After a few years I moved to the Plant Records department where the company’s assets were recorded graphically and financially. At that time, Southern Bell was developing a CAD system called WorkPrint Generation with Intergraph Corporation. This system was intended to replace the manual maintainance of cable records and replace manual drafting of engineering construction drawings. The second phase of development called for deployment into the Engineering department. As part of that deployment team in the South Florida area, I helped get this system in place and trained Drafting Clerks and Engineers in its use. Workprint Generation was eventually replaced with BSTCAD and was incorporated with other engineering systems to become OSPCM (Outside Plant Construction Management), which is still in use today.
Not long after, Southern Bell and South Central Bell merged to become BellSouth where I worked at an Outside Plant Engineer until 1994. I left to develop other interests but returned in 1996 to work in Outside Plant Engineering with a contractor. Since that time I have worked in Florida and California with contractors for BellSouth, AT&T and Verizon.
Then it became obvious to me that some clarification was needed in many technical areas. The fast pace of technical advancement needs an even faster dissemination of easy to understand information. This is particularly true because the main players in Telecom (AT&T, Verizon, et al) no longer retain a large trained staff but contracted out as much as possible.
It is my belief that an understanding of the history and fundamentals of Telecom is a necessary platform for advanced technology usage and implementation. This blog is my contribution to the next generation. I hope you find it of some use to your everyday tasks.
If you have any suggestions or technical data you would like to have converted to layman's terms, please contact me.
