CallManager Express - Blind and Full-Consult transfers

An interesting debate was started today during a new Callmanager Express install:

During lunch one of the junior engineers asked why anyone would use SIP firmware on the handsets instead of SCCP.

A member of our group suggested that the only reason he could think of was to do with call-transfer options available on each platform:

When setting up the Unified CME system the engineer has to select either blind or full-consult transfer mode and set it system wide. If you intend using SCCP handsets you'll only get this option on softkey whereas with SIP image on same handsets you get both options on softkeys.

Now we agreed that most customers normally want consultative transfers (permanant blind transfer is just rude!) but what happens if you need to do a blind-transfer say to voicemail? Is going to SIP the only option?

CME Expert, Anthony Fear, came up with the answer :

"Setup the system up with full-consult transfers but when you need to do a blind transfer - hit 'Transfer' as normal, dial extension and when you hear ringing tone hit 'Transfer' again - Viola a blind transfer in SCCP!"

"Quite why Cisco don't use the same 'Xfer' and 'BlindXfer' softkeys that you get in SIP Image is a mystery. But hey there you go!"

Apparently SIP firmware offers a 'semi-blind transfer' but no-one in the group knew exactly what this meant and so although this could be a legitimate reason to choose SIP over SCCP we decided it's a pretty lame one!

CallManager Express Non-Dialable MWI

We've been working on integrating Trixbox with CallManager Express (Full documentation to follow shortly) and stumbled across an issue where a user had accidentally discovered the MWI on and MWI off extention number on our CME system.

To his great amusement he was able to dial the mwi extentions and switch on or off the mwi indicator on any phone on the system. By default these special CME extentions are dialable - This lead us to investigate a way of making them non-dialable like intercoms. Well it turns out it's quite simple. Simply change the number under each number from say 9000 to A9000 and then in Unity Express (or your alternative Voicemail System) simpy change the mwi extentions to the new numbers.

To change the MWI indicator numbers in Unity Express

Reverse Telnet to CUE module : service-module service-engine 0/1 session

Then enter global config:
en
conf t

, then enter:
ccn application ciscomwiapplication

then change the following lines and replace the ???? with your non-dialable mwi extentions:
parameter "strMWI_OFF_DN" "????"
parameter "strMWI_ON_DN" "????"


Viola - CUE can now switch on and off your mwi lights but pesky users cannot!





Regards

Anthony Fear

Cisco Unity Express CallerID problem

We were asked today to help with a Voicemail problem on a CallManager Express system. Turns out that since the installation of the VoIP telephone system, the voicemail module has only been recording callerID on an intermittent basis.

Anthony Fear (our resident CME expert) took up the challenge -
"testing showed that only extentions that were also registered on CUE were able to leave their CallerID, all other callers were recorded as "unknown number". This turns out to be a default 'FEATURE' of CUE. In order for CUE to record any number presented to it you have to enable the feature, heres how:"

"Reverse Telnet onto the CUE module as normal and enter global config, then enter the command : voicemail callerid now all callers numbers will be recorded by the system (unless they withold them of course!)."

So there you go - easy when you know how!