Conference 7.286::digital

    
    I assure you that the Digital operators are here and ready to answer 
    your calls.
    
    Earlier today one of the operators had a problem with her phone, she
    could hear the caller but apparently the caller could not hear her.
     
    The phone problem has been corrected.
    
    If you have any questions or I can assist you in any way, please call
    me at DTN 223-4427.
    
    Regards,
    Janet MacGillivary
    Console Operations Supervisor

Janet:

  Thanks for your assurances, but the problem was occurring as I
  was typing my note, and the disconnection occurred maybe 2 minutes
  before the timestamp on my note.

  (A second call did go straight through, BTW.)

                                   Atlant

    That's better than trying to contact Microsoft Developers Network,
    they have voicemail on their credit services number that never call
    back, and I mean never--20 calls and not one message replied to.
    
    Digital's not the worst there is.

>    Digital's not the worst there is.

   Well, there it is.  Might as well leave everything exactly as it is then,
   eh?

   -- Sam

    You know, might get more recognition if we were to start using that as
    a tagline rather than the lame "Whatever It Takes" :-)
    
    - Vikas

>    Earlier today one of the operators had a problem with her phone, she
>    could hear the caller but apparently the caller could not hear her.
     
  Does this mean that if one phone goes out of service, nobody can get thru
to a Digital operator in Nashua or Merrimack? Not exactly a "fail-safe"
system.

    
    Re: 6
    
    No that it not what it means at all.  There are 12 Digital operators 
    handling an average of 2300 internal and external calls per day.  And
    if there is a problem with one line,  the remaining lines are available
    to receive calls.
     
    It just so happened that there were a couple of calls that the operator
    could hear the caller,  but the caller could not hear the operator, thus
    the operator had to abandon a couple of calls until we diagnosed and
    fixed the problem.
    
    It was the same day and around the same time as Atlant's call getting
    dropped so his call could have been one of the calls that came in on the
    operators line during the short time her phone was not working properly.
    
    In .1 I merely offered this information as a possible reason for the
    call getting dropped and an assurance that the Digital operator 
    services had not been cut.
    
    Regards,
    Janet
    
    Regards,          
    Janet

    I have been trying to confirm the address listed in my 1993 Digital
    phone book for MRO1 is still valid.
    
    After leaving numerous voice mail messages for the person who I'm to
    ship this mat'l to, I've yet to receive a return call.
    
    I tried calling the main number (DTN 297-7500) multiple times.  It just
    rings off the hook.
    
    I wanted to ship this out on Monday.  It's now Wednesday and I still 
    don't know if the address is correct.
    
    Not knowing if there is still life at MRO1, I'm now turning to you. 
    Is MRO1 still located at 200 Forest St., Marlboro, MA?   I'd like to 
    ship this stuff and get it out of my cube.
    
    Thanks,
    
    Monty 
    
    
    

        In VTX sites MRO1 is listed at 200 Forest St. Marlboro,Ma.
    01752-3085
    
    
    bob

(MARLBORO)Main Plant
Corporate User Publications/Applications & Systems Grp
Digital Equipment Corporation
200 Forest Street
Marlboro, Massachusetts 01752-3011


Site Code:         MRO
Mail Code:         MRO1
DID Number:        508-467-Plus Known Extension
DTN Number:        297-Plus known extension or
297-6211 on-site attendant or
8-222-1212 for Directory Assistance
Telephone:         508-467-5111

    THANK YOU!
    
    I'll send this stuff out tonight!
    
    Mont
    

And it's spelled Marlborough, not Marlboro.  Marlboro is located in northeastern
Massachusetts, near Georgetown.

Paul

    Not _real_ near Georgetown, Paul, except by Digital's relocation
    criteria. :-) (They're about 70-80 miles apart along the "normal" routes.)
    
    Eastern Massachusetts, about 30 miles west of Boston, is a somewhat
    closer landmark.
    
