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When I try to access the website on my iPad via safari,all I get is a blank welcoming page: https://www.forbes.com/forbes/welcome/?toURL=https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbesagencycouncil/2018/02/08/three-best-practices-to-manage-your-online-identity/&refURL=https://www.google.ca/&referrer=https://www.google.ca/. I tried fixing the URL but it still does the same thing.
Isn't the existence of a mobile and landline telephony network a waste of resources? Or does the cell tower connect to/need the landline network and cell-phones are just a kind of long range cordless phones? Are governments planning to deprecate landlines or, at least, not expand the network? -- Hofhof ( talk) 13:07, 25 April 2018 (UTC)
Readers used to reliable cell phone service availability everywhere they go might want to look at the map at https://www.telstra.com.au/coverage-networks/our-coverage . It shows how much of my country, Australia, is covered by cell phone service. Many people in those more remote areas (the gray bits) still depend on landlines. HiLo48 ( talk) 01:12, 26 April 2018 (UTC)
When I worked in the telecom industry in the early 2000's, pretty much everything past the MTSO (where the cell towers connected to) was on the same network as the landlines. I'm not sure how true that still is today though, since I've been hearing about mobile networks migrating to VOIP over the last few years. Random character sequence ( talk) 21:00, 26 April 2018 (UTC)
This is likely to vary a lot from country to country. In NZ, it isn't uncommon that exchanges will have a generator on site [1] [2] (some of the discussion in the second link may be of particular interest to anyone wanting to know about these things). It seems to be implied this means the battery backup tended to not last so long. According go the second discussion, exchanges without generators may be up to 4 days. They are designed so portable generators will be used if needed, although this may be difficult in a large scale emergency. (Although there may also be other problems with the network then.) Also mentioned there and in the other sources is that the generators are supposed to be tested frequently so they are unlikely to fail. (However I'd imagine if it's expected an important site is going to be on generator power for a long time, it's possible another generator will be brought on site just in case especially since regular testing and maintenance could still miss problems particularly those which may only arise with extended use.)
Note as sort of hinted at there, a large part of NZ is no longer using the exchange but cabinets. These obviously don't have fixed generators. They are also designed for portable generators. This source claims battery backup on cabinets can be as little as 2 hours [3] but that sounds a little low to me. The 24 to 36 hours sounds a bit more plausible although possibly also a little high. (You can find other reports like [4] which mention short time frames but it's difficult to know if those are due to battery backups running out of power or other factors. Ditto unless the person checked, it's difficult to know if a cabinet 'lasting' for a longer time was solely from battery or also from a portable generator.)
According to [5], 8 hours is required for Ultra-Fast Broadband i.e. fibre to the home facilities. Of course since UFB does not provide power to the CPE, the CPE needs to also have some sort of backup. It was decided not to require any, so most people don't have any. An additional complication is that while the UFB ONT does have provision for a phone line, not all providers use it, some using their own SIP VOIP service provided for by the router or direct to digital phones. So these devices need backup too. And I've seen many question how likely is that many providers are likely to be at being able to provide a service if there is significant problems, especially given that many of these services aren't seen as that important. Of course one of the reasons why it wasn't required is that some felt the mobile network was a more likely backup since at least then most people don't need any 'backup' on the customer side in the short term since their mobile phone uses a battery for power. And these providers at least normally are much more experienced in handling outages.
This source claims cell sites are typically 4 to 12 hours [6]. All these suggest to me 2 hours or less for cabinets sounds a little short so may not be true.
BTW, I probably should mention that some people, although connected to a cabinet and using it for their xDSL service, are using the older POTS system in the exchange for their phone line. (For the avoidance of doubt, it's delivered over the same line to the customer.) This service is called baseband copper [7]. I don't quite understand if this service still works if the cabinet has no power but the exchange does. I would have thought no but this seems to suggest it does [8] but it could simply be misleading. There is some brief discussion of the issue here [9] but I wouldn't say it confirms that the implication is true.
