Time announcement

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Deutsche Telekom time announcement (1997)

A time announcement is a telephone value-added service that is constantly available and announces the respective local zone time (in Central Europe Central European Time (CET) or summer time (CEST), also legal or civil time ) every 10 seconds to the second. It enables the time to be compared to correct clock errors and thus takes on the function of a simple and easy-to-use time standard for the public.

history

From 1958: time announcement device with magnetic tapes in an exchange
Rack - time announcement device with magnetic plate

The first devices with the help of which callers could find out the exact time over the telephone network transmitted the time with sound signals, but not with voice. In Germany, the first facility was put into operation on August 1, 1909 at the Hamburg observatory and connected to the Hamburg local network. Every subscriber from whose connection the Hamburg local network could be reached could hear the "telephone time signal". The time signal consisted of two sound signals; the first indicated the full minute, the second a full five-minute step. Every minute from second 55 to second 60 a "siren-like sound" sounded. The end of the tone indicated the full minute. Every fifth minute (to the minutes: 05,: 10,: 15 and so on) a "rattling alarm clock" sounded after the minute signal. As an experiment, connections to the time signal were established in particular from Copenhagen, Wiesbaden, Cologne, Munich and Paris, the time signal being audible without any problems. The source of the time signal was an astronomical pendulum clock that was connected to the main clock of the observatory. It stated Central European Time with a deviation of no more than half a second.

As early as 1910, a Berlin manufacturer produced and sold a wall clock with a time announcement. The company was called "Die Zeitansagende Uhr GmbH". A gear train spooled a film strip every quarter of an hour or at the push of a button, a membrane lowered itself and announced the time. From 1920, attempts were made to speak time announcements on gramophone records for commercial purposes, but the sound reproduction methods known at the time could not meet the high requirements. The mechanical scanning of the phonograph by Thomas Alva Edison proved unsuitable for continuous operation, because the recording with repeated listening wore. The electromagnetic method of Valdemar Poulsen's telegraphone was able to solve this problem, but the quality and volume were still insufficient. The devices available for both methods had difficulties in delivering a sufficiently stable playback speed and the playing time of the storage media used was far too short.

The world's first regular operation of a speaking time announcement was put into operation on February 14, 1933 in France by the Paris Observatory . The announcement machine - initiated by the physicist Ernest Esclangon - worked at constant temperature and air pressure according to the optical tone method , the first method that was able to cope with the load in continuous commercial operation. The technology had been copied from the optical sound tracks introduced in cinemas. In the case of film, the sound was recorded on a film track next to the actual images and was scanned without contact. On a cylinder with three track sets, first the track with the current full hour was played every 10 seconds, then the one with the full minute and finally the one with the next announced second in 10-second steps, followed by the announcement of the time signal. Three photocells read and amplified the sound. The recordings were spoken by radio broadcaster Marcel Laporte . The service was designed for 20,000 participants daily and was already overloaded on the first day.

In 1954 the process was ported to machines with three rotating optical disks each, a "record" for hours, minutes and seconds. Two machines went into operation in Sydney; one for regular operation, the other as a backup. The machine with the voice of actor Gordon Gow was not replaced until 1990 and after its restoration at the Sydney Observatory it was put back into operation for visitors.

In 1958, the optical sound technology was replaced by a magnetic sound time announcement with tapes . The large system was manufactured by Siemens & Halske in Nuremberg . The timer was the “mother clock” of the exchange. With this method, the seconds were then also displayed in steps of ten. This was followed by the announcement, which is still known today, “The next tone will be 1 pm, 15 minutes and 20 seconds”. This announcement was announced every 10 seconds.

In 1963, a magnetic drum machine was put into operation in the United Kingdom . It was in use until 1984. Since then, a digital system with no moving parts has been in operation.

In 1969, optical sound technology was also replaced by electromagnetic recording in the Netherlands. A rotating magnetic disk with several tonearms was used here: mechanical, later quartz clocks controlled the tonearms of the turntable, whose magnetic pickups - instead of a needle - scanned a magnetic disk (quasi a flat tape). B. the minute announcement was stored on sixty concentric tracks. Time-controlled relays created a time announcement like <First record:> "Bij de volgende toon is het ... uur, <switch to second record> ... minutes <switch to third record> en ... seconden" <switch to tone generator for time signals>; the switching was partially audible. This very reliable automatic system was also used in Germany in the 1970s. However, due to the complicated mechanics and wear and tear of the storage disks, such time announcement systems were in need of maintenance.

