147-413: A telephone , colloquially referred to as a phone , is a telecommunications device that permits 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
294-412: A thermionic tube or thermionic valve uses thermionic emission of electrons from a heated cathode for a number of fundamental electronic functions such as signal amplification and current rectification . The simplest vacuum tube, the diode invented in 1904 by John Ambrose Fleming , contains only a heated electron-emitting cathode and an anode. Electrons can only flow in one direction through
441-577: A Linear B clay tablet found in Messenia that dates to between 1450 and 1350 BC, making Greek the world's oldest recorded living language . Among the Indo-European languages, its date of earliest written attestation is matched only by the now-extinct Anatolian languages . The Greek language is conventionally divided into the following periods: In the modern era, the Greek language entered
588-604: A disruptive technology that is rapidly replacing traditional telephone network infrastructure. By January 2005, up to 10% of telephone subscribers in Japan and South Korea had switched to this digital telephone service. A January 2005 Newsweek article suggested that Internet telephony may be "the next big thing." The technology has spawned a new industry comprising many VoIP companies that offer services to consumers and businesses . The reported global VoIP market in October 2021
735-411: A radio broadcasting station , the station's large power amplifier is the transmitter and the broadcasting antenna is the interface between the power amplifier and the free space channel. The free space channel is the transmission medium and the receiver's antenna is the interface between the free space channel and the receiver. Next, the radio receiver is the destination of the radio signal, where it
882-483: A subscriber , who had to arrange for a telegraph contractor to construct a line between them, for example, between a home and a shop. Users who wanted the ability to speak to several different locations would need to obtain and set up three or four pairs of telephones. Western Union , already using telegraph exchanges, quickly extended the principle to its telephones in New York City and San Francisco , and Bell
1029-437: A water microphone , some had a metal diaphragm that induced current in an electromagnet wound around a permanent magnet, and some were dynamic – their diaphragm vibrated a coil of wire in the field of a permanent magnet or the coil vibrated the diaphragm. The sound-powered dynamic variants survived in small numbers through the 20th century in military and maritime applications, where its ability to create its own electrical power
1176-477: A DC transformer which plugs into a wall AC power outlet. A mobile phone or cellphone or hand phone is a handheld telephone which connects via radio transmissions to a cellular telephone network . The cellular network consists of a network of ground based transmitter/receiver stations with antennas – which are usually located on towers or on buildings – and infrastructure connecting to land-based telephone lines. Analog cellular networks first appeared in 1979, with
1323-577: A basis for coinages: anthropology , photography , telephony , isomer , biomechanics , cinematography , etc. Together with Latin words , they form the foundation of international scientific and technical vocabulary ; for example, all words ending in -logy ('discourse'). There are many English words of Greek origin . Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European language family. The ancient language most closely related to it may be ancient Macedonian , which, by most accounts,
1470-411: A better price for their goods. In Côte d'Ivoire , coffee growers share mobile phones to follow hourly variations in coffee prices and sell at the best price. On the macroeconomic scale, Lars-Hendrik Röller and Leonard Waverman suggested a causal link between good telecommunication infrastructure and economic growth. Few dispute the existence of a correlation although some argue it is wrong to view
1617-438: A caveat for it in 1876. Gray abandoned his caveat and because he did not contest Bell's priority, the examiner approved Bell's patent on March 3, 1876. Gray had filed his caveat for the variable resistance telephone, but Bell was the first to document the idea and test it in a telephone.[88] Antonio Meucci invented a device that allowed the electrical transmission of voice over a line nearly 30 years before in 1849, but his device
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#17327764966961764-437: A computer softphone application, utilizing the microphone and headset devices of a personal computer or smartphone. While traditional analog telephones are typically powered from the central office through the telephone line, digital telephones require a local power supply. Internet-based digital service also requires special provisions to provide the service location to the emergency services when an emergency telephone number
1911-441: A connection between two or more users. For both types of networks, repeaters may be necessary to amplify or recreate the signal when it is being transmitted over long distances. This is to combat attenuation that can render the signal indistinguishable from the noise. Another advantage of digital systems over analogue is that their output is easier to store in memory, i.e., two voltage states (high and low) are easier to store than
2058-495: A continuous range of states. Telecommunication has a significant social, cultural and economic impact on modern society. In 2008, estimates placed the telecommunication industry 's revenue at US$ 4.7 trillion or just under three per cent of the gross world product (official exchange rate). Several following sections discuss the impact of telecommunication on society. On the microeconomic scale, companies have used telecommunications to help build global business empires. This
2205-412: A display for caller ID . In addition, answering machine function may be built in. The cordless handset contains a rechargeable battery , which the base station recharges when the handset rests in its cradle. Muilt-handset systems generally also have additional charging stands. A cordless telephone typically requires a constant electricity supply to power the base station and charger units by means of
2352-430: A dynamic transmitter or by the powering of a transmitter with a local battery. One of the jobs of outside plant personnel was to visit each telephone periodically to inspect the battery. During the 20th century, telephones powered from the telephone exchange over the same wires that carried the voice signals became common. Early telephones used a single wire for the subscriber's line, with ground return used to complete
2499-508: A faster, more convenient cursive writing style with the use of ink and quill . The Greek alphabet consists of 24 letters, each with an uppercase ( majuscule ) and lowercase ( minuscule ) form. The letter sigma has an additional lowercase form (ς) used in the final position of a word: In addition to the letters, the Greek alphabet features a number of diacritical signs : three different accent marks ( acute , grave , and circumflex ), originally denoting different shapes of pitch accent on
2646-417: A handle with the receiver and transmitter attached, now called a handset , separate from the cradle base that housed the magneto crank and other parts. They were larger than the "candlestick" and more popular. Disadvantages of single-wire operation such as crosstalk and hum from nearby AC power wires had already led to the use of twisted pairs and, for long-distance telephones, four-wire circuits . Users at
2793-406: A higher-frequency signal (known as the " carrier wave ") before transmission. There are several different modulation schemes available to achieve this [two of the most basic being amplitude modulation (AM) and frequency modulation (FM)]. An example of this process is a disc jockey's voice being impressed into a 96 MHz carrier wave using frequency modulation (the voice would then be received on
2940-450: A key advantage of digital signals over analogue signals. However, digital systems fail catastrophically when noise exceeds the system's ability to autocorrect. On the other hand, analogue systems fail gracefully: as noise increases, the signal becomes progressively more degraded but still usable. Also, digital transmission of continuous data unavoidably adds quantization noise to the output. This can be reduced, but not eliminated, only at
