Ask the Expert:Cisco Unified Attendant Consoles

[ciscomoderator]

With Jamie Gale

Welcome to the Cisco Support  Community Ask the Expert conversation. This is an opportunity to learn and ask questions  about the Cisco Unified Attendant Consoles with Jamie Gale. The Cisco Unified  Enterprise Attendant Console is a highly scalable software-based console  designed for Cisco Unified Communications Manager customers. It combines  support for traditional telephony functions with advanced Unified Communications applications and services, such as at-a-glance destination  presence status for more effective dispatching of inbound calls.

Jamie Gale is a Technical Marketing Engineer in the IP Communications Business Unit at Cisco. He is an expert on Cisco Unified  Attendant Consoles with broad knowledge on the solutions Cisco offers including  the Cisco Unified Attendant Consoles for Businesses, Enterprises and   Departments. Jaime has more than six years of experience on designing,  implementing, and supporting Attendant Consoles in a whole range of businesses.

Remember to use the rating system to let Jamie  know if you have received an adequate response. 

Jaime might not be able to answer each question due to the volume expected during this event. Remember that you can continue the conversation on the Collaboration,  Voice and Video sub-community discussion forum shortly after the event. This event lasts through May 18, 2012. Visit this forum often to view responses to your questions and the questions of other community members.

[Novriadi .]

Hi Jamie,

I have a questions related with your topic,

I have Cisco Unified Attendant Console with system version 8.6.2.11 connect with CUCM ver 8.5.1.10000-26

and experience problem when Operator login to Attendant Console client and discover / view users phone status.

the phone status shows out of service status. In our environment, we use extension mobility in all users.

I have follow the documentation, such as design guide, installation guide, and troubleshooting guide, but the problem still occur, I must manually input the device name in the CUCM end users configuration (and I think we can not use this method, because it must be manually on each user - with 3000 users).

Is there any method and possibility to use extension mobility and Attendant Console, or this is a bug ?

Thanks.

Novri

[jamgale]

Hi Novri,

This certainly should work.

When using Extension Mobility there is a setting which needs to be changed on the server:

On the Attendant Console Server browse to C:\Program Files\Cisco\CTI Server\Repository\

Open up CiscoCUCM_CTI file using notepad and change the value of DRMDynamicDevicePrioritisation to True

Then browse to C:\Program Files\Cisco\CTI Server\DriverInstance\1 and open the same file name above and change the value to True for the same entry.

Once done restart your server.

With these settings, the MAC address field against a contact is left blank and the device information will be searched every time the operator does a directory lookup, this should find the correct logged in device and display the status.

[Novriadi .]

Jamie

I already set "DRMDynamicDevicePrioritisation" to true in (C:\Program Files\Cisco\CTI Server\Repository\) & (C:\Program Files\Cisco\CTI Server\DriverInstance\1).

Unfortunately I still facing the same problem with phone status show out of service. Is there any option for solving this problem ?

Is the server must use or register to DNS (Forward & Reverse) ?

FYI, I use Subscriber Server for CTI Manager.

Thanks for your advice.

Novri.

[jamgale]

Hi Novri,

In order for the correct device to be found by the CUxAC server the telephone number in the directory needs to match the DN of the line exactly, if there is any spaces or if it is a different number then BLF will not work.

Is there a missmatch in number?

You can also check the logged out phones and device profiles to ensure Allow Control from CTI is selected, if it isn't then select this option and log the EM profile out and back in again.

If the above is all correct then the only way to determine why the device is not found in a lookup by the CUxAC server would be to open a TAC case with some traces so it can be investigated.

Jamie

[Novriadi .]

Hi Jamie,

In my customers UC environment we use different number between DN in line configuration and telephone number in end user configuration (because there are several requirement for the telephone number in LDAP using 9 digit extension, with another requirement in DN in line configuration using 4 digit extension).

Is this same or inline with your explanation ?

DN number in Line configuration = Telephone number in End User configuration.

For this requirement, where i can found official explanation related with above prerequisite ?

