone else have any ideas of what this might be used for?

...how about so that you can use a bluetooth headset for iChat audio conferences. Makes perfect sense, especially if you want to have conferences in a public place, like a WiFi cafe.

Don't forget that Bluetooth isn't restricted to phones !

I agree with the original idea of having a your mac as a bluetooth answering service - nice idea. Except that I already have an answering service with my mobile provider, and it goes wherever I do. I can even dial in from a landline and get to my mailbox.

Diggory Laycock · Jul 6, 2004, 04:57 AM

Originally posted by Gee4orce:
...how about so that you can use a bluetooth headset for iChat audio conferences. Makes perfect sense, especially if you want to have conferences in a public place, like a WiFi cafe.

You can do that now. I often use a BT headset with iChat.

Ohh - maybe it's for quick switching the audio to BT. (or is that what you meant?)