Telephone data recording system

Claim 1

A system for transferring messages via telephone lines comprising: means for generating a call signal from a first telephone to a second telephone over the telephone lines; means at said second telephone for detecting said call signal and in response thereto causing said second telephone to capture the telephone lines; means at said first telephone for generating on the lines a single, complete, variable length digital message associated with said call signal, said variable length message having M digitally encoded characters, where 1 ≦ M ≦ N, N being a constant; means at said second telephone for storing successive, incoming ones of said variable length messages, said storage means including a memory having a plurality of storage banks, each of said storage banks containing N storage locations for storing up to N digitally encoded characters, means for generating a gating signal corresponding to the length of each character of the incoming, variable length message, converter means responsive to said gating signal for converting said incoming, digital characters to binary coded signals, means for detecting the end of the incoming, variable length message, pulse generator means for generating N pulses, means for shifting said binary coded signals into said memory in response to the N pulses generated by said pulse generator, means responsive to said end of message detecting means for operating said pulse generator to shift the M binary coded characters of said incoming message into an N stage storage bank of said memory, (N-M) storage locations of said bank thereby remaining empty; display means at said second telephone for visually displaying only one complete message; and readout means at said second telephone for successively reading out single ones of said stored messages to said display means, said readout means displaying the content of only one storage bank each time said readout means is activated, each readout containing a single complete, stored message.

Claim 2

A system for transferring messages via telephone lines comprising: means for generating a call signal from a first telephone to a second telephone over the telephone lines; means at said second telephone for detecting said call signal and in response thereto causing said second telephone to capture the telephone lines; means at said first telephone for generating on the lines a single, complete, variable length digital message associated with said call signal, said variable length message having M digitally encoded characters, where 1 ≦ M ≦ N, N being a constant; means at said second telephone for storing successive, incoming ones of said variable length messages, said storage means including a memory having a plurality of storage banks, each of said storage banks containing N storage locations for storing up to N digitally encoded characters, means for generating a gating signal corresponding to the length of each character of the incoming, variable length message, converter means responsive to said gating signal for converting said incoming, digital characters to binary coded signals, means for detecting the end of the incoming, variable length message, pulse generator means for generating N pulses, means for shifting said binary coded signals into said memory in response to the N pulses generated by said pulse generator, means responsive to said end of message detecting means for operating said pulse generator to shift the M binary coded characters of said incoming message into an N stage storage bank of said memory, (N-M) storage locations of said bank thereby remaining empty; display means at said second telephone for visually displaying only one complete message; and readout means at said second telephone for successively reading out single ones of said stored messages to said display means, said readout means displaying the content of only one storage bank each time said readout means is activated, each readout containing a single complete, stored message.