Answering phone

[link1305]

I was thinking about this today...and wondering, is there any way (preferably free) to answer an incoming telephone call with your computer, using a plugged in microphone and a modem? I have my headset on a lot of the day, and it would be much more convienent to just click something to take the call rather than to take my headset off and pick up my phone.......

I seem to remember something in windows 95 that sat on the taskbar....to answer calls or to not answer calls. So it must be possible.

 

[drag]

I know that there are some projects to turn Linux into a answering machine.

Basicly you need a modem that can handle voice. (preferabley a hardware modem since winmodems need special drivers that makes using them in Linux a pain).

Then you have these things called "getty"s. They are basicly console login programs (the command line stuff outside the X windows GUI). But there have been variations to make it so you can use sound instead of getting a login screen. Basicly telephone tones. You know "Hit 1 for blah blah blah, hit 2 for yadda yadda yadda" etc.

So these projects turn it into a automated answering service. Be able to do stuff like e-mail yourself mp3 versions of messages people leave for you on your computer. Don't know much beyond that, but I wouldn't think it would be too difficult to use your computer as a phone.

Normal computer geeks just tend to "build their own" setup using basic tools like vgetty (voice version of (m)getty) but here is a program that is already setup to use it. Of course with anything this geeky you need to have some knowledge of Linux.

Hell VoIP is just a step beyond that.

I am sure that they are plenty of commercial software apps to do that with Windows (I am a linux type guy). I would look for software bundled with various voice-capable modems, I remember vagely seeing boxes of modems with little smiling people with headsets on them.

 

[LiLithTecH]

You might want to have a look at this:

PC 2 Answering Machine

While not Freeware, it is very inexpensive for what it does.
Plus there is a 7-day trial before you buy.