3087-687: A keypad or dial, affixed to the telephone, to enter a telephone number , which is the address of the call recipient's telephone in the telecommunications system, but other methods existed in the early history of the telephone. The first telephones were directly connected to each other from one customer's office or residence to another customer's location. Being impractical beyond just a few customers, these systems were quickly replaced by manually operated centrally located switchboards . These exchanges were soon connected together, eventually forming an automated, worldwide public switched telephone network . For greater mobility, various radio systems were developed in
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#17327764966963234-590: A lesser extent, in the Western Mediterranean in and around colonies such as Massalia , Monoikos , and Mainake . It was also used as the official language of government and religion in the Christian Nubian kingdoms , for most of their history. Greek, in its modern form, is the official language of Greece, where it is spoken by almost the entire population. It is also the official language of Cyprus (nominally alongside Turkish ) and
3381-400: A limited but productive system of compounding and a rich inflectional system. Although its morphological categories have been fairly stable over time, morphological changes are present throughout, particularly in the nominal and verbal systems. The major change in the nominal morphology since the classical stage was the disuse of the dative case (its functions being largely taken over by
3528-459: A mixed syllable structure, permitting complex syllabic onsets but very restricted codas. It has only oral vowels and a fairly stable set of consonantal contrasts . The main phonological changes occurred during the Hellenistic and Roman period (see Koine Greek phonology for details): In all its stages, the morphology of Greek shows an extensive set of productive derivational affixes ,
3675-838: A new international frequency list and used in conformity with the Radio Regulation". According to the ITU's Radio Regulations adopted in Atlantic City, all frequencies referenced in the International Frequency Registration Board , examined by the board and registered on the International Frequency List "shall have the right to international protection from harmful interference". From a global perspective, there have been political debates and legislation regarding
3822-437: A person's age, interests, sexual preference and relationship status. In this way, these sites can play important role in everything from organising social engagements to courtship . Prior to social networking sites, technologies like short message service (SMS) and the telephone also had a significant impact on social interactions. In 2000, market research group Ipsos MORI reported that 81% of 15- to 24-year-old SMS users in
3969-491: A radio as the channel "96 FM"). In addition, modulation has the advantage that it may use frequency division multiplexing (FDM). A telecommunications network is a collection of transmitters, receivers, and communications channels that send messages to one another. Some digital communications networks contain one or more routers that work together to transmit information to the correct user. An analogue communications network consists of one or more switches that establish
4116-590: A satellite phone is that it can be used in such regions where local terrestrial communication infrastructures, such as landline and cellular networks, are not available. Satellite phones are popular on expeditions into remote locations, hunting, fishing, maritime sector, humanitarian missions, business trips, and mining in hard-to-reach areas, where there is no reliable cellular service. Satellite telephones rarely get disrupted by natural disasters on Earth or human actions such as war, so they have proven to be dependable communication tools in emergency situations, when
4263-475: A service that operated for a year until the gap in the telegraph link was closed. In the Middle Ages, chains of beacons were commonly used on hilltops as a means of relaying a signal. Beacon chains suffered the drawback that they could only pass a single bit of information, so the meaning of the message such as "the enemy has been sighted" had to be agreed upon in advance. One notable instance of their use
4410-404: A short distance from the base station. Base stations include a radio transceiver which enables full-duplex, outgoing and incoming signals and speech with the handsets. The base station often includes a microphone, audio amplifier , and a loudspeaker to enable hands-free speakerphone conversations, without needing to use a handset. The base station may also have a numeric keypad for dialing, and
4557-442: A single medium to transmit several concurrent communication sessions . Several methods of long-distance communication before the modern era used sounds like coded drumbeats , the blowing of horns , and whistles . Long-distance technologies invented during the 20th and 21st centuries generally use electric power, and include the telegraph , telephone , television , and radio . Early telecommunication networks used metal wires as
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4704-429: A single molded plastic handle, which when not in use was secured in a cradle in the base unit. The circuit diagram of the model 202 shows the direct connection of the transmitter to the line, while the receiver was inductively coupled. In local battery configurations, when the local loop was too long to provide sufficient current from the exchange, the transmitter was powered by a local battery and inductively coupled, while
4851-460: A state of diglossia : the coexistence of vernacular and archaizing written forms of the language. What came to be known as the Greek language question was a polarization between two competing varieties of Modern Greek: Dimotiki , the vernacular form of Modern Greek proper, and Katharevousa , meaning 'purified', a compromise between Dimotiki and Ancient Greek developed in the early 19th century that
4998-411: A telephone network, the caller is connected to the person to whom they wish to talk by switches at various telephone exchanges . The switches form an electrical connection between the two users and the setting of these switches is determined electronically when the caller dials the number. Once the connection is made, the caller's voice is transformed to an electrical signal using a small microphone in
5145-412: A version of the electrical telegraph that he unsuccessfully demonstrated on September 2, 1837. His code was an important advance over Wheatstone's signaling method. The first transatlantic telegraph cable was successfully completed on July 27, 1866, allowing transatlantic telecommunication for the first time. The conventional telephone was patented by Alexander Bell in 1876. Elisha Gray also filed
5292-514: A wired interface, such as USB or Lightning connectors. Smartphones, being able to run apps , have vastly expanded functionality compared to previous mobile phones. Having internet access and built in cameras, smartphones have made video calling readily accessible via IP connections. Smartphones also have access to a large number of web services and web apps, giving them functionality similar to traditional computers, although smartphones are often limited by their relatively small screen size and
5439-581: Is adapted from the French, because its written use was recorded in 1904 by the French engineer and novelist Édouard Estaunié . Communication was first used as an English word in the late 14th century. It comes from Old French comunicacion (14c., Modern French communication), from Latin communicationem (nominative communication), noun of action from past participle stem of communicare, "to share, divide out; communicate, impart, inform; join, unite, participate in," literally, "to make common", from communis". At
5586-671: Is called point-to-point communication because it occurs between a transmitter and a receiver. Telecommunication through radio broadcasts is called broadcast communication because it occurs between a powerful transmitter and numerous low-power but sensitive radio receivers. Telecommunications in which multiple transmitters and multiple receivers have been designed to cooperate and share the same physical channel are called multiplex systems . The sharing of physical channels using multiplexing often results in significant cost reduction. Multiplexed systems are laid out in telecommunication networks and multiplexed signals are switched at nodes through to
