Glossary - B

CAC

Connection Admission Control (ATM)
An ATM function which determines whether a virtual circuit (VC) connection request should be accepted or rejected. Two mechanisms used to control the set up of virtual circuits. Overbooking, which allows one connection to exceed permissible traffic limits, assumes that other active connections are not using the maximum available resources. Full booking limits network access once maximum resources are committed and only adds connections that specify acceptable traffic parameters.

Cache (memory management)

A specialized portion of a computer's RAM or disk used to optimize data transfers between system elements with different performance characteristics, e.g., disk (the last items read from) to main memory or main memory to CPU.
A small fast memory holding recently accessed data, designed to speed up subsequent access to the same data. Most often applied to processor-memory access but also used for a local copy of data accessible over a network etc.
When data is read from, or written to, main memory, a copy is also saved in the cache, along with the associated main memory address. The cache monitors addresses of subsequent reads to see if the required data is already in the cache. If it is (a cache hit) then it is returned immediately and the main memory read is aborted (or not started). If the data is not cached (a cache miss) then it is fetched from main memory and also saved in the cache.
The cache is built from faster memory chips than main memory so a cache hit takes much less time to complete than a normal memory access. The cache may be located on the same integrated circuit as the CPU, in order to further reduce the access time. In this case it is often known as primary cache since there may be a larger, slower secondary cache outside the CPU chip.
The most important characteristic of a cache is its hit rate - the fraction of all memory accesses which are satisfied from the cache. This in turn depends on the cache design but mostly on its size relative to the main memory. The size is limited by the cost of fast memory chips.
The hit rate also depends on the access pattern of the particular program being run (the sequence of addresses being read and written). Caches rely on two properties of the access patterns of most programs: temporal locality - if something is accessed once, it is likely to be accessed again soon, and spatial locality - if one memory location is accessed then nearby memory locations are also likely to be accessed. In order to exploit spatial locality, caches often operate on several words at a time, a "cache line" or "cache block". Main memory reads and writes are whole cache lines.
When the processor wants to write to main memory, the data is first written to the cache on the assumption that the processor will probably read it again soon. Various different policies are used. In a write-through cache, data is written to main memory at the same time as it is cached. In a write-back cache it is only written to main memory when it is forced out of the cache.
If all accesses were writes then, with a write-through policy, every write to the cache would necessitate a main memory write, thus slowing the system down to main memory speed. However, statistically, most accesses are reads and most of these will be satisfied from the cache. Write-through is simpler than write-back because an entry that is to be replaced can just be overwritten in the cache as it will already have been copied to main memory whereas write-back requires the cache to initiate a main memory write of the flushed entry followed (for a processor read) by a main memory read. However, write-back is more efficient because an entry may be written many times in the cache without a main memory access.
When the cache is full and it is desired to cache another line of data then a cache entry is selected to be written back to main memory or "flushed". The new line is then put in its place. Which entry is chosen to be flushed is determined by a "replacement algorithm".
Some processors have separate instruction and data caches. Both can be active at the same time, allowing an instruction fetch to overlap with a data read or write. This separation also avoids the possibility of bad cache conflict between say the instructions in a loop and some data in an array which is accessed by that loop.

CAD - CAM

Computer Aided Design/Computer Aided Manufacturing
Term given to applications which support these functions.

CAN

Campus Area Network (network)
A network which encompasses interconnectivity between floors of a building and/or buildings in a confined geographic area such as a campus or industrial park. Such networks would not require public rights-of-way and operate over fairly short distances. (see LAN, MAN, WAN).

Control Area Network
Two-wire serial bus used in automobile electronics.

CAP

Carrierless Amplitude/Phase Modulation (communications)
A modulation technique developed by Bell Labs. It was the first ADSL transceiver to be commercially deployed. CAP technology is a variation of Quadrature Amplitude Modulation (QAM), which is the technology used by the vast majority of existing modems. With CAP, the three channels (POTS, downstream data and upstream data) are supported by splitting the frequency spectrum. Voice occupies the standard 0-4 Khz frequency, followed by the upstream channel and the high-speed downstream channel.