Thanks

Novri

[jamgale]

Hi Novri,

This would indeed be the problem, in order for BLF to work you need the Telephone Number in the End User and the DN in the line configuration to match exactly, if the Telehone Number against the End User is 9 digits then this is what will be in the Attendant Console Directory and this will be the number we look for when requesting the BLF, there is no number translation in the product in order to convert the correct DN against the line.

I have attached a document which explains this a bit better, the example in this document is using E.164 numbers but it applies to any missmatch in number, there is also a possible workaround explained in the document.

Hope this helps.

[Novriadi .]

Hi Jamie,

Thanks for your resolution and explanation, very clear to me.

[brian.k.clarke]

Hi Jamie -

I see a couple posts regarding re-hosting requirements for the LAC, but I want to make sure I understand.  We currently have CUEAC running on a physical server, and we want to move it over to a virtual server on the customer's UCS deployment. If we build out a Windows 2008 server on UCS w/ the same name as the existing CUEAC server, will this require contacting TAC to re-host with a new license key?  Is CUEAC licensed to the software or the hardware, essentially?

Thank you

brian

[jamgale]

Hi Brian,

CUEAC is licensed to the hardware, it uses details such as MAC address, HOSTNAME along with VM UID when using VM.

You will need a re--host if you are moving the software to another machine.

[brian.k.clarke]

Thank you!

[Jackson Braddock]

Hi Jamie,

I have an issue with the attandant consoles and I hope you can help me. I can only see internal calls hit the queues. External callers can hear ringing but I cannot see these calls in the Attendant Console. Do you know what the problem is and how to fix it?

Thank you in advance.

Jackson

[jamgale]

Hi Jackson,

This is most commonly an issue with the CSS of the incomming gateway.

You need to make sure that the CSS used by the gateway for incomming calls has permissions to call the Partitions that the Operators IP Phones are in as well as the Partition used by the CTI Route Points and CTI Ports which are configured for the CUxAC Server.

[mgarciar]

Hi Jamie,

my customer wants to know if CUEAC Server is supported on virtualized environment using IBM hw. I found this link:

http://docwiki.cisco.com/wiki/Specification-Based_Hardware_Support

I want to confirm that the info applies also for CUEAC. Do you know if it is supported and if it has some restrictions?

Thanks,

Marco.

[jamgale]

Hi Marco,

CUEAC is supported in the Spec Based Hardware program for which you have sent the link.

As long as the minimum requirements are met as outlined from that link and then the specifications are met for the actual VM image used by CUEAC (found in the installation guide) then it is fully supported.

Jamie

[tirianwilson]

Good Morning,

     We have used the Cisco Attendant Console that was part of CallManager since the 4.0 days and it worked well for us.  When we needed to upgrade to CallManager 8.x we looked at CUEAC and several other products but could not find anything that could meet our three requirements.  Because the old AC used a text file as the directory, it was easy to have multiple groups each having their own private directory.  In fact, we have three different switchboards (for different business units) each with their own directory.  The files are stored on a central server and updated from a database by SSIS packages.  We use file permissions to prevent unauthorized users from seeing other directories and scripts to edit the configuration files so that the AC software automatically looks at the correct directory.  That worked well for us, but wasn't the cleanest or most elegant solution.  However, after buying CUEAC, returning it and buying Arc Premium, and then returning that we came to the conclusion that ARC couldn't do multiple disparate directories.  Some further research turned up a couple of vendors that claimed they could, but they failed the second requirement - supporting hold music for callers in queue.  Our third requirement is something that the old Cisco AC couldn't do but is a requirement for all new products - it must use AD authentication (either directly or through CallManager).

     So, for now, we have a second CallManager cluster running 7.1.5 to support our AC users.  This is a suboptimal solution since the ICT causes some issues and it is a pain to move phones from CallManager 8.5 down to 7.1, but it is better than any of the other products we have found.

     Having said all that, my question is this, are you aware of any product that is able to meet our three requirements: multiple directories with access control, music on hold for queued callers, and AD authentication?