Abstract: A communications system permits a personal mobile telecommunications device user, such as a cellular telephone subscriber, to complete a connection to a calling party that has attempted to reach the subscriber using the subscriber's assigned telephone number, even when the subscriber is roaming outside of his or her home area. The system includes a messaging and bridging complex having an associated database, which receives a call placed to the subscriber. If the subscriber is out of his or her home area so that the call cannot be completed, information stored in the database is used to initiate transmission of a paging signal to the subscriber. The connection to the calling party is held in the complex for a predetermined period after the paging signal is transmitted. The mobile telephone user, upon receiving the paging signal, may initiate a call from their personal mobile telecommunications device to the messaging and bridging complex, which bridges the subscriber and the calling party together.

Abstract: A communications system permits a personal mobile telecommunications device user, such as a cellular telephone subscriber, to complete a connection to a calling party that has attempted to reach the subscriber using the subscriber's assigned telephone number, even when the subscriber is roaming outside of his or her home area. The system includes a messaging and bridging complex having an associated database, which receives a call placed to the subscriber. If the subscriber is out of his or her home area so that the call cannot be completed, information stored in the database is used to initiate transmission of a paging signal to the subscriber. The connection to the calling party is held in the complex for a predetermined period after the paging signal is transmitted. The mobile telephone user, upon receiving the paging signal, may initiate a call from their personal mobile telecommunications device to the messaging and bridging complex, which bridges the subscriber and the calling party together.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for transmitting signals at different rates between an originating device and a destination device. The originating device generates a communication signal, including routing data, for transmitting the communication signal at a native rate associated with the originating device. The communication signal is received by a switch which analyzes the routing data of the signal to identify transmission rates recognizable by the destination device and, if necessary, a transmission path for routing the signal across a backbone network at the native rate. The system then determines whether to re-encode the signal for direct transmission at a different rate recognizable by the destination device, or to maintain the signal at the native rate for transmission either directly to the destination device or across the backbone network. The signal is then transmitted.

Abstract: A communications system permits a personal mobile telecommunications device user, such as a cellular telephone subscriber, to complete a connection to a calling party that has attempted to reach the subscriber using the subscriber's assigned telephone number, even when the subscriber is roaming outside of his or her home area. The system includes a messaging and bridging complex having an associated database, which receives a call placed to the subscriber. If the subscriber is out of his or her home area so that the call cannot be completed, information stored in the database is used to initiate transmission of a paging signal to the subscriber. The connection to the calling party is held in the complex for a predetermined period after the paging signal is transmitted. The mobile telephone user, upon receiving the paging signal, may initiate a call from their personal mobile telecommunications device to the messaging and bridging complex, which bridges the subscriber and the calling party together.

Abstract: A communication method wherein rate of information transfer with a given signal transmitted or received at a transceiver node is dynamically varied as a function of the relative quality of the transmission environment. The method employs a responsive buffering process at each communication node that permits this rate to be varied somewhat independently of the rate at which information is transferred to or from the transceiver node. In a particular application, the invention permits information to be exchanged between a wireless signal having a variable error correction bandwidth and a fixed bandwidth data stream.