CUCM 11.x Conference Now - Almost Perfect - Redesign ?

[cadjoe]

Ok, the Conference Now feature is better than MeetMe conference,

however, I feel that a slight redesign would make it perfect.

The major problem I have with Conference Now is the Attendee password.

The only way that the Host can change this password is to ask the Admin, or log into CUCM Self Portal.

Problems:

1) I don't even let my users know that the Self Portal exists.

2) A computer is not always handy when you need to create a meeting, even remotely via MVA.

What is extremely scary is users will get lazy and forget to change it, soo:

on Monday, HR Manager has a meeting at 9:00 AM and the Attendee password is 1234.

on Friday, the HR Manager creates a quick meeting with a manager and the Attendee password is the same.

So ANYONE that knows the HR Managers Meeting Room #, can just sit in the room waiting for another meeting.

Yes, you can kick them out of the meeting after a certain # of minutes, but its possible to have someone in the meeting not invited.

I think this is how Conference Now should work:

1) Send out your meeting invite to your room, and tell them a new made up password.

2) Attendees join early, key in the meeting room ID, get put on hold, and wait for Host.

3) Host logs into meeting room, it asks to provide Attendee password, key in password from step 1.

4) Upon the meeting starting all attendees on hold are now prompted for the password. 

5) If correct, then they are added to the meeting.

Yes, a Version 12 of CUCM would be awesome to have Voice Annouce upon entering or exiting, but the password issue is a huge security risk.

Just my thoughts for a change or at least a feature request to provide the Attendee password upon meeting creation thru the phone.

Anyone agree?

CadJoe

CUCM, Gotta Love It!

[Chris Deren]

You can change the PIN on the phone if you use Extension Mobility feature, when you are login out you get a softkey option to change it. I know it's not perfect but just another alternative from logging to self service portal.

[cadjoe]

I agree with you Jaime, everyone has a different opinion of how it should work, but having a static Attendee access code allows anyone that previously joined their meeting to join others uninvited.

Chris, The User PIN and the Attendees Access Code are not the same thing.

The Conference Now feature is the very bottom option under every user, not the PIN at the top.

The meeting number is their DN, and the Attendees Access Code is an entirely new field under each user. 

The PIN is what the HOST uses to join the meeting, which is secret and not shared.

The Attendees Access Code is what I'm referring to that should not be hard coded into the user account, and should have an option to change during meeting creation.

Thanks,

Joe

[Jaime Valencia]

Yeah, then again, we don't actually force anybody to leave a static access code, we do provide them with a way to change it.

If you don't want your users doing that in the Self-Care Portal, that's a personal/business/etc choice.

Guess it actually be more a matter of providing other alternatives, besides that ones that are already in place to change the access code.

Since there's (finally) a small IVR included in CUCM, perhaps your PER would be to provide a way to dial a separate DN, or have an option within the current IVR, to change the access code.

I can try and relay that to the CUCM team, but it's just going to be a suggestion, I cannot submit an official PER.

[cadjoe]

Yes, I understand, any suggestion is better than the way it is.

The Conference room has a 9971 video phone, an 8831 speaker phone, and an MX300.

Lots of phones that can log into a MeetMe or a Conference Now, even with an external DID going directly to the Conference Now Pilot.

But not a single computer to be able to log into the Self Care Portal to change the password, unless you get on the elevator and go back to your desk.

Kinda dumb for the host not to be able to change the Attendee password when creating the meeting.  Those on hold should be prompted for the Attendee password upon joining the meeting, not prior to going on hold.

Anything in CUCM should be controlled by a device that is registered directly with CUCM, not a separate computer website.

Maybe version 12 should have a way to View who's in the meeting, and the host has power to kick them, or at least a Name announce on entering and exiting.  You can do this now with Unity, but there's no way to password protect the meeting.

Just trying to make a great product better.

Thanks,

CadJoe

CUCM, Gotta Love It.

