Implementing Outlook Voice Access with Exchange Server 2007

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PART-1[/B][/SIZE]

A very popular new functionality of Exchange Server 2007 Enterprise Edition is Unified Messaging. With this feature set you have some great options to remotely connect to your mailbox. Within this article I will describe how to install and set up Unified Messaging and look at how to configure Outlook Voice Access and test your configuration using the Microsoft Testphone Tool provided with Exchange Server 2007.
[B]Adding the UMS-Server Role[/B]

One of the first steps to providing your users with Outlook Voice Access is to add the UMS-Server role to your Exchange Server 2007 box. This task is quite easy because you have two options:

[LIST=1][*] Using the commandline[/LIST]
[B][IMG]http://www.msexchange.org/img/upl/image0021189526820882.jpg[/IMG]
Figure 1:[/B] Set up UM using the Commandline

[LIST=1][*] Using the GUI-Setup[/LIST]
[IMG]http://www.msexchange.org/img/upl/image0041189526820914.jpg[/IMG]
[B]Figure 2:[/B] Set up UM using GUI-Setup Tool
To do this you will have to be a member of the Exchange Administrators group.
[B]Requirements[/B]

After we have successfully added this role we will now take a look at the tasks to be done to make Outlook Voice Access Availabe to users.
First, let's think about the users: their requirements are easy; the only thing they will want is a functional telephone, no matter which technology it is based on.
The requirements for your telephone network are a little bit more complex: you will have to provide a telephone installation that provides Voice over IP (VoIP) functionality, because Exchange Server 2007 will just be another VoIP device in your network. A lot of telephone systems provide this feature or at least lots of them could be prepared to work with VoIP. If you do not have a hardware telephone system, you should think of using a software telephone system.
A full list of supported devices can be found on the [URL="http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/exchange/telephony-advisor.mspx"]Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 Telephony Advisor page[/URL].
If these requirements are met and the systems are configured properly, your network is successfully prepared for configuring UMS support for Exchange Server 2007.
Be careful, if you run Exchange Server 2007 in virtual environments - it is currently unsupported to install Unified Messaging on a virtual server system, no matter which tool you are using.
[B]Configuring Outlook Voice Access[/B]

After a successful installation, we can now begin configuring. You can do this using the Exchange Management Shell – but in this article I will describe how to use the Exchange Management Console.
The console should now look like this:
[B][IMG]http://www.msexchange.org/img/upl/figure31190121267242.jpg[/IMG]
Figure 3:[/B] Exchange Management Console after a successful installation of Unified Messaging
Before we start with the detailled configuration steps, let's clarify some vocabulary:
[B]UM Dial-in Plan
[/B]An Exchange Dial-in plan is a container in Active Directory that represents sets of users’ telephone number extensions. Each Dial-in plan consists of: the subscriber access, dial codes, dialing rule groups, features and general settings.
[B]UM IP-Gateway
[/B]Each UM IP-Gateway represents the IP-Address or FQDN of your VoIP gateway(s).
[B]UM Mailbox Policy
[/B]A UM Mailbox Policy defines the message texts for the mailbox itself, the PIN policies and dialing restrictions
[B]UM Auto Attendant[/B]
A UM Auto Attendant can be used to define how calls are mapped or routed during business and non-business hours.
Now you can easily activate unified messaging for your users. Just choose the appropriate settings on the user’s mailbox context menu.
[B]Setting up “ExchangeUMTestPhone.exe”[/B]

Now that what these expressions stand for, we can configure them as needed. Now - after all configuration is done - we can begin testing if everything works properly with your Outlook Voice Access configuration. For this purpose Microsoft developed a small tool that is delivered with Exchange Server 2007 called “ExchangeUMTestPhone.exe” that can be found on the Exchange Server 2007 DVD and under the binaries folder of your Exchange Server installation.
To set up a client computer to run this tool, you will have to do the following:

[LIST=1][*] Install the 32-bit Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 on the client computer that will run the Exchange UM Test Phone application.[*] The following list shows the files that you must copy to a local folder on the client computer:[/LIST]

[LIST][*] <%windir%>\assembly\GAC_32\Microsoft.Collaboration.Media\
MediaVersionNumber\Microsoft.Collaboration.Media.dll[*] <%windir%>\assembly\GAC_MSIL\Microsoft.Collaboration\
CollaborationVersionNumber\Microsoft.Collaboration.dll[*] <%windir%>\assembly\GAC_32\SIPEPS\SipsepsVersionNumber\SIPEPS.dll[*] Exchange Server\bin\exchmem.dll[*] Exchange Server\bin\extrace.dll[*] Exchange Server\public\Microsoft.Exchange.Common.dll[*] Exchange Server\bin\Microsoft.Exchange.Data.Common.dll[*] Exchange Server\bin\Microsoft.Exchange.Diagnostics.dll[*] Exchange Server\bin\Microsoft.Exchange.Net.dll[*] Exchange Server\bin\Microsoft.Exchange.Rpc.dll[*] Exchange Server\bin\ ExchangeUMTestPhone.exe[/LIST]
Now you can start this .exe file and it should run properly and present you the following:
[IMG]http://www.msexchange.org/img/upl/image0081189526844460.jpg[/IMG]
[B]Figure 4:[/B] ExchangeUMTestPhone-Tool
With this tool you can choose between four modes and test them if they are running properly:

