In concert with Microsoft Office 2010 and Sharepoint 2010, Lync Server is the lynchpin to a successful enterprise collaboration strategy.
Improved Web Conferencing Experience
Possibly the most significant change to, and benefit of, the new collaboration tools in Lync Server is the deprecation of the live meeting client. Lync Server users can join and manage live meetings through their Communicator client. Help desk personnel no longer need to explain which client to use for what kind of call. Simple, tight integration of scheduling and managing conferences provides a huge confidence boost even for inexperienced users. With just a few clicks, users can schedule, manage, and provide content for a meeting. Conference invitees, who do not use Lync Server, can join Lync Server web conferences by using a new lightweight client, the Lync Server Attendee online client.
Administrators looking to provide limited communicator web access to non-Windows or remote users in OCS deployed Communicator web access (CWA). CWA was a dedicated
server role in OCS. In Lync Server, this role is deprecated and replaced with the
Communicator web app, which is a service running on the Front End Server.
This topology change benefits to administrators and users alike. Administratively speaking, eliminating this server role offers a reduced overall Lync Server server footprint and simplifies management responsibilities. Lync Server users accessing CWA can share their desktops, and manage inbound and outbound calls no matter what OS they used to access the CW application.
In previous versions of OCS, only Windows users could share their desktops; users could not receive calls. By bringing these additional options to the CWA experience, non Windows Lync Server users are provided with an improved experience.
Lobby Experience
With Lync Server, after joining a conference, it is possible to apply a new experience to attendees that enhances the meeting join experience. This is known as the lobby. When a nonpresenter joins a meeting that has not started, she is placed in the lobby until the presenter joins. In addition, the lobby mode can be used during a call to avoid the disturbance of people entering and exiting a conference. The presenter can control when lobby users are admitted to the conference. This enables a presenter to maintain control of a meeting, especially one with several attendees.
Multiple Language Support
Users at multinational enterprises benefit from this new Lync Server feature. Each Lync Server site can have its own language for meeting prompts. When users join a meeting, they hear prompts in the language of their site, regardless of the site of the organizer.
Simplified Join Experience
If you have ever had a difficult time getting users to connect a live meeting and were confused by the obfuscated meeting URI in previous versions, fear not. The new simplified meeting URIs make the meeting-join experience quicker and more reliable. System administrators can set a simple URL (for example, HTTP://meet.contoso.com) that will be used by all meetings. This simple URL cleans up the body of the default Outlook message so that even those unfamiliar with joining a live meeting can join easily.
Visual Conference Calls
Sometimes, a simple audio conference is all that is required for quick collaboration. If users frequently attend audio-only meetings in Lync Server, they will be presented with a familiar, clear, and concise listing of users who join their conference. Users can manage their audio conferences with confidence, using the same interface from which they make individual calls.
Mute All, DTMF, and Roll Call
Users conducting large conferences benefit from the mute all option. Using the simple, familiar Communicator interface, a meeting organizer can mute attendees to gain control of a meeting or conduct a press conference-type meeting. Meeting participants can control their meeting status using the dialpad. This also enables mobile users to have full control over their meeting experience. When conducting larger meetings, Lync Server meeting organizers can obtain an audio roll call of meeting participants. The recorded name or text-to-speech spoken name is played to only the organizer, enabling administrators to keep track of meeting participants.
Meeting Content Control
Collaboration power users can skip ahead in uploaded content shared in meetings. If you have ever been in a meeting where the presenter spent too much time on content you already knew about, you will appreciate this feature. A simple mouse click returns you to the content currently being shared.
Join from PBX
Users who are not Enterprise Voice–enabled can still participate in meetings with Lync Server Communicator. Users who have their extension homed to their corporate PBX phone can click the simple meet URL in a meeting invite. Communicator can be configured to call the meeting participants at their PBX number. This enables non-Enterprise Voice users to enjoy the benefits of Lync Server’s advanced UC features as well.
Source of Information : Pearson-Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Unleashed
Showing posts with label Lync Server. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Lync Server. Show all posts
Lync Server - Client-Side Benefits
Lync Server takes huge strides to improve the client experience. Based on hours of user testing, the Microsoft team released an improved client in terms of functionality and usability.
Pre-Call and In-Call Quality Feedback
Lync Server users can determine, in advance, what kind of call quality to expect on a given call based on real-time feedback from within Communicator. Familiar bars icons, such as on a cell phone, tell users at a glance how their network is performing during a call. This provides, for example, a user currently connected through a public Wi-Fi network the knowledge that the available bandwidth might not provide a quality experience, enabling him or her to consider other options for the call.
With location services, Lync Server has the capability to determine whether multiple users are joining a conference call from the same physical location or a location that can cause poor conditions, including feedback. During a call, Lync Server alerts users, through a pop-up, that they might be causing call quality issues and suggests actions to resolve the problem, such as going on mute.
Lync Server users who need to confirm the quality of a call prior to initiating it can make a test call to an audio test service. This functionality is built into the client and provides users who deploy a new audio device or roam to an unknown network a chance to test their call by calling the test service, recording a short sentence, and playing the message back.
Private Lines
Lync Server users can have a private line for incoming calls. This enables calls from important business contacts and family members to be easily identified and receive priority handing. Calls to a user’s private number are uniquely identified on the incoming toast and with a distinct ring. Calls to private lines override DND and other redirection settings to ensure that they always route to the user.
Call Parking
Have you ever placed a call on hold and picked it up somewhere else, but didn’t transfer it because you knew you couldn’t get to the other phone in time? Well, that is a situation for which Call Park was invented. Now users can park a call in an orbit number and go to another client to retrieve it. By combining Call Park with a third-party overhead paging system, an attendant can answer a call, park it, and page the requested person. Enterprises that have mobile internal users, such as shop floor or manufacturing employees, have been using park-and-page for many years. Now Lync Server users can enjoy the same feature.
Common Area Phones
When considering a PBX replacement, not every existing phone location can have a PC.
Hallways, lobbies, and transient worker areas are locations that can benefit from the concept of common use phones. The expense of providing a Tanjay-type device and the access control requirements (domain account, and password or fingerprint) made OCS 2007 R2 ill-suited for this task.
With Lync Server, endpoint devices are available that provide simple calling features by being plugged in and provisioned by an administrator. These phones retrieve parked calls and make internal calls without users signing in to Lync Server.
On recovering from a power failure or being unplugged, common-use phones automatically reregister with the registrar. Calling rules for default behavior can be set using the same management tools that other CS users are managed. Common-use phones have their own domain accounts in Lync Server.
Hot Desking
For transient areas, common use phones can be logged in to with a standard user’s account, enabling the user to make and receive calls wherever logged in. By using a PIN code or pairing the phone with a PC, transient workers can have all the benefits of a fully functional Lync Server endpoint wherever they need it. By signing into a phone designated as a hot-desking location, a Lync Server user gets a contact list, recent calls, and other contact-related information where he or she signs in. Hot-desking phones revert back to their common-use configurations based on a configurable timeout, allowing for a touchless user experience. Hot-desking options are easily managed by group policy settings similar to all other CS users.
Source of Information : Pearson-Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Unleashed
Pre-Call and In-Call Quality Feedback
Lync Server users can determine, in advance, what kind of call quality to expect on a given call based on real-time feedback from within Communicator. Familiar bars icons, such as on a cell phone, tell users at a glance how their network is performing during a call. This provides, for example, a user currently connected through a public Wi-Fi network the knowledge that the available bandwidth might not provide a quality experience, enabling him or her to consider other options for the call.