Joe

[devils_advocate]

As others have said, its much better than it was and everybody has different ideas.

The fact the AAC is static and needs to be changed via Self Service is not a big deal for us, our users use Self Service to control their Speed Dials and Call Forwards etc so they are used to it. 

It would be 'handy' for users to be able to change the code from a phone or TP device but its not a necessity for the feature to work so I suspect Cisco won't entertain it unless loads of people ask for it.

[cadjoe]

Loads of people must have wanted something better than MeetMe or they wouldn't have created Conference NOW.

To add a check box in Conference NOW to allow the User to Change the Attendee Access Code during meeting creation is a simple Feature Request that would be heavily used, and give users peace of mind that there isn't uninvited participants.

Thanks,

CadJoe

CUCM, Gotta Love It!

[Nadav]

If Cisco were to allow the posting of feature requests on the support community where users could vote on such requests, maybe over time you could get enough support for the idea to be under review.

However that is not how Cisco operates. If Cisco provided you with a solution that involves the administration and self-care portal, then if you want a solution your question shouldn't be whether a change will be made for a later CUCM let alone CUCM 12. What you should consider is how to allow your users to change this attendee code using the API cisco has provided. Perhaps writing a small program which utilizes AXL or rest api calls (UDS) to get this very specific task done.  

[Chris Deren]

Hod.nadav,

In fact Cisco does listed to the users and prioritizes their feature enhancements/additions based on posts via this community which is available for anyone to sign up for:

https://communities.cisco.com/community/technology/collaboration/usergroups/collaboration/collab-prod-ideas

I've been in sessions where Cisco Collab BU explicitly pointed to this and stated they do look at it.

[Nadav]

"Access to this place or content is restricted. If you think this is a mistake, please contact your administrator or the person who directed you here."

Are you sure any user should be able to access this resource? 

[Chris Deren]

You need to first sign up for the Cisco community and then join the Collaboration user community which is open for everyone:

https://communities.cisco.com/welcome

https://communities.cisco.com/community/technology/collaboration

[Jaime Valencia]

You can always get in touch with your AM/SE to submit a PER so it can be enhanced.

Bear in mind that everyone has a different idea, some people might think that the way you propose is over complicated and just like it the way it is.

That's probably the way the BU designed this, to be as user friendly as possible, and to not have to explain everybody the flow of steps you're proposing, before they actually join the meeting.

My 2 cents.

[Alexander Anoshin]

I would agree with Jamie and Gordon. Lots of clients have their own requirements and I beleive the Cisco's goal was to offer a "getting started" option that covers the HOTTEST but BASIC requirements. Those who need more can choose - http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/td/docs/voice_ip_comm/cucm/srnd/collab11/collab11/confernc.html#66165

When we were building our add-on to CUCM conferencing, we had to consider tons of customer opinions like random PIN generation, Caller ID authentication, single number for all conferences and so on. Its always a hard task for any vendor to filter clients requirements when developing the roadmap.

BTW, Jamie, is there ANY way to interfere the conferencing bridge (either software or hardware) to control the audio streams (mute/unmute feature etc)? There is no public documents about that, but probably you can advice on some approach we could research?

[Jaime Valencia]

Bear in mind that this works on top of meet-me, and as such, features like list the participants, drop them, etc are not available. Those are for ad-hoc conferencing only.

Currently this does not provide a way to know who is in the conference, and or how to mute/unmute them.

That would make for a very good PER for this, however, not sure how feasible from the technical/programming point of view this would be.

[Gordon Ross]

I think you have to ask yourself: What is CUCM? Is it a conferencing platform, or is it a phone system?

CUCM offers a couple of features that are basic, getting you started, implementations. If you want more full-featured versions, you need to pay and get the specialist add-ons.  e.g. CUCM 10 added basic call queuing. It's enough to give you a simple queue, but anything else requires an add-on.

Remember, not everyone wants a full-featured conference platform, or call queuing system, or auto attendant system.

GTG