5733-451: Is called (in the jargon of the field) " quadrature amplitude modulation " (QAM) that are used in high-capacity digital radio communication systems. Modulation can also be used to transmit the information of low-frequency analogue signals at higher frequencies. This is helpful because low-frequency analogue signals cannot be effectively transmitted over free space. Hence the information from a low-frequency analogue signal must be impressed into
5880-399: Is called. A cordless telephone or portable telephone consists of a base station unit and one or more portable cordless handsets . The base station connects to a telephone line, or provides service by voice over IP (VOIP). The handset communicates with the base station via radio frequency signals. A handset's operational range is limited, usually to within the same building or within
6027-434: Is commonly called "keying" —a term derived from the older use of Morse Code in telecommunications—and several keying techniques exist (these include phase-shift keying , frequency-shift keying , and amplitude-shift keying ). The " Bluetooth " system, for example, uses phase-shift keying to exchange information between various devices. In addition, there are combinations of phase-shift keying and amplitude-shift keying which
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6174-794: Is converted from electricity to sound. Telecommunication systems are occasionally "duplex" (two-way systems) with a single box of electronics working as both the transmitter and a receiver, or a transceiver (e.g., a mobile phone ). The transmission electronics and the receiver electronics within a transceiver are quite independent of one another. This can be explained by the fact that radio transmitters contain power amplifiers that operate with electrical powers measured in watts or kilowatts, but radio receivers deal with radio powers measured in microwatts or nanowatts . Hence, transceivers have to be carefully designed and built to isolate their high-power circuitry and their low-power circuitry from each other to avoid interference. Telecommunication over fixed lines
6321-481: Is degraded by undesirable noise . Commonly, the noise in a communication system can be expressed as adding or subtracting from the desirable signal via a random process . This form of noise is called additive noise , with the understanding that the noise can be negative or positive at different instances. Unless the additive noise disturbance exceeds a certain threshold, the information contained in digital signals will remain intact. Their resistance to noise represents
6468-609: Is self-evident in the case of online retailer Amazon.com but, according to academic Edward Lenert, even the conventional retailer Walmart has benefited from better telecommunication infrastructure compared to its competitors. In cities throughout the world, home owners use their telephones to order and arrange a variety of home services ranging from pizza deliveries to electricians. Even relatively poor communities have been noted to use telecommunication to their advantage. In Bangladesh 's Narsingdi District , isolated villagers use cellular phones to speak directly to wholesalers and arrange
6615-448: Is separated from its adjacent stations by 200 kHz, and the difference between 200 kHz and 180 kHz (20 kHz) is an engineering allowance for the imperfections in the communication system. In the example above, the "free space channel" has been divided into communications channels according to frequencies , and each channel is assigned a separate frequency bandwidth in which to broadcast radio waves. This system of dividing
6762-763: Is still used internationally for the writing of Ancient Greek . In Greek, the question mark is written as the English semicolon, while the functions of the colon and semicolon are performed by a raised point (•), known as the ano teleia ( άνω τελεία ). In Greek the comma also functions as a silent letter in a handful of Greek words, principally distinguishing ό,τι ( ó,ti , 'whatever') from ότι ( óti , 'that'). Ancient Greek texts often used scriptio continua ('continuous writing'), which means that ancient authors and scribes would write word after word with no spaces or punctuation between words to differentiate or mark boundaries. Boustrophedon , or bi-directional text,
6909-449: Is the informational equivalent of two newspaper pages per person per day in 1986, and six entire newspapers per person per day by 2007. Given this growth, telecommunications play an increasingly important role in the world economy and the global telecommunications industry was about a $ 4.7 trillion sector in 2012. The service revenue of the global telecommunications industry was estimated to be $ 1.5 trillion in 2010, corresponding to 2.4% of
7056-632: Is to modern spoken English ". Greek is spoken today by at least 13 million people, principally in Greece and Cyprus along with a sizable Greek-speaking minority in Albania near the Greek-Albanian border. A significant percentage of Albania's population has knowledge of the Greek language due in part to the Albanian wave of immigration to Greece in the 1980s and '90s and the Greek community in
7203-562: The British Overseas Territory of Akrotiri and Dhekelia (alongside English ). Because of the membership of Greece and Cyprus in the European Union, Greek is one of the organization's 24 official languages . Greek is recognized as a minority language in Albania, and used co-officially in some of its municipalities, in the districts of Gjirokastër and Sarandë . It is also an official minority language in
7350-663: The Earth instead of terrestrial cell sites , as cellphones do. Therefore, they can work in most geographic locations on the Earth's surface, as long as open sky and the line-of-sight between the phone and the satellite is provided. Depending on the architecture of a particular system, coverage may include the entire Earth or only specific regions. Satellite phones provide similar functionality to terrestrial mobile telephones; voice calling , text messaging , and low-bandwidth Internet access are supported through most systems. The advantage of
7497-657: The European canon . Greek is also the language in which many of the foundational texts in science and philosophy were originally composed. The New Testament of the Christian Bible was also originally written in Greek. Together with the Latin texts and traditions of the Roman world , the Greek texts and Greek societies of antiquity constitute the objects of study of the discipline of Classics . During antiquity , Greek
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#17327764966967644-516: The Indo-Iranian languages (see Graeco-Aryan ), but little definitive evidence has been found. In addition, Albanian has also been considered somewhat related to Greek and Armenian, and it has been proposed that they all form a higher-order subgroup along with other extinct languages of the ancient Balkans; this higher-order subgroup is usually termed Palaeo-Balkan , and Greek has a central position in it. Linear B , attested as early as
7791-773: The Nipkow disk by Paul Nipkow and thus became known as the mechanical television . It formed the basis of experimental broadcasts done by the British Broadcasting Corporation beginning on 30 September 1929. However, for most of the 20th century, televisions depended on the cathode ray tube invented by Karl Ferdinand Braun . The first version of such a television to show promise was produced by Philo Farnsworth and demonstrated to his family on 7 September 1927. After World War II, interrupted experiments resumed and television became an important home entertainment broadcast medium. The type of device known as
7938-521: The Reis telephone , in c. 1860. His device appears to be the first device based on the conversion of sound into electrical impulses. The term telephone was adopted into the vocabulary of many languages. It is derived from the Greek : τῆλε , tēle , "far" and φωνή, phōnē , "voice", together meaning "distant voice". Credit for the invention of the electric telephone is frequently disputed. As with other influential inventions such as radio , television ,
