Portal:Telephones

The Telephones Portal

A telephone, colloquially referred to as a phone, is a telecommunications device that enables two or more users to conduct a conversation when they are too far apart to be easily heard directly. A telephone converts sound, typically and most efficiently the human voice, into electronic signals that are transmitted via cables and other communication channels to another telephone which reproduces the sound to the receiving user. The term is derived from Ancient Greek: τῆλε, romanized: tēle, lit. 'far' and φωνή (phōnē, voice), together meaning distant voice.

In 1876, Alexander Graham Bell was the first to be granted a United States patent for a device that produced clearly intelligible replication of the human voice at a second device. This instrument was further developed by many others, and became rapidly indispensable in business, government, and in households. (Full article...)

A mobile phone or cell phone is a portable telephone that allows users to make and receive calls over a radio frequency link while moving within a designated telephone service area, unlike fixed-location phones (landline phones). This radio frequency link connects to the switching systems of a mobile phone operator, providing access to the public switched telephone network (PSTN). Modern mobile telephony relies on a cellular network architecture, which is why mobile phones are often referred to as 'cell phones' in North America. (Full article...)

A smartphone is a mobile phone with advanced computing capabilities. It typically has a touchscreen interface, allowing users to access a wide range of applications and services, such as web browsing, email, and social media, as well as multimedia playback and streaming. Smartphones have built-in cameras, GPS navigation, and support for various communication methods, including voice calls, text messaging, and internet-based messaging apps. Smartphones are distinguished from older-design feature phones by their more advanced hardware capabilities and extensive mobile operating systems, access to the internet, business applications, mobile payments, and multimedia functionality, including music, video, gaming, radio, and television. (Full article...)

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Bell Canada (commonly referred to as Bell) is a Canadian telecommunications company headquartered at 1 Carrefour Alexander-Graham-Bell in the borough of Verdun, Quebec, in Canada. It is an ILEC (incumbent local exchange carrier) in the provinces of Ontario and Quebec; as such, it was a founding member of the Stentor Alliance. It is also a CLEC (competitive local exchange carrier) for enterprise customers in the western provinces.

Its subsidiary Bell Aliant provides services in the Atlantic provinces. It provides mobile service through its Bell Mobility (including flanker brand Virgin Plus) subsidiary, and television through its Bell Satellite TV (direct broadcast satellite) and Bell Fibe TV (IPTV) subsidiaries.

Bell Canada's principal competitors are: Rogers Communications in Ontario and Western Canada, Telus Communications in Quebec and Western Canada, Quebecor (Videotron) in Quebec plus other Global Wireless Infrastructure Providers such as American Tower. The company serves over 13 million phone lines and is headquartered at the Campus Bell complex in the borough of Verdun in Montreal. (Full article...)

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A sound-powered telephone is a communication device that allows users to talk to each other with the use of a handset, similar to a conventional telephone, but without the use of external power. This technology has been used since at least 1944 for both routine and emergency communication on ships to allow communication between key locations on a vessel if power is unavailable. A sound-powered phone circuit can have two or more stations on the same circuit. The circuit is always live, thus a user begins speaking rather than dialing another station. Sound-powered telephones are not normally connected to a telephone exchange. (Full article...)

List of phone types
Payphone Courtesy telephone Emergency telephone Secure telephone Smartphone Mobile phone Satellite phone Phablet Car phone Windows Phone Camera phone Feature phone VoIP phone iPhone Tin can telephone Grillo telephone Golden telephone Reis telephone Cordless telephone Shoe phone Field telephone IBM Simon Mobile radio telephone Foldable smartphone Modular smartphone Prepaid mobile phone

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DTMF dialing

audio output of a DTMF signal.

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Dual-tone multi-frequency (DTMF) signaling is a telecommunication signaling system using the voice-frequency band over telephone lines between telephone equipment and other communications devices and switching centers. DTMF was first developed in the Bell System in the United States, and became known under the trademark Touch-Tone for use in push-button telephones, starting in 1963. The DTMF frequencies are standardized in ITU-T Recommendation Q.23. The signaling system is also known as MF4 in the United Kingdom, as MFV in Germany, and Digitone in Canada. (Full article...)

