Did you know that Lync Server 2010 can support meetings with up to 1,000 participants using audio/video conferencing, including sharing PowerPoint presentations? Microsoft has released a white paper that describes how to support large meetings using a dedicated Lync Server 2010 pool. The white paper can be downloaded here.
Category Archives: Lync
Lync 2010 Mobility and Mobile Clients
Anyone following Lync should know by now that Microsoft (finally) released a Lync 2010 client for Windows Phone today. Microsoft also officially announced that Lync 2010 clients for iPhone, iPad, Android, and Nokia Symbian have been submitted for approval to their respective app stores. Availability can be tracked here.
The Lync 2010 mobile clients combine instant messaging, conferencing, and calling features in a single application that’s both familiar to Lync users and optimized for mobile productivity.
The Lync 2010 clients can be used to connect to on-premise deployments of Lync Server 2010 or Lync Online in Office 365, both of which require some configuration before mobile clients can connect.
To allow mobile clients to connect to Lync Online in Office 365, you will need to add a DNS CNAME entry for Lync mobile devices, which is covered here.
To allow mobile clients to connect to an on-premise deployment of Lync Server 2010, you will need to install cumulative update for Lync Server 2010: November 2011, and then enable Mobility, which is covered here.
Lync 2010 Cumulative Update (CU) 4 Released
Microsoft has released CU4 for Lync 2010. This update package fixes the issues that are previously documented in the following Microsoft Knowledge Base (KB) articles:
US Army Pilots Microsoft Lync Server
I ran across a post on the Unified Communications Group Team Blog that speaks to the US Army’s Pilot of Lync, which was conducted by the US Army’s Communications-Electronics Research, Development and Engineering Center (CERDEC CD2). The post, which quotes a CERDEC article, mentions some interesting use cases for Lync within the US army, such as:
Lync Server 2010 Capacity Calculator
Microsoft released the Lync Server 2010 Capacity Calculator, which is a spreadsheet for calculating a hardware requirements based on information that the admin supplies about number of users, types of communication, and expected traffic. The Calculator, and an accompanying Word file that describes how to use it, can be downloaded from here.
Lync Client Information Dashboard
As I mentioned in my Lync Client Tools and Applications post, Microsoft has several Lync Client tools and applications available on the Microsoft Lync Adoption and Training Kit website. I installed the Information Dashboard and found it to be quite useful. Here’s a brief look at the Information Dashboard.
Lync Client Tools and Applications
I stumbled across some good Lync Client tools and applications on the Microsoft Lync Adoption and Training Kit website, which I think are very useful for end users and IT professionals. These include:
- IM an Expert
- Conversations Analyzer
- Conversation Translator
- Information Dashboard
- Tabbed Conversations
- Group Chat Stress
- Lync Custom Intranet Site
- Lync How-to
Here’s the Microsoft description of each tool/application:
Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Resource Kit Released
The Lync Server 2010 Resource Kit is the technical reference for the product. This book extends the product planning, deploying, and managing documentation in the Lync Technical Library. This book serves as a companion to the product documentation to learn how the product works under the hood. You can download the Lync Server 2010 Resource Kit here.
Finally…BlackBerry Support for OCS 2007 R2 and Lync 2010
According to the release notes, BlackBerry Enterprise Server 5.0 SP3 will support OCS 2007 R2 and Lync 2010. Since BES 5.0 SP3 hasn’t been released, and there’s no additional information from RIM, the level of support is unclear. However, the release notes do state;
The BlackBerry Enterprise Server is designed to support the following instant messaging servers:
The release notes can be downloaded here.
How to Control which Attributes are Visible on Contact Cards in Lync Server 2010
Lync Server 2010 shows several properties on contact cards within the Lync 2010 client by default. You can customize this by using a Lync Server 2010 Resource Kit Tool. This post provides an overview of how to control which attributes are visible on contact cards in Lync Server 2010.
How to Force an Address Book Refresh on Lync Client
I ran into a situation where I needed to force the address book to refresh on a computer that had the Lync client installed. The process to do so isn’t well documented, so I decided to create this post in case anyone else has a similar requirement. Here’s how you force the address book to refresh on a Lync Client.
How to Configure Lync Server 2010 Archiving and View Archived IM Content
Lync Server 2010 includes an Archiving Server role, which enables organizations to archive IM content, conferencing (meeting) content, or both that is sent through Lync Server 2010. In this post, I dive into how to configure Lync Server 2010 Archiving and view archived IM content. The focus of this post is:
Plan and Deploy Archiving
Set the Archiving Policy
Set the Archiving Configuration
Export and View Archived IM Content
Mandatory Settings
Optional Settings
Examples of Exporting IM Content
Viewing Exported IM Conversations
Lync Server 2010 Policies and Settings Demystified
In-band provisioning, client bootstrapping, tags, Group Policy, policies vs. settings. Yup, it can be confusing 
. In this post, I try to demystify Lync Server 2010 policies and settings.