8085-780: The United Kingdom , and throughout the European Union , especially in Germany . Historically, significant Greek-speaking communities and regions were found throughout the Eastern Mediterranean , in what are today Southern Italy , Turkey , Cyprus , Syria , Lebanon , Israel , Palestine , Egypt , and Libya ; in the area of the Black Sea , in what are today Turkey, Bulgaria , Romania , Ukraine , Russia , Georgia , Armenia , and Azerbaijan ; and, to
8232-468: The genitive ). The verbal system has lost the infinitive , the synthetically -formed future, and perfect tenses and the optative mood . Many have been replaced by periphrastic ( analytical ) forms. Pronouns show distinctions in person (1st, 2nd, and 3rd), number (singular, dual , and plural in the ancient language; singular and plural alone in later stages), and gender (masculine, feminine, and neuter), and decline for case (from six cases in
8379-424: The light bulb , and the computer , several inventors pioneered experimental work on voice transmission over a wire and improved on each other's ideas. New controversies over the issue still arise from time to time. Charles Bourseul , Antonio Meucci , Johann Philipp Reis , Alexander Graham Bell , and Elisha Gray , amongst others, have all been credited with the invention of the telephone. Alexander Graham Bell
8526-482: The model 500 telephone in the United States, were developed that permitted larger local networks centered around central offices. A breakthrough new technology was the introduction of Touch-Tone signaling using push-button telephones by American Telephone & Telegraph Company (AT&T) in 1963. The invention of the transistor in 1947 dramatically changed the technology used in telephone systems and in
8673-447: The smartphone , the dominant type of telephone in the world today. Before the development of the electric telephone, the term telephone was applied to other inventions, and not all early researchers of the electrical device used the term. Perhaps the earliest use of the word for a communications system was the telephon created by Gottfried Huth in 1796. Huth proposed an alternative to the optical telegraph of Claude Chappe in which
8820-463: The sound waves to electrical signals which are sent through the telecommunications system to the receiving telephone, which converts the signals into audible sound in the receiver or sometimes a loudspeaker . Telephones permit transmission in both directions simultaneously. Most telephones also contain an alerting feature, such as a ringer or a visual indicator, to announce an incoming telephone call. Telephone calls are initiated most commonly with
8967-440: The spark gap transmitter for radio or mechanical computers for computing, it was the invention of the thermionic vacuum tube that made these technologies widespread and practical, leading to the creation of electronics . In the 1940s, the invention of semiconductor devices made it possible to produce solid-state devices, which are smaller, cheaper, and more efficient, reliable, and durable than thermionic tubes. Starting in
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#17327764966969114-417: The syntax of Greek have remained constant: verbs agree with their subject only, the use of the surviving cases is largely intact (nominative for subjects and predicates, accusative for objects of most verbs and many prepositions, genitive for possessors), articles precede nouns, adpositions are largely prepositional, relative clauses follow the noun they modify and relative pronouns are clause-initial. However,
9261-705: The 1932 Plenipotentiary Telegraph Conference and the International Radiotelegraph Conference in Madrid, the two organizations merged to form the International Telecommunication Union (ITU). They defined telecommunication as "any telegraphic or telephonic communication of signs, signals, writing, facsimiles and sounds of any kind, by wire, wireless or other systems or processes of electric signaling or visual signaling (semaphores)." The definition
9408-497: The 1970s. In the 1960s, Paul Baran and, independently, Donald Davies started to investigate packet switching , a technology that sends a message in portions to its destination asynchronously without passing it through a centralized mainframe . A four-node network emerged on 5 December 1969, constituting the beginnings of the ARPANET , which by 1981 had grown to 213 nodes . ARPANET eventually merged with other networks to form
9555-658: The 1990s, mobile phones have gained other features which are not directly related to their primary function as telephones. These include text messaging, calendars, alarm clocks, personal schedulers, cameras, music players, games and later, internet access and smartphone functionality. Nearly all mobile phones have the ability to send text messages to other users via the SMS (Short Message Service) protocol. The multimedia messaging service (MMS) protocol enables users to send and receive multimedia content, such as photos, audio files and video files. As their functionality has increased over
9702-566: The 20th century on), especially from French and English, are typically not inflected; other modern borrowings are derived from Albanian , South Slavic ( Macedonian / Bulgarian ) and Eastern Romance languages ( Aromanian and Megleno-Romanian ). Greek words have been widely borrowed into other languages, including English. Example words include: mathematics , physics , astronomy , democracy , philosophy , athletics , theatre, rhetoric , baptism , evangelist , etc. Moreover, Greek words and word elements continue to be productive as
9849-544: The Greek alphabet since approximately the 9th century BC. It was created by modifying the Phoenician alphabet , with the innovation of adopting certain letters to represent the vowels. The variant of the alphabet in use today is essentially the late Ionic variant, introduced for writing classical Attic in 403 BC. In classical Greek, as in classical Latin, only upper-case letters existed. The lower-case Greek letters were developed much later by medieval scribes to permit
9996-549: The Greek language was the Cypriot syllabary (also a descendant of Linear A via the intermediate Cypro-Minoan syllabary ), which is closely related to Linear B but uses somewhat different syllabic conventions to represent phoneme sequences. The Cypriot syllabary is attested in Cyprus from the 11th century BC until its gradual abandonment in the late Classical period, in favor of the standard Greek alphabet. Greek has been written in
10143-466: The ITU was able to compile an index that measures the overall ability of citizens to access and use information and communication technologies. Using this measure, Sweden, Denmark and Iceland received the highest ranking while the African countries Niger , Burkina Faso and Mali received the lowest. Telecommunication has played a significant role in social relationships. Nevertheless, devices like
10290-593: The Indo-European language family. It is native to Greece , Cyprus , Italy (in Calabria and Salento ), southern Albania , and other regions of the Balkans , Caucasus , the Black Sea coast, Asia Minor , and the Eastern Mediterranean . It has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning at least 3,400 years of written records. Its writing system is the Greek alphabet , which has been used for approximately 2,800 years; previously, Greek
10437-744: The Internet. While Internet development was a focus of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) who published a series of Request for Comments documents, other networking advancements occurred in industrial laboratories , such as the local area network (LAN) developments of Ethernet (1983), Token Ring (1984) and Star network topology. The effective capacity to exchange information worldwide through two-way telecommunication networks grew from 281 petabytes (PB) of optimally compressed information in 1986 to 471 PB in 1993 to 2.2 exabytes (EB) in 2000 to 65 EB in 2007. This
10584-506: The United Kingdom had used the service to coordinate social arrangements and 42% to flirt. In cultural terms, telecommunication has increased the public's ability to access music and film. With television, people can watch films they have not seen before in their own home without having to travel to the video store or cinema. With radio and the Internet, people can listen to music they have not heard before without having to travel to
