4 ms·

As a side note, in Italy (and in some other countries) the "emergency" numbers have historically been 112 and 113 for two reasons: 1) you could dial them also

• alexis_fr 7y ago
  > but just tapping on the “hang” button That looks like a hack. I understood it at 7 years old, but it is typically the kind of hack I’m told other adults wouldn’t understand. Do you think it was much used beyond technical-minded people who always wondered how things worked?
  • gota 7y ago
    If I recall correctly we guessed this as children because the sound made by the rotary thing let go at "N" was the same as pressing the "hang" button N times I mean it was an easy association to make, so at least a couple of friends guessed it. I can't remember if I was told or if I figured it out myself, but at least the explanation I was given involved this empirical observation
  • klondike_ 7y ago
    People who needed to make a lot of phone calls would often do this because it was faster than waiting for the rotary wheel to return to the start You sometimes see it in old movies
    • logfromblammo 7y ago
      As I recall, there was a movie where someone was in jail, the CO dialed the phone number for their free phone call, and then when the CO locked the number pad and left, the "hacker" immediately hung up and redialed a different number by tapping on the cradle switch. They might have just tapped 10 times (dial rotary-0) to get an operator and then requested manual completion of the call. I don't remember, exactly. I don't even know if you can still also do pulse dialing instead of solely DTMF dialing now.
      • mindcrime 7y ago
        That was from "Hackers"[1][2]. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hackers_(film) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hackers_(film) [2]: https://youtu.be/h_Awe6CI91k?t=41 https://youtu.be/h_Awe6CI91k?t=41
    • jaclaz 7y ago
      >People who needed to make a lot of phone calls would often do this because it was faster than waiting for the rotary wheel to return to the start Allow me to doubt that, the time the rotary dial goes back is exactly the time needed for making the pulses at the correct interval/rate, typically 10 pulses per second: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulse_dialing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulse_dialing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulse_dialing#Pulse_rate_and_coding https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulse_dialing#Pulse_rate_and_c... Even if the switch allowed usually (and in theory) 7 to 12 most phones dials were set for exactly 10 and I doubt that anyone could get relably 12 pulses per second by tapping, in any case, a 999-999999 would have taken some 9-10 seconds by dialing and no less than 7 seconds by tapping or anyway at the most you would have been able to shave off at the most some 20% of the dialing time, introducing a high risk of getting "another" number.
• sandworm101 7y ago
  There is another part to the story, to why low-number number are betters. They were faster to dial on rotary phones but also faster for the machine on the other end of the line. As the rotary dial on your phone was turning, so too was a device at the phone company. The smaller the total number, the faster that machine could had your call off and start on the next. That's why the most populated areas, places like New York City (212) Chicago (312) or LA (213) have low-number area codes. And it is why "1" is often the number used to designate a long distance call. Anchorage Alaska: 907 (2x as long as NYC) All of Idaho: Either 208 (2x) or 986 (4x).
  • beatgammit 7y ago
    I always thought 1 for long distance was because that's the country code for the US, or maybe those two things are related?
    • Dylan16807 7y ago
      Country codes came much later. The current system was introduced in the CCITT Blue Book in 1964, it looks like. Area codes were in the 40s.
• speleding 7y ago
  There was a downside to using the lower numbers: rotary phones worked by repeatedly shorting the connection to indicate to the switch which number it was, so one "click" would be one, two clicks "two", etc. This led to many phones accidentally dealing "1" if they did not have their wires properly connected. It's the reason the emergency number is not 111 (They still received quite a few fake calls until newer switches came into use that only allow to tone dailing).
• jobigoud 7y ago
  In France the historical emergency numbers are also still in use in addition to 112 and are just two digits. 17 for police, 18 for fire department, 15 for emergencies.