Special Hardware

Some of the more advanced capabilities of TAPI require that an application be able, for example, to retrieve data from telephones. Most telephones cannot be connected directly to computers to control speech calls and thus are currently incapable of supporting telephony functions beyond the passive role they play in POTS. In the future, users will install and configure telephone sets like other peripheral devices. The sets will be accompanied by cards that will control the flow of information between the computer and the telephone. Client/server configurations will also be possible that allow users to take advantage of telephonic services by connecting over a LAN to a server that has such a board and associated software installed.