10731-734: The United States was spent on media that depend upon telecommunication. Many countries have enacted legislation which conforms to the International Telecommunication Regulations established by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), which is the "leading UN agency for information and communication technology issues". In 1947, at the Atlantic City Conference, the ITU decided to "afford international protection to all frequencies registered in
10878-404: The acute during the late 20th century, and it has only been retained in typography . After the writing reform of 1982, most diacritics are no longer used. Since then, Greek has been written mostly in the simplified monotonic orthography (or monotonic system), which employs only the acute accent and the diaeresis. The traditional system, now called the polytonic orthography (or polytonic system),
11025-492: The advent of smartphones, mobile phone manufacturers have also included consumer electronics companies, such as Apple , Samsung and Xiaomi . As of 2022, most mobile phones are smartphones, being a combination of a mobile phone and a personal computing device in the same unit. Most smartphones are primarily operated using a graphical user interface and a touch screen. Many phones have a secondary voice user interface, such as Siri on Apple iPhones , which can operate many of
11172-479: The arrival of Proto-Greeks, some documented in Mycenaean texts ; they include a large number of Greek toponyms . The form and meaning of many words have changed. Loanwords (words of foreign origin) have entered the language, mainly from Latin, Venetian , and Turkish . During the older periods of Greek, loanwords into Greek acquired Greek inflections, thus leaving only a foreign root word. Modern borrowings (from
11319-425: The beginning of the 20th century did not place long-distance calls from their own telephones but made an appointment and were connected with the assistance of a telephone operator. What turned out to be the most popular and longest-lasting physical style of telephone was introduced in the early 20th century, including Bell's 202-type desk set. A carbon granule transmitter and electromagnetic receiver were united in
11466-513: The bell coil to allow the AC ringer signal through while still blocking DC (keeping the phone " on hook "). Telephones connected to the earliest Strowger switch automatic exchanges had seven wires, one for the knife switch , one for each telegraph key , one for the bell, one for the push-button and two for speaking. Large wall telephones in the early 20th century usually incorporated the bell, and separate bell boxes for desk phones dwindled away in
11613-471: The caller's handset . This electrical signal is then sent through the network to the user at the other end where it is transformed back into sound by a small speaker in that person's handset. Greek language Greek ( Modern Greek : Ελληνικά , romanized : Elliniká , [eliniˈka] ; Ancient Greek : Ἑλληνική , romanized : Hellēnikḗ ) is an Indo-European language, constituting an independent Hellenic branch within
11760-439: The circuit (as used in telegraphs ). The earliest dynamic telephones also had only one port opening for sound, with the user alternately listening and speaking (or rather, shouting) into the same hole. Sometimes the instruments were operated in pairs at each end, making conversation more convenient but also more expensive. At first, the benefits of a telephone exchange were not exploited. Instead, telephones were leased in pairs to
11907-437: The correct destination terminal receiver. Communications can be encoded as analogue or digital signals , which may in turn be carried by analogue or digital communication systems. Analogue signals vary continuously with respect to the information, while digital signals encode information as a set of discrete values (e.g., a set of ones and zeroes). During propagation and reception, information contained in analogue signals
12054-796: The country. Prior to the Greco-Turkish War and the resulting population exchange in 1923 a very large population of Greek-speakers also existed in Turkey , though very few remain today. A small Greek-speaking community is also found in Bulgaria near the Greek-Bulgarian border. Greek is also spoken worldwide by the sizable Greek diaspora which has notable communities in the United States , Australia , Canada , South Africa , Chile , Brazil , Argentina , Russia , Ukraine ,
12201-441: The dative led to a rise of prepositional indirect objects (and the use of the genitive to directly mark these as well). Ancient Greek tended to be verb-final, but neutral word order in the modern language is VSO or SVO. Modern Greek inherits most of its vocabulary from Ancient Greek, which in turn is an Indo-European language, but also includes a number of borrowings from the languages of the populations that inhabited Greece before
12348-467: The development of optical fibre. The Internet , a technology independent of any given medium, has provided global access to services for individual users and further reduced location and time limitations on communications. Telecommunication is a compound noun of the Greek prefix tele- (τῆλε), meaning distant , far off , or afar , and the Latin verb communicare , meaning to share . Its modern use
12495-420: The device's functions, as well as enabling users to use spoken commands to interact with the internet. Typically alphanumeric text input is accomplished via an on-screen virtual keyboard, although some smartphones have a small physical keyboard. Smartphones offer the ability to access internet data through the cellular network and via wi-fi, and usually allow direct connectivity to other devices via Bluetooth or
12642-537: The device—from the cathode to the anode. Adding one or more control grids within the tube enables the current between the cathode and anode to be controlled by the voltage on the grid or grids. These devices became a key component of electronic circuits for the first half of the 20th century and were crucial to the development of radio, television, radar, sound recording and reproduction , long-distance telephone networks, and analogue and early digital computers . While some applications had used earlier technologies such as
12789-528: The earliest forms attested to four in the modern language). Nouns, articles, and adjectives show all the distinctions except for a person. Both attributive and predicative adjectives agree with the noun. The inflectional categories of the Greek verb have likewise remained largely the same over the course of the language's history but with significant changes in the number of distinctions within each category and their morphological expression. Greek verbs have synthetic inflectional forms for: Many aspects of
12936-422: The electrical telegraph, the last commercial line was abandoned in 1880. On July 25, 1837, the first commercial electrical telegraph was demonstrated by English inventor Sir William Fothergill Cooke and English scientist Sir Charles Wheatstone . Both inventors viewed their device as "an improvement to the [existing] electromagnetic telegraph" and not as a new device. Samuel Morse independently developed
13083-403: The expense of increasing the channel bandwidth requirement. The term "channel" has two different meanings. In one meaning, a channel is the physical medium that carries a signal between the transmitter and the receiver. Examples of this include the atmosphere for sound communications, glass optical fibres for some kinds of optical communications , coaxial cables for communications by way of
13230-412: The extent that one can speak of a new language emerging. Greek speakers today still tend to regard literary works of ancient Greek as part of their own rather than a foreign language. It is also often stated that the historical changes have been relatively slight compared with some other languages. According to one estimation, " Homeric Greek is probably closer to Demotic than 12-century Middle English
13377-523: The first digital cellular networks appearing in the early 1990s. Mobile phones require a SIM card to be inserted into the phone. The SIM card is a small PVC card containing a small integrated circuit which stores the user's international mobile subscriber identity (IMSI) number and its related key, which are used to identify and authenticate subscribers to the cellular network. Mobile phones generally incorporate an LCD or OLED display, with some types, such as smartphones, having touch screens. Since