Since the turn of the millennium, the use of the time announcement has decreased; the exact time is available from radio clocks , teletext , the Internet, as well as cell phones and smartphones. On September 19, 2007, a telephone operator, AT&T in California, discontinued the time announcement service for the first time.

Germany

"Eiserne Jungfrau", the first German time announcement device - optical sound method
Film scanning optics of the "Iron Maiden"

In the early days of manual switching, the officers in the telephone exchange also had the task of announcing the time to the subscriber on request. The officer then simply read the time from the exact wall clock and communicated this to the caller. This personnel-intensive service could be used in Hamburg for 10 pfennigs on the telephone number 44441. According to the downsizing ordinance of October 27, 1923 , only unmarried civil servants could be used. The ordinance for the reduction of personnel expenses in the Reich stipulated the dismissal of civil servants in the event of marriage. As a result, the later time announcement machine was quickly given the nickname "Iron Maiden". In Berlin the time announcement had got its own name, after the phone number used there it was called Miss A 0.

The “Iron Maiden”, which was initially used on a trial basis in the Fernamt Berlin , was born in 1935. It was developed in the Nuremberg plant by Siemens & Halske and is a good example of mechanical automation without the computer technology commonly used today. In the first few days there were 84,000 calls. The Reichspost decided to have the time announced automatically on 03 in Hamburg . From November 4, 1937, she released the "Miss from Office" from the time announcement service. On this machine, similar to its French counterpart, 24 hour announcements and 60 minute announcements were recorded on different tracks using the optical sound system. However, the seconds were not announced. In the last 3 seconds before the full minute, a buzzing sound was switched on, which represented the completion of the minutes.

In the 1960s, optical sound devices were initially replaced by magnetic tape recorders. It was not until the 1970s that magnetic disk systems that were scanned by several tonearms made a very reliable automatic time announcement possible.

From the 1960s to the 1980s, the time announcement had the number 119 and was the most frequently dialed telephone number in Germany with 600,000 calls a day. It generated annual income of around 50 million German marks for the telecommunications operator Deutsche Bundespost at that time . Until 2005 the time announcement could be reached under the number 0 11 91.

In the GDR , the time announcement could be reached on 019. The announcement differed from that of the Federal Republic of Germany. The current time was repeated regularly until the beep. So the scheme looked like this:

"8:00 a.m., 8:00 p.m., 7:00 p.m., ... BEEP - 8:00 p.m., 8:00 p.m., 8:00 p.m., ..."

Current status of the time announcement

Deutsche Telekom time announcement (2008)

After the closure of the number range 011xxx by the Federal Network Agency , the service was switched to the number 0180 4100100. The tariff for dialing is 0.20 EUR per call from most telephone networks.

For example, on July 12, 2012, a female voice greeted the caller with the following announcement:

“Welcome to Telekom Deutschland's time announcement . Today is Thursday, July 12th, 2012 "

Every ten seconds, a female computer voice repeats the current time in the following form:

“The next tone is 8 o'clock, 19 minutes and 20 seconds. BEEP "

After completing the second minute, the conversation is automatically ended with the phrase “Telekom Deutschland thanks for your call” .

You can call the Hamburg number (040) 42 89 90 to get a time announcement at the regular fixed network tariff. There is no greeting and the time is repeated every ten seconds by a female computer voice. The announcement follows the following scheme:

“The next tone is 8-19 and 20 seconds. BEEP "

A time announcement according to the classic scheme with the original voice of Elvira Bader from 1958 can be heard on the chargeable special number 0 1806/10 11 91. Calling this number costs 14 cents per minute from a German landline and max. 42 cents per minute from the German cellular network.

The time is also available via the teletext reading service of the Bavarian Association of the Blind and Visually Impaired (BIT Teleservice) on 089 14 377 399.

The Telekom-Historik Bochum eV association operates a magnetic-sound time announcement device for the German Federal Post Office from 1958 on 0234 33 88 1838.

Austria

The first time announcement was introduced in Linz in 1947 and transmitted from there to the other provincial capitals. Vienna had its own time announcement from 1948, which could be reached under the number A03 . From 1972 the time announcement was carried out with an accuracy of 10 seconds.

