Expressway 8.8 - Video Endpoint registration

This is something that catches my attention in the release notes.  In the previous release, one of the major difference between VCS and Expressway is the ability to register video endpoints.  While VCS allows endpoint registrations, Expressway works together with UCM and all the endpoints are registered to UCM as single call control.  For UCM centric customers with 3rd party video endpoints, they will need to deploy a pair of VCS just for 3rd party video endpoints registration.

Now with Expressway 8.8, it allows endpoint registrations, which means you can have your DX, SX and MX endpoints register directly to Expressway.  It also allows 3rd party endpoint registration, however for this release, only SIP endpoints are supported.  H323 will be supported in future releases.

The licensing model for Expressway registrations will follow the UCM UCL / CUWL / Telepresence room systems licensing, instead of the VCS way.  It allows you to starts small with relatively less investment.  It also makes it easier for existing UCM customers to understand this new licensing model on Expressway.

Can you run Expressway alone without UCM for video centric deployment?  Technically you can, however you will lose advance UCM capability such as Jabber, Extension Mobility, SNR, Shared Line, Multiline, VM/UM, etc.  If you want to have these capabilities in your environment, registering these endpoints to the UCM is suggested, with Expressway as your collaboration edge for B2B, MRA, CMR Cloud, etc.

Release notes:
http://www.cisco.com/c/dam/en/us/td/docs/voice_ip_comm/expressway/release_note/Cisco-Expressway-Release-Note-X8-8.pdf

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Related post:
Collaboration Edge - Step-by-Step integration guide with UCM:
http://pandaeatsbamboo.blogspot.com/2014/06/collaboration-edge-expressway-step-by.html

New Wireless phone 8821 is now available

After a prolonged wait, the next generation of 7925 is released.  A few things noted from the datasheet, including hardened design with IP67 and MIL-STD-810G compliant, security enhancement by supporting SHA2 and SCEP, and better wireless radio by supporting 11ac.

8821 datasheet:
http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/collateral/collaboration-endpoints/wireless-ip-phone-8821/datasheet-c78-737346.html?cachemode=refresh

8821-EX datasheet:
http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/collateral/collaboration-endpoints/wireless-ip-phone-8821-ex/datasheet-c78-737347.html?cachemode=refresh

Warning: Less than a month to order add-on UCM licenses

Check this out, all of the version before 8.6 will be end of sale its add on license options which means you are not able to order add on license after 31 Jul 2016
https://communities.cisco.com/docs/DOC-57172

CSR 11.5 documentation is now live!

Documents are all here:
http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/support/unified-communications/collaboration-systems-release-11-5/model.html

Updated Compatibility matrix
http://www.cisco.com/c/dam/en/us/td/docs/voice_ip_comm/uc_system/unified/communications/system/Compatibility/CSR-Compatibility-Matrix-InteractiveHTML.html

Facebook page

One more channel to share and engage:

https://www.facebook.com/Panda-Eats-Bamboo-1404693529544647/

Getting Surveillance Camera Snapshot with Spark Chatbot

Bear with me if it is just too much.  I am developing different use cases with Spark that might be useful for myself.  Yesterday I had posted these two use cases:

Device monitoring:
http://pandaeatsbamboo.blogspot.hk/2016/06/using-spark-to-monitor-device.html

Config backup:
http://pandaeatsbamboo.blogspot.hk/2016/06/using-spark-for-my-routers-and-switches.html

Another use case is I can ask the chatbot to send my home surveillance camera snapshot to me via Spark.  In a lot of time I don't need the live video as it consumes cellular bandwidth.  A snapshot is usually work to get a feeling what my children are doing at home.



Previous use cases:
Network monitoring - http://pandaeatsbamboo.blogspot.com/2016/06/using-spark-to-monitor-device.html
Config backup - http://pandaeatsbamboo.blogspot.com/2016/06/using-spark-for-my-routers-and-switches.html
Energywise demo with bot - http://pandaeatsbamboo.blogspot.com/2016/06/cisco-spark-bot-energywise-demo.html

Using Spark to monitor device availability

This is another use case I used Spark in my lab, to check the availability of my lab devices.  When there is outage, the chatbot will alert me proactively so that I can check and troubleshoot the issue earlier rather than later.

My DX70 is now on CE 8.2!

Conversion Doc:
http://pandaeatsbamboo.blogspot.hk/2016/06/migrate-dx7080-devices-from-android-to.html

CE 8.2 on DX is live now!

Conversion Doc:
http://pandaeatsbamboo.blogspot.com/2016/06/migrate-dx7080-devices-from-android-to.html

Migrate DX70/80 devices from Android to CE software

The guide is now posted:

http://www.cisco.com/c/dam/en/us/td/docs/telepresence/endpoint/ce82/dx80-dx70-convert-between-CE-android-based-software.pdf