Columbia AppleTalk Package (network)
An implementation of Apple Computer's AppleTalk protocols for Unix 4.2BSD and its derivatives, from Columbia University. There are two different LAP delivery mechanisms for: IPTalk and Ethertalk (possibly using UAB).
CAP supports the following AppleTalk protocols: AppleTalk Transaction Protocol (ATP), Name Binding Protocol (NBP), Printer Access Protocol (PAP), AppleTalk Session Protocol (ASP), AppleTalk Filing Protocol (AFP) client side. In addition, the Datagram Delivery Protocol (DDP) and Zone Information Protocol (ZIP) are partially available. The structure of the Internet Appletalk Bridge software makes it impossible to provide full DDP service. Only the Get Zone List ATP ZIP command is implemented for ZIP.
Reference site: http://www.cs.mu.oz.au/appletalk/.

[Common] Carrier (Or "phone company") (network, communications, company)

A private company that offers telecommunications services to the public. See also IXC, Local Exchange Carrier, BICI, Public Network, Telco.

CAS

Channel Associated Signaling (network, ATM)

CAT-3

Category 3 Unshielded Twisted (network)
A type of UTPcommonly used with ATM interfaces for cell transmission at low speeds, 25-50 Mbps and at distances up to 100 meters.

CAT-5

Category 5 Unshielded Twisted Pair (network)
A type of UTP commonly used with ATM interfaces for higher-speed cell transmission (more than 50 Mbps).

CBDS

Connectionless Broadband Data Service (network)
ETSI-defined Interconnection service for LANs. Based on Bellcore's SMDS service.

CBR

Constant Bit Rate (ATM)
Traffic service category used to carry digital information, such as video and digitized voice, that must be represented by a continuous stream of bits. CBR traffic requires guaranteed throughput rates and services levels. CBR is also called class A service.

CC

Continuity Cell (ATM, OAM)
A cell used periodically to check whether a connection is idle or has failed (i.e. at the cross-connect nodes), in order to guarantee a continuation in the flow of the information cells. Continuity checking is one of the OAM function types for fault management (see also AIS, RDI).

Call Control (network)

CCITT

Comité Consultatif International Téléphonique et Télégraphique (International Telephone and Telegraph Consultative Committee) (standard)
Part of the ITU. Now called ITU-T.
A list of CCITT standards.
ITU site: http://www.itu.int/.

CCR (ATM)

Current Cell Rate
A field in the RM cell header that indicates the current complying cell rate a user can transmit over a virtual connection (VC).

CCS

Common Channel Signaling (network)

CCS7

See SS7.
International standard protocol defined for open signaling in the digital public switched network. It is based on a 64 kbps channel and allows for information transfer for call control, database and billing management, and for maintenance functions.

CDDI

Copper Distributed Data Interface (network)
Temporary name for an emerging variation of FDDI capable of operating at 100 Mbps over twisted wire pair instead of fiber optic cable.

CDMA

Code Division Multiple Access (communications)
A form of multiplexing where the transmitter encodes the signal using a pseudo-random sequence which the reciever also knows and can use to decode the received signal. Each different random sequence corresponds to a different communication channel.
Motorola uses CDMA for digital cellular phones.

CDPD

Cellular Digital Packet Data wireless specification (network)
The service will allow users to run applications such as e-mail, two-way messaging and dispatch and database inquiry over existing voice-oriented cellular networks at 19.2 Kbps. The technology sends data in packets during idle time on cellular voice channels.

CDV

Cell Delay Variation (ATM)
Measures the allowable variance in delay between one cell and the next, expressed in fractions of a second. A QoS parameter that measures the difference between a single cell's transfer delay (CTD) and the expected transfer delay. It gives a measure of how closely cells are spaced in a Virtual Circuit (VC). When emulating a circuit, CDV measurements allow the network to determine if cells are arriving too fast or too slow. CDV can be introduced by ATM multiplexers (MUXs) or switches.

CDVT

Cell Delay Variation Tolerance (ATM)
A measure of the cell clumping phenomenon by which cells are delayed in the network and are clumped together and arrive at a system at a faster rate than negociated. Used in CBR traffic it specifies the acceptable tolerance of the CDV (jitter).

CE

Connection Element (network)

Connection Endpoint (network)
A terminator at one end of a layer connection within a SAP.

CEI

Connection Endpoint Identifier (network)
Identifier of a CE that can be used to identify the connection at a SAP.

Cell (ATM)

Basic ATM transmission unit
An ATM cell consists of 53 bytes or "octets." Of these, 5 constitute the header; the remaining 48 carry the data payload.

