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PowerShell for OCS admins, resistance is futile...
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In a recent blog post made by Tom Laciano, he hints that as with other Microsoft products, OCS 2010 is likely to follow suit by adopting PowerShell for command line based administratration.
Taken from the LCSKid Blog:
"No I don’t have a lab running with W14 but I am supposed to have one and really should have it by end of week but I seem to continue getting distracted and the one thing I will share as a heavy hint – get those PowerShell skills started if you haven’t already."
Source: here
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UC Expo 2010 coverage
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Unified Communications Expo, is the UK's largest event dedicated to Messaging, Conferencing and Collaboration for the Enterprise. It is an annual event, hosted out of Olympia in Earl's Court, London. Today was day one of two days (10-11th March) - I won't be there tomorrow, got to get back to the day job!
There was an excellent array of UC related products and seminars to be seen, so without further of do I will cover off those that impressed me the most by way of three separate posts entitled:
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Battle of the Video Conferencing Vendors aka Polycom vs Tandberg
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Okay, so perhaps I am being a little melodramatic, Polycom and Tandberg are not literally at each other's throats...not yet anyways! However they are both aggressively battling it out to become the no.1 vendor for all things that surround video conferencing - as you can imagine UC and Office Communications Server is definately a space they want to dominate.
However to their credit they have both taken (from what it seems) a very different plan of attack...
- Polycom have decided to launch a range of devices (HDX Series) that not only have an embedded Communicator-esque client, but also interrogate scheduling information within Microsoft Exchange (2007 support now, 2010 later). This effectively allows your video conferencing device to become a resource within your Exchange address list and along with the Outlook plug-in (Polycom Conferencing for Outlook or PCO) meetings can be setup entirely by calendar request.
- Tandberg however are very happy to admit that none of their devices utilise the OCS infrastructure for setup of conference calls, instead they have decided to integrate legacy (credit: Paul Jones) H.323 video conferencing devices with OCS and with crisp HD video. This could be a sweet spot for many businesses that have already invested heavily in this area and wish to avoid a "rip-and-replace" approach. For a complete deployment a range of back-end video servers are required (VC Gateway for internal integration, an ISDN gateway and a VCS Expressway for the edge of your networks or DMZ) - see illustration below.
The Polycom HDX 4000, this is signed via OCS and contact presence can be seen.
Controlled via integrated console
Exchange scheduling information
Integration with desktop MOC video conferencing
The Polycom stand
An exciting range of technology from Polycom and Tandberg, now all I need is my boss to write me a blank cheque, hmmmm....
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Microsoft Unified Communications Platform Futures (a seminar presented by Brett Johnson)
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This was one of the most talked about presentations to take place at UC Expo, primarily because it promised a sneak peek at what was coming later this year (Q4) with Office Communications Server Wave 14 aka OCS 2010. Even the Redmond based OCS product guys tweeted "DON'T MISS THIS!
Microsoft Unified Communications Platform Futures session at UCExpo. @ "
However this was not meant to be and Microsoft marketing were blamed for a last minute stop on any juicy information, if you look at Brett's opening slide it reads "Microsoft Unified Communications Platform Futures* (*sort of)". Nevertheless Brett put on a good show, points of interest include:
- VoiceCon will uncover more on OCS 2010 and not UC Expo
- Microsoft Reading (TVP) was closed during recent snow days (3 days), OCS provided remote communications for all employees with no business or system impact
- Microsoft are leaders in UC (as awarded by Gartner's 2009 Magic Quadrant)
- Demo calls were run via 3G tethering (MS didn't pay for conference Internet!)
- OCS 2010 will cause major disruption within the telephony space - hailed as the first version of OCS to truly replace the office PBX!
- Some of the slides were taken from Chris Mayo's presentation at PDC 2009
During a brief discussion with Brett I asked "What PBX functionality will OCS 2010 offer over and above of OCS 2007", to which he replied "Everything". Thanks Brett! 
