TMS - Free Busy Overview page removed in TMS 14

[Paulo Souza]

Hi folks,

I am aware that Cisco has removed Free Busy Overview from TMS 14. Last moth I had to abort two TMS upgrading just because of this big changing in TMS 14, the customer prefered to keep version 13 than losing the page.  =(

Well, now I have some customers very unsatisfied with TMS 14, including those who aborted the upgrading and new customers who just bought TMS few days ago. Some customers really needs to have TMS 14, because of Conductor integration and Smart Scheduler.

I opened a TAC case just to ask "why has this page been removed if it was so usefull?". The answer was:

"(...) I checked with the developers and this page was removed because it was very database heavy, and thus killed TMS performance. Unfortunately there are no plans of introducing a similar or equivalent page in the future (...)"

Couldn't Cisco suggest further hardware requirements for TMS instead of removing the page? Does Cisco really have no plans to add a page like Free Busy Overview? Are there another customers around the world demanding the same thing? Because in Brazil, most customers are demanding. What additional options do I have (except MS Exchange integration and outlook calendar)? Can I build my own free Busy Overview page by using Booking API or something else?

Thanks in advance.

Regards

Paulo Souza

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[Paulo Souza]

I would really appreciate any help.

=)

Paulo Souza

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[mahkrish]

Hi Paulo, I understand your situation, but when you start adding participants you can definitely see the endpoints/rooms highlighted in red indication if they are booked at the same time.

BR/Mahesh Adithiyha

[Paulo Souza]

Hi Mahesh,

Thanks for your reply!

I am aware that I can check the option "availability" into the "Add participants" window so that I can see the availability of the rooms. But in order to get into this page, the user must to have access to schedule new conferences, and this is the problem, most of my customers have a "pre-schedule" process, they have a team that checks the availability of the rooms before forward the scheduling request to the team which schedules the conference indeed. They also have secretaries who only have access to check the availability of the rooms.

Without Free Busy Overview page I would have to give access to undesirable users to create new conferences, the customer definitely does not want to do that.

What would you suggest me in this case?

Thanks again.

Regards

Paulo Souza

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[mahkrish · Accepted solution]

Hi Paulo, I would request you to reach out to the Cisco sales/account member of your region to have this feature back in upcoming future TMS release, as they can reach out to respective team in Cisco to have further discussion on this.

BR/Mahesh Adithiyha

[Paulo Souza]

Hi Mahesh,

We have done that. =)

I opened this thread just to see if somebody could suggest me some alternative.

Regards

Paulo Souza

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[Paulo Souza]

Is there any another possibility? Can I access "Add participants" page when not scheduling a conference?

Paulo Souza

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[Kjetil Ree · Accepted solution]

Paulo Souza wrote:
I opened a TAC case just to ask "why has this page been removed if it was so usefull?". The answer was: 
"(...) I checked with the developers and this page was removed because it was very database heavy, and thus killed TMS performance. Unfortunately there are no plans of introducing a similar or equivalent page in the future (...)"

I can confirm that the statement above it is accurate.

Couldn't Cisco suggest further hardware requirements for TMS instead of removing the page? 

It is not so easy as just recommendig more memory, CPU, or other hardware. Belive me: There are very good engineering reasons for removing that page. It really was killing TMS performance.

Does Cisco really have no plans to add a page like Free Busy Overview?

No plans, that's correct.

Are there another customers around the world demanding the same thing?

I have been informed of a couple of customers that did not like its removal. It is of course sad to see features that customers rely upon disappear, but I do believe that the normal booking pages do the same job, just better.

Can I build my own free Busy Overview page by using Booking API or something else?

Yes, you can do that using the API. If you have some experience using TMS's Booking API, it isn't a very hard ting to do (if you disregard the fact that you again would be killing TMS's performance); if you have no prior Booking API experience, it is a bit harder to do.

Regards,

Kjetil

[Patrick Sparkman]

An alternative might be using the Ad Hoc Booking page.  It isn't in the same format at the Free Busy Overview, but it will give you busy or free status.

[Paulo Souza]

Hi Patrick,

Thanks for answering. I considered this possibility, but the costumer didn't like it when I suggested, because this page does not have a calendar format, and it does not show the availability of all day long.

Thanks!

Paulo Souza

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[Paulo Souza]

Hi Kjetil,

Thank you very much. You are really helpfull in this community!

I will investigate something related to the Booking API.

Regards

Paulo Souza

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