Cell header (ATM)

The 5-byte ATM cell header contains control information regarding the destination path and flow control. More specifically it contains the following fields: GFC, VPI, VCI,PT, CLP and HEC.

Cell Layer (ATM)

Same as ATM Layer.

CEP

Connection End Point (network)

CEPT

Conférence Européenne des Postes et Télécommunications (normalisation)
European Conference on post and telecommunicationsEuropean organisation of 26 European Post and Telecommunication governing services to support European advices by the CCITT.

CEPT-1

European Digital Signal 1
European standard for digital physical interface at 2.048 Mbps. European acronym. The US equivalent acronym is E-1.

CEPT-3

European Digital Signal 3
European standard for digital physical interface at 34.368 Mbps. It can simultaneously support 16 E-1/CEPT-1 circuits. European acronym. The US equivalent acronym is E-3.

CEPT-4

European Digital Signal 4
European standard for digital physical interface at 139.264 Mbps. European acronym. The US equivalent acronym is E-4.

CER

Cell Error Rate/Ratio
A QoS parameter that measures the fraction of transmitted cells that are erroneous (they have errors when they arrive at the destination).

CERT

Computer Emergency Response Team (network, Internet, security)
The CERT was formed by ARPA in November 1988 in response to the needs exhibited during the Internet worm incident. The CERT charter is to work with the Internet community to facilitate its response to computer security events involving Internet hosts, to take proactive steps to raise the community's awareness of computer security issues, and to conduct research targeted at improving the security of existing systems.
CERT products and services include 24-hour technical assistance for responding to computer security incidents, product vulnerability assistance,technical documents, and tutorials.
In addition, the team maintains a number of mailing lists (including one for CERTAdvisories), and provides an anonymous FTP server, at "cert.org",where security-related documents and tools are archived.
See also: Advanced Research Projects Agency.

CES

Circuit Emulation Service (ATM)
ATM Forum-defined class of service which provides a virtual circuit connection which emulates the characteristics of a real, constant-bit-rate, dedicated-bandwidth circuit. TDM-type, constant-bit-rate (CBR)circuits are emulated by the AAL1.

CGA

Color Graphics Adapter (hardware, graphics)
One of IBM's earliest hardware video display standards for use in IBM PCs. CGA can display 80*25 or 40*25 text in 16 colors, 640*200 pixels graphics in 2 colors or 320*200 in 4 colors (PC video modes 0-6). It is now obsolete.

Carrier Group Alarm (network)

Cheapernet

The IEEE 802.3 10BASE2 standard (or cable used in such installations). 'Thinnet,' another term for the standard, specifies a less expensive, thinner version of traditional Ethernet cable.

CI

Congestion Indication (network)
A bit in the RM cell to indicate congestion (it is set by the destination if the last cell received was marked).

Command Interpreter (general)
A program that does an action after each command line entered.

CID

Channel IDentifier (ATM)
8-bit field of the AAL2 cell's header. CID identifies the connection which the mini-cell belongs to. 0 is forbidden, 1 is used for signaling, numbers from 2 to 7 are reserved. Therefore, it is possible to identify 248 connections.

CIF

Cell Information Field
The payload (48bytes) of an ATM cell.

CIM

Common Information Model (standard, management, data)
A standard scheme for describing management data, whether the source is CMIP(Common Management Information Protocol), DMI or SNMP. Cim is being defined by the DMTF. See also HMMS, WBEM, HMON.

Cinepak (algorythm, video)

A CODEC used for digitizing video.

CIP - CLIP

Classical IP and ARP over ATM (ATM)
An adaptation of TCP/IP and its address resolution protocol (ARP) for ATM defined by the IETF (Internet Engineering Task Force) in RFCs (Requests for Comment) 1483 and 1577 (i.e. IP support for the QoS classes,ARP over SVC and PVCnetworks). It places IP packets and ARP requests directly into PDUs (protocol data units) and converts them into ATM cells. The main issues in the transport of IP over ATM are the packet encapsulation and the address resolution. Classical IP does not recognize conventional MAC layer protocols like Ethernet or token ring. See also LANE.

CIR

Committed Information Rate (network, Frame Relay)
A term used in Frame Relay, which defines the Average transmission rate over time the network is committed to provide the user with, under any network conditions (for a given virtual circuit).

Circuit

Bi-directional communication channel, temporarily et permanently established between 2 terminal devices on a network, in a direct way of going through intermediate devices.