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The following are images from various telephone-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1Martin Cooper of Motorola, shown here in a 2007 reenactment, made the first publicized handheld mobile phone call on a prototype DynaTAC model on 3 April 1973. (from Mobile phone)
Image 2Smartphone with infrared transmitter on top for use as remote control (from Smartphone)
Image 3Active mobile broadband subscriptions per 100 inhabitants (from Mobile phone)
Image 4Two decades of evolution of mobile phones, from a 1992 Motorola DynaTAC 8000X to the 2014 iPhone 6 Plus (from Mobile phone)
Image 5E-waste in Agbogbloshie (from Smartphone)
Image 6A high-capacity portable battery charger (power bank) (from Smartphone)
Image 7Elisha Gray, 1876, designed a telephone using a water microphone in Highland Park, Illinois. (from History of the telephone)
Image 8Actor portraying Alexander Graham Bell in a 1932 silent film. Shows Bell's second telephone transmitter (microphone), invented 1876 and first displayed at the Centennial Exposition, Philadelphia. (from History of the telephone)
Image 9A user consulting a mapping app on a phone (from Smartphone)
Image 10Historical marker commemorating the first telephone central office in New York State (1878) (from History of the telephone)
Image 11Alexander Graham Bell was awarded the first U.S. patent for the invention of the telephone in 1876. (from History of the telephone)
Image 12A Meizu MX4 with Flyme OS (from Smartphone)
Image 13Scrapped mobile phones (from Mobile phone)
Image 141896 telephone (Sweden) (from History of the telephone)
Image 15The LG Prada with a large capacitive touchscreen introduced in 2006 (from Smartphone)
Image 16Xiaomi 13 Ultra featured a Leica Summicron camera system (from Smartphone)
Image 17Top of cellular telephone tower (from History of the telephone)
Image 18A Nexus 6, an Android smartphone, displaying the Main Page of the English Wikipedia (from Smartphone)
Image 19Receiver schematic, c.1906 (from History of the telephone)
Image 20A driver using two handheld mobile phones at once (from Mobile phone)
Image 21A smartphone touchscreen (from Smartphone)
Image 22This layout of the camera viewfinder was first introduced by Apple with iOS 7 in 2013. Towards the late 2010s, several other smartphone vendors have ditched their layouts and implemented variations of this layout. (from Smartphone)
Image 23Personal Handy-phone System mobiles and modems, 1997–2003 (from Mobile phone)
Image 24A Moto G7 Power; its display uses a tall aspect ratio and includes a "notch". (from Smartphone)
Image 25Antonio Meucci, 1854, developed a voice-communication apparatus that several sources credit as the first telephone. (from History of the telephone)
Image 26Android smartphones (from Mobile phone)
Image 27A text message (SMS) (from Mobile phone)
Image 28Mobile payment system (from Mobile phone)
Image 29Tivadar Puskás proposed the telephone switchboard exchange in 1876. (from History of the telephone)
Image 30Reis's telephone around 1861, first device called telephone (from History of the telephone)
Image 31Optical track pad sensor of an HTC Legend, 2010. (from Smartphone)
Image 32A New York City driver holding two phones (from Smartphone)
Image 33The original Apple iPhone; following its introduction in 2007, the common smartphone form factor shifted to large touchscreen software interfaces without physical keypads (from Smartphone)
Image 34Mobile payment system. (from Smartphone)
Image 35Thomas Edison invented the carbon microphone which produced a strong telephone signal. (from History of the telephone)
Image 36"Device options" menu of Samsung Mobile's TouchWiz user interface as of 2013, accessed by holding the power button for a second (from Smartphone)
Image 37The Nokia 9110 Communicator, opened for access to keyboard (from Smartphone)
Image 38The HTC Desire, a 2010 smartphone with optical trackpad and search button (from Smartphone)
Image 39Several BlackBerry smartphones, which were highly popular in the mid-late 2000s (from Smartphone)
Image 40The Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra has an artificial intelligence-powered feature (from Smartphone)
Image 41IBM Simon and charging base (1994) (from Smartphone)
Image 42Cellular networks work by only reusing radio frequencies (in this example frequencies f1–f4) in non adjacent cells to avoid interference (from Mobile phone)
Image 43Apple iPhone smartphone (from History of the telephone)
Image 44The master telephone patent granted to Bell, 174465, March 7, 1876 (from History of the telephone)
Image 45Private conversation, 1910 (from History of the telephone)
Image 46Mobile phone subscribers per 100 inhabitants. 2014 figure is estimated. (from Mobile phone)
Image 47The Motorola DynaTAC 8000X. In 1983, it became the first commercially available handheld cellular mobile phone. (from Mobile phone)
Image 48Inserted memory and SIM cards (from Smartphone)
Image 49A 19th century acoustic tin can or "lovers' telephone" (from History of the telephone)
Image 50Dupuis and Haug during a GSM meeting in Belgium, April 1992 (from Mobile phone)
Image 51A sign in the US restricting cell phone use to certain times of day (no cell phone use between 7:30–9:00 am and 2:00–4:15 pm) (from Mobile phone)
Image 52A sign along Bellaire Boulevard in Southside Place, Texas (Greater Houston) states that using mobile phones while driving is prohibited from 7:30 am to 9:00 am and from 2:00 pm to 4:15 pm. (from Smartphone)
Image 53Tooltip in Kiwi Browser, a Google Chromium derivative, reveals the full URL by hovering over the tab list using the stylus on a Samsung Galaxy Note 4. (from Smartphone)
Image 541917 wall telephone, open to show magneto and local battery (from History of the telephone)
Image 55A German rotary dial telephone, the W48 (from History of the telephone)
Image 56Oppo Find X6 features software-based tuning co-developed with Hasselblad (from Smartphone)
Image 57
Bell prototype telephone stamp
Centennial Issue of 1976
(from History of the telephone)
Image 58Philipp Reis, 1861, constructed the first telephone, today called the Reis telephone. (from History of the telephone)
Image 59A French Gower telephone of 1912 at the Musée des Arts et Métiers in Paris (from History of the telephone)
Image 60Mobile/desktop convergence: the Librem 5 smartphone can be used as a basic desktop computer (from Smartphone)
Image 61People using phones while walking (from Mobile phone)
Image 62A Samsung Galaxy S20 Plus, featuring a "hole-punch" camera (from Smartphone)
Image 63Typical mobile phone mini-SIM card (from Mobile phone)
Image 64Replica of the telettrofono at Museo Nazionale Scienza e Tecnologia Leonardo da Vinci of Milan, Italy, invented by Antonio Meucci and credited by several sources as the first telephone. (from History of the telephone)

