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There are effectively a limitless number of applications that can be part of a Unified Communications system, because
third-party applications can be developed to closely integrate with the Cisco suite of products. The following is a list of
the more common applications found in a Unified Communications system:
• Voice Mail: Voice mail can be provided using Cisco Unity, Unity Connection, or Unity Express. Unity and Unity
Connection run on the MCS 7800 series platforms, and Unity Express is a self-contained module that is added to an
ISR router and administered through the command line and GUI. The maximum mailboxes and recording time
capacities vary depending on which module (either Advanced Integration Module or Network Module) is installed in
the router.
• Cisco Emergency Responder: This application tracks the location of an IP telephony device based on the physical
switch port it is connected to. This information is attached to the caller information in the event the device calls 911,
which in turn allows 911 responders to locate the device (and therefore presumably the emergency) more precisely.
911 operation in a Unified Communications environment is a major design challenge because a VoIP phone system
can easily throw out the premise that a PSTN call is placed from the same location as the phone that made it.
© 2008 Cisco Systems Inc. All rights reserved. This publication is protected by copyright. Please see page 147 for more details.
• Cisco Unified Contact Center [Express]: This is a call center application with full feature support for advanced
call distribution, supervision, escalation and logging. Versions are available to support small and large call centers.
• Cisco Unified Meeting Place [Express]: This is a full-featured web-conferencing application enabling voice and
video conferencing as well as document sharing and collaboration, whiteboarding, and conference participant
management.
• Cisco Unified Presence: This extends the native capabilities of Unified CM 6.x+ to indicate presence information.
The native capability includes on/off hook status in speed dials and call lists, whereas the full applications server
provides detailed presence information as typically found in chat applications ("On the Phone," "Out to Lunch," "Do
Not Disturb," and so on).
Endpoints Layer
An increasing variety of Cisco Unified IP Phones (and third-party IP phones) can be part of a Unified Communications
deployment. All Cisco Unified IP Phones provide a display-based user interface, user customization, Power over Ethernet
capability (where appropriate), and support for G.711 and G.729 codecs (and, on some models, Cisco Wideband and/or
iLBC codecs). The following is a partial list and brief description of the Cisco Unified IP Phones available:
Commercial/Retail Phones
7931G: 24 programmable buttons, 4-way LEDs, Dedicated HolaVTransfer/Redial buttons
7921G: Wireless, 2-in. color screen, speakerphone, XML-PTT, longer battery life
Mobility
7921G: Wireless, 2-in. color screen, speakerphone, XML-PTT, longer battery life
IP Communicator: Software-based IP Phone, emulates 7970G functionality
© 2008 Cisco Systems Inc. All rights reserved. This publication is protected by copyright. Please see page 147 for more details.
Business Class
7940G: B/W LCD, 2-button, XML-capable, SIP-capable
7941G: Higher resolution B/W LCD, 2-button, XML-capable, SIP-capable
7960G: B/W LCD, 6-button, XML-capable, SIP-capable
7961G: Higher resolution B/W LCD, 6-button, XML-capable, SIP-capable
Advanced Media
7942G: Hi-fidelity audio, Hi-res display, 2-button, XML-capable, SIP-capable
7945G: Gig Ethernet, Hi-fidelity audio, Hi-res color display, 2-button, XML-capable, SIP-capable
7962G: Hi-fidelity audio, Hi-res display, 6-button, XML-capable, SIP-capable
7965G: Gig Ethernet, Hi-fidelity audio, Hi-res color display, 6-button, XML-capable, SIP-capable
7975G: Gig Ethernet, Hi-fidelity audio, backlit hi-res color display, 6-button, XML, SIP-capable
Color Touch
7970G: Backlit hi-res color touch screen, 8-button, XML-capable, SIP-capable
7971G-GE: Gig Ethernet, Backlit hi-res color touch screen, 8-button, XML-capable, SIP-capable
7975G: Hi-fidelity audio, Backlit hi-res color touch screen, 8-button, XML-capable, SIP-capable
Video
7985G: Personal desktop video phone
Unified Video Advantage: Software IP Video Phone with support for attached camera
Conference
7936G: Backlit LCD, 3 softkeys, small-medium conference needs
7937G: Hi-fidelity audio, extended audio coverage w/ extra mics, large display
Messaging
A variety of messaging options are available to suit the needs of businesses small and large. The following table provides
a summary of the options.
Product
Max.
Users Messaging Capability Platform
TDM PBX
Integration? Networking? Redundancy?
Unity Express 250 Voice Mail + Integrated Messaging ISR No Yes No
Unity Connection 3000 Voice Mail + Integrated Messaging MCS Yes No No
Unity 7500
per server
Voice Mail + Integrated Messaging +
Unified Messaging
MCS Yes Yes Yes
The following sections describe the messaging products listed in the table in more detail.
