초록 ▼

An enduser at a POTS analog voice-only endpoint (136) and endusers at H.320 standard multimedia terminals (101, 102, 103, 104), which each communicate over separate voice, video and data streams, engage in a videoconference with each other in a pseudo multimedia manner through a central platform (13

An enduser at a POTS analog voice-only endpoint (136) and endusers at H.320 standard multimedia terminals (101, 102, 103, 104), which each communicate over separate voice, video and data streams, engage in a videoconference with each other in a pseudo multimedia manner through a central platform (135) that provides call conversion capabilities. A document to be shared by a user at the POTS endpoint with users at the multimedia endpoints is transmitted as a data signal from a facsimile machine (137) or PC terminal (138) associated with the POTS user to a server (146) in the platform. The received data signal is then inputted to a multimedia bridge (124) and transmitted on the data stream to each multimedia endpoint for display on a window on each multimedia terminal. Similarly, a document to be shared by a multimedia endpoint is transmitted on a data stream to the multimedia bridge, where it is bridged on the data stream transmitted to the other multimedia endpoints and to the server. The document is then transmitted from the server to the facsimile machine or PC terminal associated with the POTS endpoint. In conventional multimedia conferencing arrangements, voice-activated switching is used to determine which user's video image is bridged onto the video stream transmitted to each multimedia terminal. When the audio signal from the POTS user would cause a video signal from that user's terminal to be bridged to all the multimedia endpoints if in fact that user was at a multimedia terminal, a stored image of that user is retrieved from a database (151) and outputted by the bridge on the video stream transmitted to each multimedia terminal to enable the multimedia participants to visually identify the presently talking enduser.

대표청구항 ▼

[ The invention claimed is:] [1.] In a telecommunications network, a method of providing a pseudo multimedia service comprising the steps of:establishing a communications connection between a multimedia terminal and a telephone, the multimedia terminal associated with a user and operable to communic

[ The invention claimed is:] [1.] In a telecommunications network, a method of providing a pseudo multimedia service comprising the steps of:establishing a communications connection between a multimedia terminal and a telephone, the multimedia terminal associated with a user and operable to communicate voice, video and data signals over separate voice, video and data streams, respectively, on a bearer channel, the telephone associated with a telephone user and not having video capabilities, voice signals between the telephone user and the user at the multimedia terminal being communicated to and from the telephone over the voiceband connection and to and from the multimedia terminal over the voice stream;establishing a communications connection between the multimedia terminal and a data terminal that is also associated with the telephone user,determining the identity of the telephone user;using the determined identity of the telephone user, retrieving a previously stored image of the telephone user from an image database which has stored therein images of a plurality of different telephone users in association with their identities;transmitting the retrieved image of the telephone user to the multimedia terminal on the video stream, wherein the image of the telephone user is displayed on the multimedia terminal while voice signals are being communicated between the user at the multimedia terminal and the telephone user;receiving a data signal on the data stream from the multimedia terminal; andtransmitting the received data signal to the data terminal.