Patent ID: 7599477

Claim:
A telephone system including a plurality of telephone terminals including at least one being connected to a telephone line, a microcomputer or several interconnected microcomputers, each microcomputer equipped with a set of software modules and a high-flow bus to which one or more of said telephone terminals are connected, each one of said telephone terminals including: a USB bus controller sub-unit associated with one microcontroller, a station sub-unit including a handset and its interface circuits comprising a digital/analog converter, an adapter and a dialing keypad associated with a display unit, said telephone terminal connected to the telephone line further comprising an interface circuit with the telephone line, the station sub-unit and a line sub-unit of the terminal being connected to an audio/data/address bus of the bus controller sub-unit, and in that a link between the USB bus controller sub-unit of of said telephone terminal and the microcomputer includes at least three channels, namely one channel for transferring data between the microcomputer and said telephone terminal, a second channel that is a bidirectional audio channel link between the microcomputer and the handset, and a third channel that is an audio channel between the microcomputer and the telephone line, said at least three channels making it possible to establish telephone communications between said line and said telephone terminal and/or between said telephone terminals, and a plurality of microcomputers associated with telephone terminals of the type of said microcomputers being connected to a local network and each comprising an Ethernet card, characterised in that said microcomputers are programmed so as to constitute a distributed unit automatic exchange, the software of this unit automatic exchange being present in all the microcomputers and including at least the following modules: a “USB exchanges” module for identifying and formatting the messages circulating on the USB bus, analyzing the header of each message so as to select the data, a “signaling” module which manages the telephone signaling of the USB telephone terminal, a “call processing” module which communicates with the various call processing modules of the other microcomputers of the network so as to know the state of the various USB telephone terminals and be able to select a free RTC line at the time of an outgoing call, a “routing” module containing information concerning the telephone terminals of the system concerning the actions to be taken according to the telephone terminal in question, events, the state of the line and concerning dialing, a “switching” module which carries out and cuts the audio connections inside the microcomputer, and a “telephone operational system” module which coordinates the telephone modules inside a given microcomputer, manages the delay times and launches each software module with the required recurrence.