Cisco Unified Presence (CUP) Installation and Configuration

I was in the process of rebuilding my demo server and was having some issues getting CUP to work.  In an attempt to find support forums or blogs referring to CUP I came across a series of 9 YouTube videos created by a fellow Cisco SE detailing the installation and configuration.  The videos are geared towards CUCM and CUP 8.6 but 90%+ applies to CUCM and CUP 9.0 as well.

Hope this helps those of you attempting the install yourself.

MSNBC: Behind the Scenes

http://videolounge.cisco.com/video/msnbc-behind-the-scenes

This is a great video highlighting Cisco's partnership with MSNBC marrying broadcast and TelePresence to deliver a rich face to face like experience.

One more great video on Session management

Great video on Session management and interoperability with Legacy PBX's and leveraging your current investments.

High level UC 9.0 overview.

Look for another post shortly with more information!

Great Overview Of Cisco Microsoft Interop.

Jabber for iPad

Jabber for iPad is now available for install from the Apple App store.  Here is a quick video guide on the features and functionality of the client.




The admin guide for Jabber for iPad can be found in this location:

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/voice_ip_comm/jabber/iPad/Admin_doc/output/b_Jabber_for_iPad_admin_guide.pdf#page31

Additionally, here is the Jabber for iPad TMS Provisioning Template.

Happy Jabbering!

VCS Root Account Password Recovery

"I forgot to document the root password on my VCS (C/E) and I need to ssh as Root to perform X... How do I reset the root password?"

This is a question I get frequently.  The process is actually very simple, but requires console access.  Here is the procedure taken straight out of the VCS Admin guide.

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/telepresence/infrastructure/vcs/admin_guide/Cisco_VCS_Administrator_Guide_X7-1.pdf

Resetting an administrator or root password

If you forget the password for the default admin account or any other administrator account, log in to the VCS using the account of another administrator with read-write access and change the password.

However, if you do not have any other administrator accounts with read-write access, or have forgotten the passwords for them all, you can set a new password for the admin account using the following procedure. This can also be used if you have forgotten the password for the root account:

1. Connect a PC to the VCS using the serial cable as per the instructions in VCS Getting Started Guide.
2. Restart the VCS.
3. Log in from the PC with the username pwrec. No password is required.
4. Select the account (root or admin) whose password you want to change.
5. You will be prompted for a new password.

The pwrec account is only active for one minute following a restart. After that time you will have to restart the system again to change the password. 

UC on UCS

Wanted to make sure everyone was aware to make this change on all Virtualized Unified communications.  This is a known issue with VMware and Linux host.  I have seen this cause very weird issues on a UC deployment.  

http://docwiki.cisco.com/wiki/Disable_LRO

Note:

After upgrading the ESXi host to 4.1 or 5.0 and upgrading VMs to VMwareTools to 4.1 or 5.0, you may experience slow TCP performance on VMs running on the 4.1 or 5.0 ESXi host. You can address this situation by disabling Large Receive Offload (LRO) on the ESXi host.

To disable LRO, follow this procedure:

1. Log into the ESXi host or its vCenter with vSphere Client.
2. Select the host > Configuration > Software:Advanced Settings.
3. Select Net and scroll down slightly more than half way.
4. Set the following parameters from 1 to 0:
   • Net.VmxnetSwLROSL
   • Net.Vmxnet3SwLRO
   • Net.Vmxnet3HwLRO
   • Net.Vmxnet2SwLRO
   • Net.Vmxnet2HwLRO
5. Reboot the ESXi host to activate these changes.
   

Your guest VMs should now have normal TCP networking performance.

Cisco TelePresence Video Communication Server (VCS) VM Appliance

Prefer the small footprint and virtualized deployment model?  VCS Control and Expressway appliances are now available as VMWare appliances with the VCS 7.1 code. 

For those interested in the minimum specs and supported configurations, please see the deployment guide.

It is important to note that there are some unsupported features with this initial version of the VM appliance.

1. ESXi 4.1 compatible, but not ESXi 5.  During testing there was a problem related to an LSI RAID card that caused an issue.
2. VMWare fault tolerant mode is not supported because the VCS uses dual cores.  VMotion IS supported.

What is all the jabbering about Jabber?

What is Jabber?  Is Jabber a product, protocol, some crazy mentality or what?  Cisco's Jason Shearer sheds some clarifying light on Jabber in this video.

Cisco's Enterprise connect Keynote.  Announcing and showing new Jabber clients and New High end video endpoint. 

https://communities.cisco.com/videos/9151
https://communities.cisco.com/videos/9147

VCS Setup

Great Doc that Wes point me to today. This Doc will walk you through the complete setup of a VCSc and VCSe.  The appendixes are great includes DNS, and firewall information.  


http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/telepresence/infrastructure/vcs/config_guide/Cisco_VCS_Basic_Configuration_Cisco_VCS_Control_with_Cisco_VCS_Expressway_Deployment_Guide_X7-1.pdf

Cisco Jabber Video FREE!

Got video?  Now there is no excuse.  Cisco is now offering Cisco Jabber Video for Free!  Jabber Video is the latest evolution of the already successful product, Movi.  To help make video the next voice, Cisco is offering the application in a hosted environment for free.  Now you can video enable your business partners, friends, family, etc.

Join now while all of the good usernames are available.

https://www.ciscojabbervideo.com/home

UC on UCS install video

I was doing some searching and found these great video from Jason Murray on How to install and configure UC on UCS.  He also has a 5 part video series on the BE6k.  Check it out.

Cisco Unified Communications Virtualized

http://docwiki.cisco.com/wiki/Unified_Communications_in_a_Virtualized_Environment

I have been doing alot with Cisco Unified Communications on the new Cisco UCS servers.  If you are looking at moving in this direction the Doc wiki is the best source for the latest information and specs on running the Cisco applications in a virtual environment.  This is the place to OVA templates as well.

Administering TC Endpoints on CUCM 8.6

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/telepresence/endpoint/codec-c-series/tc5/administration_guide/cts_endpoint_administration_ucm86_quick_start_guide_tc50.pdf


With the release of TC 5.0 for EX, MX, Profile and C Series TelePresence codecs comes the ability to natively register to CUCM.  This document provides a very basic step by step guide for adding a TC 5.0 enabled codec to CUCM.  Addionally, the appendix discussing CDP in TP endpoints is very good.

As always, additional Cisco TelePresence documents can be found at http://www.cisco.com/go/telepresence/docs.