Patent ID: 7237004

Claim:
A dataconferencing appliance for use at a local site to facilitate a dataconferencing session between the local site and at least one geographically distant remote site, the local and remote sites being accessible via a shared voice call network and a shared data network, the remote site having a remote dataconferencing appliance connected to the voice call network and the data network, at least one of the local and remote sites having an image source for producing image data representative of an image, and the local site having a local display device for displaying the image at the local site, the dataconferencing appliance comprising: a telephone adapter for connecting a telephone receiver to the voice call network so that a voice call session can be established between the telephone receiver and the remote site via the voice call network, the telephone adapter including circuitry for monitoring the voice call session and for transmitting signals within the voice call session; a network interface for connecting the dataconferencing appliance to the data network; a dataconference control unit connected to the telephone adapter and the network interface, the dataconference control unit adapted for communication with the local display device, the dataconference control unit implementing a negotiation procedure that obtains a network access code and causes the telephone adapter to generate and transmit within the voice call session a signal representative of the network access code for receipt by the remote dataconferencing appliance, the dataconference control unit being responsive to receipt at the telephone adapter of a remote signal transmitted from the remote dataconferencing appliance within the voice call session, the remote signal representing a remote network access code, and to establish a data communication session, parallel to the voice call session, between the local and remote sites via the data network using the remote network access code, when received, thereby enabling image data to be transmitted between the local and remote sites over the data network for display via the local and remote display; and a housing adapted to incorporate the telephone adapter, the network interface, and the dataconference control unit into an integrated dataconferencing appliance.