With location services, Lync Server has the capability to determine whether multiple users are joining a conference call from the same physical location or a location that can cause poor conditions, including feedback. During a call, Lync Server alerts users, through a pop-up, that they might be causing call quality issues and suggests actions to resolve the problem, such as going on mute.
Lync Server users who need to confirm the quality of a call prior to initiating it can make a test call to an audio test service. This functionality is built into the client and provides users who deploy a new audio device or roam to an unknown network a chance to test their call by calling the test service, recording a short sentence, and playing the message back.
Private Lines
Lync Server users can have a private line for incoming calls. This enables calls from important business contacts and family members to be easily identified and receive priority handing. Calls to a user’s private number are uniquely identified on the incoming toast and with a distinct ring. Calls to private lines override DND and other redirection settings to ensure that they always route to the user.
Call Parking
Have you ever placed a call on hold and picked it up somewhere else, but didn’t transfer it because you knew you couldn’t get to the other phone in time? Well, that is a situation for which Call Park was invented. Now users can park a call in an orbit number and go to another client to retrieve it. By combining Call Park with a third-party overhead paging system, an attendant can answer a call, park it, and page the requested person. Enterprises that have mobile internal users, such as shop floor or manufacturing employees, have been using park-and-page for many years. Now Lync Server users can enjoy the same feature.
Common Area Phones
When considering a PBX replacement, not every existing phone location can have a PC.
Hallways, lobbies, and transient worker areas are locations that can benefit from the concept of common use phones. The expense of providing a Tanjay-type device and the access control requirements (domain account, and password or fingerprint) made OCS 2007 R2 ill-suited for this task.
With Lync Server, endpoint devices are available that provide simple calling features by being plugged in and provisioned by an administrator. These phones retrieve parked calls and make internal calls without users signing in to Lync Server.
On recovering from a power failure or being unplugged, common-use phones automatically reregister with the registrar. Calling rules for default behavior can be set using the same management tools that other CS users are managed. Common-use phones have their own domain accounts in Lync Server.
Hot Desking
For transient areas, common use phones can be logged in to with a standard user’s account, enabling the user to make and receive calls wherever logged in. By using a PIN code or pairing the phone with a PC, transient workers can have all the benefits of a fully functional Lync Server endpoint wherever they need it. By signing into a phone designated as a hot-desking location, a Lync Server user gets a contact list, recent calls, and other contact-related information where he or she signs in. Hot-desking phones revert back to their common-use configurations based on a configurable timeout, allowing for a touchless user experience. Hot-desking options are easily managed by group policy settings similar to all other CS users.
Source of Information : Pearson-Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Unleashed
Enterprise Voice Benefits
Perhaps some of the most tangible, new, and exciting benefits of Lync Server are those related to the Enterprise Voice set of features. With the new release, Lync Server competes with the voice features provided by traditional PBXs. In fact, at VoiceCon 2010, Lync Server won the Voice RFP competition competing against the major PBX manufacturers.
Mediation Server Role Collocation
In prior versions of OCS, the Mediation Server was a dedicated role and required a one one relationship between the server and the gateway. OCS configuration enabled only a single, next-hop configuration from the Mediation Server to the media gateway (PBX, PSTN, and so on). Although certain gateway manufacturers were able to load-balance calls from the gateway to OCS, OCS was limited to only the single next hop. In Lync Server, the mediation role now runs on the Front End Server as a service. This concept of mediation server collocation provides tangible benefits from a topology, administrative, and user perspective.
With Lync Server, each Front End Server can have its own mediation service, enabling pools to route to gateways instead of the mediation servers. This enables multiple mediation servers to route to the same gateway or multiple gateways to route to a single mediation service.
This capability provides tremendous flexibility to design engineers and enterprises with a large number of PBX/PSTN trunks at a single site or many smaller sites. In previous versions of OCS, these scenarios required a mediation server at each location. In addition to a tangible reduction in servers, this topology change provides greater resiliency, more flexible routing choices, and more options for media flow.
Media Bypass
One of original roles of the mediation server was to transcode between RealTime audio (RTAudio) and G.711 to integrate with standards-based media gateways and PBXs. With Lync Server, calls can be sent using G.711 directly to a supported gateway or PBX. Although low bandwidth signaling (SIP) still traverses the mediation service role, higher bandwidth media (RTP) flows directly from a Lync Server endpoint to the GW/PBX, bypassing the Mediation Server role.
This change provides several benefits, including
. Removes a potential single point of failure that a mediation server introduced
. Reduces the overall server footprint of OCS
. Reduces the number of hops a media stream takes
In addition, in scenarios where a branch appliance is deployed, calls from PBX users at a branch to Lync Server users at the same branch, media now remains at the branch. Prior to Lync Server, an extra mediation server at the branch was required to enable similar call flow.
Optional Dedicated A/V Conferencing Role
In scenarios that require heavy conferencing resources, or MCUs, the A/V Conferencing role can be split off from the Front End Server role. Multiple A/V servers can be placed in a pool and this A/V pool can be designated as the conferencing resource for many other pools. This topology offers a distinct advantage enabling conference-centric enterprises the capability to provide a highly available conferencing resource to the users, but also keeping this resource-intensive application isolated from the day-to-day IM presence and telephony services. Additionally, this enables an enterprise to virtualize basic telephony services while providing physical hardware for A/V services.
Call Admission Control and DiffServ
Although RTAudio is a flexible payload codec, many larger enterprises believe that Lync Server should support call admission control, or CAC, as well. Already a fixture in many
VoIP communications servers, call admission control is now configurable in Lync Server. With Lync Server, network managers can control the amount of bandwidth voice and video calls consume on a given link. By configuring the bandwidth policy service to control a specific site, calls can be rejected or rerouted to the PSTN when sufficient bandwidth is not available to complete the call. This ensures quality audio or video sessions. Enterprises can garner tremendous benefit from planning their CAC strategy prior to deployment.
Lync Server users benefit from its capability to leverage the concept of differential services code points (Diffserv—or DSCP) for audio and video traffic. By separating port ranges for audio and video, Lync Server enables network administrators to provide different per-hop behaviors (for example, EF or expedited forwarding) for these streams. This enables latency sensitive traffic to route ahead of web or other non-real-time traffic. Windows 7 and Vista desktops can leverage Windows-based QoS. This enables them to be provisioned to apply DSCP markings to packets based exclusively on application and port ranges.
By combining CAC, DSCP, and Windows-based QoS policies, network administrators can rely on Lync Server to adhere to the policies they create and deploy on their network to enable all packets to arrive as required and ensure a quality user experience.
E911
Primarily developed for North America, enhanced 911 (E911) allows for additional information to be presented to the public service answering point (PSAP) that enables emergency personnel to obtain details about the specific location of an emergency call. These additional attributes are a building number, mailstop, cubicle number, or any other specific attribute that can save precious seconds in an emergency situation. Because VoIP is mobile, simply relying on a telephone number is not suitable for IP communications. The new location information service (LIS) role in Lync Server enables network identifiers such as switch ports, subnets, and wireless BSSID information to be matched up with location information and transmitted to the PSAP when setting up a 911 call. In addition to regulatory compliance benefits, e911 allows for a safer telephony environment. With Lync Server’s E911 service, end users trust that calls made to a 911 service will provide the vital details to emergency personnel.
Location can be set through the policy or manually. Visual indication of the current location is presented directly in the Lync Server client. E911 can also be configured to enable other onsite users to be automatically conferenced into an emergency call, enabling corporate first responders to be aware of 911 calls as they happen, which coordinates with police, fire, and other emergency services as they arrive.
Malicious Call Trace
When a Lync Server user receives a call that she deems is harassing or threatening, she can flag it in the call database. By alerting system administrators of this fact, they can quickly determine the source of the call and trace it back to its origin for evaluation by security personnel.
