Goodbye to the Fax machine.

[electronicskip]

Looks like the fax machine is having its final goodbye due to Telecom providers no longer required to operate the appropriate service to run them.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-63472371

[Dave Moll]

Given that fax is a peer-to-peer service, what is the telecom provider's commitment in running them (i.e. what in the provision would prevent them from working)?

I must admit that I thought fax was already considered an obsolete technology. I have never needed to use the fax machine "in anger" that I have owned for the last few years.

[electronicskip]

last time i used mine was about 4 years ago.
For some reason my vehicle insurance company insisted they faxed me the document instead of emailing it as i need it quickly.

[paulsherwin]

This is *extremely* misleading reporting. Fax machines are really just analogue modems, and if a POTS service is available using any technology (which it will be), then they will continue to work. This report is obviously a regurgitation of some half understood press release. So much for gold standard BBC journalism, this is the standard I'd expect from my local Newsquest churnalism operation.

[Dave Moll]

Originally Posted by electronicskip

For some reason my vehicle insurance company insisted they faxed me the document instead of emailing it as i need it quickly.

What would they have done if you hadn't been one of the minority who still had a fax machine?

[Aub]

https://www.ofcom.org.uk/consultatio...ax-bt-and-kcom

[G6Tanuki]

Good riddance. A couple of decades back the inadvertent interleaving of someone else's faxed medical notes from their consultant with the notes from my consultant nearly led to me having an entirely unnecessary operation.

I also remember someone asking their IT service desk 'How do I spell check a fax?'

[Dave Moll]

Thanks, Aub, for that link - not that I feel any more enlightened by that than the BBC reportage. I assume that it would simply become a matter of "hard luck" if a fax connection fails to operate correctly in the future.

[paulsherwin]

The NHS is one of the few remaining major fax machine users, because their IT systems are so awful and isolated.

[agardiner]

The POTS service is being discontinued by BT/Openreach in favour of IP only technology. It is planned that the POTS service will be completely switched off by 2025. It is already happening in my area where no new landlines are able to be ordered, and they are upgrading existing ones to IP only. Items like fax machines and other peer to peer digital technologies, don't work over IP, even with POTS style adapters, which of course route the traffic using VOIP.

The latency and echo of such circuits results in a failure of the analogue modem to lock with the modem at the other end. It is a similar problem to the ISDN switch off; ISDN is currently provided over IP by Openreach, but end to end terminal adapters such as the old sports boxes used by commentators into radio stations, won't lock with the end host and drop the call.

[McMurdo]

I wonder by extrapolation of the IP system that they will also end leased lines? Only a few years ago when working at water authority depots, leased lines were the thing for industrial SCADA when remote outstations went 'unmanned'. They allowed remote equipment to talk via RS485 or modem without worrying about expensive, older equipment having to use the internet.

[agardiner]

HAHAHA. I doubt it! Leased lines are expensive.

[Dave Moll]

Originally Posted by agardiner

Items like fax machines and other peer to peer digital technologies, don't work over IP, even with POTS style adapters, which of course route the traffic using VOIP.

Thank you for that answer. What then is the difference between peer-to-peer and other digital communications that the former are incompatible with VoIP?

[Richard_FM]

I wonder how long they will last in Japan, where they are still popular for cultural reasons.

[Wendymott]

Not being knowledgeable about the above .... what about Telex machines ? When I started working for NEI in 1980 we had a Telex machine in the orrifice . Do they still work on the BT system ? Slight tongue in cheek Im afraid

[bikerhifinut]

You may make whatever comments you like about faxes.
My pennorth
before retirement I worked as a middle manager in a Port environment, mainly ferries, for a major UK operator as an agent ie we did it all for them.
When, infrequently but not unusually, the data line went down for longer than was commercially tolerable (less than 30 minute), we had a system whereby the central booking could be faxed to us. Our rather special lads and lasses in the office were experts in photocopying the cargo lists to us at the sharp end and by a bit of extra labour and the good old fashioned electric telephone we could physically discharge and load a ship and backload with minimal delay and get the info back to Dover where the dinosaur computer lived and produce an accurate and legal manifest. This would then be faxed back to us, copied and endorsed so that the ship could sail.
I was involved in a few BCM (business continuity management) situations and our terminal was the only one that could demonstrate an ability to operate without access to the internet etc. I'm a little bit proud of that because it was a by product of my merchant navy deck officer training to be able to do the job when the electronic crutches failed.
Andy

[McMurdo]

What then is the difference between peer-to-peer and other digital communications that the former are incompatible with VoIP

I would guess it's to do with the digital codecs which might not quite know what to make of a fax signal. And someone also mentioned latency, a fax connection is very much a 'conversation'.

[Refugee]

They have been sending faxes over the radio for years.
They work when digital needs a reboot that takes more than half an hour even with a valve radio.
Useful links.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiofax
https://faxauthority.com/glossary/ra...herfax-hf-fax/
I guess you could modify a fax machine to work on a VOIP line if there is a call for it.
I have heard stories about store rooms full of computers on NHS sites where they dare not take down old working ones due to potential down time getting the new ones working.
Fax machines are old and working and they dare not take them down because the alternatives have a potential long down time before they can be got going.
The great feature of fax machines is that the receiving machine sends a signal back after the received sheet has left the printer and is in the tray without a paper jam.
Modern alternatives fail to provide such a feature without great expense.

[emeritus]

Where I worked before retiring some 10 years ago, they installed what I think was a VOIP phone system, and our faxes were recieved and sent via our PCs. We used to use fax a lot, as fax was preferred due to the handshaking ensuring that your fax was being received by the recipient in real time. If something went wrong, your receipt showing successful transmission would serve as proof of delivery, which was vital when documents had to be received by inextensible deadlines. We did retain a conventional landline for a conventional fax machine as insurance if the computer controlling our local office exchange went down, and I did make use of it on one occasion.

I believe that Fax was/is popular in Japan because of the difficulty of typing anything in Japanese characters on account of their vast number- it used to be much quicker to write messages etc. by hand than typing, but I don't know what the present situation is.

[agardiner]

Originally Posted by Dave Moll

Thank you for that answer. What then is the difference between peer-to-peer and other digital communications that the former are incompatible with VoIP?

Peer-to-peer requires a 'conversation' as mentioned elsewhere in this thread. When converted to VOIP, you now have an extra layer in the mix, (technically many extra layers) and the latency this introduces prevents the conversation from being reliable. In a nutshell, the peer-to-peer doesn't exist as there are multiple 'hops' of the digital signal. Modern forms of digital communication expect these hops, and all that matters is that the data reaches its intended destination.