I have two retail copies of Office Communications Server 2007 Standard Edition that I don’t need. These are copies that I have obtained from events and are not-for-resale copies. But hey, what better way to get rid of them than to give them away in a contest!
If you are not familiar with OCS 2007, it is a fantastic Microsoft product that provides Instant Messaging, Web Conferencing, Audio Conferencing, Video Conferencing, and PBX-type functionality (Enterprise Voice) where your Communicator Client can make phone calls to the PSTN as well as other Communicator users in your environment. I encourage you to learn more about OCS 2007 here. As always, feel free to drop me an e-mail if you have a question.
There will be two winners and each winner will receive one copy. Two winners will be chosen at random.
Contest Guidelines:
The details are very simple (one entry per person):
- Sign up and enter a valid e-mail address in your profile as this is how I will contact the winners
- Make a comment in this blog post about what you like best about Microsoft’s Unified Communications offerings
Timeline
The contest will end December 6th (GMT -06:00) Central Time (US & Canada) at midnight (so the night of the 5th). Any submission after this time will not count. After the deadline, I will choose the two winners at random and contact you via the e-mail address you have set. If you have any issues and/or questions, contact me by e-mail using the e-mail link at the top right of my blog homepage.
The contest has ended and the winners have been e-mailed!
ricsip, it’s definitely nice to be able to use my communicator. Internally in our dogfood forest which all of our UC team is one, we have all the Enterprise Voice, UM integration, etc. deployed. It’s nice to be able to use Communicator to make calls either by Enterprise Voice, Communicator Call, and just communicate with people a lot easier. And when I need to check voicemail, I can dial through Communicator and since I’m authenticated already, no need for me to enter PIN or extension. Love it!
aretzler, I’ll have to check that out. Great tip!
tvalentin, I’m definitely looking forward to integrating OCS R2 for clients. It definitely looks like a great product. OCS 2007 RTM is a great product for its first lifecycle and I am really impressed. It’s only going to get better from here! The IT experience is great as well. I do have to admit that the certificates are a bit complicated for a lot of people just starting off with OCS. Especially when you start getting into the expanded configuration and using hardware load balancers. Thankfully Microsoft is trying to make this easier in OCS R2 with a more intuitive tool for certificates in regards to the Edge Role.
For me there are really a few parts to OCS’s awesomeness.
One is the end user experience. The way it integrates so simply into Office etc is great. Communicator is a great tool. Then any headset or Mic can be your telephone. IM conversations are loggied back in Outlook.
Second is how MS are thinking about new ways of doing things. Take Tanjay and Roundtable as examples. Integration and simplification of conferencing in OCS R2.
Third is the IT experience. It is simple (as long as you read the documentation) to set up a lab environment.
The Final thing that is great is the price. As far as I’m concerned OCS is really excellent value, and would be competative in price against a standard pbx. (That said I’d still love a free copy!)
We’re currently implementing a pilot at work. Right now we have the ability to make internal calls, receive voice mail through email, listen to email, calendar, etc. A neat feature I discovered this morning is that when you set your out of office for voice mail, you can have it also create one for your email. Pretty Slick!
Hi,
I just simply love the fact, that I can talk to anybody using my laptop, sitting in a hotel, and still the other party can see my original deskphone number, and I dont spend a fortune on roaming phone bills. I call anybody from my contact-list with a single click, and also calling my voicemail and replying to voice messages or listening to my calendar items was never been so easy and efficient!
Joe, I love that as well. In fact, when I talk to clients about OCS functionality, I often discuss the exact feature you mentioned and how this increases productivity a lot because instead of wasting time looking for a meeting room, they can just via IM and instantly start a Live Meeting session. Excellent functionality. Thanks for commenting!
I think what I like best about the Microsoft UC offerings specifically related to OCS 2007, is the integration of the IM features of communicator with Live Meeting. For my company, its a huge deal to be able to easily start and participate in live meetings quickly and efficiently. We have conducted worldwide IT conferences using only Communicator and Live Meeting. There is a lot more to the UC offerings than just the items I mentioned, but this is a good starting place for anyone looking at this type of solution.