Selected biography

Charles Bourseul (28 April 1829 – 23 November 1912) was a pioneer in development of the "make and break" telephone about 20 years before Bell made a practical telephone. (Full article...)

List of selected biographies
Alexander Graham Bell Thomas Edison Innocenzo Manzetti Johann Philipp Reis Antonio Meucci Tivadar Puskás Douglas H. Ring W. Rae Young Martin Cooper (inventor) Thomas Cowherd Gardiner Greene Hubbard Anthony Pollok Thomas A. Watson Elisha Gray George Sweigert Pat Fleet John Draper

Selected images

Image 1Telephone booth box art outside the Tower of London, 2012
Image 2Foldable smartphones
Image 3A Northern Electric telephone, model number N415H, circa 1950 (probably)
Image 4Public telephone, Bucharest, Romania
Image 5A historic telephone booth in Skansen, Stockholm
Image 6Mailbox and public telephone in Haßfurt, Germany
Image 7Landline call blocking in use
Image 8An example of a K6, the most common red telephone box model, photographed in London in 2012
Image 9Track-side emergency brake and emergency telephones at the platform of the metro station Aspern Nord, Donaustadt, Vienna, Austria
Image 10A police box outside Earl's Court tube station in London, built in 1996 and based on the 1929 Gilbert Mackenzie Trench design
Image 11Push-button telephone
Image 12A Bell Canada payphone with digital display
Image 13Android smartphones
Image 14A traditional North American rotary phone dial. The associative lettering was originally used for dialing named exchanges but was kept because it facilitated memorization of telephone numbers.
Image 15A Western Electric candlestick phone from the 1920s
Image 16Rotary dial telephone, probably from Belgium; the circuit diagram inside is in Dutch and French
Image 17An Italian gettone telefonico (telephone token) from 1945, which was used in Italian phone booths
Image 18Apple iPhones
Image 19Acoustic telephone ad, The Consolidated Telephone Co., Jersey City, New Jersey, 1886
Image 20A cordless phone
Image 21A Funke + Huster telephone inside the Idrija Mine, Slovenia
Image 22The AUTOVON was a worldwide American military telephone system that was built starting in 1963.
Image 23Wooden wall telephone with a hand-cranked magneto generator
Image 24Emergency telephones, on the Paris-Bordeaux railway line, Saint-Saviol station, Vienne, France
Image 25Automatic electric Rotary dial telephone
Image 26Rotary dial telephone, probably from Belgium; the circuit diagram inside is in Dutch and French
Image 27Photograph of the interior of the Prairie Grove Airlight Outdoor Telephone Booth in Prairie Grove, Arkansas, which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places
Image 28Historical telephone with the German imperial eagle and the heraldic shield of the House of Hohenzollern dynasty; Vollmer's Mill, Seebach, Baden-Württemberg, Germany

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v t e Telephony
Types	Landline Cable telephony Mobile phone Satellite phone Photophone
Accessories	Answering machine Caller ID
Connectivity	Cable protection system Communications satellites Fibre-optical Free-space optical ISDN Mobile phone signal POTS PSTN Submarine cables VoIP
Calls	Missed call Misdialed call Nuisance call Phone tag
Applications	Fax transmission Telephone calls Telephone newspapers Théâtrophone Video calls
Telecommunication portal Telephones portal

v t e Emergency telephone numbers
Emergency telephone Harmonised service of social value
000 (Australia) 102 (India) 106 (Australia) 108 (India) 110 (Iran, Japan, China) 111 (New Zealand) 112 (Europe and others, worldwide GSM mobile networks) 119 (parts of Asia and Jamaica) 120 (China) 122 (Austria, Egypt, and Bosnia and Herzegovina) 123 (Colombia, Egypt) 128 (Mercosur member states) 190 (Brazil) 911 (Iraq, North America E-911 system, Philippines) 988 (North America Suicide & Crisis Lifeline) 999 (Bangladesh, UK and others) 1122 (Pakistan)
Telephones portal Telecommunication portal List article Category Wikimedia Commons