Author: Ståle Hansen

TEL, SIP, mailto, and Lync meeting links association

Ståle Hansen 4 Comments

On a windows 8 machine you can have several application that can open Lync and Outlook related URL’s. This can be a problem since it may not always be the application you want to use that is opening your links. This article will help you take control of your Unified Communications links.

The applications

  • Lync Rich (desktop) client – Opens TEL:, SIP: and Lync meeting links
  • Lync Windows Store App – Opens Lync meeting links
  • Skype – Opens TEL:
  • Chrome – Opens TEL: and mailto:
  • Outlook – Opens mailto:
  • Mail App – Opens mailto:

Usually I would think you would prefer Lync Rich Client and Outlook to open you links. So when the Lync Windows Store app opens meetings you are an administrator of or Skype opens TEL: links when you want to call someone with Lync this could be an issue. I will in this article talk about when you use the URL’s and how to take control over them. Continue reading →

Lync Server 2013 and Operations Manager article at NextHop

Ståle Hansen 1 Comment

LyncSCOMI am a big fan of active monitoring of Lync Server through System Center Operations Manager. In january I did a talk on this topic at the Nordic Infrastructure Conference (NIC) 2013 with an extensive demo. May 2013 I got the honour of publishing an article on this topic at the official Microsoft blog, NextHop. It is ranked in the top 1% most visited Microsoft blogs so there is a lot of activity there.

My key takeaways from the article is that Operations Manager, tuned and maintained correctly, will ensure Quality of Life for the administrators as well as the second and third tier support engineers. I strongly believe this, and I love what they have done with the Synthetic Transactions and improved them in the Watcher Node with rich error reporting.  Head over to NextHop to read more :) http://blogs.technet.com/b/nexthop/archive/2013/05/17/notes-from-the-field-lync-server-2013-and-active-monitoring-with-system-center-operations-manager.aspx

You can also view my NIC talk and download my deck from SlideShare

Lync 2010/2013 Script to find available numbers in a Lync deployment

Ståle Hansen 10 Comments

LyncPSHaving worked on a couple of Enterprise Voice deployments since the launch of Lync Server 2013 I am still missing a feature that I honestly thought would be incorporated in to Lync by now. It is the ability to find unused available numbers in a given number range assigned to the Lync Server based on Unassigned Numbers. I even hoped it would be possible to assign a teluri to users through a drop down list in the Silverlight GUI since the information is available in the server. I hope this will be available in a future Cumulative Update.

This is almost how I wrote it back in january 2011 when I created the List-UnusedNumber.ps1 script. This is still true and I have therefore revitalized the old script and upgraded it and tested it on Lync 2013. The original script was also featured on the Lync PowerShell blog, which was a huge thing for me. Continue reading →

Awarded Microsoft Most Valuable Professional (MVP) 2013

Ståle Hansen 1 Comment

Today I received the Microsoft MVP Award for my contributions in the Lync Community. This is the Third time I have received this award, the first time was in 2011. This is huge and it is really inspiring to get recognition for my contributions. Here’s an excerpt from the email I got:

MVP2013

Congratulations! We are pleased to present you with the 2013 Microsoft® MVP Award! This award is given to exceptional technical community leaders who actively share their high quality, real world expertise with others. We appreciate your outstanding contributions in Lync technical communities during the past year.

I feel very honored to be part of this outstanding community and I want to mention the MVP Summit as a highlight of the experience. With all the cool things happening around Lync, Office and Windows 8 I look forward to contribute to the community the coming year as well.

See this cool video about being an MVP created for the 2013 20 year anniversary

Resources

About the MVP Award Program
Lync MVP Awardees
MVPs.org community site
Microsoft MVP FAQ

Microsoft Press: Using Lync Server 2013 Calling Number Translation Rules

Ståle Hansen 2 Comments

On 25th of march I was part of the MVP monday blog series where MVPs from all the products get picked to write an article from their product field. I decided to write about Calling number translation rules in Lync Server 2013. To my surprise the article was chosen to be published over at the Microsoft Press blog as well as part of their ongoing series. This is so cool and I am honoured to be part of the group of authors at these two blogs.

Read the full article here: From the MVPs: Using Lync Server 2013 calling number translation rules to change display number

mvpbloggmspress

No media connectivity with Lync Server 2010 collocated mediation server and external users

Ståle Hansen 7 Comments

At a customer site there was a Lync Server 2010 that had been running for about a year. This solution was now going to be expanded with a collocated mediation server over a dedicated PSTN network card. The mediation server deployed fine and I added routes and tested connection with the SIP trunk provider over telnet, TCP 5060 and it seemed fine. Continue reading →

Lync 2013 Downloads

Ståle Hansen 10 Comments

image4A collection of important downloads, documentation and whitepapers for Lync Server 2013, will be updated continuously. Let me know if I have missed something important. I also recommend listening to The UC Architects podcast where we will discuss tools, features and news regarding Lync and Exchange
Last updated 23.12.14

Continue reading →

Lync sessions from Nordic Infrastructure Conference (NIC) 2013 now online

Ståle Hansen 3 Comments

262088_196758450372054_3536971_nJanuary 24th 2013 I had the honour to speak at the Nordic Infrastructure Conference (NIC) in Oslo. There where 30 speakers and 24 of them where MVP’s presenting on topics like Windows Server, Virtualization and Cloud, System Management, Unified Communications and Windows Client. There was a lot of great speakers this year as last time like Jeffrey Snover, Scott Schnoll, Johan Arwidmark, Justin Morris and Martin Lidholm to name a few. See a screen of all the speakers. Of the sessions I managed to attend I would really recommend watching the video of  Jeffrey Snover’s PowerShell CrashCourse. Continue reading →

Cannot complete the transfer in Lync Server 2013

Ståle Hansen 10 Comments

Recently I had a standard Lync call forwarding issue at a new SIP trunk deployment. The problem was that I could not forward any calls to my cellphone, use call forwaring or simring. This was a Lync 2013 deployment, but making sure that EnableSipRefer is set to $False still applies in 2013. And usually fixes this issue by using this PowerShell Cmdlet: Set-CsTrunkConfiguration –EnableReferSupport $False. After running the cmdlet it usually just works and to be sure I logged the client out and in. So if you have the same issue try this first.

This time though it did not work, even when stopping and starting the Lync services. I had to troubleshoot more. Continue reading →

Lync Server 2013: Unable to publish Topology, trouble with trusted servers

Ståle Hansen 5 Comments

When publishing the topology from the Lync 2013 topology builder you may experience the following error message and the operation will fail:

Error: A trusted server with the type “” and the fully qualified domain name (FQDN) “” was found for a different Transport Layer Security (TLS) target