Caller ID Controls
Lync Server allows for a user’s caller ID to be modified dynamically based on the destination of the call—internal or external. This enables an enterprise to maintain full reverse name lookup to the corporate directory for internal calls, but provide a uniform departmental or location number to be presented when making external calls. This is used in certain situations such as outbound call centers, support desks, or any other situation where it is necessary to block caller ID digits to external parties. This can be set at a user level or by policy.
Anonymous Agents
Lync Server response group agents can be placed in anonymous groups. This feature enables help desk personnel to participate in a response group without providing a name and number to internal users. Prior to Lync Server, users calling a response group saw the agent they were connected to in their Communicator client and frequently then bypassed the response group on subsequent calls, defeating the purpose of the group by failing to leverage the available pool of agents. Lync Server response groups in anonymous mode are suitable for use in scenarios where the agent’s number needs to be kept private.
On-Net and Off-Net Voice Routing
For an enterprise to benefit from a large geographically dispersed voice network with many PSTN egress points, the capability to route calls through these points is crucial. However, when the points are located in different cities or countries, each point can require different dialing formats, prefixes, or other access codes. This can add tremendous complexity to a corporate dialing plan. Fortunately, Lync Server provides central alternative routes and number-formatting changes to manipulate the dialed number prior to routing to a PBX or the PSTN.
Media Gateway Certification
Beginning with OCS 2007, Microsoft developed the open interoperability program (OIP) for PBX and gateway vendors to enable enterprises to determine whether a particular piece of hardware or software version is certified to work with OCS. Beginning with Lync Server, audio quality and performance testing is included in OIP certification. This enables systems engineers to design a solution that will perform properly for all communication modalities.
Source of Information : Pearson-Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Unleashed
Mediation Server Role Collocation
In prior versions of OCS, the Mediation Server was a dedicated role and required a one one relationship between the server and the gateway. OCS configuration enabled only a single, next-hop configuration from the Mediation Server to the media gateway (PBX, PSTN, and so on). Although certain gateway manufacturers were able to load-balance calls from the gateway to OCS, OCS was limited to only the single next hop. In Lync Server, the mediation role now runs on the Front End Server as a service. This concept of mediation server collocation provides tangible benefits from a topology, administrative, and user perspective.
With Lync Server, each Front End Server can have its own mediation service, enabling pools to route to gateways instead of the mediation servers. This enables multiple mediation servers to route to the same gateway or multiple gateways to route to a single mediation service.
This capability provides tremendous flexibility to design engineers and enterprises with a large number of PBX/PSTN trunks at a single site or many smaller sites. In previous versions of OCS, these scenarios required a mediation server at each location. In addition to a tangible reduction in servers, this topology change provides greater resiliency, more flexible routing choices, and more options for media flow.
Media Bypass
One of original roles of the mediation server was to transcode between RealTime audio (RTAudio) and G.711 to integrate with standards-based media gateways and PBXs. With Lync Server, calls can be sent using G.711 directly to a supported gateway or PBX. Although low bandwidth signaling (SIP) still traverses the mediation service role, higher bandwidth media (RTP) flows directly from a Lync Server endpoint to the GW/PBX, bypassing the Mediation Server role.
This change provides several benefits, including
. Removes a potential single point of failure that a mediation server introduced
. Reduces the overall server footprint of OCS
. Reduces the number of hops a media stream takes
In addition, in scenarios where a branch appliance is deployed, calls from PBX users at a branch to Lync Server users at the same branch, media now remains at the branch. Prior to Lync Server, an extra mediation server at the branch was required to enable similar call flow.
Optional Dedicated A/V Conferencing Role
In scenarios that require heavy conferencing resources, or MCUs, the A/V Conferencing role can be split off from the Front End Server role. Multiple A/V servers can be placed in a pool and this A/V pool can be designated as the conferencing resource for many other pools. This topology offers a distinct advantage enabling conference-centric enterprises the capability to provide a highly available conferencing resource to the users, but also keeping this resource-intensive application isolated from the day-to-day IM presence and telephony services. Additionally, this enables an enterprise to virtualize basic telephony services while providing physical hardware for A/V services.
Call Admission Control and DiffServ
Although RTAudio is a flexible payload codec, many larger enterprises believe that Lync Server should support call admission control, or CAC, as well. Already a fixture in many
VoIP communications servers, call admission control is now configurable in Lync Server. With Lync Server, network managers can control the amount of bandwidth voice and video calls consume on a given link. By configuring the bandwidth policy service to control a specific site, calls can be rejected or rerouted to the PSTN when sufficient bandwidth is not available to complete the call. This ensures quality audio or video sessions. Enterprises can garner tremendous benefit from planning their CAC strategy prior to deployment.
Lync Server users benefit from its capability to leverage the concept of differential services code points (Diffserv—or DSCP) for audio and video traffic. By separating port ranges for audio and video, Lync Server enables network administrators to provide different per-hop behaviors (for example, EF or expedited forwarding) for these streams. This enables latency sensitive traffic to route ahead of web or other non-real-time traffic. Windows 7 and Vista desktops can leverage Windows-based QoS. This enables them to be provisioned to apply DSCP markings to packets based exclusively on application and port ranges.
By combining CAC, DSCP, and Windows-based QoS policies, network administrators can rely on Lync Server to adhere to the policies they create and deploy on their network to enable all packets to arrive as required and ensure a quality user experience.
E911
Primarily developed for North America, enhanced 911 (E911) allows for additional information to be presented to the public service answering point (PSAP) that enables emergency personnel to obtain details about the specific location of an emergency call. These additional attributes are a building number, mailstop, cubicle number, or any other specific attribute that can save precious seconds in an emergency situation. Because VoIP is mobile, simply relying on a telephone number is not suitable for IP communications. The new location information service (LIS) role in Lync Server enables network identifiers such as switch ports, subnets, and wireless BSSID information to be matched up with location information and transmitted to the PSAP when setting up a 911 call. In addition to regulatory compliance benefits, e911 allows for a safer telephony environment. With Lync Server’s E911 service, end users trust that calls made to a 911 service will provide the vital details to emergency personnel.
Location can be set through the policy or manually. Visual indication of the current location is presented directly in the Lync Server client. E911 can also be configured to enable other onsite users to be automatically conferenced into an emergency call, enabling corporate first responders to be aware of 911 calls as they happen, which coordinates with police, fire, and other emergency services as they arrive.
Malicious Call Trace
When a Lync Server user receives a call that she deems is harassing or threatening, she can flag it in the call database. By alerting system administrators of this fact, they can quickly determine the source of the call and trace it back to its origin for evaluation by security personnel.
Caller ID Controls
Lync Server allows for a user’s caller ID to be modified dynamically based on the destination of the call—internal or external. This enables an enterprise to maintain full reverse name lookup to the corporate directory for internal calls, but provide a uniform departmental or location number to be presented when making external calls. This is used in certain situations such as outbound call centers, support desks, or any other situation where it is necessary to block caller ID digits to external parties. This can be set at a user level or by policy.
Anonymous Agents
Lync Server response group agents can be placed in anonymous groups. This feature enables help desk personnel to participate in a response group without providing a name and number to internal users. Prior to Lync Server, users calling a response group saw the agent they were connected to in their Communicator client and frequently then bypassed the response group on subsequent calls, defeating the purpose of the group by failing to leverage the available pool of agents. Lync Server response groups in anonymous mode are suitable for use in scenarios where the agent’s number needs to be kept private.
