Glossary and Abbreviations
Issue 5 January 1998 GL-5555-230-024
appearance
A software process that is associated with an extens ion a nd whose purpos e is t o supe rvise a call .
An extension can have multiple appearances. Also called call appea rance, li ne appear anc e, and
occurrence. See also call appearance.
application
An adjunct that requests and receives ASAI services or capabilities. One or more applications
can reside on a single adjunct. However, the switch cannot distinguish among several
applications residing on the same adjunct and treats the adjunct, and all resident appli cations, as
a single application. The terms application and adju nct a r e us ed i nte rcha nge ably throughout this
document.
applications processor
A micro-computer based, program controlled computer providing application services for the
DEFINITY switch. The processor is used with several user-controlled applications such as traffic
analysis and electronic documentation.
application service element
See capability group.
architecture
The organizational structure of a system, including hardware and software.
ARS
See Automatic Route Selection (ARS).
ASAI
See Adjunct-Switch Application Interface (ASAI)
ASCII (American Standard Code for Information Interchange)
The standard code for representing characters in digital form. Each character is represented by
an 8-bit code (including parity bit).
association
A communication channel between adjunct and switch for messaging purposes. An active
association is one that applies to an existing call on the switch or to an extension on the call.
asynchronous data transmission
A method of transmitting data in which each character is preceded by a start bit and followed by
a stop bit, thus permitting data characters to be transmitted at irregular intervals. This type
transmission is advantageous when transmission i s no t regular (characters typed at a keyboard).
Also called asynchronous transmission. See also synchronous data transmission.
asynchronous data unit (ADU)
A device that allows direct connection between RS-232C equipment and a digital switch.
asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM)
A packet-like switching technology in which data is transmitted in fixed-size (53-byte) cells. ATM
provides high-speed access for data communication in LAN, campus, and WAN environments.
ATB
See All trunks busy (ATB).
ATD
See Attention dial (ATD).
attendant
A person at a console who provides personalized service for incoming cal lers and voi ce-servic es
users by performing switching and signaling operations. See also attendant console.