8851 hold and transfer softkeys not appearing

[tyoder]

I have a group of three 8851 phones that the hold and transfer softkeys are not appearing. The phones with this issue are all in the same building, and they have the same softkey template as 24 other phones do that do not have the same issue.

This issue arose over a short break with no changed having been made in CUCM.

I checked the template configuration and the connected state does have the Hold (Hold) and Transfer (Trnsfer) options selected. Also, the phones in question all have more then two Maximum Number of Calls set.

I have also tried restarting one of the phones with this issue, but that did not fix the issue either.

Is there anything else I can check to see where the issue has arisen?

Thank you.

[Maren Mahoney]

[T]hey have the same softkey template as 24 other phones do that do not have the same issue.

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Does this mean that all of the phones have a Softkey Template manually configured on the Phone Configuration Page?

Do all of the phones have the same "Common Phone Profile"? (There is a setting in there for Feature Control Policy which might override a default softkey template)

When you restarted the phone, did you simply reboot the phone itself? Or did you "Reset Phone" from the phone configuration page in CUCM. A simple reboot of the phone does not always cause the phone to pick up new/changed settings, but sending an Apply Config or Reset Phone from CUCM will push out any configuration changes. I have had a reset (from CUCM) solve this very issue.

Maren

[tyoder]

All 27 phones use the same Softkey Template that was manually configured in the Softkey Template Configuration page.

No, not all of the phones have the same Common Phone Profile, however, there are only two options that these phones have chosen for them. The export for all of these phones show that the Feature Control Policy as blank.

I reset the phone using the Reset option in the phone configuration page in CUCM.

I thought the Common Phone Profile setting might be the issue, so I changed that on one of the phones with this issue to match a phone that does not have this issue, and Reset the phone again. This did not fix the issue.

[Maren Mahoney]

All 27 phones use the same Softkey Template that was manually configured in the Softkey Template Configuration page.

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Can I interpret this to mean that you have a customized Softkey Template and have checked the box making that softkey template the default? If so, what is the status of the Softkey Template field on the phone configuration page of the three phones that are misbehaving?

It is indeed odd that the softkeys would disappear with no changes made on the system. I've seen stranger things happen, though. 

Are all of the phones running the same firmware? If so, I would suggest a factory reset of one of the offending phones to see if that fixes the issue.

Maren

[tyoder]

No, to clarify, the 27 phones are the phones we have that are 8851s and they have the same softkey template chosen. I do not see any of our 28 templates being marked as the default.

Also, I was just informed this morning that there are actually more than the three phones that are having the same issue. However, I need to get more info to find out which phones are having the issue. As of now, there appears to be three separate buildings that are experiencing the problem.

Yes, all 8851 phones are on the same firmware version. I will take a phone to test and attempt a factory reset on it to see if that rectifies the issue.

[Maren Mahoney]

What I'm trying to understand is whether you have a specific Softkey Template configured on the phone configuration page for all of these phones, or if the phone configuration page has a Softkey Template of "<None>" which would mean it gets the system default softkey template. To figure out which softkey template is the default you'd have to look at each of them to see which one has the "Default Softkey Template" checkbox checked.

If you have a current version of CUCM (12.5 or 14) the default softkey template (unless you have changed it) will be "Cisco User with Feature Hardkeys". This softkey template assumes users will use the physical buttons on the phones for Hold, Conference and Transfer (both in On Hook and Connected call states), so the set of ".... with Feature Hardkey" softkey templates do not include them in the layout.

So, if some phones - on the phone configuration page - have a <None> softkey template and some have a specific softkey template this might explain your issue.

And you may have already examined this and I'm telling you things you already know. Partly I'm having you double-check just to be sure, and partly I'm leaving breadcrumbs for future readers of this thread.

Maren

[tyoder]

None of these phones have the <None> option chosen. I did go through all of our templates, but didn't see any, at least manually created, that had the default box checked. They all have the same template chosen.

I have attached a screenshot of the configuration of one of the phones with the issue.

Could a change to our network cause this issue? The only thing the affected buildings seem to share in common is they are all areas that the network team updated our network infrastructure at. The buildings that haven't been updated seem to be fine.

[Jerrytech1]

we have this issue occasionally and it's caused by the phones being in the wrong VLAN. They can't download the correct configuration.

[Maren Mahoney]

As @Jerrytech1 mentioned, absolutely a network change could affect these phones. This is especially true if changes were made to the Softkey Template after the network change. The phones are stubborn and will use (or at least try to use) 'last known good' information if they are unable to obtain information during boot. It is entirely possible that the phones can get to CUCM to register, but not get to the TFTP process to download a new config file.

If some of the changes made involve security, you will want to make sure that the security team opened the right ports. There is a list of ports used in communications in the CUCM Security Guide.

If some of the changes involved IPs, VLANs, DHCP, etc. you will need to ensure that the phones have all of the information they are supposed to have. Settings obtained automatically can be viewed under Settings > Admin Settings > Ethernet Settings. You can also see if there are connectivity issues on the phone under Settings > Admin Settings > Status > Status Messages.

Maren

[tyoder]

Thank you. I expect that this is the root cause of the issue. Our network guy is going to assist me in looking through these settings and security concerns.

I appreciate your assistance with this matter.