On-Net and Off-Net Voice Routing
For an enterprise to benefit from a large geographically dispersed voice network with many PSTN egress points, the capability to route calls through these points is crucial. However, when the points are located in different cities or countries, each point can require different dialing formats, prefixes, or other access codes. This can add tremendous complexity to a corporate dialing plan. Fortunately, Lync Server provides central alternative routes and number-formatting changes to manipulate the dialed number prior to routing to a PBX or the PSTN.
Media Gateway Certification
Beginning with OCS 2007, Microsoft developed the open interoperability program (OIP) for PBX and gateway vendors to enable enterprises to determine whether a particular piece of hardware or software version is certified to work with OCS. Beginning with Lync Server, audio quality and performance testing is included in OIP certification. This enables systems engineers to design a solution that will perform properly for all communication modalities.
Source of Information : Pearson-Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Unleashed
Benefits for Lync Server Users
UC solution begins with the end-user experience. Lync Server’s newly designed Communicator client provides a concise, seamless, and logical view to enable users easy access to all communications modalities.
Contacts
Lync Server provides many new, yet familiar, ways to interact, learn about, and communicate with colleagues. The clear view of many data streams enables the user to choose the proper modality to communicate with another user. Users can save time when locating resources because they can search for others using keywords as well as names. Even with incomplete information, users can locate and communicate with others.
Lync Server also leverages the concept of social networks. Live contact cards, photos, and spoken names enable users to recognize and discover more about the people in their social network that matter to them most.
Users can save time and be more granular when searching, thanks to SharePoint skill search with address book service web queries (ABS-WQ). By simply placing a mouse over a contact, the hover card provides a consistent view of vital user data across all Office products, including Lync Server, enabling users to be more productive and save time by not switching applications as often.
Users that are part of a large enterprise might be overwhelmed by team-level or corporate wide changes by having users’ photos and their spoken name populating the OCS contact list. In this way, users can become familiar with their evolving social network. Users can become better corporate citizens by learning how a new colleague’s name is pronounced prior to meeting or speaking with him or her. You can now quickly see updates from all your contacts in a single concise view, called the Activity Feed.
Contact management is simpler thanks to the unified contact store. Lync Server now utilizes Exchange 2010 for its contact list, so users save time by not having to manage contacts in both Lync Server and Exchange. When the Outlook Social connector is deployed, users can search across their entire social network, such as Facebook from within Communicator.
Users now have easy access to the history of their communication with a particular contact, enabling them to easily determine the context of a conversation and eliminate the need to catch up on a conversation, for example, when usually just a simple IM can answer a question. Similarly, when starting new conversations, a user can easily provide context to a session to further streamline communications.
Managing Communications
Although there are many ways to initiate a call to a contact, users that are transitioning to Lync Server from traditional PBXs will benefit from having an easily accessible dialpad. In the previous version of OCS, the dialpad existed but was not easy to find.
Lync Server users migrating from simple instant messaging and presence on previous versions of OCS to Enterprise Voice on Lync Server will benefit from being able to conduct communications using any modality from a familiar, consistent interface.
When coupled with exchange unified messaging, users can now have a simple-to-view visual representation of each voicemail message. Lync Server users save time by easily managing voicemails within Communicator.
Panoramic Mode
Lync Server clients can leverage the panoramic video of roundtable devices, allowing for a more comfortable face-to-face video experience. This emulates a telepresence environment that integrates well with commodity desktop hardware.
Activity Feed
Users of common current social networks (Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and so on) will immediately recognize and be comfortable with the new activity feed in the Lync Server Communicator client. With a simple glance, you can receive updates (notes) and pictures from those in your social network.
Privacy and Presence Enhancements
Executive users benefit most from the new privacy enhancements in Lync Server. By adding enhanced privacy to a pool, users added to a contact list appear as offline until granted permission by the added contact to see their presence updates. This is valuable, for example, to create ethical walls between departments or divisions. Even if this setting is applied to a pool, users can opt out, enabling all others to see their presence.
Audio and Video to MSN PIC Contacts
Although public instant messaging communication (PIC) has always been a benefit of OCS, Lync Server takes the PIC story a bit further by enabling one-to-one audio and video exclusively to PIC contacts that are homed to the MSN service. This change enables corporate users with a strong MSN presence outside of work to reduce the need to run a separate client on their corporate workstation, yet maintain a robust communications experience.
Source of Information : Pearson-Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Unleashed
Contacts
Lync Server provides many new, yet familiar, ways to interact, learn about, and communicate with colleagues. The clear view of many data streams enables the user to choose the proper modality to communicate with another user. Users can save time when locating resources because they can search for others using keywords as well as names. Even with incomplete information, users can locate and communicate with others.
Lync Server also leverages the concept of social networks. Live contact cards, photos, and spoken names enable users to recognize and discover more about the people in their social network that matter to them most.
Users can save time and be more granular when searching, thanks to SharePoint skill search with address book service web queries (ABS-WQ). By simply placing a mouse over a contact, the hover card provides a consistent view of vital user data across all Office products, including Lync Server, enabling users to be more productive and save time by not switching applications as often.
Users that are part of a large enterprise might be overwhelmed by team-level or corporate wide changes by having users’ photos and their spoken name populating the OCS contact list. In this way, users can become familiar with their evolving social network. Users can become better corporate citizens by learning how a new colleague’s name is pronounced prior to meeting or speaking with him or her. You can now quickly see updates from all your contacts in a single concise view, called the Activity Feed.
Contact management is simpler thanks to the unified contact store. Lync Server now utilizes Exchange 2010 for its contact list, so users save time by not having to manage contacts in both Lync Server and Exchange. When the Outlook Social connector is deployed, users can search across their entire social network, such as Facebook from within Communicator.
Users now have easy access to the history of their communication with a particular contact, enabling them to easily determine the context of a conversation and eliminate the need to catch up on a conversation, for example, when usually just a simple IM can answer a question. Similarly, when starting new conversations, a user can easily provide context to a session to further streamline communications.
Managing Communications
Although there are many ways to initiate a call to a contact, users that are transitioning to Lync Server from traditional PBXs will benefit from having an easily accessible dialpad. In the previous version of OCS, the dialpad existed but was not easy to find.
Lync Server users migrating from simple instant messaging and presence on previous versions of OCS to Enterprise Voice on Lync Server will benefit from being able to conduct communications using any modality from a familiar, consistent interface.
When coupled with exchange unified messaging, users can now have a simple-to-view visual representation of each voicemail message. Lync Server users save time by easily managing voicemails within Communicator.
Panoramic Mode
Lync Server clients can leverage the panoramic video of roundtable devices, allowing for a more comfortable face-to-face video experience. This emulates a telepresence environment that integrates well with commodity desktop hardware.
Activity Feed
Users of common current social networks (Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and so on) will immediately recognize and be comfortable with the new activity feed in the Lync Server Communicator client. With a simple glance, you can receive updates (notes) and pictures from those in your social network.
Privacy and Presence Enhancements
Executive users benefit most from the new privacy enhancements in Lync Server. By adding enhanced privacy to a pool, users added to a contact list appear as offline until granted permission by the added contact to see their presence updates. This is valuable, for example, to create ethical walls between departments or divisions. Even if this setting is applied to a pool, users can opt out, enabling all others to see their presence.
Audio and Video to MSN PIC Contacts
Although public instant messaging communication (PIC) has always been a benefit of OCS, Lync Server takes the PIC story a bit further by enabling one-to-one audio and video exclusively to PIC contacts that are homed to the MSN service. This change enables corporate users with a strong MSN presence outside of work to reduce the need to run a separate client on their corporate workstation, yet maintain a robust communications experience.