Circuit emulation (network)

A virtual-circuit (VC) service offered to end users where the characteristics of an actual, digital bit-stream (i.e. videotraffic) line are emulated (i.e. a 2 Mbps or 45 Mbps signal).

CL

Connectionless Service (network, communications)

Client (programming)

A computer system or process that requests a service of another computer system or process (a "server") using some kind of protocol and accepts the server's responses. A client is part of a client-server software architecture. For example, a workstation requesting the contents of a file from a file server is a client of the file server.

Client/Server model

A computing (networking) architectural model where processing can be distributed between nodes requesting information (clients) and those maintaining data (servers).

CLIP

Classical IP (ATM)
See CIP.

CLNAP

ConnexionLess Network Access Protocol (ATM, network)

CLP

Cell Loss Priority (ATM)
A priority bit in the ATM cell header; when set, it indicates that the cell can be discarted if necessary. Similar to the DE bit in frame relay.

CLR

Cell Loss Ratio (ATM)
A QoS parameter that gives the ratio of the lost cells to the total number of transmitted cells.

CLS

Connectionless Server (ATM)
On an ATM network used to link the appropriate equipment into a network for connectionless traffic. Traffic streams are routed via virtual paths or virtual connections to the CLS, which performs the actual switching functions.

Connectionless Service (network)

Cluster

Operating System:
An elementary unit (logical unit) of allocation of a disk made up of one or more physical blocks.
A file is made up of a whole number of possibly non-contiguous clusters. The cluster size is a tradeoff between space efficiency (the bigger is the cluster, the bigger is on the average the wasted space at the end of each file) and the length of the FAT.

network:
In a network environment this term can refer to: A collection of devices in a single location. A physical grouping of workstations that share one or more applications.
A configuration in which two or more terminals are connected to a single line or single modem.

Clustering (general, server)

Putting computers together to build a cluster.

CMD

Cell multiplexing/demultiplexing (ATM)
An ATM layer function that groups cells belonging to differentvirtual paths or circuits and transmits them in a stream to the target switch, where they are demuxed and routed to the correct end-points.

CMIP

Common Management Information Protocol (network, ATM)
An ITU-T standard for the message formats and procedures used to exchange management information in order to operate, administer, maintain and provision a network. Document: ISO/IEC 9596.
See also OAM&P, SNMP, LMI, ILMI.

CMIS

Common Management Information Service (network)
Network management information services are used by peer processes to exchange information and commands for the purpose of network management. CMIS defines a message set (GET, CANCEL-GET, SET, CREATE, DELETE, EVENT-REPORT and ACTION), and the structure and content of the messages such that they might be used by "open" systems. In concept, it is similar to SNMP, but more powerful (and hence more complex). ISO/IEC 9595.
See CMIP.

CMR

Cell Misinsertion Rate (ATM)
A performance measure that is defined as the number of misinserted cells (those that arrive from the wrong source) per (virtual) connection second.

CNET

The French national telecommunications research centres. Now called France Telecom R&D.
Site: http://www.issy.cnet.fr/.

CNRS

Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
French organisation for Scientific Research.

CO

Central Office (communications, network)
Premises of a carrier service provider where customer lines (i.e. telephone lines) are multiplexed and switched to other COs.

Code Division Multiplexing

See Code Division Multiple Access.

CODEC

COder/DECoder (hardware, video, network)
A device or a program that converts (encodes) analog signals into a form for transmission on a digital circuit. It can be a set of hardware or software components, or a combination, providing (or not) digital compression and decompression of analog signals so that they can be efficiently transmitted or stored. The compression method may be proprietary or standards-based. Codecs allow voice and video transmission over digital links.

COmpressor/DECompressor (algorithm)
Also, the algorithm or scheme used when recording digital video. Many CODEC schemes are available, depending on image quality and file size.

Collapsed Backbone

Network architecture under which the backplane of a device such as a hub performs the function of a network backbone; the backplane routes traffic between desktop nodes and between other hubs serving multiple LANs.

COM

Continuation of Message
A PDU that is part of a message.

Communications Server

Also called an asynchronous server or asynchronous gateway, a type of gateway that translates the packetized signals of a LAN to asynchronous signals. It handles different asynchronous protocols and allows nodes on a LAN to share modems or host connections.

Concatenation (communications)

The linking of transmission channels end-to-end.