13524-430: The handset was on the cradle. In the 1930s, telephone sets were developed that combined the bell and induction coil with the desk set, obviating a separate ringer box. The rotary dial becoming commonplace in the 1930s in many areas enabled customer-dialed service, but some magneto systems remained even into the 1960s. After World War II, the telephone networks saw rapid expansion and more efficient telephone sets, such as
13671-431: The importance of social conversations and staying connected to family and friends. Since then the role that telecommunications has played in social relations has become increasingly important. In recent years, the popularity of social networking sites has increased dramatically. These sites allow users to communicate with each other as well as post photographs, events and profiles for others to see. The profiles can list
13818-449: The language show both conservative and innovative tendencies across the entire attestation of the language from the ancient to the modern period. The division into conventional periods is, as with all such periodizations, relatively arbitrary, especially because, in all periods, Ancient Greek has enjoyed high prestige, and the literate borrowed heavily from it. Across its history, the syllabic structure of Greek has varied little: Greek shows
13965-467: The late 15th century BC, was the first script used to write Greek. It is basically a syllabary , which was finally deciphered by Michael Ventris and John Chadwick in the 1950s (its precursor, Linear A , has not been deciphered and most likely encodes a non-Greek language). The language of the Linear B texts, Mycenaean Greek , is the earliest known form of Greek. Another similar system used to write
14112-732: The local communications system can be compromised. Telecommunications Telecommunication , often used in its plural form or abbreviated as telecom , is the transmission of information with an immediacy comparable to face-to-face communication. As such, slow communications technologies like postal mail and pneumatic tubes are excluded from the definition. Many transmission media have been used for telecommunications throughout history, from smoke signals , beacons , semaphore telegraphs , signal flags , and optical heliographs to wires and empty space made to carry electromagnetic signals. These paths of transmission may be divided into communication channels for multiplexing , allowing for
14259-427: The long-distance transmission networks, over the next several decades. With the development of stored program control and MOS integrated circuits for electronic switching systems , and new transmission technologies such as pulse-code modulation (PCM), telephony gradually evolved towards digital telephony , which improved the capacity, quality, and cost of the network. Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN)
14406-552: The management of telecommunication and broadcasting. The history of broadcasting discusses some debates in relation to balancing conventional communication such as printing and telecommunication such as radio broadcasting. The onset of World War II brought on the first explosion of international broadcasting propaganda. Countries, their governments, insurgents, terrorists, and militiamen have all used telecommunication and broadcasting techniques to promote propaganda. Patriotic propaganda for political movements and colonization started
14553-452: The many other countries of the Greek diaspora . Greek roots have been widely used for centuries and continue to be widely used to coin new words in other languages; Greek and Latin are the predominant sources of international scientific vocabulary . Greek has been spoken in the Balkan peninsula since around the 3rd millennium BC, or possibly earlier. The earliest written evidence is
14700-479: The medium for transmitting signals. These networks were used for telegraphy and telephony for many decades. In the first decade of the 20th century, a revolution in wireless communication began with breakthroughs including those made in radio communications by Guglielmo Marconi , who won the 1909 Nobel Prize in Physics . Other early pioneers in electrical and electronic telecommunications include co-inventors of
14847-567: The medium into channels according to frequency is called " frequency-division multiplexing ". Another term for the same concept is " wavelength-division multiplexing ", which is more commonly used in optical communications when multiple transmitters share the same physical medium. Another way of dividing a communications medium into channels is to allocate each sender a recurring segment of time (a "time slot", for example, 20 milliseconds out of each second), and to allow each sender to send messages only within its own time slot. This method of dividing
14994-414: The medium into communication channels is called " time-division multiplexing " ( TDM ), and is used in optical fibre communication. Some radio communication systems use TDM within an allocated FDM channel. Hence, these systems use a hybrid of TDM and FDM. The shaping of a signal to convey information is known as modulation . Modulation can be used to represent a digital message as an analogue waveform. This
15141-742: The mid-1930s. In 1936, the BBC broadcast propaganda to the Arab World to partly counter similar broadcasts from Italy, which also had colonial interests in North Africa. Modern political debates in telecommunication include the reclassification of broadband Internet service as a telecommunications service (also called net neutrality ), regulation of phone spam , and expanding affordable broadband access. According to data collected by Gartner and Ars Technica sales of main consumer's telecommunication equipment worldwide in millions of units was: In
15288-596: The mid-1960s, thermionic tubes were replaced with the transistor . Thermionic tubes still have some applications for certain high-frequency amplifiers. On 11 September 1940, George Stibitz transmitted problems for his Complex Number Calculator in New York using a teletype and received the computed results back at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire . This configuration of a centralized computer ( mainframe ) with remote dumb terminals remained popular well into
15435-433: The mid-20th century for transmission between mobile stations on ships and in automobiles. Hand-held mobile phones were introduced for personal service starting in 1973. In later decades, the analog cellular system evolved into digital networks with greater capability and lower cost. Convergence in communication services has provided a broad spectrum of capabilities in cell phones, including mobile computing, giving rise to
15582-435: The middle of the century. Rural and other telephones that were not on a common battery exchange had a magneto hand-cranked generator to produce a high voltage alternating signal to ring the bells of other telephones on the line and to alert the operator. Some local farming communities that were not connected to the main networks set up barbed wire telephone lines that exploited the existing system of field fences to transmit
15729-465: The morphological changes also have their counterparts in the syntax, and there are also significant differences between the syntax of the ancient and that of the modern form of the language . Ancient Greek made great use of participial constructions and of constructions involving the infinitive, and the modern variety lacks the infinitive entirely (employing a raft of new periphrastic constructions instead) and uses participles more restrictively. The loss of
15876-452: The music store. Telecommunication has also transformed the way people receive their news. A 2006 survey (right table) of slightly more than 3,000 Americans by the non-profit Pew Internet and American Life Project in the United States the majority specified television or radio over newspapers. Telecommunication has had an equally significant impact on advertising. TNS Media Intelligence reported that in 2007, 58% of advertising expenditure in
16023-400: The neighbourhood of 94.5 MHz (megahertz) while another radio station can simultaneously broadcast radio waves at frequencies in the neighbourhood of 96.1 MHz. Each radio station would transmit radio waves over a frequency bandwidth of about 180 kHz (kilohertz), centred at frequencies such as the above, which are called the "carrier frequencies" . Each station in this example