Reachable on 0810 00 1503 since May 2009, until then only 1503, but decades ago under 15. A female voice repeats itself every 10 seconds. E.g. at 6:19:11 pm it reads:

“It starts with the buzzer - 6 pm, 19 minutes, and 20 seconds. 'Do' "

The individual words were recorded by Renate Fuczik in 1974. In Austria, the time signal was linked to the BEV's atomic clock . The name buzzer tone comes from the fact that the tone was originally generated by the buzzer machine (the Austrian name for call and signal machine ).

For higher demands - z. B. for milliseconds (0.001 s) or better - there was a second telephone number in larger cities , in Vienna 1505. Here continuous seconds dots (soundless, short clicks) can be heard - which can also be electronically precisely tapped - and with good stopwatches already allow an acoustic accuracy of 0.002 seconds. As minutes identifier , the second 59 is omitted, the hour accounts for the second points 55-59.

The original plan was to discontinue both services on May 12, 2009. On May 27, 2009 the time announcement 1503 was changed to the new number 0810 001503 and provided with the voice of the radio presenter Angelika Lang . Today, according to Telekom Austria , the time signal is obtained from the German time signal transmitter DCF77 in Mainflingen near Frankfurt, which is fed by the atomic clocks in the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB) in Braunschweig .

Switzerland

The telephone time announcement can be reached on 161. At least in parts of German-speaking Switzerland, the spoken text is bilingual (D / F), with the following text:

The next tone is x o'clock, y minutes and z seconds. Beep. Au prochain ton il sera x heures, y minutes, et z secondes. Beep.

The French spoken text announces the seconds 10, 30 and 50, while the German announces the seconds 0, 20 and 40.

Time signal transmitter

Even higher accuracies are possible with the time signal services using special time signal transmitters , but the signal propagation time from the transmitter to the receiver must then also be taken into account (around 0.001 s per 300 km distance). In many cases - especially in the home user sector - the delay caused by the electronics of the receiver is more important than the signal propagation time.

A normal frequency is also offered in many places by means of the central atomic clock (mostly 440 or 1000  Hz ).

Satellite navigation systems (e.g. GPS ) also provide highly accurate time.

See also

Web links

Commons : Time announcement  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Cf. Meyers Großes Konversations-Lexikon: Article Bürgerliche Zeit
  2. ↑ Telephone time signal. Electrotechnical Journal (ETZ) 1909, p. 811
  3. ↑ NN: The time ansa constricting clock in. Sp 6.1910, No. 35, p 944; quoted in Stefan Gauß: Nadel Rille Fichter. Cultural history of the phonograph and the gramophone in Germany (1900–1940). Publishing house Böhlau. Excerpts online (p. 237)
  4. ↑ Website of the Paris Observatory: L'horloge parlante officielle française de l'Observatoire de Paris. La première horloge parlante au monde. ( Memento of October 22, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) (The official French speaking clock of the Paris Observatory. The world's first speaking clock), accessed on February 22, 2013
  5. ↑ Nick Lomb (sydneyobservatory.com.au): George the Speaking Clock told the time on the telephone. February 1, 2012, accessed February 22, 2012
  6. ↑ a b Telekom Historik: time announcement device. Retrieved February 22, 2013
  7. ↑ telephonesuk.co.uk: Speaking Clock accessed February 22, 2012
  8. ↑ a b c bayern-online.com: First time announcement facility in Germany ; Broadcast with the mouse (3 min)
  9. ↑ a b tagesschau.de, Until the end of time - the last note was… , 4th Sept. 2007 (tagesschau.de archive)
  10. ↑ Die Zeit, At the next note , April 9, 1982
  11. ↑ BIT teleservice of the BBSB with a new number. Press release of the Bavarian Association of the Blind and Visually Impaired. Archive 2014
  12. ↑ Search and find by phone on ORF from September 2, 2018, accessed on September 3, 2018.
  13. ↑ a b Time announcement is not set , May 8, 2009
  14. ↑ Farewell to the time announcement. Futurezone (fuzo-archiv.at), Feb. 22, 2008
  15. ↑ Time announcement can be reached under a new number. Fuzo Archives, May 27, 2009
  16. ↑ 1503 becomes 0810 001503: The new time announcement is here. Telekom Austria press release, May 27, 2009 (pressetext.com)