May 31 2008 12:47PM GMT
Posted by: Tony Bradley
OCS,
Mac Messenger 7.0,
Unified Communications,
UCC,
UC,
Mac,
Microsoft,
Evangelyze,
Office Communications Server 2007,
Joe Schurman,
OCS 2007,
Office Communications Server
If you are a Mac user, as an ever-increasing percentage of you seem to be, you may be feeling left out of the unified communications revolution. As Microsoft, Cisco, Avaya, IBM, and a host of smaller players all vie to establish their share of the UC pie, the Mac operating system has been largely ignored. According to Evangelyze Founder and Executive Director Joe Schurman, Microsoft has changed that with the introduction of Mac Messenger 7.0. This initial step at integrating Macs with Office Communications Server 2007 does not include Live Meeting or enterprise voice support, but it does enable Mac users to benefit from video, audio, presence, and instant messaging with other users in an OCS 2007 / UCC infrastructure.
May 31 2008 12:36PM GMT
Posted by: Tony Bradley
sync,
Live Messenger,
Mobile device,
Unified Communications,
UC,
Mary-Jo Foley,
Echoes,
Microsoft,
presence
In a recent post on the ‘All About Microsoft’ blog at ZDNet, Mary-Jo Foley describes an ambitious plan already in the works from Microsoft that seeks to eliminate the need for phone numbers. The project, codenamed ‘Echoes’, is being developed and incubated by Microsoft’s Israeli Strategic Development Center. The short-term plan apparently involves engaging telcom providers to partner up to provide a common network address book, to SMS in/out messaging, simultaneous ringing, click-to-call, single-sign on and more for their mobile phone users. In a nutshell, the goal seems to be a move toward greater convergence of the unified communications components (email, voicemail, instant messaging, presence, etc.) that will result in simplified communications that can be initiated by just knowing a user’s name rather than having to know, or look up their phone number.
May 31 2008 12:24PM GMT
Posted by: Tony Bradley
UCC,
UC,
Unified Communications,
Mike Stacy,
Evangelyze,
certificate,
OCS,
Office Communications Server 2007
Certificates are a key component of enabling communications between the various components of Microsoft UCC implementation. The OCS server maintains certificates with the various servers in order to facilitate secure communications. Having the certificates expire unexpectedly means losing communications unexpectedly, so admins need to be proactive about ensuring certificates are renewed or replaced before they expire. Mike Stacy, a Director at Evangelyze, discusses how to monitor OCS for certificate expiration.
May 31 2008 12:16PM GMT
Posted by: Tony Bradley
UC,
VoIP,
Unified Communications,
Nortel,
Dallas,
Global Connect 2008
This is admittedly very short notice, but in my defense I just learned of this conference myself and its in my ‘back yard’ so to speak. The Global Connect 2008 conference is being held at the Gaylord Texan Resort in Grapevine, TX near Dallas starting tomorrow, June 1. Actually, for some there is even a Leadership Conference being held today. The stuff going on Sunday is primarily Special Interest Group meetings and such, along with a reception being hosted by Nortel. Nortel’s President of Enterprise Solutions, Joel Hackney, is also kicking off the general session with a keynote speech. For more details about the conference and what you can expect to see or learn there, take a look at the Advance Program.
May 25 2008 3:03AM GMT
Posted by: Tony Bradley
TMobile,
AT&T,
Starbucks,
wifi hotspot,
Wireless
I have never understood why Starbucks charged for their wifi hotspot access. I understood why TMobile wanted to make some money off of the deal, but wifi hotspots are everywhere. I like Starbucks, but Panera has free wifi, other coffee shops, bakeries, and restaurants have free wifi. Heck, I got new tires on my car the other day and the tire store offered free wifi in the waiting room. The Internet is available for free virtually anywhere, so I could never understand why someone would pay $20 or $30 a month, or even worse $10 a day, for the privilege of accessing it at a Starbucks. Well, no more! Almost. AT&T has won the contract for Starbucks from TMobile and they are offering a revamped pricing structure. Subscribers to the AT&T broadband Internet service will be able to access the Starbucks wifi for free. Patrons who use a Starbucks card, will be able to access the Starbucks wifi for free for the first 2 hours per day. Additional time will cost money, but less than patrons are used to paying for the TMobile wifi hotspot access. Now, if McDonald’s would get on the free wifi bandwagon too American caffeine and fast food consumers will be all set.
May 22 2008 8:57PM GMT
Posted by: Tony Bradley
International Trade Commission,
ITC,
Alcatel-Lucent,
patent,
lawsuit,
UCC,
UC,
unified communication,
Microsoft
Microsoft is heavily invested in unified communications and they have developed a fair amount of proprietary tools and technologies- many of which they hold patents for. They filed a lawsuit against Alcatel-Lucent for infringing on 4 of their unified communications patents, and originally Alcatel-Lucent was found guilty of violating one of the four patents. This week the ITC overturned that ruling and found in favor of Alcatel-Lucent. This is following the April decision by the ITC in a related countersuit that found Microsoft guilty of violating two Alcatel-Lucent patents in which Microsoft was ordered to pay almost $370 million in damages. The war is not over though between these two. Maybe Microsoft should just buy Alcatel-Lucent and then there won’t be any further allegations of patent infringement?
May 12 2008 3:33PM GMT
Posted by: Tony Bradley
Unified Communications,
UCC,
release,
update,
Q4,
R2,
Office Communications Server,
OCS 2009,
OCS 2007,
Microsoft
There is a rumor in the blogosphere that Microsoft may release an update to Office Communications Server 2007 this fall. The next major release of Office Communications Server is expected to be OCS 2009. However, according to at least one blog, Microsoft may release OCS 2007 R2 in Q4 of this year to update OCS 2007. As quickly as the unified communications landscape changes, an R2 of OCS 2007 would make sense. There are a variety of features and functions that customers want and need, and if Microsoft makes them wait until 2009 or later for the next major OCS release, those customers might invest in alternative solutions that meet their needs now. There is no confirmation of the rumor from Microsoft, and no details currently available regarding what updates or features might be included in R2.
May 10 2008 1:27PM GMT
Posted by: Tony Bradley
web browser,
fax,
voicemail,
email,
Telephony Office-LinX,
Esnatech,
Gmail,
Google
The Gmail web-based email client from Google is one of the most popular email clients currently in use. Using a web-based email solution means that a user is never farther from their email than the nearest web browser. That could be at home, at work, at a public library, or even on a mobile phone. Now, the speed and availability of Gmail can also be leveraged as part of a unified communications solution using Esnatech’s Telephony Office-LinX. Office-LinX allows companies to tie their PBX-based and mobile phones in with Google’s applications, including GMail. That same search functionality that lets users find a keyword in an email from 7 months ago will also be able to help users locate voicemails and faxes.
May 10 2008 12:38PM GMT
Posted by: Tony Bradley
Mobile,
BlackBerry,
UCC,
UC,
Unified Communications,
Office Commmunications Server,
OCS,
Microsoft
The Palm Pilot started the handheld PIM (Personal Information Manager) trend, but the RIM (Research In Motion) Blackberry handheld is the device that revolutionized information management by merging it with a mobile phone and incorporating enterprise email on the go. Unified communications seeks to bring that type of on-the-go communications to a whole new level, but the Blackberry was left sitting on the bench…until now. WebMessenger has introduced WebMessenger Mobile for Microsoft OCS, an application for Microsoft OCS which delivers some of the unified communications capabilities of OCS to the Blackberry handheld device. This first generation version essentially only provides IM and IM presence. WebMessenger is working with telecommunications switch vendors to incorporate presence on the phone side as well.