Nil Einne ( talk) 16:21, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
Computing desk | ||
---|---|---|
< April 24 | << Mar | April | May >> | April 26 > |
Welcome to the Wikipedia Computing Reference Desk Archives |
---|
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages. |
When I try to access the website on my iPad via safari,all I get is a blank welcoming page: https://www.forbes.com/forbes/welcome/?toURL=https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbesagencycouncil/2018/02/08/three-best-practices-to-manage-your-online-identity/&refURL=https://www.google.ca/&referrer=https://www.google.ca/. I tried fixing the URL but it still does the same thing.
Isn't the existence of a mobile and landline telephony network a waste of resources? Or does the cell tower connect to/need the landline network and cell-phones are just a kind of long range cordless phones? Are governments planning to deprecate landlines or, at least, not expand the network? -- Hofhof ( talk) 13:07, 25 April 2018 (UTC)
Readers used to reliable cell phone service availability everywhere they go might want to look at the map at https://www.telstra.com.au/coverage-networks/our-coverage . It shows how much of my country, Australia, is covered by cell phone service. Many people in those more remote areas (the gray bits) still depend on landlines. HiLo48 ( talk) 01:12, 26 April 2018 (UTC)
When I worked in the telecom industry in the early 2000's, pretty much everything past the MTSO (where the cell towers connected to) was on the same network as the landlines. I'm not sure how true that still is today though, since I've been hearing about mobile networks migrating to VOIP over the last few years. Random character sequence ( talk) 21:00, 26 April 2018 (UTC)
This is likely to vary a lot from country to country. In NZ, it isn't uncommon that exchanges will have a generator on site [1] [2] (some of the discussion in the second link may be of particular interest to anyone wanting to know about these things). It seems to be implied this means the battery backup tended to not last so long. According go the second discussion, exchanges without generators may be up to 4 days. They are designed so portable generators will be used if needed, although this may be difficult in a large scale emergency. (Although there may also be other problems with the network then.) Also mentioned there and in the other sources is that the generators are supposed to be tested frequently so they are unlikely to fail. (However I'd imagine if it's expected an important site is going to be on generator power for a long time, it's possible another generator will be brought on site just in case especially since regular testing and maintenance could still miss problems particularly those which may only arise with extended use.)
Note as sort of hinted at there, a large part of NZ is no longer using the exchange but cabinets. These obviously don't have fixed generators. They are also designed for portable generators. This source claims battery backup on cabinets can be as little as 2 hours [3] but that sounds a little low to me. The 24 to 36 hours sounds a bit more plausible although possibly also a little high. (You can find other reports like [4] which mention short time frames but it's difficult to know if those are due to battery backups running out of power or other factors. Ditto unless the person checked, it's difficult to know if a cabinet 'lasting' for a longer time was solely from battery or also from a portable generator.)
According to [5], 8 hours is required for Ultra-Fast Broadband i.e. fibre to the home facilities. Of course since UFB does not provide power to the CPE, the CPE needs to also have some sort of backup. It was decided not to require any, so most people don't have any. An additional complication is that while the UFB ONT does have provision for a phone line, not all providers use it, some using their own SIP VOIP service provided for by the router or direct to digital phones. So these devices need backup too. And I've seen many question how likely is that many providers are likely to be at being able to provide a service if there is significant problems, especially given that many of these services aren't seen as that important. Of course one of the reasons why it wasn't required is that some felt the mobile network was a more likely backup since at least then most people don't need any 'backup' on the customer side in the short term since their mobile phone uses a battery for power. And these providers at least normally are much more experienced in handling outages.
This source claims cell sites are typically 4 to 12 hours [6]. All these suggest to me 2 hours or less for cabinets sounds a little short so may not be true.
BTW, I probably should mention that some people, although connected to a cabinet and using it for their xDSL service, are using the older POTS system in the exchange for their phone line. (For the avoidance of doubt, it's delivered over the same line to the customer.) This service is called baseband copper [7]. I don't quite understand if this service still works if the cabinet has no power but the exchange does. I would have thought no but this seems to suggest it does [8] but it could simply be misleading. There is some brief discussion of the issue here [9] but I wouldn't say it confirms that the implication is true.
Nil Einne ( talk) 16:21, 29 April 2018 (UTC)