Concentrator (communications)

A kind of multiplexor where many inputs may be active simultaneously so the output bandwidth must be at least as great as the total bandwidth of all simultaneously active inputs.
For example, a concentrator may be used to connect 24 2400 bps TTYs to a host via a 57600 bps channel.

Congestion control (ATM)

A resource and traffic management mechanism to avoid and/or preventexcessive situations (buffer overflow, insufficient bandwidth) that cancause the network to collapse. It controls traffic flow so switches and end-stations are not overwhelmed and cells dropped.
ATM defines several simple schemes - among them GFC (generic flow control) and CLP fields in cell headers and the EFCI (explicit forward congestion indicator) bit in the PTI (payload type identifier). More sophisticated mechanisms are needed to deal with congestion in large ATM networks carrying different types of traffic. The ATM Forum recently ratified arate-based traffic management strategy that counts on switches and end-stations throttling back when congestion is encountered; a credit-based scheme also wos considered, which relied more heavily on switch buffers. Other means of congestion control include UPC (usage parameter control) and CAC (connection admission control).
When confronted by congestion, many ATM switches discard cells according to CLP. Since voice and video are not tolerant of cell loss, this can make it difficult to achieve quality of service parameters. Data traffic is more tolerant of loss and delay, but if cells containing information from a higher-level packet are dropped, the entire packet may have to be transmitted.Considering that IP packets are 1,500 bytes long and FDDI packets 4,500 bytes,the loss of a single cell could cause significant retransmissions,further aggravating congestion. See also flow control.

Connection (communications, network)

An association between two or more end points that is used to convey information between these end points.
A connection can be unidirectional or bi-directional; it can be point-to-point, point-to-multipoint (multicast), multipoint-to-point (concast) or multipoint-to-multipoint.
The term "connection", in conjunction with clarifying adjectives, can identify other concepts with specific meaning.
An ATM connection consists of the concatenation of ATM Layer links in order to provide an end-to-end information transfer capability to access points.
In switched virtual connection (SVC) environments the LAN Emulation Management entities set up connections between each other using UNI signaling.

Connection-Oriented [Service]

See Connection-oriented Network.

Connectionless communications/network

A form of cell switching or packet multiplexing that identifies individual channels based on global addresses rather than predefined virtual circuits. Packets are transferred from source to destination without the need of a pre-established connection. Examples are IP and SMDS (see also datagram). Used by shared-media LANs like FDDI and token ring.

Connection-oriented communications/network (network)

A form of cell switching or packet multiplexing characterized by individual virtual circuits based on virtual circuit identifiers.
Communications service where an initial connection between the endpoints (source and destination) has to be set up. Examples are ATM and Frame Relay.

Contention (network)

When two or more users access the same network at the same time.
Mecanism used to resolve the problem of the access to a same network by multiple users at the same time.

Contention Slot - Contention Period

Minimum time a host must transmit for before it can be sure that no other host's packet has collided with its transmission. If the maximum propagation delay from one host to any other is T, then a host that starts to transmit at time t0 may collide with a host that starts just before t0 + T. The first host will not detect the collision until time t0 + 2T.

COS

Class of Service
See QoS Classes.

CPCS

Common Part Convergence Sublayer (ATM)
Part of the AAL convergence sublayer(CS) which remains constant with any traffic type. It has always to be present in the AAL implementation. Its task is to pass primitives to the other AAL sublayers (SAR, SSCS).

CPE

Customer Premises Equipment
Computer and communications equipment (hardware and software) used by a carrier's customer and located at the customer's site (see also DTE).

CPI

Common Part indicator (ATM)
A one-byte field in the header of the CPCS-PDU in AAL3/4 that indicates the number of bits the BASize field consists of.

CPN

Customer Premises Network (network)
General industry term for computer network equipment owned and operated by a customer of a communications service.(see also CPE).

CRA

Cell Rate Adaptation (network, ATM)

CRC

Cyclic Redundancy Check
A mathematical algorithm used to ensure accurate delevery based on the actual content of the data (frame or cell).

CRF

Connection Related Function (network)

CRM

Cell Rate Margin (ATM)
A measure of the residual useful bandwidth for a given QoS class, after taking into account the SCR.

CRS

Cell Relay Service
A carrier service offered to the end users by an ATM network that delivers (transports and routes) ATM cells in compliance with ATM standards and implementation specifications.

