Converting to Unified Messaging from standard Unity voicemail

[thomas1]

We have Unity 4.0 and only use the standard voicemail functionality. We are planning to go to full blown Unified Messaging soon. How do we migrate all the current user mailboxes, greetings, profiles, etc. to Unified Messaging? Does all of that have to be blown away? Do we have to start completely over?

Thanks,

Stu

[lindborg]

Well, how are you setup now? Is Unity installed on another network from your current corporate email network? If so, are the mail aliases the same as those you used when you created VM only users for Unity? If so, you're home free - you can use DiRT to migrate over in one shot. if not, you have to do it in a two-step process that's a little more labor intensive - do the DiRt restore then use the Migrate Subscriber Data tool to move the subscriber information from each VM box you moved over with DiRT onto the correct corporate email account one at a time - this will save all your settings (voice name, greetings, password, notification devices etc...) but for a large number of users can be a bit tedious.

Here's a white paper that may be of help - it's targeted more at planning ahead for such a migration but still contains the basics of what you need to do here:

http://www.cisco.com/univercd/cc/td/doc/product/voice/c_unity/whitpapr/migvm_um.htm

[thomas1]

Our Unity box and Exchange servers are on the same LAN, but our Unity box uses its own Exchange server. The consultant did not set up the users in Unity with same aliases used for email accounts. I know how to correct the aliases on Unity. Thanks for giving me this information. This gives me hope. :)

[lindborg]

I'm not sure what you mean by "correct the aliases on Unity" - that kinda scares me. You going to bulk edit them in Exchange 5.5 directory-land? Just curious...

[noran01]

I read through that whitepaper, but it is for Unity 3.1....does the same process apply for 4.0(3)?

[thomas1]

Are you wanting to change the user's alias? For us, our Unity is using it's own Exchange server rather than our Enterprise Exchange servers. I changed the alias by going into exchange on the Unity box. I clicked on "Active Directory Users and Computers". Expand down till you see the "Users" folder and click on it. All the users should be in the right panel. Double click the user's name and click on the "Exchange General" tab. You will see the Alias field. Once you make the change, you can go into Unity System Administration and see the change for the user.

[noran01]

You are using your own Exchange server on the Unity machine? This is what i was looking to do: Have Unity 4.0(3) and Exchange Server 2000 installed on the same machine which will be a member of our corp. domain. However I would like to have unified messaging for only a handfull of users (mostly execs). We already have a corp. Exchange server handling all email which is also running exch 2000. Can my setup be done or am i forced to use the corp. exchange servers?

[thomas1]

Yes, we are currently using Exchange on the Unity, but we want to get away from this. Cisco highly recommends that you don't have both on the same box. Our Exchange team would tell you not to do it also. We've had lots of problems with Exchange being on the same box. It's a long story why we did it that way initially, but we knew it was temporary anyway. We are going to Unified Messaging this weekend. We will be using the corp Exchange. However we will only be setting up a few users on full Unified Messaging. The rest will still be only on voicemail functionality. The consultant we have coming in this weekend explained that the users NOT on Unified Messaging will be setup with two mailboxes - one for email and one for voice. So, you may be able to do the same. I'm sure he is getting this from a white paper. We are doing it this way due to bandwidth limitation to a remote office. When we get a full T-1 in, we will merge the boxes into just one box for full unified messaging for everyone.

[noran01]

ok, you are doing it the same way we will be. However, the only reason not eveyone will be 'turned on' for unified messaging is because there is no need for a majority of the people to have it...probably only execs and users who travel. If you read that whitepaper that was posted above it explains what the consultant will be doing most likely....sounds like he read that paper.

The only thing I need to do is test this environment first and would like to connect the new unity 4.0(3) box to my corp. exchange server as well as tie it into Active Directory. My question is this: if i do this tie-in with exchange and let the unity script update the active directory schema will it affect anything? At this point I do not wish to use the unity 4 box as production, only as testing. I will still have my unity 2.4.65 machine handling everything until we switch over.

[afuller]

Updating the schema will always affect Active Directory. You're introducing new attributes that will get replicated around just like other attributes, and this increases the network load. This document discusses AD capacity planning with Unity.

http://www.cisco.com/univercd/cc/td/doc/product/voice/c_unity/whitpapr/adsizing.htm

If you want to play with the production schema without affecting the production network, Microsoft recommends you take a current DC (or promote a new DC and let it replicate with the current ones) offline and into a lab network where it could never get to the production network (thus cutting off replication). Then update the schema on that box, do your testing, and if you like what you see, put that DC back on the production network. It'll replicate everything it has with the rest of the domain. You will have to force that box to be the schema master, so be aware of that if you need to use that role for other schema changes.

adam

[noran01]

I'm not too worried about the network load, its more of an issue if I do decide to do it on a production environment will it impact regular operations...will mail delivery cease due to new records in the active directory schema or will mail delivery be disrupted due to the fact there is a second vm mailbox for each user?

If i do take a DC off the prod. environment and into a lab I will also need to do the same with an exchange server and also a subscriber call mamager as well. Unfortunately I do not have the resources to do this at this momemnt in time.

[afuller]

Updating the schema does not affect mail delivery, nor does the existance of second mailboxes dedicated for voice mails. To exchange, they're all just mailboxes regardless of who the users are and what applications use them.

adam