    -Tom

        re:-12 Well a nit back atcha Marlboro and Marlborough are accepted
    spellings for all of the boro/borough's in that area. Nothboro,
    Southboro, and Westboro are in the same boat. The use of boro or borough 
    is even taught in the school systems. Far better thing to nit about is
    how difficult it can be to get the info .0 was looking for. VTX isn't
    an intuitively obvious tool to use.
    
    bob
     

With the exception of Attleboro, all towns in Massachusetts with names
ending in "-boro*" (including North Attleborough) are officially spelled
"-borough".

/john

re .13,

> Not _real_ near Georgetown, Paul

Yes, in addition to Marlborough, location of MRO1, thirty miles west of Boston,
                           ****
there is a Marlboro directly east of Georgetown, northeast of Boston.
                  *

You can abbreviate Marlborough as Marlboro, I suppose, as many do.  It may be
accepted, but it is not correct, especially since there's also an place in the
same state called Marlboro.

Paul

    
    
    The street signs in Marlboro read "Marlboro" with both spellings.
    Look at the highway signs, then get on local roads.  Not sure
    if the state does it one way and the town signs spell it another,
    or who's right or wrong.... don't care.
    
    gb
    
     

    Sorry. I misunderstood. No, there is no Marlboro in Massachusetts, not
    even near Georgetown. There's a Boxford a little south of Georgetown,
    not to be confused with the Boxborough that is a little north of
    Marlborough. Then there's Middleton/Middleborough,
    Weston/Westborough/Westfield/Westford/Westwood...
    
    But we digress.

> No, there is no Marlboro in Massachusetts, not even near Georgetown.

My 1996 Rand McNally US Atlas shows it, as does DeLorme's Street Atlas USA
software and MapQuest on the Web.  Marlboro is on MA 133, east of Georgetown and
just west of I-95.  It might be a bump in the road for all I know, but it's
listed.

There's also a Marlborough Junction listed, but fortunately it's part of
Marlborough.

But we digress.

But this is Notes, no?

Paul

    With all this about which spelling is correct I'm starting to feel
    sorry I ever asked.
    
    I used "Marlboro" because that is the spelling used in the Digital
    phone book.  I figured it was printed in MA and whomever was
    responsible for printing it would know how to spell a town in their 
    own state. 
    
    For those of you who have site addresses available in VTX, don't assume
    everyone has the same VTX menu's that you do.  Some kind individual who
    wanted to help me out and teach me how to find this in VTX found out we
    have different menu options. (Yes, Even I thought everyone's VTX menu's
    were the same.)  After about an hour of playing around in VTX, I now
    know how to locate a site address by 'keyword'.  I don't have option #6
    like many of you.  (My menu skips from #2 to #31.)
    
    Anyway...Thanks Joyce for helping me out.  
    
    

>My 1996 Rand McNally US Atlas shows it, as does DeLorme's Street Atlas USA
>software and MapQuest on the Web.  Marlboro is on MA 133, east of Georgetown
>and just west of I-95.

That's part of Georgetown.

The two towns which border Georgetown on the east are Newbury and Rowley.

(Remember, there are no unincorporated areas within the Commonwealth of
Massachusetts.)

/john

>(Remember, there are no unincorporated areas within the Commonwealth of
>Massachusetts.)
    
    ... brilliantly bringing us back to the title of the topic. :-)

	...and then there is New Marlborough in Berkshire County...

    re. 20
    
    You're welcome Monty.  It was an interesting learning experience.
    
    j

    
    Ratholing here...
    
    Re: .19
    
    >My 1996 Rand McNally US Atlas shows it, as does DeLorme's Street Atlas
    >USA software and MapQuest on the Web.  Marlboro is on MA 133, east of
    >Georgetown and just west of I-95.  It might be a bump in the road for
    >all I know, but it's listed.
    
    This is a standard map-makers copyright protection trick.  Put a fake
    (but plausible) town on the map.  If your competitors copy the error,
    then you have a much stronger case in court with regards to copyright
    infringment.  It's hard to claim that you did your own research about
    a town that doesn't exist, and which the original company can prove
    doesn't exist.  According to one version of a Rand McNally map, I lived
    in a town called Horlickville one year, and that town ceased to exist
    the next year.
    
