Modems and external dialers.

[Bill Gunshannon]

On 6/5/19 12:30 PM, Liam Proven via cctalk wrote:
> On Wed, 5 Jun 2019 at 18:27, John Labovitz via cctalk
> <cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote:
> 
>>
>> I do recall a little handheld device with a touchtone keyboard that you could fit over the microphone of a normal handset. It wasn’t automated, but at least you didn’t have to use the rotary dial.
> 
> This was a built-in feature of the Psion range of PDAs. The address
> book app could dial any number in the address book, merely by holding
> it up to the phone mouthpiece.
> 
> It blew people's minds at the time (very early 1990s).
> 

Why?  Handheld touchtone generators were very common in the
the early 90's.  Even the late 80's.  I bought mine in Radio
Shack.  They were often needed if your employer used an in
house private phone network (like MMDS where I worked) or
a phone accessed Email system (like IBM's PROFS) because
the phone company had this habit of turning off the keypad
on payphones after the first connection.

bill