Step-By-Step Guide to Deploying Lync Server 2010 Enterprise Edition Published
In this 100+ page article, I walk you through each of the tasks, at a step-by-step level, required to deploy a Lync Server 2010 Enterprise Edition lab environment.
The focus of this article is the following:
- Prepare the Lync 2010 Enterprise Edition Server Infrastructure
- Set Up Enterprise Edition Hardware and System Infrastructure
- Create Service Accounts
- Install Prerequisite Software
- Prepare Active Directory Domain Services for Lync Server 2010
- Grant Setup and Administration Permissions
- Add DNS Records
- Create the Lync File Share
- Define the Topology for Lync 2010 Enterprise Edition Front End Pool in Topology Builder
- Configure Simple URLs
- Publish the Topology
- Setup the Lync 2010 Front End Server and Front End Pool
- Install the Local Configuration Store
- Install Front End Servers
- Request, Install, and Assign Certificates
- Start Services
- Install Monitoring and Archiving
- Install the Local Configuration Store
- Install the Monitoring and Archiving Server
- Start Services
- Deploy Monitoring Server Reports
The article can be downloaded from here:
http://policelli.com/Files/Deploying_Lync_Server_2010_Enterprise.pdf.
NOTE: Updated March 7th, 2011 to include Monitoring and Archiving.
Step-By-Step Guide to Deploying Lync Server 2010 Standard Edition Published
The installation of Lync Server 2010 is a fairly task-intensive process. In this article, I walk you through each of the tasks, at a step-by-step level, required to deploy a Lync Server 2010 Standard Edition Server lab environment.
The focus of this article is the following:
- Prepare the Lync 2010 Standard Edition Server Infrastructure
- Define the Topology for Lync 2010 Standard Edition Server in Topology Builder
- Implement the Topology for Lync 2010 Standard Edition Server
- Set Up the Lync 2010 Standard Edition Server
- Run the Lync Server 2010 Control Panel
The article can be downloaded from here:
http://policelli.com/Files/Deploying_Lync_Server_2010_Standard.pdf. I will port this over to a blog post in the coming days.
I am also working on a similar step-by-step guide for Lync Server 2010 Enterprise Edition.
Step-By-Step Guide to Preparing a Lab Environment for Lync Server 2010
In this post, I will walk you through preparing a lab environment for Lync Server 2010. Since the infrastructure prerequisites for Lync Server 2010 Standard Edition and Lync Server 2010 Enterprise Edition differ slightly, the focus of this lab will be the common steps that apply to both editions. In future posts, where I detail the steps to create the Lync Server 2010 lab, I will outline the Edition specific steps.
The focus of this post is:
- Create the Virtual Machine
- Install Active Directory Domain Services
- Install Active Directory Certificate Services
Lync Server 2010 Planning Tool Released
The Microsoft Lync Server 2010, Planning Tool was released yesterday. The Microsoft Lync Server 2010, Planning Tool provides prescriptive guidance to get you started with planning your topology. The Microsoft Lync Server 2010, Planning Tool can be downloaded from here. The Microsoft Lync Server 2010, Planning Tool Readme can be downloaded from here.
The Microsoft Lync Server 2010, Planning Tool asks you a series of questions about your organization and the features that you are interested in. The planning tool will then use your answers to recommend a topology based on the tested Microsoft Lync Server 2010 user model.
What’s New in the Planning Tool for Lync Server 2010?
Lync 2010 Server and Client Updates–January 2011
Several updates for Lync 2010 Server and Lync 2010 clients were posted in late January. Here’s a list of what I was able to find:
Lync 2010 Server Updates
- Update package for Lync Server 2010, Administrative Tools: January 2011
- Cumulative update for Lync Server 2010, Core Components: January 2011
- Update package for Lync Server 2010, Conferencing Server: January 2011
- Update package for Lync Server 2010, Web Components Server: January 2011
Lync 2010 Client Updates
How-To Download and Use the Lync Server 2010 Visio Stencil
Microsoft published a Visio Stencil for Lync Server 2010. The Visio Stencil can be downloaded from here.
Once you download it, you can save it in your Visio Stencil directory (“%userprofile%/Documents/My Shapes” on Windows 7) or any other location you’d like.
To use the Lync Server 2010 Visio Stencil within Visio 2010, follow these steps:
Lync Server 2010 TechNet Library
I was recently looking for Lync Server 2010 documentation on TechNet and stumbled across a download link to a CHM file that contains all of the Lync Server 2010 documentation from TechNet. After downloading the file, and confirming that the content is the same the online TechNet Library, I noticed a link within the CHM which will allow you to check for updates to the CHM file in future.
The CHM file can be downloaded from http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=205577.
The online TechNet Library for Lync Server 2010 can be found at http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/gg398616.aspx.