We will learn about them more in detail in subsequent section.
Users and Groups – users and groups are used in Cisco Unity Express to configure mailboxes and to assign permissions.
Users/Subscriber Accounts – a user is called a subscriber, is an account intended for exclusive use of one person. This account defines the extension number of a mailbox, how user messages will be stored, how messages will be retrieved or retained, and permissions of subscriber.
To create a user from CLI interface use the following command syntax:
Username userid Group – a group is collection of subscribers. Like subscriber account a group account defines extension number of a mailbox, storage, retrieval and retention of group messages. Permissions assignment at group level allows management of permissions across a number of subscribers belongs to one group. In Unity Express during installation following groups are created: Members of administrator group have capability to configure all aspects of Cisco Unity Express. Groupname groupid [create | delete | description “description” | fullname “full-name”] (this command creates the group with the groupid value.) Broadcast group is used to send a broadcast message to all subscribers of the local Unity Express as well as members of other networked Cisco Unity Express locations. Subscriber mailbox versus general delivery mailbox – A mailbox is a storage location used to store a recorded message. Cisco Unity Express has two types of mailboxes – subscriber mailbox and general purpose mailbox. Subscriber mailbox – is also referred as user mailbox and assigned to one person. The person can personalize or customize it as per there requirements. For example a subscriber mailbox created/assigned to Mr. John Smith. Mr. John Smith phone is configured to forward his mailbox if his extension is busy or he doesn’t answer. When a caller is redirected to his mailbox, he gets a greeting message; caller can leave a message, which will be available to Mr. John Smith for retrieval. General delivery mailbox– this kind of mailbox is assigned to a group of people. Such as creation of a GDM for customer service department. The method of leaving message by caller is same for GDM as for individual/subscriber mailbox. Once a caller leaves message in a GDM, it becomes accessible from anyone in customer service department. To retrieve message from a GDM a group member need to login to there personal user mailbox, once they logged in they will be prompted to retrieve messages for any GDM they are associated with. Mailbox subscriber features – now we will discuss about mailbox subscriber features available to individual subscribers and group members of GDM. Mailbox login, passwords and PINs – a password/pin are associated with a user during the creation process in Unity Express or during the import of CME users. The administrator has option to generate random value or leave it blank, or specify value for password/pin. Administrators/users can change password/pin after creation of user. Table 1 lists the default options available with password/pin settings. Table 1: Password/ PIN settings Configuration option Password PIN Enable expiry (days) 3-365 3-365 History depth 1-10 1-10 Minimum length 3-32 3-16 Account lockout policy Disable lockout Permanent Temporary Disable lockout Permanent Temporary Number of attempts for temporary lock 1-200 1-200 Temporary lockout duration (mins) Default of 5 mins Default of 5 mins Maximum number of failed attempts 1-200 1-200 The account lockout policy can be configured for permanent locking /temporary locking or be disabled and not track failed logon attempts. A password is used in Unity Express to access GUI interface whereas a PIN is used to access TUI. Tutorial – provides a basic means to configure basic settings of user mailbox without administrator intervention. Tutorial feature prompts the user to take action on each of the following mailbox options: Recorded name is used identify mailbox to other subscribers Self enrollment process let you record your personal greeting and then choosing a password which will be used to log in to Cisco Unity Express via TUI. Greetings – this message is for the caller which he /she hears when reaches the subscriber mailbox. We can have standard or alternate greeting messages in Cisco Unity Express. A standard greeting could be “I am not on my desk, please leave a message”. An alternate message could be “I am on vacation this week. Thanks for calling”. Alternate message is disabled by default. As if it is enabled it will override the standard message. Message management and playback – once message is left in subscriber mailbox, the recipient has several options on how to treat the message. Play and restart – allows the subscriber to hear message content and restart playback at anytime. Fast forward and rewind – allow subscriber to quickly move ahead or backward thru message. Skip – allow subscriber to interrupt playback message and leave message unheard. Save – allows subscribe to archive the read message for retrieving later. Reply to original sender – allow subscriber to respond to message send immediately. Forward to another subscriber – allows recipient of message to forward message to another subscriber mailbox . Delete – delete message. Undelete – restore a message back to mailbox. Message types – there are five message types found in subscriber mailbox or GDM these are: Broadcast message – message sent to all subscribers on Cisco Unity Express and networked modules. Expired message – message in mailbox past the retention date. Urgent message – message tagged as high importance. New message – a message not yet played. Saved message – a message already listened but saved for future retrieval. The message type determines the order in which messages will be presented to subscriber and options available to handle them. Refer to table 1 to see message types and options. Table 2: message types and options Message type Order played Play Replay Save Delete Skip Reply Forward Broadcast 1 Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No Expired 2 Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No Urgent 3 Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes New 4 Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Saved 5 Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Message waiting indicator – It alerts subscriber that a new message is come in the mailbox. Cisco Unity Express in conjunction with Cisco unified CME/Cisco Unified Communications, use a red light and a flashing envelop which appears on phone display window. When a new message arrives, Cisco unity sends an alert message to Cisco CME/Cisco unified communication manager and also phone type, determines how it will appear on IP phone. When mailbox is assigned to a subscriber group, an extension number is defined explicitly for the mailbox. This extension number is used to inform corresponding phone to receive alert. MWI is configured using the following command syntax: Mwi on / Mwi off Message notifications – it is enabled by default globally and also on per user basis in Unity Express. So administrator need to enable message notification at global level and then at user level. The