Source of Information : Pearson-Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Unleashed
Brief History of UC
Before Voice over IP (VoIP), voice calls were sent over a dedicated network. Each call passed through a dedicated circuit and was switched from one point to the other, hence the term circuit-switched. Although this guaranteed a quality connection, it required dedicated processing power and physical connectivity. For example, the wire that went from your home telephone to the central office (CO) connected you to a physical port on the CO telephone switch. The processor of the CO switch had to constantly monitor each port to determine whether a particular phone (port) made a request to dial a number or access a feature, such as call forwarding.
With a telephone connected to a dedicated network, either the public switched telephone network (PSTN) or an enterprise class private branch exchange (PBX) network, it was difficult for outside influences to affect the quality of a connected call. Although having this separate network held numerous advantages, most notably quality and reliability, individual PBX or CO switches used proprietary protocols limiting interoperability and feature expansion. It also meant, for example, that if you wanted to access your PBX voicemail box from your email client, you were subject to the whim of the PBX voicemail vendor’s decision as to what you could and couldn’t do and what standards were supported.
Using LANs and Packet-Switched Networks
As more and more communications began using LANs and packet-switched networks (the Internet is just a huge packet-switched network), the voice networks were forced to open up and connect to other networks. Unified messaging was probably the first mainstream attempt at UC. Accessing voicemail from your email client and unifying your inbox gave users the potential of true UC. In fact, some traditional phone vendors still consider unified voice messaging the equivalent to UC. Of course, anyone who has shared a desktop with a single click, made a call without dialing a phone number, or created a conference using only the mouse certainly knows that is not the case.
The capability to leverage a database of phone numbers to make calls using the phone was also an early attempt at UC. Anyone who attempted to deploy this type of integration, even as recently as a decade ago, knows that it’s not for the faint of heart and was generally implemented only in narrow cases, such as when a huge database of contacts were dialed by large calling centers. The average enterprise had neither the expertise nor the time and money to implement such a system.
VoIP Becomes Mainstream
When VoIP finally became mainstream, again, the promise of truly UC was presented to the enterprise community. In theory, now that the voice packets were riding the same network as the data packets, how difficult could it be to unify them? A lot harder than it looked.
Although VoIP brought the capability to easily perform day-to-day administrative tasks such as moves, adds, and changes, little was done to unify the communications. Users’ identities were still synched from, and stored outside of, the VoIP PBX, voicemail systems still use proprietary interfaces, and now the quality of the voice call was subject to influences outside of the PBX administrator’s hands. It seemed that, aside from adding complexity to the building of a communications system, VoIP didn’t add that much value overall.
As a new technology, most of the effort in deploying VoIP was put into the actual engineering and the proper deployment of the technology, not in the leveraging of the endless possibilities that existed. In addition, VoIP was initially positioned as a replacement end state for the traditional TDM infrastructure. Enterprises that saw cost savings over dedicated point-to-point (T1) links saw value in VoIP-compatible PBXs, but just replacing the line cord that went into the desktop phone with an Ethernet patch cord didn’t alter the user experience much.
Users still had to remember phone numbers, dial a multitude of phone numbers to reach someone, leave and retrieve voicemail messages using the handset, check multiple voicemail inboxes, and so on. Communications were unified simply because they were using a VoIP-based communications system.
To truly unify communications, begin with a central repository of user attributes at the core of your strategy. This repository should be easily updated, secure, and extensible so that as new features are created, the required attributes can be easily added. If an enterprise has deployed a Windows server infrastructure, it already has a repository in place: Active Directory.
Unlike other solutions, Microsoft’s UC architecture directly uses Active Directory and does not rely on a separate data feed for synchronization. Unlike previous versions, Lync Server now utilizes a Central Management Store (CMS) for all settings and configuration details. This store is replicated to all servers so that servers are now survivable.
Source of Information : Pearson-Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Unleashed
With a telephone connected to a dedicated network, either the public switched telephone network (PSTN) or an enterprise class private branch exchange (PBX) network, it was difficult for outside influences to affect the quality of a connected call. Although having this separate network held numerous advantages, most notably quality and reliability, individual PBX or CO switches used proprietary protocols limiting interoperability and feature expansion. It also meant, for example, that if you wanted to access your PBX voicemail box from your email client, you were subject to the whim of the PBX voicemail vendor’s decision as to what you could and couldn’t do and what standards were supported.
Using LANs and Packet-Switched Networks
As more and more communications began using LANs and packet-switched networks (the Internet is just a huge packet-switched network), the voice networks were forced to open up and connect to other networks. Unified messaging was probably the first mainstream attempt at UC. Accessing voicemail from your email client and unifying your inbox gave users the potential of true UC. In fact, some traditional phone vendors still consider unified voice messaging the equivalent to UC. Of course, anyone who has shared a desktop with a single click, made a call without dialing a phone number, or created a conference using only the mouse certainly knows that is not the case.
The capability to leverage a database of phone numbers to make calls using the phone was also an early attempt at UC. Anyone who attempted to deploy this type of integration, even as recently as a decade ago, knows that it’s not for the faint of heart and was generally implemented only in narrow cases, such as when a huge database of contacts were dialed by large calling centers. The average enterprise had neither the expertise nor the time and money to implement such a system.
VoIP Becomes Mainstream
When VoIP finally became mainstream, again, the promise of truly UC was presented to the enterprise community. In theory, now that the voice packets were riding the same network as the data packets, how difficult could it be to unify them? A lot harder than it looked.
Although VoIP brought the capability to easily perform day-to-day administrative tasks such as moves, adds, and changes, little was done to unify the communications. Users’ identities were still synched from, and stored outside of, the VoIP PBX, voicemail systems still use proprietary interfaces, and now the quality of the voice call was subject to influences outside of the PBX administrator’s hands. It seemed that, aside from adding complexity to the building of a communications system, VoIP didn’t add that much value overall.
As a new technology, most of the effort in deploying VoIP was put into the actual engineering and the proper deployment of the technology, not in the leveraging of the endless possibilities that existed. In addition, VoIP was initially positioned as a replacement end state for the traditional TDM infrastructure. Enterprises that saw cost savings over dedicated point-to-point (T1) links saw value in VoIP-compatible PBXs, but just replacing the line cord that went into the desktop phone with an Ethernet patch cord didn’t alter the user experience much.
Users still had to remember phone numbers, dial a multitude of phone numbers to reach someone, leave and retrieve voicemail messages using the handset, check multiple voicemail inboxes, and so on. Communications were unified simply because they were using a VoIP-based communications system.
To truly unify communications, begin with a central repository of user attributes at the core of your strategy. This repository should be easily updated, secure, and extensible so that as new features are created, the required attributes can be easily added. If an enterprise has deployed a Windows server infrastructure, it already has a repository in place: Active Directory.
Unlike other solutions, Microsoft’s UC architecture directly uses Active Directory and does not rely on a separate data feed for synchronization. Unlike previous versions, Lync Server now utilizes a Central Management Store (CMS) for all settings and configuration details. This store is replicated to all servers so that servers are now survivable.
Source of Information : Pearson-Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Unleashed
Overview of Unified Communications
Since the first time a call was placed to a phone that did not answer, users of communications devices needed unified communications (UC). However, ask 1,000 IT professionals what UC means, and you’ll likely get close to that number of answers. This is due to that fact that unlike Voice over IP (VoIP), where there is a tangible description of what a technology is or does, UC is s bit more difficult to qualify. Is it collaboration? Is it the capability to see someone’s presence? Is it instant messaging? Is it all of these in a single client? The answer is yes... and no. Without realizing it, as we attempt to collaborate on a more granular and contextual level, we have been unifying our communications slowly and steadily for years.
