Notification Manager Commands › Notification Manager Command Descriptions › NMTAP Method

NMTAP Method

The NMTAP program provides a means for NMFIND to contact someone with a TAP alphanumeric or numeric pager. It differs from NMPAGE in that the REXX code talks directly to the modem instead of using the ADDRESS VOX PAGE command to perform the page. NMTAP supports the batching of pages (that is, sending multiple pages to a paging service with a single phone call). NMTAP is designed so you can easily modify it to support a different protocol than TAP. For more information, see the nmtap.txt file in the Distrib directory.

NMTAP only communicates with TAP alphanumeric pager services. Therefore, you can only use NMTAP to page a numeric pager if that pager is reachable with an alphanumeric pager service. You cannot call NMTAP directly; rather, you must install it as the invocation string for a method in your Notification Manager database and use NMFIND to invoke it.

Specify the following items when defining a method that uses NMTAP:

• The invocation string is NMTAP.
• NMTAP supports only the TELL parameter of NMFIND. For this reason, you must choose to make any method that invokes this program support only the TELL parameter.

As mentioned previously, NMTAP supports the TELL parameter of NMFIND, but it does not support the ASK parameter of NMFIND (it can be used only as a TELL method). The text sent to a numeric pager is the line on which to call in and the item number. The text sent to an alphanumeric pager is the line on which to call in, the item number, and some or all the text of the TELL message.

Define the following parameters below for any method that uses NMTAP as its invocation string. If a parameter is marked as required, you must define it as a parameter for the method. If a parameter is not required, you do not need to define it in the database. If you do not define the parameter, the default value is used whenever the method is invoked. Remember, you cannot set a value for a parameter at the entity or time-block level (that is, override the default value) if you do not define the parameter at the method level.

The following is a list of method parameters that are to be stored in the Notification Manager database for each NMTAP method definition: