Responding to a call with a prompt and routing the call to a phone selected in response to the prompt

摘要

A method and apparatus provide multiple telephone lines using a single directory number. A method and apparatus associate multiple directory numbers with multiple telephone lines. A broadband residential gateway (BRG) is a user interface to a broadband communication system providing packetized telephone service and other media services. The BRG can provide greeting and message features. A greeting may instruct a caller to select a name or extension which is associated with a party the caller is attempting to reach. Also, a message, played after the greeting, may further instruct the caller.

主权项

1. A single physical device comprising:
a plurality of integrated communications interfaces to multiple other devices at a customer premise, wherein the plurality of integrated communications interfaces comprise a telephone port connection and an Ethernet connection, and wherein the multiple other devices comprise a plain old telephone system (POTS) phone and an Internet Protocol (IP) phone; a transceiver comprising a register to facilitate data transfer across an IP network; a processing unit coupled to a memory, wherein the memory comprises instructions to respond to receipt of an incoming call comprising an IP packet via the transceiver, with a greeting that includes a prompt, and to route the incoming call from the IP network to the IP phone of a party or an extension selected from among the multiple other devices by a caller in response to the prompt.