The truth is that UC more closely defines how humans interact in person. For example, how did you communicate with someone who was having a conversation on a mobile phone? Without thinking about it, you updated his presence to busy in a call. If it wasn’t important, you would probably just wait. However, if you really needed to communicate with someone, you would most likely make eye contact, and, if he signaled to you that he could accept communication from you, you would either use a gesture or speak to him.
This is nearly the same way you communicate when using a UC solution. Utilizing tools such as instant messaging, presence, voice, video, and screen sharing, you are able to interact with others in near real-time, using a familiar interface to provide the same clues and info you get when you interact with someone face to face.
Software-Powered Communication
As computer-processing power has dramatically increased (compare even a low-end workstation of today to the high-end workstations of less than a decade ago), the communications industry has realized that software-powered communication servers allow for dramatic changes in the way both enterprises and consumers interact with one another.
No matter how you define UC, the desire to reduce the latency in user-to-user communication should be a primary goal of any UC strategy. For example, how many times have you been involved in an email thread that stretched out over days or weeks due to time zones or some other reason that could have been solved with a quick, real-time audio conference call?
Enabling users to communicate in the method that best suits their needs at any particular moment, while relaying their willingness and availability to communicate, goes a long way towards reducing the human latency inherent in attempts at collaboration and communications today.
Source of Information : Pearson-Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Unleashed
The truth is that UC more closely defines how humans interact in person. For example, how did you communicate with someone who was having a conversation on a mobile phone? Without thinking about it, you updated his presence to busy in a call. If it wasn’t important, you would probably just wait. However, if you really needed to communicate with someone, you would most likely make eye contact, and, if he signaled to you that he could accept communication from you, you would either use a gesture or speak to him.
This is nearly the same way you communicate when using a UC solution. Utilizing tools such as instant messaging, presence, voice, video, and screen sharing, you are able to interact with others in near real-time, using a familiar interface to provide the same clues and info you get when you interact with someone face to face.
Software-Powered Communication
As computer-processing power has dramatically increased (compare even a low-end workstation of today to the high-end workstations of less than a decade ago), the communications industry has realized that software-powered communication servers allow for dramatic changes in the way both enterprises and consumers interact with one another.
No matter how you define UC, the desire to reduce the latency in user-to-user communication should be a primary goal of any UC strategy. For example, how many times have you been involved in an email thread that stretched out over days or weeks due to time zones or some other reason that could have been solved with a quick, real-time audio conference call?
Enabling users to communicate in the method that best suits their needs at any particular moment, while relaying their willingness and availability to communicate, goes a long way towards reducing the human latency inherent in attempts at collaboration and communications today.
Source of Information : Pearson-Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Unleashed
Lync Server Integration with Other Microsoft Applications
One of the greatest strengths of a Microsoft product is that it is guaranteed to integrate with other Microsoft applications. Not only does it integrate in the sense that applications work with each other, Microsoft actually hooks the Lync Server technologies into other applications. This means that rich presence information can be shared with other applications and that one doesn’t necessarily have to switch to the Communicator client to interact with other users on the system. Not only do these integration points give other applications access to Lync Server, but in some cases, it also gives Lync Server access to information stored in other systems such as SharePoint or Exchange.
Integration with Exchange
Probably the coolest of the new integrations with Exchange is that Exchange 2010 Outlook Web App (OWA) now has Presence and IM integration built in. This provides useful features such as
. Presence for internal and federated Lync Server contacts
. The capability to start and maintain chat sessions directly from OWA
. Lync Server contact list integration, including adding and removing contacts and groups
. The capability to control the presence state from OWA
Lync Server also integrates into the meeting creation process, enabling you to create a voice and/or video conference at the time of the meeting creation. This gives users a onestop shop to service meeting needs. Lync Server also integrates with the Unified Messaging role in Exchange that enables Lync Server to use Exchange as the storage for voice mail messages.
Integration with SharePoint
Lync Server has taken an interesting approach to its integration with SharePoint. Like older versions of Communications Server, Lync Server displays Presence information anywhere a contact is shown in SharePoint and enables users to start an IM or audio conference with a click on the Presence icon.
What’s new is that Lync Server can read information from SharePoint to allow users totally new functionality. Probably the best example of this is the concept of a skills-based search. A Communicator user can search a company for “anyone who knows Exchange” as an example, and then Lync Server looks at data stored in SharePoint about users and identifies those who list that particular skill. It returns a list of users who do have that skill. This type of bidirectional integration opens up a whole world of possibilities for making it easier for users to connect with each other in a productive manner. Imagine being a new employee and having the option to ask Lync Server to show you a list of people in HR who deal with vacation requests and that are currently online and not busy. This is better than looking at a company intranet, searching for the HR pages, digging through documents to see who handles vacation requests, looking up the numbers, and then trying each of them until you finally get through to someone.
Integration with Office
Lync Server also integrates with some functions in Office 2010, including Backstage, a mechanism in Office 2010 that enables an unlimited number of people to concurrently edit a common document. Lync Server provides Presence information about other people working in the document, providing quick and easy IM collaboration between editors of the document.
Source of Information : Pearson-Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Unleashed
Integration with Exchange
Probably the coolest of the new integrations with Exchange is that Exchange 2010 Outlook Web App (OWA) now has Presence and IM integration built in. This provides useful features such as
. Presence for internal and federated Lync Server contacts
. The capability to start and maintain chat sessions directly from OWA
. Lync Server contact list integration, including adding and removing contacts and groups
. The capability to control the presence state from OWA
Lync Server also integrates into the meeting creation process, enabling you to create a voice and/or video conference at the time of the meeting creation. This gives users a onestop shop to service meeting needs. Lync Server also integrates with the Unified Messaging role in Exchange that enables Lync Server to use Exchange as the storage for voice mail messages.
Integration with SharePoint
Lync Server has taken an interesting approach to its integration with SharePoint. Like older versions of Communications Server, Lync Server displays Presence information anywhere a contact is shown in SharePoint and enables users to start an IM or audio conference with a click on the Presence icon.
What’s new is that Lync Server can read information from SharePoint to allow users totally new functionality. Probably the best example of this is the concept of a skills-based search. A Communicator user can search a company for “anyone who knows Exchange” as an example, and then Lync Server looks at data stored in SharePoint about users and identifies those who list that particular skill. It returns a list of users who do have that skill. This type of bidirectional integration opens up a whole world of possibilities for making it easier for users to connect with each other in a productive manner. Imagine being a new employee and having the option to ask Lync Server to show you a list of people in HR who deal with vacation requests and that are currently online and not busy. This is better than looking at a company intranet, searching for the HR pages, digging through documents to see who handles vacation requests, looking up the numbers, and then trying each of them until you finally get through to someone.
Integration with Office
Lync Server also integrates with some functions in Office 2010, including Backstage, a mechanism in Office 2010 that enables an unlimited number of people to concurrently edit a common document. Lync Server provides Presence information about other people working in the document, providing quick and easy IM collaboration between editors of the document.
Source of Information : Pearson-Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Unleashed
Lync Server Related Acronyms
. Call Admission Control (CAC)—A method of preventing oversubscription of VoIP networks. Unlike QoS tools, CAC is call-aware and acts as a preventive congestion control by attempting to route calls across other media before making a determination to block a call rather than impacting the quality of existing calls.
. Call Detail Records (CDR)—A record produced by a phone system containing details of calls that have passed through it. They track information such as the number of the calling party, the number of the called party, the time of call initiation, the duration of the call, the route by which the call was routed, and any fault condition encountered. These records might be used for cross billing, for tracking of an employee’s usage of the system, or for monitoring system uptime and issues.
