I'm a UC Blog

Andrew Fryer from Microsoft UK just posted an interactive YouTube vignette that focuses (in no great detail) on Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2.

Andrew will be producing the UK launch event for Windows 7, Windows Server 2008 R2 and Exchange Server 2010 at Wembley Stadium.

It seems there was a lot of interest as this has already gone to a waiting list. Head here to register or to play the video it can be viewed below.

Brief Description

Back in early 2007 my workplace were in the market for an enterprise strength unified communications system, the aim from a high level was to take the businesses voice and data collaboration systems to the next level.

In addition to this we knew it had to have:

• Instant Messaging
• Voicemail to E-mail
• Presence
• Conferencing opportunities
• Mobile integration
• PBX integration
• Calendar synchronisation
• VoIP Softphone

At the time Microsoft had Live Communications Server 2005 which didn’t really deliver all the functionality we were after, but all was not lost. During our discussions with Microsoft, Nortel and BT we were informed of a new product called Office Communications Server 2007, this not only ticked all of our boxes but integrated seamlessly with our already well established choice of systems.

These incumbent technology investments were:

• Microsoft Exchange
• Nortel CS1000 PBX
• MPLS Wide Area Network (MPLS is not a requirement per se but for site-to-site integration you will need to think about QoS)

Before we knew it we were about to embark on a very rewarding proof of concept.

Today we are continuously building upon the success of the OCS platform and I was asked to talk more about it in an Innovative Communications Alliance case study, this has just been published up on their website here.

If you are also interested in running a similar pilot I’d recommend you give these guys a shout.

The deployment of Office Communications Server 2007 R2 usually requires a PBX for telephony functionality, however the R2 version allows for remote SIP trunking, therefore the opportunity to integrate with 3rd party telephony breakout services.

To-date I am not aware of any Microsoft partners offering these services, until now…

Taken from JahJah’s website:

Introducing JAJAH SIP Trunking, now certified by Microsoft

Unified Communications Services are a giant leap forward for enterprises and small to medium sized businesses seeking greater productivity and more efficient ways for employees to communicate and collaborate with each other, customers, suppliers and partners.

Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 Release 2 (OCS) and JAJAH’s IP Communications Platform, enterprises are now able to implement a fully scalable IP communications solution across the organization, whether single or multi-site, local or global, without requiring infrastructure upgrades.

As a SIP Trunking provider for Microsoft OCS, JAJAH provides full IP telephony capabilities to any organization using Microsoft OCS, anywhere in the world.

In addition, JAJAH’s range of mobile, desktop and landline IP telephony solutions seamlessly complement Microsoft OCS, extending the Unified Communications capabilities of the enterprise outside the office.

What is SIP Trunking and why do I need it?

Over the past two decades communications have largely moved from analog signaling, PBX and related infrastructure to digital technologies leveraging the Internet. The shift is primarily driven by the decreased cost and increased resource efficiency that comes from IP communications, without any loss of security or quality. As communications services have converged onto the Internet the ability to integrate numerous services has developed. The result is Unified Communications.

SIP Trunking is the delivery mechanism that underpins unified communications, providing the function of connecting an organization’s PBX(s) to the necessary service providers. In doing so, it ensures phone calls and other IP-based communications originating from an employees’ phone or computer are connected to the destination.

Enterprises interested in implementing unified communication solutions consider video, presence, instant messaging and other communication and collaboration tools. Voice over IP, which is a core element of IP communications, is powered by SIP Trunking.

Any enterprise looking to implement a VoIP or Unified Communications service must have a SIP Trunking provider.

Source: here

Exchange 2007 SP2 has been released and is required for Exchange 2010 interconnectivity, other features below:

• Enhanced Auditing – New Exchange auditing events and audit log repository enable Exchange administrators to more easily audit the activities occurring on their Exchange servers. It allows the right balance of granularity, performance, and easy access to audited events via a dedicated audit log repository. This simplifies the auditing process and makes review of audited events easier by segregating audited events in a dedicated location.
• Exchange Volume Snapshot Backup Functionality – A new backup plug-in has been added to the product that will enable customers to create Exchange backups when a backup is invoked through the Windows Server 2008 Backup tool. Exchange Server 2007 didn’t have this capability on Windows Server 2008 and additional solutions were required to perform this task.
• Dynamic Active Directory Schema Update and Validation – The dynamic AD schema update and validation feature allows for future schema updates to be dynamic deployed as well as proactively preventing conflicts whenever a new property is added to the AD schema. Once this capability is deployed it will enable easier management of future schema updates and will prevent support issues when adding properties that don’t exist in the AD schema.
• Public Folder Quota Management – SP2 enables a consistent way to manage quotas by improving the current PowerShell cmdlets to perform quota management tasks.
• Centralized Organizational Settings – SP2 introduces new PowerShell option that enable centralized management of many of the Exchange organization settings.
• Named Properties cmdlets – SP2 enables Exchange administrators to monitor their named property usage per database.
• New User Interface for Managing Diagnostic Logging– SP2 enables Exchange administrators to easily configure and manage diagnostic logging from within the Exchange Management Console.

Update: Information now on The Exchange Team Blog here

Taken from the System Center Team Blog:

System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008 R2 has RTM’d and GA via volume licensing is set for October 1. This is great news for all and I’d like to especially thank our VMM 2008 R2 Development, Product Management, and Test teams. Lots of hard work fueled by their passion in virtualization and management has resulted in a very good software release.

A 180-day evaluation version is now available, too, on the Microsoft Download site. You can access it here.

Please experience for yourself what the 10,000+ people who have previously downloaded our ‘Release Candidate’ plus organizations such as Continental Airlines, Lionbridge Technologies, and Indiana University have seen with VMM 2008 R2!

I encourage everyone to explore the new System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008 R2 and its new features such as quick storage migration, live migration, and many others. We even offer support for vSphere 4.

To learn more on the new features and capabilities of VMM2008 R2, please try to attend our upcoming TechNet session ‘Technical Overview of System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008 R2’. Presented by our Technical Product Manager Kenon Owens, it will be chocked full of new and cool VMM 2008 R2 items. Go here to register for this Wednesday, September 09, 2009 (10:00 AM Pacific) event.

Thanks!

Zane Adam

Senior Director, Virtualization and management

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Overview

Source: here