Chris’s Blog

Microsoft have announced official support for the Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 R2 member server role on a server that has a Windows Server 2008 R2 operating system installed. Now for the fine print.. the following scenarios are currently not supported on Windows Server 2008 R2:

• Group Chat will not function in a Windows 2008 R2 forest or when Group Chat member servers are joined to a Windows 2008 R2 domain. Some issues with changes in Windows 2008 R2 require a Group Chat Client and Group Chat Admin Tools hotfix, scheduled for mid-April 2010.
• Deploying Group Chat on Windows 2008 R2 is currently not supported.
• Upgrading the operating system to Windows Server 2008 R2 for an existing installation of OCS 2007 R2 is not supported.
• Installing 32-bit OCS 2007 R2 administration tools on 64-bit Windows 2008 R2 is not supported.Development with Speech Server 2007 Developer Edition and deployment of the Speech Server 2007 role are not supported on Windows Server 2008 R2.

For more information, see KB 982021

For the next few days you can download free copies of some MS Press e-books on OCS 2007 R2.. visit Johann’s Blog here for more info

Quest have some really cool products to add value to UC implementations (like you need it, right?)

Some of the key products are:

Spotlight on Messaging:
Spotlight® on Messaging helps administrators get more out of their messaging environments by diagnosing and resolving problems across multiple platforms. A comprehensive view into an organization’s messaging infrastructure, Spotlight on Messaging:

• Reduces cost and improves productivity by identifying issues and performance bottlenecks before they affect end users
• Accelerates problem resolution by significantly reducing the time-to-resolution during outages
  Improves system performance by maximizing the availability and responsiveness of messaging servers

MessageStats:
MessageStats is the most complete and comprehensive messaging reporting and analysis solution in the industry. Used on more than 15 million Exchange mailboxes around the world everyday, MessageStats helps reduce and quantify your Exchange investment. An essential tool to keeping tabs on the cost of your infrastructure, MessageStats gathers, analyzes, and reports on Exchange and other messaging components to:

• Better understand usage and trends
• Find unused and excess capacity
• Justify expenses
• Optimize operational efficiencies

Providing a complete view of all messaging components from one interface, MessageStats delivers platform-specific business- and technical-focused reports for:

• BlackBerry
• Windows Mobile
• Microsoft Office Communications Server
• Microsoft Exchange
• Outlook Web Access
• And more..

For more info on these and other value add products from Quest Software, visit their site here

Yesterday I attended the IBM Lotusphere Comes to You event here in Sydney. I was excited to see what the IBM Unified Communications strategy would be and ended getting a lot more than I had bargained for.

The event covered a large part of their portfolio from Messaging and Collaboration, UC and Web Portals to Cloud Computing. As a consultant, I have always taken an interest in what “the other guys” are doing, but, being honest, the last time I saw Domino was back in version 6.

I was most impressed with how slick the Notes 8.5 client looks and the fact that they have integrated everything into a single client whether it be IM, voice & video, document libraries, opening and editing MS Office docs with Symphony, even SAP integration, it can all be done via the Notes 8.5 client.

One of the themes that became immediately obvious was value.. ROI is important, especially in today’s economic climate and IBM seem to be on top of that, a great example is Lotus Symphony which is a free, MS Office compatible suite that includes a word processor, spreadsheet editor and presentation editor. I was also impressed by the fact that IBM have realised that (as predicted by Gartner) Apple’s market share in the desktop space is growing and that Windows may not always be the desktop OS of choice, and I think they have catered for this really well by making their software platform independent so it will run on Windows, OSX, and Linux.

In the Cloud Computing space, LotusLive is their solution to online collaboration and it is available now, offering online meetings, hosted email and more.

So, what about UC and more specifically, voice stuff? does “the pbx killer” a.k.a OCS R2 have some competition? IBM are calling it UC² and, well.. I liked what I saw, they certainly have some innovative little features, very easy to use and will certainly make collaboration “child’s play”. They are certainly working with an impressive list of business partners as well. I would say though, that with the maturity of OCS R2 and the fact that it is available now I think IBM may just have missed the boat a little. UC² will be available “later this year” and given the momentum OCS already has, it’s going to be interesting..

Gartner Magic Quadrant for Unified Communications

Microsoft have announced the release of Office Communications Server 2007 R2. Customers will be able to purchase the release, currently in private beta testing, beginning in February 2009.

A few of the new features are:

• Dial-in audioconferencing
• Desktop sharing
• Persistent group chat
• Attendant console and delegation
• APIs and Visual Studio integration

For more info, click here