POTS; was: Anyone here from Oregon USA to help with collection pickup?

[Gordon JC Pearce]

Alexey Toptygin wrote:
> On Mon, 2 Oct 2006, Sean Conner wrote:
> 
>>  But what about cell phones and roaming?  Last year I went to Las Vegas
>> with a friend of mine.  My cell phone is in the 561 area code (Palm Beach
>> County), my friend's phone is in the 205 area code (Tuscaloosa, Alabama).
>> Las Vegas is 702.  My Dad was able to call me (760) while I was in Las
>> Vegas, and I was able to call my friend (205 area code, although 
>> phyically
>> five feet away) from my cell phone.
>>
>>  How do they handle *that*?
> 
> This is getting dangerously OT, but what the hell, I used to test these 
> things :-)
> 
> All calls from the PSTN to a particular cell number go to that number's 
> 'home' switch. This switch owns the enclosing block of numbers in the 
> PSTN sense. It also keeps track of which switch is the 'serving' switch 
>

So there's no real way to distinguish between a mobile phone and a landline?

Gordon