16170-492: The operators in the signaling towers would shout to each other by means of what he called "speaking tubes", but would now be called giant megaphones . A communication device for sailing vessels, called telephone , was invented by Captain John Taylor in 1844. This instrument used four air horns to communicate with vessels in foggy weather. Johann Philipp Reis used the term in reference to his invention, commonly known as
16317-515: The presence or absence of an atmosphere between the two. Radio waves travel through a perfect vacuum just as easily as they travel through air, fog, clouds, or any other kind of gas. The other meaning of the term "channel" in telecommunications is seen in the phrase communications channel , which is a subdivision of a transmission medium so that it can be used to send multiple streams of information simultaneously. For example, one radio station can broadcast radio waves into free space at frequencies in
16464-408: The receiver was included in the local loop. The coupling transformer and the ringer were mounted in a separate enclosure, called the subscriber set. The dial switch in the base interrupted the line current by repeatedly but very briefly disconnecting the line one to ten times for each digit, and the hook switch (in the center of the circuit diagram) disconnected the line and the transmitter battery while
16611-643: The regions of Apulia and Calabria in Italy. In the framework of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages , Greek is protected and promoted officially as a regional and minority language in Armenia, Hungary , Romania, and Ukraine. It is recognized as a minority language and protected in Turkey by the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne . The phonology , morphology , syntax , and vocabulary of
16758-709: The relationship as causal. Because of the economic benefits of good telecommunication infrastructure, there is increasing worry about the inequitable access to telecommunication services amongst various countries of the world—this is known as the digital divide . A 2003 survey by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) revealed that roughly a third of countries have fewer than one mobile subscription for every 20 people and one-third of countries have fewer than one land-line telephone subscription for every 20 people. In terms of Internet access, roughly half of all countries have fewer than one out of 20 people with Internet access. From this information, as well as educational data,
16905-403: The signal. In the 1890s a new smaller style of telephone was introduced, packaged in three parts. The transmitter stood on a stand, known as a " candlestick " for its shape. When not in use, the receiver hung on a hook with a switch in it, known as a "switchhook". Previous telephones required the user to operate a separate switch to connect either the voice or the bell. With the new kind, the user
17052-510: The size of their keyboards. Typically, smartphones feature such tools as cameras, media players, web browsers, email clients, interactive maps, satellite navigation and a variety of sensors, such as a compass , accelerometers and GPS receivers . In addition to voice calls, smartphone users commonly communicate using a wide variety of messaging formats, including SMS, MMS, email, and various proprietary messaging services, such as iMessage and various social media platforms. In 2002, only 10% of
17199-420: 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
17346-437: The stressed vowel; the so-called breathing marks ( rough and smooth breathing ), originally used to signal presence or absence of word-initial /h/; and the diaeresis , used to mark the full syllabic value of a vowel that would otherwise be read as part of a diphthong. These marks were introduced during the course of the Hellenistic period. Actual usage of the grave in handwriting saw a rapid decline in favor of uniform usage of
17493-609: The telegraph Charles Wheatstone and Samuel Morse , numerous inventors and developers of the telephone including Antonio Meucci , Philipp Reis , Elisha Gray and Alexander Graham Bell , inventors of radio Edwin Armstrong and Lee de Forest , as well as inventors of television like Vladimir K. Zworykin , John Logie Baird and Philo Farnsworth . Since the 1960s, the proliferation of digital technologies has meant that voice communications have gradually been supplemented by data. The physical limitations of metallic media prompted
17640-450: The telephone switch, which allowed for the formation of telephone exchanges , and eventually networks. In the United Kingdom, the blower is used as a slang term for a telephone. The term came from navy slang for a speaking tube . In the U.S., a somewhat dated slang term refers to the telephone as "the horn," as in "I couldn't get him on the horn," or "I'll be off the horn in a moment." Early telephones were technically diverse. Some used
17787-412: The telephone system were originally advertised with an emphasis on the practical dimensions of the device (such as the ability to conduct business or order home services) as opposed to the social dimensions. It was not until the late 1920s and 1930s that the social dimensions of the device became a prominent theme in telephone advertisements. New promotions started appealing to consumers' emotions, stressing
17934-406: The telephone to work a fluctuating current reproduced sounds the best. The fluctuating currents became the basis for the working telephone, creating Bell's patent. That first patent by Bell was the master patent of the telephone, from which other patents for electric telephone devices and features flowed. In 1876, shortly after Bell's patent application, Hungarian engineer Tivadar Puskás proposed
18081-631: The then-newly discovered phenomenon of radio waves , demonstrating, by 1901, that they could be transmitted across the Atlantic Ocean. This was the start of wireless telegraphy by radio. On 17 December 1902, a transmission from the Marconi station in Glace Bay, Nova Scotia, Canada , became the world's first radio message to cross the Atlantic from North America. In 1904, a commercial service
18228-490: The voltages and electric currents in them, and free space for communications using visible light , infrared waves, ultraviolet light , and radio waves . Coaxial cable types are classified by RG type or "radio guide", terminology derived from World War II. The various RG designations are used to classify the specific signal transmission applications. This last channel is called the "free space channel". The sending of radio waves from one place to another has nothing to do with
18375-492: The wartime purposes of aircraft and land communication, radio navigation, and radar. Development of stereo FM broadcasting of radio began in the 1930s in the United States and the 1940s in the United Kingdom, displacing AM as the dominant commercial standard in the 1970s. On March 25, 1925, John Logie Baird demonstrated the transmission of moving pictures at the London department store Selfridges . Baird's device relied upon
18522-418: The world's gross domestic product (GDP). Modern telecommunication is founded on a series of key concepts that experienced progressive development and refinement in a period of well over a century: Telecommunication technologies may primarily be divided into wired and wireless methods. Overall, a basic telecommunication system consists of three main parts that are always present in some form or another: In
18669-454: The world's population used mobile phones and by 2005 that percentage had risen to 46%. By the end of 2009, there were a total of nearly 6 billion mobile and fixed-line telephone subscribers worldwide. This included 1.26 billion fixed-line subscribers and 4.6 billion mobile subscribers. A satellite telephone, or satphone, is a type of mobile phone that connects to other phones or the telephone network by radio link through satellites orbiting
18816-515: The years, many types of mobile phone, notably smartphones, require an operating system to run. Popular mobile phone operating systems in the past have included Symbian , Palm OS , BlackBerry OS and mobile phone versions of Windows . As of 2022, the most used operating systems are Google's Android and Apple's iOS . Before the era of smartphones, mobile phones were generally manufactured by companies specializing in telecommunications equipment, such as Nokia , Motorola , and Ericsson . Since
