On Thu, 30 Dec 1999, Ted Lemon wrote:

> There ought to be a package for this.   I'd like something like this
> too - basically, what I want is a device that I can plug into a POTS
> line and have it notice that the phone is ringing, pick it up, play a
> message, and listen for input, including DTMF.   I suspect that this
> can be done with a Winmodem, but of course that would require us to
> have documentation, which is something we're not likely to get.   :'(

If you have a so-called voice/fax modem, vgetty can make the computer
act as an answering machine. [Voice/fax modems compress the audio and
send it over the serial port.] vgetty is distributed with mgetty,
<http://alpha.greenie.net/mgetty/>. There's already an mgetty package.