Cisco Unity Express
Unity Express is an ISR-based application that runs either on an AIM module or an NM module. AIM modules are
connected to the main board as a daughter board addition and use flash memory for greetings and message storage. AIM
modules therefore have less capacity for storage. NM modules are inserted into module bays in ISR routers, use a hard
© 2008 Cisco Systems Inc. All rights reserved. This publication is protected by copyright. Please see page 147 for more details.
Understanding Unified Communications
Applications
In this section, we examine the variety of applications available for integration in a Unified Communications environment,
including Messaging, Auto Attendant, Interactive Voice Response (IVR), Contact Center, Mobility, and Presence.
© 2008 Cisco Systems Inc. All rights reserved. This publication is protected by copyright. Please see page 147 for more details.
disk for greeting and message storage, and have greater capacity for storage than AIM modules. Unity Express supports
from 4 to 16 concurrent sessions and 12 to 250 mailboxes (dependent on the module and platform installed). Unity
Express is managed through the command line or a web-based GUI. It allows users to view and sort their voice messages
using the IP Phone display, email application, or IMAP client. Unity Express can be deployed in conjunction with
Unified CM or CM Express and can supplement a full Unity deployment.
Cisco Unity Connection
Unity Connection is a medium-size business solution with a full range of messaging features. It can be deployed on its
own or as a coresident installation as part of Unified Communications Manager Business Edition on suitable MCS platforms.
When deployed as part of CM Business Edition, Unity Connection supports up to 500 users; when deployed as a
standalone application, Unity connection supports up to 3000 users per server (dependent on hardware). Scalability is
achieved by networking up to 10 other Unity messaging products of any type. Fourteen languages are supported for
deployments worldwide. Unity Connection also supports speech recognition, allowing users to speak commands to
manage their messages hands-free. Multiple interfaces are supported for managing messages from an IP Phone, an email
client, a web GUI, or Cisco Unified Personal Communicator. Users can define their own rules to transfer calls based on
caller, time of day, and Microsoft Exchange calendar status.
Cisco Unity
Unity is the enterprise-class messaging application with support for up to 7500 users per server and up to 250,000 users
in a multi server networked environment. Interoperability with legacy voice-mail systems, notably Octel and Nortel
systems, allows a phased transition to IP messaging with minimal disruption to users. Unity supports 35 languages, facilitating
deployments worldwide. Full unified messaging is possible with connectors for Exchange, Notes, and GroupWise,
providing a single inbox for email, voice mail, and fax messages. Text-to-speech capability allows users to have their
emails read to them over the phone by the RealSpeech engine; speech recognition is also available so users can instruct
Unity to play, search, or record messages hands-free. Secure messaging is supported, allowing encrypted messages and
preventing messages that have expired from being played. Access to messages is made simple, intuitive, and possible
from almost anywhere.
© 2008 Cisco Systems Inc. All rights reserved. This publication is protected by copyright. Please see page 147 for more details.
Auto Attendant
An Auto Attendant is basically an advanced answering machine; instead of only one message, it can play several, depending
on the date and time, which number was called, and most importantly, what numbers the callers pressed in response
to the greeting they heard. If you have ever heard: "For service in English, press I. Pour service en Francais, appuyez sur
le 2 . . . , " you have been served by an Auto Attendant. Typically, Auto Attendants allow callers to select the department or
extension they want to call, and often they allow the caller to spell out a first or last name to search in the company directory.
Cisco Unity, Unity Connection, and Unity Express all provide Auto Attendant functionality; Unity and Unity
Connection include a simple web interface that makes it very easy to construct menus and test to see that they work as
you intended.
Cisco Unified IP IVR
Although Auto Attendants are useful, their functionality is limited to pretty basic menu navigation. To scale this functionality
up to call-center size, and especially to include speech recognition, prompt-and-collect ("Please enter your 10-digit
account number, followed by the # sign"), Text-to-Speech, database integration, and Java application integration, a much
more advanced IVR application is required. Cisco Unified IP IVR has all these advanced capabilities. Call centers that
have a high call volume and many possible queues of callers waiting for different agent capabilities can effectively deploy
Unified IP IVR to steer callers to the correct agent, or perhaps to an automated information source without the need to tie
up an agent at all. Unified IP IVR includes the capability to provide both real-time and historical reports on its utilization
and offers multiple-language support.
Cisco Unified Customer Voice Portal
For the very largest call centers, the Unified CVP product provides advanced IVR, including speech recognition,
advanced queuing, integration with Cisco Unified Contact Center (Enterprise and Hosted), and powerful call routing,
management, and reporting features.