. Client Access License (CAL)—A software license that entitles a user to access specific systems or specific features in a system. Usually these come in two flavors: Standard and Enterprise.
. Common Intermediate Format (CIF)—A format used to standardize the vertical and horizontal resolutions in video signals, often in video conferencing systems.
. Communicator Web Access (CWA)—The browser-based Communicator client provided by Lync Server.
. Direct Inward Dialing (DID)—A service offered by telephone companies wherein one or more trunk links is provided to a customer for connection to the customer’s PBX. Incoming calls are routed to internal destination numbers at the PBX. This enables a company to have significantly more internal lines than it does external lines.
. Dual-tone multi-frequency (DTMF)—A method for providing telecommunication
signaling over analog telephones lines in the voice frequency band. DTMF is also
referred to as Touch Tone. This technology enables users to initiate events in the
phone system by simply pressing a button on a keypad.
. Extensible Markup Language (XML)—A set of rules for encoding documents in a
machine-readable format. The goal of XML is to be a simple and open standard for
representing arbitrary data structures, most often in web services.
. Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol (XMPP)—An open, XML-based protocol designed to provide near real-time extensible IM and presence information. It has since expanded into VoIP and file transfer signaling.
. Hardware Load Balancing (HLB)—A method of distributing a workload across multiple computers to optimize resource utilization, increase throughput, and provide a level of redundancy through the use of an external hardware device.
. IM—A form of real-time, direct, text-based communication between multiple parties. IM is sometimes referred to as online chat.
. Interactive Voice Response (IVR)—A technology that enables a system to detect voice and dual-tone multifrequency inputs. IVR is often used in telecommunications for automated decision trees. This technology powers concepts such as “press 1 for English” when providing for call routing.
. Mean Opinion Score (MOS)—In multimedia, MOS provides a numerical indication of the perceived quality of a call after compression and/or transmissions. MOS is expressed as a single number ranging from 1 to 5 where 1 is the lowest perceived audio quality and 5 is the highest perceived audio quality.
. Network Address Translation (NAT)—A method of modifying network address information when packets pass through a traffic routing device. This effectively remaps a packet from one IP space to another. NAT is common in home usage where multiple computers with a private IP addressing site behind a router or firewall that holds a publically routable address. NAT maps a port back to the initiating internal host and reroutes responses back to the originating host.
. Network Load Balancing (NLB)—A method of distributing a workload across multiple computers to optimize resource utilization, increase throughput, and provide a level of redundancy through the use of software running in the operating system.
. Personal Identification Number (PIN)—A secret numeric password shared between a user and a system that is used to authenticate the user to the system.
. PSTN—The network of the world’s public circuit-switched telephone networks. The first company to provide PSTN services was Bell Telephone.
. Plain Old Telephone Service (POTS)—Another term for a PSTN.
. Private Branch Exchange (PBX)—A telephone system that serves a particular business or office as opposed to a common carrier or a system for the general public. This is what traditionally provides voice services to companies that are connected to the local exchange to provide external connectivity for telephone calls.
. Quality of Experience (QoE)—A subjective measure of a customer’s experiences with a vendor or service.
. Quality of Service (QoS)—A mechanism to control resource reservation in a system; typically, it is a method to prioritize various traffic types to ensure a minimum level of performance for a particular type of traffic.
. Real Time Protocol (RTP)—A standardized packet format for delivering audio and video over the Internet. RTP’s claim to fame is the capability to deal with large amounts of packet loss before the impact on the call becomes noticeable.
. Remote Call Control (RCC)—A method of utilizing a phone resource on one system with a resource on another. Typically, in the context of Lync Server, this is the capability to use a Communicator client to place a call through a desk phone that is controlled by a PBX rather than by Lync Server.
. SIP—An Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) defined protocol used for controlling multimedia communications sessions. The goal of SIP is to provide a common signaling and call setup protocol for IP-based communications.
. SIP for Instant Messaging and Presence Leveraging Extensions (SIMPLE)—An open standard protocol suite that provides for the registration of presence information and the receipt of presence status notifications.
. Survivable Branch Appliance (SBA)—A combination of Registrar, Mediation Server, and PSTN gateway that is designed to maintain most voice services for a site that has lost connectivity to the main Lync Server site.
. Role Based Access Control (RBAC)—An approach to restricting system access to authorized users by granting the rights based on the role served by the user. This normally results in granular permissions with an eye toward granting the minimum level of rights needed to perform a task.
. Transmission Control Protocol (TCP)—Generally considered one of the core protocols of the Internet. TCP is a protocol that provides reliable ordered delivery of a stream of packets from one device to another. TCP has the reliability advantage of performing an acknowledgement of receipt of a packet back to the sender. This acknowledgement, however, comes at a performance price and ultimately limits the scalability of TCP.’
. Uniform Resource Identifier (URI)—A string of characters used to identify a name or a resource on the Internet. This allows interaction with representations of the resource over a network, often the Internet, using various protocols.
. User Datagram Protocol (UDP)—Another method of delivering a stream of packets from one device to another. UDP does not attempt to order or verify delivery of packets, nor does it need to first initiate a conversation with a destination host via a handshake. This behavior makes it faster and more scalable than TCP, but ultimately, it is less reliable.
. Virtual Private Network (VPN)—A method of passing packets across a public network in a secured and authenticated manner. VPNs enables users to access their private corporate networks through connections to the public Internet.
. Voice over IP (VoIP)—A generic term for transmission technologies that deliver voice communications over IP-based networks. Also referred to as IP Telephony or Internet Telephony.
Source of Information : Pearson-Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Unleashed
. Call Detail Records (CDR)—A record produced by a phone system containing details of calls that have passed through it. They track information such as the number of the calling party, the number of the called party, the time of call initiation, the duration of the call, the route by which the call was routed, and any fault condition encountered. These records might be used for cross billing, for tracking of an employee’s usage of the system, or for monitoring system uptime and issues.
. Client Access License (CAL)—A software license that entitles a user to access specific systems or specific features in a system. Usually these come in two flavors: Standard and Enterprise.
. Common Intermediate Format (CIF)—A format used to standardize the vertical and horizontal resolutions in video signals, often in video conferencing systems.
. Communicator Web Access (CWA)—The browser-based Communicator client provided by Lync Server.
. Direct Inward Dialing (DID)—A service offered by telephone companies wherein one or more trunk links is provided to a customer for connection to the customer’s PBX. Incoming calls are routed to internal destination numbers at the PBX. This enables a company to have significantly more internal lines than it does external lines.
. Dual-tone multi-frequency (DTMF)—A method for providing telecommunication
signaling over analog telephones lines in the voice frequency band. DTMF is also
referred to as Touch Tone. This technology enables users to initiate events in the
phone system by simply pressing a button on a keypad.
. Extensible Markup Language (XML)—A set of rules for encoding documents in a
machine-readable format. The goal of XML is to be a simple and open standard for
representing arbitrary data structures, most often in web services.
. Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol (XMPP)—An open, XML-based protocol designed to provide near real-time extensible IM and presence information. It has since expanded into VoIP and file transfer signaling.
. Hardware Load Balancing (HLB)—A method of distributing a workload across multiple computers to optimize resource utilization, increase throughput, and provide a level of redundancy through the use of an external hardware device.
. IM—A form of real-time, direct, text-based communication between multiple parties. IM is sometimes referred to as online chat.
. Interactive Voice Response (IVR)—A technology that enables a system to detect voice and dual-tone multifrequency inputs. IVR is often used in telecommunications for automated decision trees. This technology powers concepts such as “press 1 for English” when providing for call routing.
