Personal desktop router

In a customer premises telephone call-routing system having a telephony switch for switching received telephone calls to connected telephones, a method for individual customization of routing rules for the received telephone calls, comprising steps of:

• (a) executing a client-user interface on a computer workstation connected to a customer local area network (LAN), and to a client-server router storing routing rules associated with individual users of the computer workstation, the LAN also coupled to a computerized telephony switch receiving the incoming telephone calls;
• (b) determining routing for the received telephone calls separately for one of the individual users at the computer workstation using the client user interface;
• (c) transmitting the routing determination to the client-server router executing on a processor coupled to the LAN, and storing the routing determination as a set of editable routing rules for the individual user;
• and
• (d) routing the received telephone calls for the individual user by the router according to the transmitted routing determination.

A client-server telephone call router system for determining routing of incoming telephone calls in a customer premises telephone call switching system including a telephony switch connected to individual telephones and computer workstations proximate individual ones of the telephones, the computer workstations also interconnected on a local area network (LAN) coupled to the telephony switch, the router system comprising:

• a client user interface executable on at least one of the computer workstations, and providing functions for editing routing rules for individual specific users;
• and
• a client-server router executable on a processor coupled to the LAN, the client-server router having a list of routing rules with individual portions dedicated to the individual specific users;
• wherein the client-user interface transmits edited routing rules to the client-server router, and the client-server router alters editable routing rules in the individual portions associated with the individual specific users.