An executive call screener?

January 11, 2008 2:00 PM

What is this called: A little terminal (not part of the phone) on an executive's desk that says who is on the line.

Recently, on the show Medium, a character had one of these on his desk that showed him who was on the line. This reminded me that they had one of these at an old job. It was not part of the phone, but rather a stand-alone mini-terminal that sat on the bosses' desk. If I recall correctly, the boss' secretary had a matching terminal at her desk, and she would type in who was on the line, or other messages.

What were these called? Are they still in use?

posted by Futurehouse to technology (7 comments total)

It wasn't a caller-ID box?
posted by cmgonzalez at 2:01 PM on January 11, 2008

Often they are called a "sidecar". They are often used for receptionists.

I'm assuming that is what was on Medium, I've not seen the show.
posted by grumpy at 2:03 PM on January 11, 2008

I remember these too, but I don't remember them as "sidecars". I believe we called ours by the brand name, but I'm blanking on that right now. I think they were mostly made obsolete by IM.
posted by sharkfu at 2:06 PM on January 11, 2008

It was more than caller ID, since the secretary could type stuff at her desk that appeared on the display on Mr. Boss' desk.

It wasn't the attendant console (sidecar). Those have all kinds of buttons and line keys, but is not exactly what I was looking for here.

As I recall, the boss terminal had buttons where he could send codes back to the secretary that let her know if he wanted the call or not.

(This boss also had to have a button at his desk that automagically closed his office door, so that should tell you a little about what he was like...)

Thanks for the help so far.
posted by Futurehouse at 2:10 PM on January 11, 2008

I was originally going to suggest that it may have been a trading 'turret' system , but the 'office door' thing reeks of a more general room AV / room automation setup to me. Can you describe the age/era of this old job? Was this a US or European job? If it was within the last decade I'd have to go with a Crestron installation, as they generally own high-end automation. If older I'm at a loss.
posted by datacenter refugee at 3:49 PM on January 11, 2008

This was in the mid-90's. It wasn't Crestron - in my last house, we put in a Crestron system to control our music and home entertainment, and I am familiar with their systems.

I am sure my boss got this from our phone vendor, and the system was a single purpose one - existed only to let the secretary screen the calls and silently announce them to my power-hungry boss.
posted by Futurehouse at 4:44 PM on January 11, 2008

We had these at our office until recently - they were called Amtels.
posted by AuntLisa at 6:30 PM on January 11, 2008