18963-424: Was $ 85.2 billion with a projection of $ 102.5 billion by 2026. IP telephony uses high-bandwidth Internet connections and specialized customer premises equipment to transmit telephone calls via the Internet, or any modern private data network. The customer equipment may be an analog telephone adapter (ATA) which translates the signals of a conventional analog telephone; an IP Phone , a dedicated standalone device; or
19110-574: Was a distinct dialect of Greek itself. Aside from the Macedonian question, current consensus regards Phrygian as the closest relative of Greek, since they share a number of phonological, morphological and lexical isoglosses , with some being exclusive between them. Scholars have proposed a Graeco-Phrygian subgroup out of which Greek and Phrygian originated. Among living languages, some Indo-Europeanists suggest that Greek may be most closely related to Armenian (see Graeco-Armenian ) or
19257-505: Was also used in Ancient Greek. Greek has occasionally been written in the Latin script , especially in areas under Venetian rule or by Greek Catholics . The term Frankolevantinika / Φραγκολεβαντίνικα applies when the Latin script is used to write Greek in the cultural ambit of Catholicism (because Frankos / Φράγκος is an older Greek term for West-European dating to when most of (Roman Catholic Christian) West Europe
19404-556: Was by far the most widely spoken lingua franca in the Mediterranean world . It eventually became the official language of the Byzantine Empire and developed into Medieval Greek . In its modern form , Greek is the official language of Greece and Cyprus and one of the 24 official languages of the European Union . It is spoken by at least 13.5 million people today in Greece, Cyprus, Italy, Albania, Turkey , and
19551-570: Was crucial. Most, however, used the Edison/Berliner carbon transmitter , which was much louder than the other kinds, even though it required an induction coil which was an impedance matching transformer to make it compatible with the impedance of the line. The Edison patents kept the Bell monopoly viable into the 20th century, by which time the network was more important than the instrument. Early telephones were locally powered, using either
19698-490: Was during the Spanish Armada , when a beacon chain relayed a signal from Plymouth to London . In 1792, Claude Chappe , a French engineer, built the first fixed visual telegraphy system (or semaphore line ) between Lille and Paris. However semaphore suffered from the need for skilled operators and expensive towers at intervals of ten to thirty kilometres (six to nineteen miles). As a result of competition from
19845-407: Was established to transmit nightly news summaries to subscribing ships, which incorporated them into their onboard newspapers. World War I accelerated the development of radio for military communications . After the war, commercial radio AM broadcasting began in the 1920s and became an important mass medium for entertainment and news. World War II again accelerated the development of radio for
19992-438: Was further developed by many others, and became rapidly indispensable in business , government , and in households . The essential elements of a telephone are a microphone ( transmitter ) to speak into and an earphone ( receiver ) which reproduces the voice at a distant location. The receiver and transmitter are usually built into a handset which is held up to the ear and mouth during conversation. The transmitter converts
20139-471: Was later reconfirmed, according to Article 1.3 of the ITU Radio Regulations , which defined it as "Any transmission , emission or reception of signs, signals, writings, images and sounds or intelligence of any nature by wire , radio, optical, or other electromagnetic systems". Homing pigeons have been used throughout history by different cultures. Pigeon post had Persian roots and
20286-676: Was later used by the Romans to aid their military. Frontinus claimed Julius Caesar used pigeons as messengers in his conquest of Gaul . The Greeks also conveyed the names of the victors at the Olympic Games to various cities using homing pigeons. In the early 19th century, the Dutch government used the system in Java and Sumatra . And in 1849, Paul Julius Reuter started a pigeon service to fly stock prices between Aachen and Brussels ,
20433-520: Was launched in the 1980's, providing businesses and consumers with access to digital telephony services such as data, voice, video , and fax services. The development of digital data communications methods made it possible to digitize voice and transmit it as real-time data across computer networks and the Internet , giving rise to the field of Internet Protocol (IP) telephony, also known as voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP). VoIP has proven to be
20580-405: Was less likely to leave the phone "off the hook". In phones connected to magneto exchanges, the bell, induction coil, battery and magneto were in a separate bell box or " ringer box ". In phones connected to common battery exchanges, the ringer box was installed under a desk, or other out-of-the-way place, since it did not need a battery or magneto. Cradle designs were also used at this time, having
20727-407: Was not slow in appreciating the potential. Signalling began in an appropriately primitive manner. The user alerted the other end, or the exchange operator , by whistling into the transmitter. Exchange operation soon resulted in telephones being equipped with a bell in a ringer box , first operated over a second wire, and later over the same wire, but with a condenser ( capacitor ) in series with
20874-486: Was of little practical value because it relied on the electrophonic effect requiring users to place the receiver in their mouths to "hear". The first commercial telephone services were set up by the Bell Telephone Company in 1878 and 1879 on both sides of the Atlantic in the cities of New Haven and London. In 1894, Italian inventor Guglielmo Marconi began developing a wireless communication using
21021-485: Was recorded in writing systems such as Linear B and the Cypriot syllabary . The alphabet arose from the Phoenician script and was in turn the basis of the Latin , Cyrillic , Coptic , Gothic , and many other writing systems. The Greek language holds a very important place in the history of the Western world. Beginning with the epics of Homer , ancient Greek literature includes many works of lasting importance in
21168-549: Was the first to be awarded a patent for the electric telephone by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) in March 1876. Before Bell's patent, the telephone transmitted sound in a way that was similar to the telegraph. This method used vibrations and circuits to send electrical pulses, but was missing key features. Bell found that this method produced a sound through intermittent currents, but in order for
21315-580: Was under the control of the Frankish Empire ). Frankochiotika / Φραγκοχιώτικα (meaning 'Catholic Chiot') alludes to the significant presence of Catholic missionaries based on the island of Chios . Additionally, the term Greeklish is often used when the Greek language is written in a Latin script in online communications. The Latin script is nowadays used by the Greek-speaking communities of Southern Italy . The Yevanic dialect
21462-637: Was used for literary and official purposes in the newly formed Greek state. In 1976, Dimotiki was declared the official language of Greece, after having incorporated features of Katharevousa and thus giving birth to Standard Modern Greek , used today for all official purposes and in education . The historical unity and continuing identity between the various stages of the Greek language are often emphasized. Although Greek has undergone morphological and phonological changes comparable to those seen in other languages, never since classical antiquity has its cultural, literary, and orthographic tradition been interrupted to
21609-673: Was written by Romaniote and Constantinopolitan Karaite Jews using the Hebrew Alphabet . In a tradition, that in modern time, has come to be known as Greek Aljamiado , some Greek Muslims from Crete wrote their Cretan Greek in the Arabic alphabet . The same happened among Epirote Muslims in Ioannina . This also happened among Arabic-speaking Byzantine rite Christians in the Levant ( Lebanon , Palestine, and Syria ). This usage
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