AT&T Co, as reported briefly last month, made a string of Integrated Services Digital Network-related announcements headlined by an agreement with Wang Laboratories Inc (CI No 1,064). Under that agreement, Wang will write interfaces to enable its Wang Integrated Image Systems system to communicate with AT&T’s Number 5ESS public telephone exchange via ISDN protocols. Wang will develop the ISDN basic and primary rate interfaces required for the systems to communicate over 5ESS switches in the public telephone network, while AT&T will provide technical support and testing facilities to assist Wang in developing these interfaces. The two companies also will jointly conduct market research to identify customer applications for WIIS over the 5ESS switch. AT&T has also launched a second generation Datakit virtual circuit switch that it says will enhance the data communications features of the 5ESS switch, and bring new services to ISDN users. The company says that telephone company ISDN customers will now be able to access minicomputers and mainframes using multiplexed channels at megabit speeds, and use Datakit II VCS to connect different data processing systems for their customers; Datakit II VCS also enables companies to offer their customers new data services, including programmable security features that screen calls and check passwords before allowing users to connect to the network. Amdahl’s Unix IBMulators, VAXes, AT&T 3Bs, Hewlett-Packard minicomputers and Sun Microsystems’ workstations support Datakit II VCS, with IBM System/370 mainframes, DECnet architecture and TCP/IP systems to be added early next year. AT&T says the Datakit II VCS incorporates remote concentrators that make it easier to design data networks; each of the concentrator cabinets houses critical protocol-conversion functions and communicates with the host switch. In a related announcement, Holmdel, New Jersey-based QPSX Communications Inc is to introduce what is claimed to be the first connectionless IEEE Metropolitan Area Network. The company claims the Queued Packet and Synchronous Exchange Metropolitan Area Network, QPSX MAN – licensed from AT&T Network Systems – enables telephone company customers to send integrated voice, data and video information, combining information from telephones, computer networks and imaging systems for transmission over telephone company fibre optic networks; the initial transmission rate for the system is 45Mbps, and AT&T Network Systems will also provide installation, distribution and related services for QPSX Communications, which will market QPSX MAN systems in North America through QPSX-SI, a new subsidiary headquartered in New Jersey. First trial systems will be shipped to Telecom Australia in April 1989. Unix-based DACS controller And AT&T has added DACS IV to its family of DACS products: the new one is a network multiplexer and digital cross-connect system for high capacity fibre optic routes. AT&T claims that the DACS IV is able to multiplex and rearrange DS1 signals within DS3 signals, and lets companies select specific DS1 circuits from their high speed metropolitan or inter-city trunks for cross connection, rearrangement, rerouting or testing. AT&T has also revealed that DACScan Controller, a Unix system-based controller which directs a network of DACS III and IV systems, is under development.
And AT&T also introduced the FT Series G Ring Diversity Switch, a new feature of the FT Series G lightwave system that is claimed to enable telephone companies to provide virtually uninterrupted service on high capacity fibre optic circuits.