. Mean Opinion Score (MOS)—In multimedia, MOS provides a numerical indication of the perceived quality of a call after compression and/or transmissions. MOS is expressed as a single number ranging from 1 to 5 where 1 is the lowest perceived audio quality and 5 is the highest perceived audio quality.
. Network Address Translation (NAT)—A method of modifying network address information when packets pass through a traffic routing device. This effectively remaps a packet from one IP space to another. NAT is common in home usage where multiple computers with a private IP addressing site behind a router or firewall that holds a publically routable address. NAT maps a port back to the initiating internal host and reroutes responses back to the originating host.
. Network Load Balancing (NLB)—A method of distributing a workload across multiple computers to optimize resource utilization, increase throughput, and provide a level of redundancy through the use of software running in the operating system.
. Personal Identification Number (PIN)—A secret numeric password shared between a user and a system that is used to authenticate the user to the system.
. PSTN—The network of the world’s public circuit-switched telephone networks. The first company to provide PSTN services was Bell Telephone.
. Plain Old Telephone Service (POTS)—Another term for a PSTN.
. Private Branch Exchange (PBX)—A telephone system that serves a particular business or office as opposed to a common carrier or a system for the general public. This is what traditionally provides voice services to companies that are connected to the local exchange to provide external connectivity for telephone calls.
. Quality of Experience (QoE)—A subjective measure of a customer’s experiences with a vendor or service.
. Quality of Service (QoS)—A mechanism to control resource reservation in a system; typically, it is a method to prioritize various traffic types to ensure a minimum level of performance for a particular type of traffic.
. Real Time Protocol (RTP)—A standardized packet format for delivering audio and video over the Internet. RTP’s claim to fame is the capability to deal with large amounts of packet loss before the impact on the call becomes noticeable.
. Remote Call Control (RCC)—A method of utilizing a phone resource on one system with a resource on another. Typically, in the context of Lync Server, this is the capability to use a Communicator client to place a call through a desk phone that is controlled by a PBX rather than by Lync Server.
. SIP—An Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) defined protocol used for controlling multimedia communications sessions. The goal of SIP is to provide a common signaling and call setup protocol for IP-based communications.
. SIP for Instant Messaging and Presence Leveraging Extensions (SIMPLE)—An open standard protocol suite that provides for the registration of presence information and the receipt of presence status notifications.
. Survivable Branch Appliance (SBA)—A combination of Registrar, Mediation Server, and PSTN gateway that is designed to maintain most voice services for a site that has lost connectivity to the main Lync Server site.
. Role Based Access Control (RBAC)—An approach to restricting system access to authorized users by granting the rights based on the role served by the user. This normally results in granular permissions with an eye toward granting the minimum level of rights needed to perform a task.
. Transmission Control Protocol (TCP)—Generally considered one of the core protocols of the Internet. TCP is a protocol that provides reliable ordered delivery of a stream of packets from one device to another. TCP has the reliability advantage of performing an acknowledgement of receipt of a packet back to the sender. This acknowledgement, however, comes at a performance price and ultimately limits the scalability of TCP.’
. Uniform Resource Identifier (URI)—A string of characters used to identify a name or a resource on the Internet. This allows interaction with representations of the resource over a network, often the Internet, using various protocols.
. User Datagram Protocol (UDP)—Another method of delivering a stream of packets from one device to another. UDP does not attempt to order or verify delivery of packets, nor does it need to first initiate a conversation with a destination host via a handshake. This behavior makes it faster and more scalable than TCP, but ultimately, it is less reliable.
. Virtual Private Network (VPN)—A method of passing packets across a public network in a secured and authenticated manner. VPNs enables users to access their private corporate networks through connections to the public Internet.
. Voice over IP (VoIP)—A generic term for transmission technologies that deliver voice communications over IP-based networks. Also referred to as IP Telephony or Internet Telephony.
Source of Information : Pearson-Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Unleashed
What Is Microsoft Lync Server?
Lync Server is the latest incarnation of a product line dating back to 2000. Microsoft has made a substantial commitment to providing a single integrated communications suite that enables users to communicate with each other more easily. Lync Server represents a fundamental shift in how telephony is handled. Lync Server attempts to remove telephony from dedicated systems such as Private Branch Exchanges (PBX) and places them in a software based infrastructure that can more easily adapt to changing needs and so they can be extended to provide new functionality as technologies change.
Picture a world in which users are no longer tied to a single device for their communication endpoint. They can choose to use a traditional style desk phone, a headset attached to a laptop, or a mobile device to place and receive calls. Not only do they have these choices, but these choices also don’t need to be static. Rather than being assigned a phone and a phone number, a user can log into any supported phone with his own identity and that phone becomes his phone. Calls to users are routed to this device or other devices that they have requested and ring at the same time. Rich presence information in the system enables a user to know whether another user is available even before picking up the phone to call the user.
Lync Server attempts to enable users to alter their forms of communications seamlessly as the situation demands without having to make drastic changes. For example, Andrew might have a question for Sean. Andrew looks at his Lync Server client and sees that Sean is listed as available. As such, Andrew sends Sean an Instant Message via Communications Server asking him whether he has a moment for a question. Sean replies, “Yes.” After a few messages, Sean determines that Andrew’s question is a little complicated to handle over IM and suggests they speak by phone. Andrew is able to convert the IM to a point-to-point voice chat with a single click. Now Andrew and Sean are able to speak directly. After a few minutes, Andrew determines that he still doesn’t quite understand what Sean is explaining and asks whether Sean could show him what he means. At this point, Andrew converts the call to a video conference with application sharing. Sean is able to draw out his explanation via his favorite application and explains it as he goes by simply talking.
In this scenario, everything can be accomplished by two people on beaches over laptops. Lync Server doesn’t require participants to reserve video conferencing resources ahead of time, to schedule conferences, or even to use specific hardware. Through these functions, Lync Server is able to make the world a much smaller place by enabling users to dynamically control their own communications and to be available almost anywhere at most any time.
Source of Information : Pearson-Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Unleashed
Picture a world in which users are no longer tied to a single device for their communication endpoint. They can choose to use a traditional style desk phone, a headset attached to a laptop, or a mobile device to place and receive calls. Not only do they have these choices, but these choices also don’t need to be static. Rather than being assigned a phone and a phone number, a user can log into any supported phone with his own identity and that phone becomes his phone. Calls to users are routed to this device or other devices that they have requested and ring at the same time. Rich presence information in the system enables a user to know whether another user is available even before picking up the phone to call the user.
Lync Server attempts to enable users to alter their forms of communications seamlessly as the situation demands without having to make drastic changes. For example, Andrew might have a question for Sean. Andrew looks at his Lync Server client and sees that Sean is listed as available. As such, Andrew sends Sean an Instant Message via Communications Server asking him whether he has a moment for a question. Sean replies, “Yes.” After a few messages, Sean determines that Andrew’s question is a little complicated to handle over IM and suggests they speak by phone. Andrew is able to convert the IM to a point-to-point voice chat with a single click. Now Andrew and Sean are able to speak directly. After a few minutes, Andrew determines that he still doesn’t quite understand what Sean is explaining and asks whether Sean could show him what he means. At this point, Andrew converts the call to a video conference with application sharing. Sean is able to draw out his explanation via his favorite application and explains it as he goes by simply talking.
In this scenario, everything can be accomplished by two people on beaches over laptops. Lync Server doesn’t require participants to reserve video conferencing resources ahead of time, to schedule conferences, or even to use specific hardware. Through these functions, Lync Server is able to make the world a much smaller place by enabling users to dynamically control their own communications and to be available almost anywhere at most any time.
Source of Information : Pearson-Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Unleashed
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