Integrating 3CX and MS Exchange 2007 Unified Messaging (UM)

[ciscotech2007]

3CX team, posting this question in the general forum for the community to benefit from the information you provide.

The question I have is the interoperability between Exchange 2007 Unified Messaging on 3CX. With many companies using Exchange and 3CX gaining in popularity inquisitive minds want to know.

What's is 3CX's goal of functionality between 3CX IP PBX and Exchange 2007 UM? How important is this feature of 3CX and to what length will 3CX develop this relationship?

What prior version of 3CX introduced Exchange 2007 UM role and 3CX functionality?

Has there been strides in the development of the Exchange 2007 UM and 3CX integration with 3CX minor and major releases? If so, what were they?

What is the general feedback you get from customers with 3CX installed systems with Exchange 2007 UM integrated?

What are the (2) top positive elements in the 3CX integration with Exchange 2007 UM?

What are the (2) areas of improvement in the 3CX integration with Exchange 2007 UM? What is 3CX doing to develop these solutions into resolutions?

It appears Exchange 2007 UM offers some similar features that 3CX offers native such as;

(a) Physical Voicemail box storage
(b) Auto-attendant
(c) maybe more...

What, if any, of these 'shared features' does 3CX recommend and why or why not? Meaning, if 3CX system users integrate VM to be redirected to Exchange for VM storage or auto-attendant would 3CX consider this to be a best practice or leave these features to 3CX? Why or why not?

Please describe 3CX's vision in regard to the best role Exchange 2007 UM could take when integrated with 3CX, however small or large. I think people would be very interested to attain your feedback. It would also help parters and system integrators like myself to better assess this add-on solution of 3CX and realize it's purpose, potential and value-add to 3CX customers.

Please advise us as well to your development and testing in using 3CX and Exchange UM on the same PHYSICAL machine. I am getting mixed feedback on if this is truly reasonable or if it would cause too much resource use and system resources, thus 'bogging' down even the fastest hardware. Please indicate what steps, if possible, your teams completed in setting up the optimal 3CX and Exchange 2007 UM production environment. Details are good including SIP port registry changes and OS changes, if any.

Thank you for your time and keep up the good work. 3CX will be the world leader in Windows IP PBX software, the world just does not know it yet.

 

[ciscotech2007]

I see in the FAQ sections of 3CX there is a manual for how to connect Exchange 2007 with Unified Messaing (UM) role.

Would you please give us an explanation of what is happening behind the scenes? The configuration appears rather simple, so I can only presume there's core changes going on the backend and we would be interesting in understanding what exactly is going on.

(a) Similar to setting up our IP SIP endpoints, we are used to using display names, user IDs and user passwords. When reviewing 3CX configuration and Exchange 2007 UM 'ADD IP gateway' option... there's little to nothing about passwords. How does Exchange 2007 UM authenticate with the 3CX server without a username/password?

(b) When using Exchange 2007 UM as 3CX's voicemail box server, and users dial '999' (default VM extension) how does Exchange 2007 UM 'figure out' which mailbox is calling? (SIP header information?)

(c) I noticed the FAQ mentions not only using Exchange 2007 UM as 3CX's voicemail box server but also using Exchange 2007 UM auto-attendant feature. There may be times 3CX installers and admins may want to use this feature instead of the auto-attendant in 3CX. Why or why not would 3CX recommend using Exchange 2007 UM's auto-attendent?

(d) Have your research and development teams had good results in using Exchange 2007 UM's auto-attendent, even for testing? Do the Exchange 2007 UM features such as Speech Recognition and finding users by name work when using 3CX is the IP PBX and using Exchange 2007 UM's auto-attendent?

The FAQ covering setup covers using Exchange 2007 UM machine as the 3CX users mailbox. Does this mean when 3CX is configured in this manner, no voicemail boxes will be available on the 3CX server? Like, when setting up an extension, will 3CX still give the admin the choice to 'enable voicemail box', even if the voicemail box is now on the Exchange 2007 UM server?

 

[ciscotech2007]

Nick, I would be interested in your feedback

 

[N_G]

Hi,

This page describes in detail more information about the integration
http://wiki.3cx.com/Home/technical-documentation-dash/msexchange-2007-integration

Here is the guide how to setup Exchange 2007 as the voice mail server
http://www.3cx.com/support/exchange-server-2007.html

Whether you want to use Exchange 07 is a personal choice. The Exchange 2007 UM server will use up a lot of resources. You will have to scale your server accordingly. According to my information Exchange UM can not run on the Exchange Server machine, thus it requires a separate machine (with separate OS license). The UM functionality also requires CALS from Microsoft. For details about licensing and features please go to the Microsoft website.

Note also that if you use the Exchange auto attendant, you will not have Music on Hold (because it does not have this feature)

 

[Ase]

Whether you want to use Exchange 07 is a personal choice. The Exchange 2007 UM server will use up a lot of resources. You will have to scale your server accordingly. According to my information Exchange UM can not run on the Exchange Server machine, thus it requires a separate machine (with separate OS license).

Hi,

There is no problem running both Exchange 2007 Server and UM role on the same machine.
Please check the first picture in your own FAQ found at:

http://www.3cx.com/support/exchange-server-2007.html

//Ase

 

[N_G]

Well i dont know the details of deploying Exchange 2007. Please contact Microsoft Support for information on that.

 

[ciscotech2007]

Nick,

Thank you for your feedback. I was unaware Exchange 2007 UM did not support MoH. It seems UM role is not exactly the best solution. It does not share many features with a full PBX system..... unlike 3CX that runs a very competitive match against major PBX systems.

I understand your post but I would like to ask 3CX to answer each question in the post. We would like to know more information. We want to know the many questions I asked in the intial posts when it comes to 3CX and Exchange 2007 UM role.

William, your a smart guy! We're interested in your feedback as well.