iPhone/Jabber Support - What System supports it?

[timo.minx]

We are currently exploring a new telephone system for our small business with 5 phones. As we are an R&D company with people constantly running around the lab the iPhone integration is key for us.

Can anyone tell me what Cisco phone system we have to purchase to get this capability? UC300/UC500/???

Thanks!

[sossie]

Neither UC320 or UC500 range support any iPhone integration. The BE3000 models CME models will, but are outside price range for small business (in my opinion).

From what I understand and can get out of Cisco, if you want Jabber integration, both the UC models are pretty much dead ends. Jabber requires CUPS which is only available for the enterprise end of the market.

Also if you want to use Jabber out of the office (which is what most small business want) you need Cisco anyconnect VPN software on your iphone. Anyconnect for iphone is only supported on Cisco ASA firewalls, which as far as small business are concerned after they have just brought a UC device which inculdes a firewall is pointless.

I'm a big fan of cisco networking gear, have been Cisco certifed for over 10 years and work for a Cisco partner, so its a bit sad for me to say, but if you want real unified communications for small business 3CX is a far better and complete product. If you want a basic PABX which rings desk phones the UC320 is ok.

[Mario Garcia]

It is my understanding with CCA 3.2 and SWP 8.3 for UC500 will support Jabber. CCA 3.2 is already released, SWP 8.3 is scheduled to come out in the next few weeks.

What is your time frame?

Sent from Cisco Technical Support iPhone App

[Alberto Montilla]

Dear Timo;

As per today, UC300 does not support mobile client integration, working on it, but still not a firm target date.

On UC500, we are working to launch iPhone Jabber 8.6 (for telephone calls only - no IM/presence) by end of March with software pack 8.3. Meanwhile there is the possibility to connect third party clients (iSIP or aSIP for example), but this requires advanced knowledge (CLI) to achieve this purpose, so if you or the partner is a Cisco UC partner then should be able to integrate without issues.

Regards

Alberto

[sossie]

Hi Alberto,

I have been advised by our Cisco person - hopefully incorrectly. That to use Cisco Jabber on iPhone/Galaxy requires cisco anyconnect VPN. I know Anyconnect for mobile devices is not possilble on IOS devices - only on ASA's running version 8.3. hence I can't see how it will be possibe with a UC500.

Does/will Jabber work will standard IPsec vpn, connecting to UC500?

Also I understand that Jabber for CM/CME systems requires Cisco Unified Presence Server (CUPS) for presence etc. I guessing that Jabber for UC500 will not support presence because there is no CUPS?

Any there any plans to consolidate the Cisco range, and retire UCC and replace it with CUPS for the UC devices? This would be nice is it would enable good upgrade paths from small business to larger business, with out having to completly change sofware/systems.

[Alberto Montilla]

Hi Simon;

Thanks for your question.

Related to VPN, as per today, Cisco Anyconnect VPN on iPhone is validated with ASA only. This does not preclude the use of other IOS devices, provided they are validated. We are working on the validation with other IOS router (UC500 or SR520).

With regards of presence, UC500 will not support presence on jabber. There are no short term plans to integrate UCC with CUPS, but we always looks for synergies across product lines, so this may well come in the future.

Regards

Alberto

[Todd Vohs]

Alberto, Simon and Mario,

I have a 320 and an ASA5505.  I had to create an Intermediate DMZ-type of network (a friend of mine termed it iDMZ) to get them to work but seems to work fine.  The WAN port of the 320 is in the iDMZ and I am not routing data on it. 

I too have been looking for something with remote access for my Motorola Xoom and Samsung Galaxy Nexus.  There are no clients for the 320 for any type of mobile solution so I downloaded 3CX.  Although it has some issues too, the remote client is great.  I enabled the proprietary 3CXTunnel so I only had to open 1 port on my ASA and used a static NAT mapping to the 3CX PBX.  I was looking at enabling the IPSEC/L2TP on the ASA since there is a native client on both my devices and then could close the static NAT port, this would help with some other applications also for me.  I did look at the AnyConnect but it does not run on my Xoom and requires root'ing the Nexus which voids the warranty.

I am a small outbound sales office with 2 employees.  I bought the 320 for some of its features but am finding that it is as Simon stated, "If you want a PBX to ring some phones, the 320 is ok".  Even with its issues, the 3CX is way ahead of the 320 unless there is some type of remote/mobile solution coming down the road for the 320.  So there is a need for a remote/mobile solution.  I would also like to use my RV082 at home to create a VPN tunnel to the 320 and then could have one of my office phones at the house or use the VPN capabilities of one of my SPA525G2's.

The item that bothers me is that while talking with a Verizon technician, was informed that the Samsung Galaxy Nexus is using SIP natively to their system on 4G/LTE.  I would think there would be a way to natively integrate a 320 and Nexus?????  Or am I off base here.

Thanks,

Todd