    I'm actually kind of surprised that they put one with such a similar
    name on the map in such close proximity to the real one.

Re .25:

1.  There are 6 ZIP+4's allocated to Marlboro Rd in Georgetown, MA less than �
mile from where DeLorme places "Marlboro".

2.  ISP Shore.Net provides service to "GEORGETOWN, MANCHESTER, LOWELL,
GLOUCESTER, HAVERHILL, MARLBORO".

It's quite likely to be a real locality.
				/AHM

    Maybe it is real and I just have never heard of it in 25 years of
    living in that area. The only Marlborough/Marlboro mentioned in any of
    the various histories of Newbury that recount visits by George
    Washington, contributions made by various towns after the great
    Newburyport fire of 1811, etc. is the one that today hosts MRO.
    
    There's always those strange and ancient little parishes/villages in
    Massachusetts, though, not to mention the odd postal station.
    
    -Tom

There are quite a few "towns" in Massachusetts that are not in fact separate
municipalities.  Hyannis, Forge Village, West Acton, Cochituate, and Allston
come to mind.  This place called "Marlboro" near Georgetown is a part of some
other town.  The fact that its name is identical to the common spelling variant
of the incorporated town of Marlborough is not a reason to be pedantic about
the spelling; it would not surprise me if there were town segments that were
*identical* in name to real towns elsewhere.  Certainly there are completely
disjoint streets with the same name near each other in Boston; I used to live
on one of them.

						Brian

    I have driven this road for years and years. There is no town named
    Marlboro in that part of the Massachusetts I doubt there is even a
    neighborhood in Georgetown or Rowley with such a name. I've lived
    nearby for years ( Lowell and Gloucester) and think I would recognize
    even a name for a local neighborhood. I suspect the
    note regarding mapmakers copyright protection maneuvers may be
    responsible for this, though perhaps it is just an error.

    Re.-1. I agree with you. It does not exist. I grew up in Danvers. Spent
    a lot of time driving the roads of Topsfield, Georgtown, Rowley. This
    particular Marlboro does not exist in that area of Massachusetts. 

    
    Maybe it's under the Parker River, aka like the towns that disappered 
    under Quabin.
    
    This is serious stuff, folks, we have lost a whole town.
    
    Dave Y.

	And this has what to do with living and working at Digital?

							mike

Ratholes are part of the Digital Style of Working.

Paul

  As someone said several replies back, there are hundreds of "places" in New
England that are not communities in the usual sense. Long ago, when trans-
portation was much more limited, people became very attached to the neighbor-
hoods where they lived, and often attached names to these neighborhoods.
Often, these places consisted of nothing but a one-room schoolhouse and a
few nearby farms, for example. People were free to make up names for such
places, even if they duplicated a place name in another part of the state.
  The only time people had to become more formal about place names was if they
opened a post office (in which case they could NOT duplicate or nearly dupli-
cate another place name with a P.O. in the same state, for obvious reasons)
or if the place was incorporated as a village (part of a town, a legal arrange-
ment in some New England states but not MA) or as a town.
  Another source of place names was the railroads. Every station and freight
depot had a name. Sometimes the railroad created its own name to assign to a
depot.
  As the years went on, hundreds of these places were abandoned or ceased to
have any identity as a place, but the names lived on. Mapmakers used old maps
as the basis for new ones, and unless a local authority told the mapmaker that
a specific place no longer existed, the place name lived on. Off-hand I can
think of a dozen such places within 20 miles of here (LKG).
  I think it is likely that there was a place called Marlboro between George-
town and Rowley at one time. I think that if the mapmakers had created a fake
town for copyright protection, they would have not have chosen a name matching
another city in the state. 
  Re "boro vs. borough" on Highway signs: For Boxboro, it's even worse. They
use both spellings on signs on I-495 within a mile of each other.