All I can say is roll-on March 24th where hopefully Gurdeep Singh Pall will share more at VoiceCon
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StartReady OCS Appliance & Round-up
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Deploying OCS can be quite complex and you could say server sprawl is included "out of the box"! But the folks at StartReady have come up with the first ever OCS 2007 R2 Appliance. With a ridiculously easy to use web based setup wizard, they claim you can have your OCS environment setup in a matter of minutes. I did of course challenge them on this and to my amazement it was true - the PSTN break-out is achieved via SIP trunking over the Internet or private network. All the roles are virtualised, which then led to my question "Is this supported by Microsoft?" and apparently it is? Costs start at £12k
So there we have it folks, another exciting UC Expo. Please do feel free to let me know if I have missed off anything worth mentioning, with that I will leave you with some pictures from the event...
Picture of the StartReady UC Appliance in all it's glory... (well how exciting do you expect a custom built server to be?)
The Microsoft stand
Until next time...
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My article is up on Microsoft "Next Hop"
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Next Hop is a Microsoft TechNet portal dedicated to Unified Communications, specifically Office Communications Server. Articles are written by the Microsoft product groups, experienced field engineers, MVPs and in this case ME!
I asked (begged) if Dr. Rez if he would consider a new contributor and my wish was granted. Check out my article, entitled "Unified Communications and Its Impact on IT and the Business from Delivery to a Year and Beyond".
Thanks - Dr. Rez and Susan Bradley
Next Hop Homepage - here
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Exchange Team posts part 2 of "Call Answering Rules" for Exchange 2010
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Exchange (and Outlook) is the conduit whereby users can access new e-mail, contacts, calendar, news (RSS), voicemail (Exchange Unified Messaging) and presence (via OCS and your Communicator client).
Exchange 2010 extends the unified messaging functionality by offering the end user more control over call answering, this is achieved by adding a free/busy aware rule based system. In essence you (the user) have the capability to setup your own "follow-me" service, not too dissimiliar from Google Voice.
In a recent blog post this functionality is looked at in greater detail.
Source: here
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Video: How Microsoft IT deployed Unified Communications
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Check out an interesting video on how Microsoft's own IT department deployed Office Communications Server 2007 R2 and views from key members of staff. The post-UC views expressed within the video are definately shared by the organisation I work for.
Taken from TechNet Edge:
Unified Communications at Microsoft supports over 40,000 users. Multiple communications tools such as e-mail, Instant Messaging, voice mail, voice, and presence are delivered in a unified experience which is available anywhere. Because multiple and disparate communication systems have been consolidated and in sourced onto a single solution, the ability to manage and measure the environment is enhanced.
Source: here
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Interested in an OCS 2010 sneak peek?
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Of course you are! For those who are not already aware, Microsoft are attending the upcoming UC Expo in Olympia, London. Brett Johnson, a technical lead in the Microsoft Unified Communications group, will present an early preview of OCS Wave 14 (aka OCS 2010), this session (Wednesday 10th March 11:50 AM - 12:20 PM) is rumoured to take place "two weeks earlier than the official public beta launch".
For UC enthusiasts in the UK, I have seen Brett present Exchange and OCS previously and I have no doubt that this will be a show to not be missed - see you there!
For more information on the up and coming OCS release, read my previous posts.
Source: here
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R.I.P. Innovative Communications Alliance (ICA)
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Previously I mentioned that during the "integrated roadmap" announcement there was continued collaboration with Microsoft technologies, I had mistaken this to mean that the existing agreement (entered back in July 2006 and expected to terminate this July) would continue and possibly renew. However only 2 days since the AvayaN strategy was announced the ICA site (and my case study!) was taken down. This now re-directs to a Microsoft Gold Partner page within the existing Avaya site.
When I asked Avaya for more information on this, the following statement was released:
"The ICA relationship ceased with the Avaya acquisition of Nortel Enterprise Solutions. ICA was based on a four year contract between Nortel and Microsoft that was already scheduled to expire within the year. Avaya has and will continue to work closely with Microsoft to ensure tight integration between our solutions providing customers the greatest flexibility in deploying UC solutions. Current customers with Microsoft OCS integrations with Nortel solutions can continue to utilize their solution as they do today. Avaya is a Microsoft Gold development partner and has been integrating with Microsoft products across their portfolio for well over a decade - including Windows, Active Directory, Exchange, Outlook, Internet Explorer, Office, CRM, and, of course, OCS and Office Communicator. These integrations are important customer requirements that we are committed to continuing. We understand the somewhat more competitive situation that Microsoft has established, but Avaya has a lot of experience of working with competitors to ensure integration and interoperability to meet our customers' business needs.