© 2008 Cisco Systems Inc. All rights reserved. This publication is protected by copyright. Please see page 147 for more details.
Cisco Unified Contact Center
Cisco provides a range of Contact Center products for SMB, Enterprise, and Service Provider applications. Customer
contact solutions provide multiple avenues to reach and interact with customers, including basic telephony as well as
feature-rich web, email, and even video interaction. The three Contact Center products are described next:
• Cisco Unified Contact Center Express: Suitable for 10 to 300 agents, it provides sophisticated call routing,
outbound dialing capabilities, comprehensive contact management, and chat and web collaboration in a singleserver,
integrated "contact center in a box."
• Cisco Unified Contact Center Enterprise: Provides intelligent contact routing, call treatment, network-to-desktop
computer telephony integration (CTI), and multichannel contact management. It combines multichannel automatic
call distributor (ACD) functionality. Sophisticated monitoring allows customers to be routed to the most appropriate
agent (based on real-time conditions such as agent skills, availability, and queue lengths) anywhere in the enterprise,
regardless of the agent's location.
• Cisco Unified Contact Center Hosted: An application hosted by service providers, who then lease its functionality
to customers who want a virtual contact center without the need to manage and maintain it themselves. Subscribing
business customers can have IP or time-division multiplexing (TDM) infrastructures or a combination of the two.
Contact Center Hosted provides all the advanced capabilities found in Contact Center Enterprise.
Cisco Unified Mobile Solutions
Today's workforce is mobile, distributed, and utilizes multiple technologies to communicate. The desire to have a seamless
transition between the various ways in which people can be reached has spurred the development of mobility features
in Cisco Unified Communications. The key products are the following:
• Cisco Unified Mobility: (a.k.a Single Number Reach) Allows multiple remote destinations (commonly a cell phone,
a home office phone, or other work location) to be configured to ring at the same time as the worker's enterprise
desk phone. Thus, when a customer calls your work number while you are on your way to a meeting, your cell
phone can ring and you can answer without the customer realizing you are away from your desk. Furthermore, if
you return to your desk, you can simply pick up your desk phone and continue the call.
A related feature, called Cisco Mobile Voice Access, allows users to place calls from their enterprise desk phone
from a remote location or a cell phone. By dialing a configured number and entering an access code, the enterprise
system will prompt for the number you want to call, and the call will be placed as if you were at your desk. This is
useful not only for presenting the preferred Caller-ID number to the customer, but also potentially for long-distance
toll savings.
• Cisco Unified Personal Communicator: A desktop PC (or Mac) application that combines a software IP Phone, IM
client, video, and online collaboration capabilities. Presence indications ("Busy," "In a call," "Away," "Do Not
Disturb," and so on) can save time and enhance productivity because users can see the status of the person they want
to contact before trying to reach them. Integration with an Outlook toolbar provides click-to-call or click-to-chat
from a message or contact.
• Cisco Unified IP Communicator: A fully functioned software IP Phone, often characterized as a "7970 under
glass." Users can place and receive calls from their PCs from anywhere that connectivity to the call agent can be
established. This is typically achieved through a VPN connection; it is perfectly possible to place a call from an
airport boarding lounge or your local coffee shop. Unified IP Communicator can be enhanced with Unified Video
Advantage, which integrates a PC webcam for video calls.
• Cisco Unified Mobile Communicator: An application for smart mobile phones that provides access to enterprise
directories, presence indicators, secure text/chat, voice-mail access, call history of any of the user's phones displayed
on the mobile handset, and collaboration and conferencing integration with Unified Meeting Place.
• Cisco Unified Presence: A server-based application that extends the on/off hook status monitoring capability of Unified
CM 6.x to include IM-like status messages. Status indications can be displayed or integrated with Personal Communicator,
Mobile Communicator, IP Phone Messenger, the Microsoft Office Connector, and IBM Sametime Communicator.
© 2008 Cisco Systems Inc. All rights reserved. This publication is protected by copyright. Please see page 147 for more details.
FIGURE 4
The Cisco
Telepresence 3000
System—Image ©
Cisco
nified Communications Applications
Cisco Telepresence
Cisco Telepresence is a state-of-the-art high-definition videoconferencing system. A specially designed system of furniture,
cameras, monitors, and microphones creates a life-sized illusion of a meeting whose participants may be half a world apart.
With 1080p HD video, CD-quality spatial audio, and high-quality lighting, the experience is dramatic to say the least. In
combination with the Telepresence Multipoint Switch, up to 36 locations can be included in a single conference with nearzero
latency. This can only be described as a high-end solution, with commensurate demands on bandwidth.
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