[LIST][*] Call answering ([url=http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb124770.aspx]Test Call Answering Functionality with the Unified Messaging Test Phone[/url])[*] Subscriber Access ([url=http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb124089.aspx]Test Subscriber Access Functionality with the Unified Messaging Test Phone[/url])[*] Auto Attendant ([url=http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa996332.aspx]Test Auto Attendant Functionality with the Unified Messaging Test Phone[/url]) [*] TLS functionality ([url=http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb232157.aspx]Test TLS Functionality Using the Unified Messaging Test Phone[/url])[/LIST]
Each link describes the test scenario in detail, and tells you clearly what prerequisites are needed for this scenario.
In general, any problems during your tests should occur now. Within my “real world” deployments of Unified Messaging these probes became essential for me to just make sure that everything was set up properly and no configuration errors were made.
[B]Troubleshooting Unified Messaging[/B]

If things are not working properly, the ExchangeUMTestPhone tool is your premier troubleshooting tool, too. As described in [URL="http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb124716.aspx"]How to Debug Unified Messaging with the Unified Messaging Test Phone[/URL], you can quite easily switch to debug mode by creating an .ini file with the appropriate settings.
After restarting your Exchange Unified Messaging Service, you will now be able to debug your problem. Due to the better logging functionalites that are now available with the debugger, you should see where the error occurred and how to fix it.
To activate Unified Messaging Server Logging, you may use the Registry Editor and change the following setting:
[B]HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\MSExchange UnifiedMessaging\Diagnostics[/B]
The supported logging levels are:

[LIST][*] Expert = 7[*] High = 5[*] Medium = 3[*] Low = 1[*] Lowest = 0[/LIST]
After a service restart, your event log should display very detailed error messages.
Another solution to solve your unified messaging problem may be the Exchange Troubleshooting Assistant, which is installed by default on your Exchange Server box.
[B]Conclusion[/B]

As you have seen in this guide on how to install and test unified messaging on Exchange Server 2007, the configuration of this new service is not as complex as it seems to be. If you take a straightforward approach and make sure that every setting is correct, you should be successful. And if there are some problems, Microsoft has added tools to Exchange Server 2007 that help when troubleshooting and solving your unified messaging problems.



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[B]UM Architecture[/B]

Exchange Server 2007 Outlook Voice Access relies on two important services:

[LIST][*]Microsoft Exchange Unified Messaging service (UMservice.exe)[*]Microsoft Exchange Speech Engine service (SpeechService.exe)[/LIST]
The Exchange Unified Messaging service allows storage of voice and fax messages in an Exchange Server 2007 mailbox. In addition it gives users voice access to e-mails, voice-mails, calendar and contract items. If this service is not running, UM features are unavailable for all users in your organization. The Microsoft Exchange Speech Engine service relies on Microsoft Exchange Unified Messaging services. This service is responsible for:

[LIST][*]Dual Tone Multi-Frequency (DTMF)[*]Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR)[*]Text-to-Speech (TTS)[/LIST]
This service is essential to make Outlook Voice Access work properly. An overview of how all the services interact with each other can be found on [URL="http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb232168.aspx"]Microsoft Technet[/URL].
[B][IMG]http://www.msexchange.org/img/upl/image0021196075341359.jpg[/IMG]
Figure 1: [/B]Architecture of Exchange Server 2007 Unified Messaging([URL="http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb125049.aspx"]Source: Microsoft[/URL])
When taking a look at the ports required for UM functionality we will see that the Microsoft Exchange Unified Messaging service listens on TCP port 5060 in unsecured mode and TCP port 5061 when Mutual Transport Layer Security (MTLS) is used. Each UM worker process that is created listens on TCP port 5065 and 5066. When an IP-Gateway is involved and sends Real-time Transport Protocol (RTP) traffic to the Speech Engine service worker process, it or the IP PBX will use a valid higher UDP port. With Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 1, which should be released in the last quarter of calendar year 2007, this changes a little bit: the Exchange Unified Messaging Service will listen on the TCP ports 5060 and 5061 at the same time; each UM .NET worker process will listen on port 5065 and 5067. If you configure secure communications only, it will use Port 5066 and 5068. So if you use Exchange Unified Messaging over firewalls, you should make sure that these ports are open.
[B]Exchange Unified Messaging Processes[/B]

