
C HAPTER
1
About Unified Messaging
The essence of communication is breaking down barriers. The telephone, for instance,
breaks distance and time barriers so that people can communicate in real time or near–real
time when they are not in the same place. But as communications evolve, there are new bar-
riers to be overcome. New forms of communication emerge, such as e-mail, voice mail, fax
machines, and pagers, and people use different devices for each of these. Unified messaging
(UM) is designed to overcome these barriers. It breaks down the terminal and media barri-
ers so that people using different technologies, different media, and different terminals ...