Connectivity:

Microsoft

Jun 30 2008   4:21PM GMT

Information Overload



Posted by: Tony Bradley
Office Communicator Mobile, Office Communicator, Microsoft Voice, VoIP, IT education, user training, UC, Microsoft, Unified Communications

Unified Communications helps companies to communicate more effectively and efficiently. It is also seen by many as being always connected and never being able to be unavailable. By phone, email, voicemail, instant messaging, from your computer, your cell phone, your laptop, or any web-based portal, workers can access tools and communicate. But, what happens when they don’t want to be available? This article from TechTarget’s SearchUnifiedCommunications examines the issues and some potential solutions. In my opinion, education is a key ingredient. Many organizations jump on the technology bandwagon, but don’t give their workers the information and the education they need to use the tools effectively. Tools like Microsoft’s Office Communicator (and its portable counterpart Office Communicator Mobile) enable workers to communicate anywhere, any time. However, users can also control that access. They can set their Presence to Do Not Disturb. They can configure the level of access for their contacts so that key people- team members, managers- can see their true availability, while the rest of the world sees their Away. When calls come in via Microsoft UC Voice, the worker can send them straight to voicemail, or right-click and port them to email or voicemail if they are not available to take the call. In order to realize the benefits of effective and efficient communications, organizations need to provide end-user training in the proper use of the tools and how to work with the more advanced capabilities as well.

Jun 30 2008   2:32PM GMT

Integrating Avaya with Microsoft UC



Posted by: Tony Bradley
ROI, Unified Communications, UCC, UC, integration, Microsoft, Avaya

One of the promises of unified communications, particularly Microsoft Unified Communications, is the ability to leverage the existing telecommunications infrastructure. Selling UC to upper management and proving the ROI is significantly more difficult if it means ripping out and disposing of the entire existing communications infrastructure to replace it with a new UC infrastructure. Avaya wants to make that integration and incremental adoption that much easier by providing detailed guidance for making it happen with Extend the Value of Microsoft Office Applications with Avaya Unified Communications.


Jun 30 2008   3:29AM GMT

Cutting Edge Microsoft UC



Posted by: Tony Bradley
VoIP, OCS 2007, SIP, Virtualization, hyper-v, new global telecom, ngt, Unified Communications, UCC, UC, Microsoft

Microsoft has put a fair amount of marketing muscle into their Unified Communications offering. Many organizations are busy architecting, deploying, and implementing the various components- Exchange Server 2007, Office Communications Server 2007, the OCS 2007 Mediation Server, etc. The standard, supported configuration involves separate server hardware for most of the components, and an on-site PBX solution. Evangelyze Communications however, working with VoIP provider NGT (New Global Telecom) has built a fully functional Microsoft Unified Communications deployment running almost entirely virtualized in Hyper-V, and connected remotely to a hosted VoIP service. You can learn more from Mike Stacy’s blog: Hosted Gateway/SIP Trunk with OCS. The result is a Microsoft Unified Communications deployment with significant cost savings in terms of hardware and infrastructure.


Jun 7 2008   1:56PM GMT

Unified Communications in the Call Center



Posted by: Tony Bradley
customer service, latency, call center, Aspect, Microsoft, Unified Communications, UC

Microsoft has a unified communications offering for small and medium businesses (SMB) with Response Point. They also have a more robust solution for enterprises providing even more features, functionality, and power for unified communications with Microsoft UC. What they do’t have, or at least didn’t have, is a unified communications solution for call centers, or other businesses that rely on communications more than standard businesses at an almost exponential level. The have formed a partnership with Aspect, a company that focuses on delivering innovative solutions for customer service and call centers. Combining the power and flexibility of Microsoft’s Office Communications Server 2007 with Aspect Unified IP delivers next-generation communications for call centers. There are still some hurdles to cross. Aside from delivering unified communications capabilities to the call center, the solution also has to offer high availability and resiliency to ensure communications are not disrupted even in the event of a server, or complete site catastrophe.


Jun 5 2008   2:42PM GMT

Planning Capacity and Bandwidth for OCS 2007



Posted by: Tony Bradley
Director of Professional Services, Evangelyze, Mike Stacy, VoIP, Unified Communications, UCC, UC, OCS 2007, Office Communications Server, Microsoft, calculator, capacity, bandwidth

One of the most important factors in a successful VoIP or unified communications implementation is ensuring that adequate server processing horsepower and network bandwidth exist to handle the load. Streaming audio and video are less tolerant of latency and packet fragmentation, and the infrastructure has to be capable of meeting the demands of unified communications. Mike Stacy, Director of Professional Services for Evangelyze, has created an OCS Capacity and Bandwidth Calculator. The calculations to determine the number of users a given server can support, or the bandwidth capacity necessary for those users to use unified communications technologies are contained in an Excel spreadsheet which Stacy makes available for free.


Jun 5 2008   2:33AM GMT

A Look at Aastra’s Response Point System



Posted by: Tony Bradley
VoIP, UCC, UC, Unified Communications, D-Link, Syspine, Quanta, Aastra, SIP, Response Point, Microsoft, Allen Miller

Microsoft’s Response Point phone system will have a third hardware provider very soon. Quanta (Syspine) and D-Link have already been providing Response Point base units and phones, and now the long awaited Aastra phone system is nearly ready for prime time. The Microsoft Response Point system offers small and medium businesses many of the features and functions of larger enterprise-level unified communications voice solutions, in a cost-effective and exceptionally simple system. Aastra, aside from just being the third vendor on the block to offer Response Point equipment, is also the first to provide a cordless phone handset option that works with Response Point. Ohio-based consultant Allen Miller shows off some pictures of his beta system and talks a little about the Aastra equipment on his blog. Miller also talks in another post about his experience using the Aastra Response Point phones to conduct a call over VoIP while also loading his network down with additional activity. Overall, Miller gives the Aastra system high marks and says that his call was crystal clear even with the extra network traffic.


May 31 2008   1:28PM GMT

D-Link Takes on Cisco for UC Switching



Posted by: Tony Bradley
switch, Unified Communications, UCC, UC, Response Point, Microsoft, Cisco, D-Link

D-Link, an established name in consumer wired and wireless networking, is targeting rival Cisco to deliver switching solutions for unified communications. D-Link is one of the primary partners with Microsoft for their Response Point communications package, a simple, cost-effective product for small and medium businesses (SMB) which provides many of the benefits of an enterprise unified communications implementation without the cost or complexity. D-Link plans to deliver a range of products aimed at providing unified communications for the SMB market, and they envision being able to achieve 50 percent profit margins in this hot, cutting edge arena.


May 31 2008   12:47PM GMT

Microsoft Brings UC to Mac



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

Microsoft ‘Echoes’ Aims to Get Rid of Phone Numbers



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 22 2008   8:57PM GMT

ITC Overturns Microsoft Victory Over Alcatel-Lucent



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?