Enabling Local IP Address Dialing on a Cisco VCS Control

I recently fielded a question about IP address dialing and the Cisco Video Communications Server (VCS). It reminded me of a video design I put together a while ago and I have been meaning to put some more video / telepresence content on the blog. To that end, I figured I would share my approach to enabling IP address dialing with the Cisco VCS. 

Unlocking Jabber Video Sign-In Preferences for Jabber.com

Recently, I was doing some testing with the Jabber Video for TelePresence (Movi) client. I was all set to go. I had my Jabber client loaded on my iPad, my VCS up and humming (loudly, I might add), and the Jabber Video client running on my MBP. I wanted to add another client to the mix, so I figured I would use the Jabber Video client on my iMac. This client was configured to use the free Jabber service (jabber.com) and I found out that I was unable to edit the server configuration. 

I found an easy (albeit unsupported) fix to the problem and I figured it was worth sharing.

Troubleshooting: Protocol Captures on Cisco VCS

This is just a quick write up on how to pull network traces from the Cisco Video Communications Server (VCS). As anyone who has been in the business of integrating solutions in existing networks knows, having the ability to pull protocol traces goes a long way to streamlining the troubleshooting process. Deploying a VCS is no different.

Upgrading Cisco VCS from X6.1 to X7.1

This is just a quick blog on a recent upgrade I did for a VCS X6.1 system to X7.1. The upgrade was pretty painless but I wanted to highlight two points of interest. Well, interesting to me anyway...

Upgrading from Factory Built X6.1

The first is a RTFM item that I almost missed. Fortunately, I caught this on a second read through. From the X7.1 release notes, if you have a VCS unit that was shipped with X6.1 pre-installed, you will need to do some CLI tinkering for the backup process to work correctly. I suppose something was missed in the build. Anyway, in summary:

1. SSH to the Cisco VCS 
2. Login as root
3. Create the /tandberg/persistent/oti and /tandberg/persistent/management folders
4. Logout 

Example:

wolverine:~wjb$ssh root@10.3.9.20

root@10.3.9.20's password:

~ # mkdir /tandberg/persistent/oti
~ # mkdir /tandberg/persistent/management
~ # exit

Getting an Upgrade License

This was a new one on me. I am used to upgrading other Cisco Collaboration applications but have only applied an upgrade to the VCS under the Tandberg regime. The process is pretty simple. First, go to http://www.cisco.com/go/license and log in using your CCO account. From here, you should scroll down to the section under Product Authorization Key (PAK) and RMA License Transfer. You will see a "tab" option called Tandberg Software Upgrade & Look up.

After clicking the Tandberg Software Upgrade & Look up select the "Register for a Tandberg Software Upgrade License" link. You will need the Serial Number and MAC address from your VCS unit. Enter that data, click on the GetVersion button and then the rest is self-explanatory. 


NOTE: You may not see X7.1 listed in your entitlement drop down [I saw X7.0(y)] versions only). Just pick the latest X7.0, the license key will work fine and dandy.


Read More
There is a good discussion on the Cisco Support Community where Martin provides a good jump point for looking at X7.1. Of particular interest, Cisco provides an OVA for VCS. Yes, that's right vVCS! More on that later.

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Troubleshooting FindMe Alias Forbidden Error on Cisco VCS

I just wanted to dump a quick blog on using FindMe configurations on the Cisco Video Communications Server (VCS) Express Starter Kit. I was doing some testing with FindMe and realized pretty quickly that I may want to RTFM a little more. I thought the quick troubleshooting exercise may be of interest to someone out there in bitLand! 

Content Sharing and Video Communications

I was recently pondering my first opportunity to design and deploy video communication solutions [back when it was known as Videoteleconferencing (VTC)]. I was thinking about what people wanted from the technology. How they wanted to interface with the technology and the other video users out there over their ISDN (H.320) or IP (H.323) networks. Lots of things about the technology have changed, but the use case has not. People use video for the promise of interacting with people visually over a great distance. Moreover, people want to collaborate over video. 

In this blog, I wanted to go on a tour down memory lane with the collaboration aspect of good ol' VTC IPVC telepresence(?). Whatever you want to call it, here we'll call it video. We are going to discuss the ITU-T's T.120 and H.239 Recommendations as well as the IETF's Binary Floor Control Protocol (BFCP) and associated proposals.