Unfortunatly, the telephone is one of the most "taken for granted" technologies to date. Nobody ever thinks about what happens when they lift the handset to place or answer a call (even though they do it many times a day), but when they don't hear that dialtone they all look right down into the handset with utter dismay and bewilderment. Everyone expects a computer to crash, but not their phone system, even though it is usually controlled by a CPU. Then there is no limit to what they will spend to get their phones back into operation. A business will go many hours or even days with a disabled computer or HVAC system. But they need their phones back ASAP. If you can do that for them your as good as gold.
Stone88, as already stated, the best (and only?) way to learn phone systems is OJT. Unless you work for a manufacturer or vendor approved by a manufacturer, system certification can be costly and sometimes hard to obtain. At any rate you will still learn alot more from experience than from a classroom. We have NEC certified technicians, but the main reason they become certified is so that they can use NTAC for support.
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CMS Communications, Inc. [This message has been edited by Rolm9751 (edited January 13, 2005).]