Table Of Contents
Planning for Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence Installation
About Planning for Installation
How System Configuration Affects Route Patterns
How System Configuration Determines Video Quality and Affects End Users
About Meeting Scheduling Options
About User Profile Management Options
Completing the Planning Worksheet
Planning for Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence Installation
Revised: June 22, 2007, OL-11747-01
Use the following information to plan for Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence installation:
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About Planning for Installation
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Completing the Planning Worksheet
About Planning for Installation
Before you plan Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence installation, read the following sections to understand how system components work together to provide meetings:
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How System Configuration Affects Route Patterns
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How System Configuration Determines Video Quality and Affects End Users
System Components
Table 1-1 identifies Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence components.
Table 1-1 System Components
Component DescriptionInternal
Cisco Unified Videoconferencing 3500 Series hardware and software
Hosts multipoint, site- or segment-switched meetings
Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence server, which includes the following interfaces:
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Administration Center
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Video Administration, including the Video Administration Configuration Tool
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CLI
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End-user web scheduling
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Hosts system administration
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Handles conference scheduling and management
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Handles conference access management in conjunction with the MCU
External
For Microsoft Outlook Scheduling
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Microsoft Exchange with Active Directory
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Microsoft Outlook client
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Manages Cisco TelePresence System endpoints as resources
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Schedules meetings
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Sends out meeting notifications
For Web Scheduling
SMTP server
Sends out meeting notifications
Cisco Unified Communications Manager1
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Manages the MCU as a SIP trunk device and routes calls to the MCU
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Provides Cisco TelePresence System endpoint information to the Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence server
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Authenticates end users against the database
Cisco TelePresence Systems
Joins Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence meetings and provides live, face-to-face meeting experiences
1 This product was named Cisco Unified CallManager.
How System Configuration Affects Route Patterns
Before planning for installation, you should understand how configuration of the Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence system components identified in Table 1-2 affects route patterns.
Table 1-2 System Component Configuration and Route Patterns
Component Description ReferenceCisco Unified Videoconferencing 3500 MCU
Services configuration
During services configuration, you define the type of meeting that you want to provide to end users and identify the service by assigning it a service prefix. The service prefix becomes part of the meeting ID, and the meeting ID is used by the Cisco Unified Communications Manager to route incoming calls to the MCU.
Service prefixes must be unique and cannot conflict with or contain another service prefix. For example, if service prefix 123 is defined, there can be no service prefix 1 or 12 because they can result in digits that match 123. Similarly, if the service prefix 1 is defined, there can be no service prefix 12 or 123.
Example 1
Your company uses five-digit dialing for internal calls, and you want to designate all calls that begin with 3 as calls for Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence meetings. Configure a service with service prefix 3.
Example 2
Your company uses five-digit dialing for internal calls. You want to designate specific calls that begin with 3 as calls for Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence meetings, and you want to define services by switching type. Configure a service for site switching with a service prefix of 37, and configure a service for segment switching with a service prefix of 38.
See the "Creating New Services" section in the Configuration Guide for Cisco Unified Videoconferencing 3500 MCU Release 5.2.1.
Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence
Meeting ID length configuration
To identify the service that will be provided for a meeting, Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence generates a meeting ID by prepending the service prefix to a random number, the length of which is determined by the configured meeting ID length. Therefore, the number of digits you configure for the service prefix affects the resulting number of digits in a generated meeting ID, which is the phone number end-users dial to access the Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence meeting.
Example 1 (continued)
The MCU prepends service prefix 3 to the default, four-digit meeting ID length, resulting in a five-digit meeting ID. Configure the route pattern in Cisco Unified Communications Manager as 3.XXXX so that all calls beginning with 3 are routed to the MCU, and callers are placed directly into a meeting with the defined capabilities for that service.
Example 2 (continued)
Because the MCU prepends service prefixes 37 and 38 to the default, four-digit meeting ID length, resulting in a six-digit meeting ID, configure the meeting ID length as three, and configure the route patterns as 37.XXXX for site and 38.XXXX for segment.
See the "Configuring Meeting ID Settings" section in the Configuration Guide for Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence Version 1.1.
How System Configuration Determines Video Quality and Affects End Users
Before planning for installation, you should understand how video quality is determined by the settings you configure on the Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence system components that are identified in Table 1-3 and how these settings affect end-users.
