Licence non traversal Call on the VCSExpressway

[abdelkader amghar]

Hi All,

Someone can confirm me that if the VCXexpressway doesn't have licence non-traversall and I make call the call between 2 endpoint register on the VCSx the call will be automatocilly transformed on "traversal call".

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/telepresence/infrastructure/articles/vcs_traversal_call_license_usage_kb_168.shtml

The problem is that I've noticed that we have 2 type of traversall call (media routed and media non-routed)

One of my customer use VCSx on the DMZ public , he has also a MCU45x on this DMZ. The problem that If I call from internet to the MCU throught VCSx the media is not routed therefore the MCU tried to communicate the RDP session with the far endpoint to the internet and the firewall drop the media.

My question is how can I forced the media routed for the equipement register to this VCSx.

Regards

[aostense · Accepted solution]

Hi Abdelkader,

As you say, a traversal call license can be used as a non-traversal license on the VCS Expressway if you don’t have any non-traversal calls available (not possible the other way around). But, even if a traversal license are consumed for a non-traversal license, it doesn’t necessary mean the media will be routed in all scenarios.

There are three ways to force the media (RTP) going through the Expressway:

1)      Use a traversal zone towards another gatekeeper

2)      Interworking between SIP and H.323

3)      Interworking between IPv4 and IPv6

So if a H.323 device is calling into the MCU, you can force the MCU to be SIP registered only. This way the media will be interworked on the VCS Expressway, and the media will flow through the VCS Expressway, and not directly towards the MCU. You can also register the MCU on IPv6.

Currently we don’t have any other ways to force the media, but I guess this would be a nice feature request (e.g. per subzone etc.).

If the above suggestions doesn't work for you, the workaround will then be to register the MCU on your VCS Control, as the VCS Expressway has an traversal zone towards this VCS (?) and then the media will be routed correctly. The other workaround is to put the MCU in the DMZ and open all required ports.

To force signaling, you should use "Call routed mode" set to "Always". Then signaling will always flow through the VCS (but not the media).

Hope this helps.

Kind regards,

Arne

[abdelkader amghar]

Hello Arne,

Thanks you for your answer. Cisco said me the same answer

Sent from Cisco Technical Support iPhone App

[Yorick Petey]

Hello,

Thank you for your posts.

Now it's clear for the VCS-Expressway, a traversal license can be used instead of a non-traversal one if there is no more licences available.

But what about the VCS-Control server? The default set of licenses is 10 non-traversal calls and 100 traversal calls.

This does not make sense to me. Most of the video calls are internal calls between the registered endpoints, so they will consume non-traversal licenses.

Why the traversal license count is so high compared to the non-traversal one?

On VCS-C, if all non-traversal licenses are used, the traversal license does not seem to be used as replacement. Do you confirm this behavior?

Thank you for your feedbacks.

Yorick

[Martin Koch]

The usage of traversal instead of non-traversal=local call licenses is only done on the VCS-E.

You can find some more info here:

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/telepresence/infrastructure/articles/vcs_traversal_call_license_usage_kb_168.shtml

100 traversal calls is the maximum amount of traversal calls you can get per physical VCS. On a VCS-C take these 100 as a free gift.

The VCS-C is mainly build to be used for local calls. This is why its licensing aims to sell more of these.

Traversal calls on the VCS-C are more for operational needs, like traversal calls to the VCS-E

interworking, ...

So do not see the logic from how you would like to use it but from the how Cisco can sell in licenses

and then it suddenly makes sense :-)

Please rate the answers using the stars below the messages!

[Yorick Petey]

Hello Martin,

Thank you for your feedback, it confirms what I was thinking, unfortunately.

To complete what you said about the Cisco licensing strategy, this is especially because I know it that I was surprised by the "free gift" of 100 traversal calls . Your comment makes sense!

Thank you for your time, +5 for you.

Yorick

[Martin Koch]

Thx for your feedback, thats always important!

[mguguvcevski]

I would also like to add a short comment to this thread in form of a question regarding the same topic but for a VCS Expressway with Starter Pack license.

Would it be possible to route the media to the DNS zone, and vice versa through the Expressway ?

Is there a way to configure the DNS zone as a Traversal Server Zone and other zones in form of Traversal Clients ?

I have to admit that I was playing with this kind of setup on a VCS Expressway, where I configured a Traversal Client and a Traversal Server on the same box, utlizing the loopback. It is possible and it worked in practice with one perk:

All calls had to be routed through the Expressway, irrespective of their destination, and the license consumption was two per call, one from the Traversal Client to the Traversal Server, and another in the other direction in the search rules.

Any thoughts ?

[David Anstee]

Good article that describes this in more detail here

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/telepresence/infrastructure/articles/vcs_traversal_call_license_usage_kb_168.shtml

[tufan.kabacioglu]

Hello,

is it same for VCS Starter pack? I have a problem because of this. I have a VCS starter pack and local jabber clients. When I try to call another sip endpoints from different companies, media is not routed through the VCS and  drops on the firewalls. It is required to make all calls routed on the vcs for my setup. Isn't it possible to do that for VCS starter pack still?

Regards,

Tufan

[Tomonori Taniguchi]

If you want to force media routed on VCS regardless of SIP UA registration method, you can enable the media encryption policy.

VCS will handle the call through B2BUA and willing to stay in media routing.

This feature introduced in X7.2 software release.

[tufan.kabacioglu]

Hi Tomonori,

Thanks for quick answer. Is it possible to say what should I do exactly? Do I need to select "Force encrypted" in all zones?

Regards,