CS

Convergence Sublayer (ATM)
The upper half of the AAL.It is divided into two sublayers, the Common Part (CPCS) and the Service Specific ( SSCS). It is service dependent and its functions include manipulation of cell delay variation (CDV), source clock frequency recovery, forward error correction (FEC). Though each AAL has its own functions, in general the CS describes the services and functions needed for conversion between ATM and non-ATMprotocols (see also SAR).
In general, the procedures and functions that convert between ATM and non-ATM formats. Describes the functions of the upper half of the AAL layer. Also used to describe the conversion functions between non-ATM protocols such as frame relay or SMDS and ATM protocols above the AAL layer.

Controlled Slip (network, ATM)

CSCW

Computer Supported Co-operative Work
More commonly called groupware.

CSF

Cell Switch Fabric
See Switch Fabric.

CSI

Convergence Sublayer Indication (ATM)

CSMA/CA

Carrier Sense Multiple Access/Collision Avoidance (network)
In LAN technology, CSMA technique that combines slotted time-division multiplexing (TDM) with carrier sense multiple access/collision detection (CSMA-CD) to avoid having collisions occur a second time. CSMA/CA works best if the time allocated is short compared to packet length and if the number of stations is small.

CSMA-CD

Carrier Sensed Multiple Access/Collision Detection (network)
A physical layer standard used in Ethernet LANs for gaining access to shared media and transmitting data frames. Provides a mechanism for detecting when the shared media is idle so it can be used and for detecting when two users try to transmit simultaneously ("collision").

CS-PDU

Convergence Sublayer Protocol Data Unit (ATM)
The PDU used at the CS for passing information between the higher layers and the SAR, where they are converted intocells.

CSR

Cell Missequenced Ratio (ATM)
A performance measure that is defined as the number of missequenced cells (those that arrive in the wrong order) per (virtual) connection second.

CSS

Cascading Style Sheet (network, Internet)
A simple mechanism for adding style (e.g. fonts, colors, spacing) to Web documents. For background information on style sheets, see the Web style sheets resource page.
Discussions about CSS are carried out on the www-style@w3.org mailing list and on comp.infosystems.www.authoring.stylesheets.
Site: http://www.w3.org/Style/CSS/.

CSU

Channel Service Unit
Device on the customer end of a digital circuit that provides the interface between customer equipment and the network. Converts between CPE and network digital formats, provides network signaling, and supports test and diagnostic functions. May be combined with a DSU in a single device. See DCE.

CSCW

Computer Supported Cooperative Work (tool)
Software tools and technology to support groups of people working together on a project, often at different sites. Other name: Groupware.

CTD

Cell Transfer Delay (ATM)
A QoS parameter that measures the average time for a single cell to be transferred from its source to its destination over a virtual connection. It is the sum of any coding, decoding, segmentation, reassembly, processing and queueing delays. See also CDV.

CTI

Computer Telephone Integration (communication)
Enabling computers to know about and control telephony functions such as making and receiving voice, fax, and data calls, telephone directory services, and caller identification. The integration of telephone and computer systems and is a major development in the evolution of the automated office. CTI is not a new concept - such links have been used in the past in large telephone networks - but only dedicated call centres could justify the costs of the required equipment installation. Primary telephone service providers are now beginning to offer information services such as {Automatic Number Identification} and {Dialled Number Identification Service} on a scale wide enough for its implementation to bring real value to business or residential telephone usage. A new generation of applications (middleware) is being developed as a result of standardisation and availability of low cost computer-telephony links. This can link personal computers with telephones and/or a local area server with a PBX. Leading telephony and {software} vendors such as AT&T, British Telecom, IBM, Novell, Microsoft and Intel are developing better telephony services and capabilities which should eventually enable low cost CTI. The main CTI functions are integrating messaging with databases, word processors etc.; controlling voice, fax, and e-mail messaging systems from a single application program; graphical call control - using a graphical user interface to perform functions such as making and receiving calls, forwarding and conferencing; call and data association - provision of information about the caller from databases or other applications automatically before the call is answered or transferred; speech synthesis and speech recognition; automatic logging of call related information for invoicing purposes or callback. Typical productivity benefits are improved customer service; increased productivity; reduced costs; enhanced workflow automation; protected investment in computers and telephony; computerised telephony intelligence. IBM were one of the first with workable CTI, now sold as "CallPath". Callware's Phonetastic is typical of the new breed of middleware.

CTS

Clear To Send (physical layer, communication)

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