We believe that the combination of Avaya communications with Microsoft OCS and Office products is the most powerful end-to-end solution for Microsoft customers in the market, and are continuing to invest and enhance all our solutions in this area. "
Shame...but not surprising, especially given the threat that OCS brings to the traditional PABX vendors. I'd imagine it would be unlikely for this agreement to be re-established.
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The first round of iPhone 3G VoIP apps are released to the app store
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Since the announcement of the iPad and Apple's new software development kit, VoIP is now permitted over 3G - yay! Previously a hack known as 3Gunrestrictor was used to trick the iPhone into sending illegal data over the 3G network, as expected this was broken regularly by iPhone OS updates.
Applications released to date include:
I have already made a Skype-out call via Fring over Vodafone's 3G network and I can confirm success!
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iPad does VoIP, but is it filling a hole that needs plugging?
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Last night Apple hosted their 2010 media event and as expected a the much hyped new tablet style device was launched, namely the “iPad”. Apple’s CEO Steve Jobs touted the iPad to fill the gap between mobile phone and laptop, but does this requirement really exist?
Personally speaking I find the lack of full Mac OS X makes the device quite unattractive, essentially rendering the iPad as an overgrown iPhone.
Other negatives include:
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No camera
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No Flash
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10 hours battery life (how can this compete with other e-ink based eBook readers)
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No flash memory slot
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No interchangeable batter (usual Apple story)
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Limited to AppStore applications only
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No hard keyboard (without keyboard dock)
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No multi-tasking
It does however have a microphone, speaker/headset socket and given the recent changes to VoIP over 3G (introduced in Apple’s latest iPhone SDK) it would make for a another piece of kit you could make a call home with! But surely you could just use the iPhone for this purpose?
I have a tablet, with Windows 7/multi-touch I might add, why would I need anything else?
A video preview of the iPad can be seen below.
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Microsoft IT cuts telelphony costs by deploying OCS 2007 R2 (bet they got a good deal on their CALs!)
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Deploying OCS definitely delivers cost benefits, R2 specifically offers an in-built conference bridge service - many enterprise spend £1,000's on managed offerings. Brett Johnson explains how MS UK saved in excess of £3.5 in one year!
Taken from Brett Johnson's Blog:
I needed to get permission to post this, but now I have, here is our real example of how Office Communications Server R2 (OCS R2) has been deployed in our Dublin data centre and as such, enabling all Microsoft UK employees the capability of reducing travel expenditure as well as our 3rd party conferencing costs but utilising the native capabilities of OCS R2, namely: Live Meeting and Audio Conferencing.
Compelling reading for any case study.
“In Microsoft UK, the Sales & Marketing and Support Group has seen average cost reductions of over 50% in both T&E and Telecoms, generating savings of £3.6m saving year on year (over the period from November 2008 to Oct 2009 compared to the previous 12 months)
· T&E costs savings are 51% T&E (£3.3m)
· Telecom costs savings are 54% Telecoms (£320k)
The cost savings are due to the adoption of Unified Communication and Live Meeting and changes in the travel policy. The travel policy changes resulted in many business meetings being hosted online and therefore business continued as before.”
Source: here
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Same blog, different name!
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When I first started up this blog (almost a year ago) it was about Virtualisation, Messaging, Windows, Voice and anything else relevant! However over the last 6 months a common theme has prevailed - Unified Communications.
Therefore from this point forth "I'm a PC Blog" is now "I'm a UC Blog", both old and new domains remain intact, namely http://imapcblog.com (old) and http://imaucblog.com (new).
The focus continues to be things that are UC:
- The PBX
- Mobiles/VoIP enabled devices (iPhone, BlackBerry & Windows Phone)
- Microsoft Exchange
- Microsoft Communications Server
- Security
- Crazy off-topic geekyness!