"The AbleComm Guide to Phone Systems" provides the information people need to select phone systems and related telecommunications equipment for professional offices, small- and medium-size businesses and homes. This book will help people choose and use their telephone system properly, to get the most out of it and to keep it working; and will even help people who sell phone equipment. Products covered include simple and complex phone systems, voicemail, auto-attendant, headsets, back-up power, music on hold, cordless phones and more. There are extensive sections on telecom terminology, technology trends, choosing a phone system, phone system features, wire and cable, installation and troubleshooting. The book also covers the various technologies for making phone calls: analog, DSL, VoIP, ISDN, wireless, T1 and cable. The extensive acronym section covers such terms as LECs, ILECS and BLECs plus LANs, MANs and WANs, and even POPs, POTS, SIM, SIC and SNAFU. Readers will learn how to locate their octothorpe and how Stephen Baldwin, Paul Teutul and others waste time on the telephone. The author, Michael N. Marcus, is known for mixing technology and humor. He is founder and president of AbleComm, Inc. (the telecom department store"), and has personally installed hundreds of phone systems, and designed and developed several popular and innovative telecommunications products. He's also a journalist who has written for many magazines and newspapers. This is his fourth book about communications equipment and is an abridged version of his 396-page "Phone Systems & Phones for Small Business & Home."
Personal website:
www.MichaelMarc.us
Publishing website:
www.SilverSandsBooks.com
Blog about books and other things:
www.BookMakingBlog.blogspot.com
Info, help & book reviews for authors:
www.BookFur.com
Pre-publication book assessments
www.RentABookReviewer.com
Hilarious (and sometimes poignant) book:
"Stories I'd Tell My Children (but maybe not until they're adults)"
Available in hardcover, paperback and e-book editions.
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"STINKERS! America's Worst Self-Published Books"
"Brainy Beginner's Guide to Self-Publishing"
"Self-Publish Your Book Without Losing Your Shirt."
"Get the Most out of a Self-Publishing Company: Make a Better Deal. Make a Better Book."
"Independent Self-Publishing: The Complete Guide"
----------Coming soon----------
"The 100 Worst Self-Publishing Misteaks"
"A Self-Published Book Doesn't Have to be Ugly."
"555 Ways to Self-Publish Better Books"
"Easy E-books"
Michael N. Marcus either is now or has been a journalist, author, publisher, advertising copywriter, public relations practitioner, photographer, band manager, amateur attorney, golf ball SCUBA diver, recording engineer and founder and president of AbleComm, Inc. ("the telecom department store").
He provided the words for over 100 websites and blogs, has been an editor at Rolling Stone, and has written for many other magazines and newspapers. Michael specializes in making technology understandable, and often humorous. He has written over 20 books, and more are planned.
Born in 1946, Michael's a proud member of the first cohort of the Baby Boom, along with Dolly Parton, Candy Bergen, Donny Trump, Billy Clinton and Georgie Bush.
At the urging of a misguided guidance counselor, he went to Lehigh University to become an electrical engineer, and was quickly disappointed to learn that engineering was mostly math -- and slide rules were not as much fun as soldering irons.
Michael was one of the few literate people in his engineer-filled freshman dormitory and made money editing term papers. He got in big trouble when he got caught running intercom wire from his dorm room to a friend's room two floors below, and when an inspector found a payphone in his suitcase.
Later, his college apartment had an elaborate and illegal multi-line phone system, a phone booth with a toilet in it, and an invisible phone activated by two hand claps.
Michael lives in Connecticut with his wife Marilyn, Hunter the Golden Retriever, and a lot of stuff -- including both indoor and outdoor telephone booths, a "Lily Tomlin" switchboard, lots of books, CDs and DVDs, and many black boxes with flashing lights. Marilyn is very tolerant.