Table 1-3 System Component Configuration and Video Quality
Component Description ReferenceCisco Unified Communications Manager
Region configuration
You must allocate enough bandwidth to regions that include Cisco TelePresence devices. The video call bandwidth specified in Cisco Unified Communications Manager region configuration takes effect when the bandwidth requested exceeds the region, affecting calls by end users as follows:
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If the bandwidth changes such that the quality of the resolution is not affected, for example from 4Mbps to 3Mbps, the call continues to the MCU at 3Mbps.
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If bandwidth changes such that the quality of the resolution is affected, for example 4Mbps to 2Mbps or from 1080p to 720p, the call is not successful.
See the documentation for your Cisco Unified Communications Manager release.
Device configuration
Cisco Unified Communications Manager supports six quality settings for Cisco TelePresence devices, ranging from 1Mbps 720p to 4Mbps 1080p per display.
Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence chooses the service to provide to end users based on the lowest quality setting of all invited Cisco TelePresence devices.
See the Cisco Unified Communications Manager Installation Guide for the Cisco TelePresence System for your release.
Cisco Unified Videoconferencing 3500 MCU
Services configuration
You must create a service that specifies the maximum call rate and switching type for each type of service that you want to provide to end users.
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When end users schedule meetings, Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence chooses the service that most closely matches but does not exceed the lowest quality setting of invited Cisco TelePresence endpoints. The switching type, however, must match exactly; otherwise, meeting scheduling fails. For example, if an end user schedules a site-switched meeting with a mix of 720p and 1080p endpoints, but there is no 720p, site-switched service defined on the MCU, meeting scheduling fails.
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When end users dial in to meetings, the MCU provides the service defined for the service prefix that the end user dials. If the quality of calls by end users meets or exceeds that of the service, the call continues with audio and video. If the quality does not meet that of the service, the call continues with audio only.
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Tip
If all the endpoints in your environment have the same quality setting, you need only to configure one service for site switched and one service for segment switched to support that quality setting.
See the "Creating New Services" section in the Configuration Guide for Cisco Unified Videoconferencing 3500 MCU Release 5.2.1.
Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence
System usage configuration
The Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence quality settings correspond directly to the quality settings in Cisco Unified Communications Manager. For example, the Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence setting Highest Detail, Best Motion corresponds to the Cisco Unified Communications Manager quality setting Highest Detail, Best Motion: 4Mbps 1080p per display.
The default quality setting takes effect when end users do not invite Cisco TelePresence devices to Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence meetings.
See the "Configuring the Video Quality and Switching Mode" section in the
Configuration Guide for Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence Version 1.1.
About Meeting Scheduling Options
Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence supports scheduling meetings through Microsoft Outlook, on the web through an end-user interface on the Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence server, or a combination of both, though system behavior for modifying and deleting meetings is unique for each option.
For information about the required configuration to implement scheduling options, see the following sections:
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Completing the System Preparation Checklist for Microsoft Outlook Scheduling, page 2-2
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Completing the System Preparation Checklist for Web Scheduling, page 2-3
For information about scheduling meetings, see the User Guide for Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence Version 1.1 or the Quick Start Guide for Microsoft Outlook Integrated with Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence Version 1.1.
About User Profile Management Options
Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence supports automatic, manual creation of user profiles, or a combination of both.
The system automatically creates a user profile when a new user attempts to log in to Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence and is successfully authenticated by Cisco Unified Communications Manager. This method allows eligible, unprofiled users to use Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence without waiting for a system administrator to create their user profiles.
These end users have access to their end user profiles via the web; however, they continue to be authenticated by and log in with their Cisco Unified Communications Manager credentials. Names of end users who have not logged in to Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence do not display in the list of meeting invitees in the web scheduling form.
Alternately, you can manually create end user profiles on the Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence server. Manually creating user profiles is useful for adding a few new users to the database to restrict access, for example. These end users have access to their end user profiles via the web and can change their associated passwords.
System Configuration Example
Company A uses five-digit dialing for internal calls. The administrator designates calls that begin with digits 36 - 39 as calls for Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence meetings and defines services by switching type.
Based on the configuration for Company A described in Table 1-4, Figure 1-1 shows how system components work together to provide Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence meetings.
Figure 1-1 Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence System
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Completing the Planning Worksheet
Use Table 1-5 to record information for configuration of external system components and for Cisco Unified Conferencing for TelePresence operating system and application installation.