Emergency Notification Capabilities

[brentb123]

Greetings.

I am writing a report for a university that currently has a Cisco IP telephone system which covers several campus locations in different cities.

They are looking at implimentation of an Emergency Notification System... software that will run on one of their servers (with a back up server in a different city).  This software allows them to pre-define a number of messages that would be useful in the event of emergencies on campus (ie. tornado warning, chemical release, etc.).  The ENS software allows messages to be broadcast to various devices such as SMS text to portable devices, email, computer pop-up messages for any users on the network, etc.  These messages may be audio, video or text.

My question is:  Is it possible to use the API capabilities of the Cisco system to allow messages to be directed to groups of IP phones... is it possible to flash the lights on the telephones... and even trigger an alert tone or other ring tone on the set to attract attention of the user?

Is anyone aware of previous integration of this type with Cisco?

Thanks.

Regards,

Brent. 

[kimcneil]

Hello Brent,

Cisco has third party developer partners who work with Cisco to integrate their solutions with Cisco Unified Communications Manager and Cisco Unified IP Phone 7900 Series endpoints. Two such vendors that come to mind that you may want to check out would be Singlewire's InformaCast (formerly Berbee) and Radianta's Beacon Office and Emergency Assist. Links to Singlewire's website and to Radianta's applications (which are part of the Cisco Unified Application Environment or CUAE) are shown below.

Singlewire InformaCast

www.singlewire.com

Radianta Beacon Office and Emergency Assist

http://www.cisco.com/web/developer/cuae/content/applications.html

www.radianta.com

Trust this helps!

Kirk McNeill

Collaboration Solutions Marketing

Cisco Systems

[brentb123]

Hmmm.

While the applications you have mentioned from Singlewire and Radianta are certainly interesting (and useful) they really do not address the capability I am asking about.

Is there someone at Cisco that is able to tell me if there is an API capability (perhaps using SIP 2.0 and/or SOAP) that would allow me to address a message to all phones or to groups of phones?

Thanks.

Brent Bauman, CTS-D, LEED(r) AP

Electrical Consultant - Engineered Security and Safety Solutions     Stantec 10160 - 112 Street Edmonton AB T5K 2L6

Ph: (780) 917-7456

Fx: (780) 917-7279

[kimcneil]

Hello Brent,

Cisco Unified Communication Manager does not natively provide emergency notification capabilities. However, this does not mean that a developer cannot send messages to the phone or open a speaker path to do this (thus the two suggested partners noted in prior response should you wish to inquire with them).

One other possible route to leave you might consider would posting your question to one or more developer forums for responses. Link is below and as you'll note, there are forums for CTI, SIP, IP Phone Services that you could browse and see if one or more might be of interest to solicit feedback from.

Here's the link:

http://www.cisco.com/web/developer/cucm/content/forums.html

Regards,

Kirk McNeill

Collaboratin Solutions Marketing

Cisco Systems

[brentb123]

Just in case anyone comes across this thread with a similar issue...

A Cisco partner... "Syn-Apps" does make an alerting application called "SA-Announce" that has these capabilities.

http://www.syn-apps.com

Regards,

Brent.

[evanh]

This is an older post but I'll comment for others.  I deployed Syn-Apps in my environment this year, and it has the capabilities you seek.  I can send alerts via a button on my phone, a call handler, an app on my iPhone, or a web interface and reach Cisco IP phones connected to my CUCM, analog phones, remote cellular phones, or send it to a desktop app on a PC, etc.   

They have a free demo on their site, I deployed it in my lab and was running in less than an hour and was able to validate the specific functionality I was looking for in my environment, so I bought the product.  I would encourage you to do the same.

Hope this helps.

[dlovell]

Brent,

Another option for your ENS is provided by IPcelerate - not sure about where you are located, however here is a link to the Contacts page on the IPcelerate website:

http://www.ipcelerate.com/contact.html

[keithknowles]

And yet another option would be InformaCast by Singlewire Software.  We are currently using it and it seems to fit our needs quite well.

[Velin Tsekov]

Hi,

I have a similar task. We need to install 10-15 IP Phones in one hospital and we need to find a system that needs to be integrated with CUCM/CME for an audio alert notification. What I mean, if there is an emergency case, the porter needs to push a button on his IP Phone to notify (alarm sound) the 3rd floor where the on duty team is. I need a system which is compatible with Cisco. It's not neccesery to be something complicated, just need an easy system which can be integrated via SIP or I dont know just for an audio alert.

Any tips?

[skilambi]

Either look at products like Informacast or syn-apps or IP celerate or buy an IP notification and when you dial these endpoints you can get notification.

http://www.cyberdata.net/products/voip/digitalanalog/sip_notification_endpoints.html

http://www.algosolutions.com/products/Audible-and-Visual-Alerting/8180-sip-audio-alerter.html

Srini