If you have a look at the figure below, you will see how Outlook Voice Access message flow works:
[B][IMG]http://www.msexchange.org/img/upl/image0031196075341406.gif[/IMG]
Figure 2: [/B]Outlook Voice Access Message Flow([URL="http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/e953e88d-5458-4952-8244-2f257c67e765.aspx"]Source: Microsoft[/URL])
[B]Exchange Unified Messaging Connectivity[/B]

Now we have understood how the services itself interacts, the next step then will be connecting it to an SIP-Gateway.
Although there are lots of officially supported VoIP or PBX devices that Exchange Server 2007 is able to work with ([URL="http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/exchange/telephony-advisor.mspx"]Telephony Advisor for Exchange Server 2007[/URL]), a lot of companies are having trouble with this implementation. Therefore, quite a few good products have been published to make things easier. In this article we will take a closer look at some of them:

[LIST][*]DIVA SIP Control[*]Ferrari Office Master Gateway for Unified Messaging[*]Asterisk Software[*]Microsoft Partner UM Starter Kit[/LIST]
[B]Dialogic SIP Control and Dialogic Media Gateways[/B]
A lot of companies may have still have an ISDN Server Adapter from Dialogic. This ISDN adapter may solve your problem. The software module Diva SIPControl allows you to create an 8 channel PSTN/IP Gateway (further channels are possible but you need a valid license. SIPControl translates the Call-Control-Information of the DIVA adapter into SIP messages based on RFC 3261. You can [URL="http://www.dialogic.com/products/ip_enabled/Diva_SIPcontrol.htm?dl=1&regID=19456"]download DIVA SIP Control Software here[/URL]. Here is a [URL="http://www.dialogic.com/pubs/20647701.pdf"]PDF of supported devices[/URL].
The procedure of how to deploy the DIVA SIP Control software is quite easy. After having done this, the only thing left is to connect your Exchange Unified Messaging Configuration with your DIVA SIP Control Solution.
If you are running Exchange Server 2007 Unified Messaging in virtual environments (which is completely unsupported from Microsoft at present), this solution may not help you, because you cannot directly connect your DIVA adapter to your virtual machine.
Another option is to use the “Dialogic Media Gateway for Microsoft Communications”. For more information you should [URL="http://www.dialogic.com/microsoftuc/exchange2007UM/default.htm"]check this website[/URL]. This “black box” is a Linux Software based solution which can be configured quite easily and you can connect it to every virtual installation of Exchange Server 2007.
[B]Ferrari Office Master Gateway for Unified Messaging[/B]
Ferrari Office Master Gateway is a solution from Ferrari Electronic that can be easily compared with the Dialogic Media Gateway for Microsoft Communications. It is Linux based too, and has a web interface for configuration. More information can be found [URL="http://www.ferrari-electronic.de/index.php?id=182&L=1"]here[/URL].
[B]3CX Phone System[/B]
3CX provides a software based SIP Gateway solution. The enterprise Edition of this software provides Exchange Server 2007 Unified Messaging connectivity. It can be installed on a Windows 2000/2003/XP and Vista machines and is quite easy to configure. [URL="http://www.3cx.com/support/exchange-server-2007.html"]More information on the 3CX Phone System can be found here[/URL].
[B]Asterisk VoIP Gateway Software[/B]
If you have a good knowledge of Linux software solutions, you can configure Asterisk VoIP. A free VMWare based installation of Asterisk can be found at [URL="http://www.trixbox.org/"]Trixbox[/URL], but the configuration itself is more complex. You can find a brief description of it [URL="http://garysweeting.blogspot.com/2007/04/setting-up-exchange-um-with-sipxasterix.html"]here[/URL].
After a successful installation of Asterisk you will be able to configure it through the Web Interface.
[B][IMG]http://www.msexchange.org/img/upl/image0041196075341406.jpg[/IMG]
Figure 3: [/B]Asterisk SIPXConfig
[B]Microsoft Partner UM Starter Kit[/B]
Another way to use Exchange Unified Messaging may be to use the VoIP Specialist Partner offer known as “UM for $1000 Starter Trial Kit”. This solution contains a compatible VoIP gateway solution and two hours of telephone assistance for the setup. For more information please check the [URL="http://msexchangeteam.com/archive/2006/09/25/428984.aspx"]Microsoft Exchange Team Blog[/URL].
In addition to these solutions, there are a lot more, but these ones have been well tested and work properly.
[B]Conclusion[/B]

As you have seen in the information above, you have lots of possible ways of connecting your Exchange Server 2007 Unified Messaging Environment to your PSTN or already existing VoIP-Solution. Exchange Server itself works like a simple VoIP device; it does not contain a VoIP Gateway solution. If you do not have a PBX solution that offers this interface, you will have to choose whether you want to run a hardware-based “Black-Box” solution or a software based one using tools like Asterisk, Dialogic SIPControl, or [URL="http://www.3cx.com/phone-system/"]3CX Phone System for Windows[/URL]

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