options available to configure message notification at system level comprise of enabling message notification for urgent messages or all. Alert subscriber and have option to log in and retrieve the new message during notification call or otherwise drop the notification call and dial back in Unity Express to retrieve message. Message notification need to be enabled at system level so that subscriber can use this feature. The administrator can configure which type of message is valid to trigger notification, on urgent or all. When a phone call is generated subscriber has option to login into mailbox during notification call, if administrator allows. The administrator can also configure option of including copy of the recorded message as attachment in the email, so that subscriber don’t need to login to mailbox to retrieve the message. Enabling cascading allows a subscriber to send message notification to another Unity Express subscriber or a group. If a new message remains unread for specific time, a notification is configured to dial a phone number, or another option is to configure ring no to answer to limit the amount of time call will remain in ringing state before unity considers it as unsuccessful attempt. Restriction tables are used to limit the phone numbers that Unity can dial. Message Notification – user level – once the administrator has enabled and configured message notification on system level, all users require permission to use this feature. So it has to be enabled for each user. At a user level, Cisco Unity Express can be configured to call a phone number or send an email alert to subscriber of the received message. Each subscriber mailbox supports six device types that can be called or emailed in such event. Table 3 lists message notification device types as under: Table 3: Message notification device types Device type Destination type Home Phone Phone number Work phone Phone number Cell phone Phone number Pager (numeric) Phone number Text pager Email address Email inbox Email address In destination type, the subscriber may enter a number to be dialed as well as any extra digits which need to be dialed after the phone number. Extra digits could be 0 -9 with *inserting a 1-sec pause. To configure message notification we can use following command syntax: Voicemail notification enable (Enable notification) Voicemail notification preference {all | urgent} (notification for all or urgent messages only) Voicemail notification email attach (attach voice messages to outgoing notification emails) Voicemail notification connect-timeout seconds (Specifies the number of seconds after which an outgoing message notification call is disconnected and considered a failed call) Voicemail notification allow-login (Enables a subscriber to log in to voice mail during an outgoing notification call.) Voicemail configuration outgoing-email from-address email-address (Configures an address to use in the From field of outgoing Cisco Unity Express e-mail messages) In destination type email address, a valid email address can be added along with customized line of text. Day/time can be specified for alert notification generation and a subscriber can configure two cascading subscribers or groups with a time delay between each other. Live Replay Live Record – the live replay feature allows a subscriber to use the received caller identification number (automatic number identification) and place a phone call to that caller during voice mail message playback. The live record feature allows subscriber to record a live call and have that call delivered into the subscriber mailbox. Distribution Lists – it is simply a list of subscribers who are grouped together under one name and number to have single voice mail to each member of group simultaneously. Distribution lists are of two types – public and private. Public Distribution Lists – is collection of subscribers which are available to all Cisco Unity Express subscribers to use as a Distribution list. Such list can be created by any subscriber. List name list-name number list-number create (Creates a list named list-name with the number list-number.) List number list-number owner owner-ID (Assigns an owner to the list. The owner can be a local subscriber or a local group) List number list-number member {member-name | extension} type {group | user | gdm | list | remote | blind | non-subscriber} (Assigns a member to the list) Private distribution list can be created by a subscriber. Each subscriber can create up to 10 distribution lists for their exclusive use. list number list-number description description (adds description to list) show lists public (Command to display lists) Mailbox Storage – it defines how much storage space can be used for storing messages. Storage is broken down into two categories: overall storage and per user storage. Overall storage is defined in minutes of recorded voice and is determined by hardware platform of Cisco Unity Express. The per user storage is determined by administrator during subscriber mailbox creation process. The administrator can increase/decrease storage available to user during/after creation of mailbox. Mailbox Caller Features – Callers have following options while they were listening to a greeting or leaving a message in a user mailbox or a GDM: Record Message – caller has option to bypass greeting and proceed to leave message to subscriber. After message recording caller has option to preview recorded message, send message, delete message, and set message priority. Operator Assistance – it is also known as zero out and allows caller to reach operator. Mailbox Login – this enables subscriber to log in to their mailbox from outside the office and while they are away from their IP Phone. VoiceView Express – It is an alternative feature to TUI. It operates on an IP phone service. IP phone services are XML based web pages that Cisco IP phones can render. So if an IP phone is VoiceView express enabled subscriber can login to mailbox, view messages, reply them and so on. It can be enabled/disabled on system wide basis by administrator. Service VoiceView (Enters VoiceView Express configuration mode) Enable Session idletimeout minutes (Specifies the number of minutes a VoiceView Express session can be idle.) Integrated Messaging – a subscriber has option of using the TUI, VoiceView express or their email client to retrieve messages. Integrated messaging provides access to voice mail messages via an email client and allows subscriber to treat voice mail messages similar to email messages. By using an IMAP-capable email client, subscriber has option of adding an IMAP email account to their existing email client. Voice Profile for Internet Mail – voice profile for internet mail (VPIM) feature allows one voice mail system to exchange messages with other voice message systems. If a subscriber of one voice mail system had to forward a message to a subscriber of another voice mail system, the sending system has to place call to another receiving system and play message in real time. This concludes the CCNA Voice topic covering voice mail features of Cisco Unity Express. In this lesson we learnt how to use these features and what these features are meant for.