Cisco Unified MeetingPlace

This document contains frequently asked questions regarding the Cisco MeetingPlace server.

A. No, it generates a random ID.

A. If you get this error when you click on the Execute button in the Database Backup table, this indicates that the tape backup is currently running. In addition, you see this warning in the Error Log:

06/20 18:00:00 WARN 0x52462  0/9, "dbmbox.cc", 128 (0x1, 0xa0, 0, 0)
                    DB server request 1 received response 160

A. When a meeting is originally scheduled with the parameter Record Meeting set to No, disk space is not reserved. So when a user initially enters #61 from a meeting scheduled this way, it is similar to rescheduling the meeting with Record Meeting set to Yes. Therefore, anyone whose user profile has the scheduling restriction set to Cannot Schedule (common to the guest profile), also cannot be the first one in the meeting to enter #61 (ad hoc recording). As long as your profile parameter, Able to Record, is set to Yes, you can enter #61 to turn the recording on or off after the ad hoc recording has been enabled. This assumes that you have a valid Cisco MeetingPlace recording license and available recording space.

A. A Terminated message is logged in the output of the cptrace -C command. For example, if the unique ID of the meeting is 2000fa1 then issue the cptrace -C -c0x20000fa1 command.

Note: You must be in the conference server to find this record.

A. After you enter the sysconfig command, this output appears. It is normal to see the WARNING message. As long as you see one warning line, and it also shows /mnt, the save is successful.

This output shows the status of the disk backups. If the backups are enabled, the save is successful.

meetingplace:tech$ sysconfig
Root: 2a
Database: 2c
Temporary files: 1b
Prompts: 2f
Voice files: 2g
Voice files: 1g

WARNING: The current configuration does not match the saved
configuration 5a6
/dev/disk1c on /mnt rw
Disk backups are enabled

A. On a DAT backup, the major items backed up are report data, user profiles, conference records, and system configurations information. DAT backups do not include voice files, custom prompts, recorded user names, or attachments. For a detailed list of items that are backed up, you can check /lat/db/backuplist.

A. When examining the viewexlog, users might notice that some events are not in chronological order. These events are all from the Cisco MeetingPlace Gateway System Integrity Module (GWSIM).

The log messages are time-stamped with the local system's time before they are sent to the network server, in this case the Microsoft Windows NT server. If the Windows NT system clock is not in sync with the Cisco MeetingPlace server's clock (and it usually is not), the log messages appear to be out-of-sequence.

A. In Cisco MeetingPlace server release 5.1 and later, the cptrace -C command output shows the user that rescheduled the meeting. In Cisco MeetingPlace releases 4.x and 5.0.x, the cptrace -C command output shows the original scheduler even if another user reschedules the meeting.

A. You can look at the cptrace -C command output, at the value assigned to Ability, to see if the user was invited as listener or speaker. A value of 27 indicates a speaker, and a value of 33 indicates a listener. In this example, a speaker is indicated.

cptrace -C -c0x200094943
03/20 10:31:28.48 C 20004943 ADD Part Part 0 User 213 Ability 27 Result 0

A. A Delete message is logged in output of the cptrace -C command. For example, if the unique ID of the meeting is 2000fa1, then issue the cptrace -C -c0x20000fa1 command.

A. A Purged message is logged in the cptrace -C command. For example, if the unique ID of the meeting is 2000fa1, then issue the cptrace -C -c0x2000fa1 command.

Note: You must be in the conference server to find this record.

A. The Cisco MeetingPlace system allows you to design a total of sixteen different translation tables to be used by the profile users. Here are some tips that describe how Cisco MeetingPlace determines which translation tables are to be used by the system:

The translation table to be used depends on whether it is an automatic blast outdial or a screened outdial. Automatic blast outdials are achieved through one of these methods:

• Press #32 to outdial a team from the voice user interface (VUI).

• Click the Automated button to outdial a team or missing invitees from the MeetingTime outdial dialog.

• Schedule meetings and have the system call invitees.

Screened outdials are achieved either by pressing #31 to outdial a person from the VUI, or by clicking the Screened button to outdial a person from the MeetingTime outdial dialog.

For the system blast outdial, the system uses the translation table of the person being outdialed. For screened outdial, the system uses the translation table of the person who initiated the outdial.

For example, if you are in the meeting and initiate an outdial to user B by #31 from the phone, the system uses your translation table.

A. If the meeting was scheduled with the Cisco MeetingPlace for Outlook interface, then you do not receive a link to renew or cancel in the System Manager Alert notification. When scheduling with Outlook, you must cancel or renew the meeting from the Outlook interface in order to sync your calendar with the Cisco MeetingPlace server.

A. In the U.S., all Cisco MeetingPlace T1s use robbed bit for signaling because it does not have an extra channel to send the AB bits (it uses all 24 channels). Robbed bit basically "robs" one bit out of every six bytes, and uses that for the AB bits.

A. There are two reasons why you might need a CSU when you connect Cisco MeetingPlace T1 to the Telco. The first reason is distance. If the T1 drops are more then 600 feet away from the Cisco MeetingPlace server, a CSU is required (to regenerate the signals). The second reason is if the signaling type that comes from the T1 is different than the one configured on the Cisco MeetingPlace server. If this is the case, you can use a CSU to sync it up.

A. When a user makes a call to the Cisco MeetingPlace server and gets a busy signal, there are two possibilities:

• Something may be wrong with the PBX that prevents the call from landing on the Cisco MeetingPlace server. If this is the case and ports are not actually used up, the troubleshooting is on the PBX since the Cisco MeetingPlace server does not provide a busy signal.

• All of the ports may be used up by the Cisco MeetingPlace server, and subsequent calls that come in get the busy signal from the PBX. If the ports are used up, this is normal behavior.

A. Cisco MeetingPlace only supports line-side, loop-start, and ground-start channel-asscociated signaling (CAS) protocols, but Cisco supports both line-side and trunk-side wink-start CAS protocols.

A. On a networked Cisco MeetingPlace system, if the scheduling home server for the scheduler is out of recording space, MeetingPlace checks to see if the Schedule only on home server field is set to No. If it is, and there are other servers available on the home site, it attempts to schedule the meeting on another server. If there are no other servers available on the home site, and Schedule only on home server is set to No, then it attempts to schedule that meeting on a remote server.

A. Yes, but you must be either the scheduler of the meeting or have at least attendant privileges to delete the recording. To do this, go to MeetingNotes and press 3 to delete all attachments, recordings, and comments.

Note: This also deletes all attachments and comments for that meeting.

A. The Cisco MeetingPlace server can handle a maximum of 100 recurring meetings in one chain. For instance, in MeetingTime you may have configured the Maximum Advance Days to schedule for 330 days. However, when you try to schedule a daily meeting for 200 days you are not allowed. Based on a server limitation, you are allowed to schedule only 100 days in advance. The same issue occurs when you want to schedule a weekday meeting for more than 20 weeks in a row. You are only allowed to schedule weekday meetings 20 weeks in a row (100 days), and then you have to schedule another meeting with the same meeting ID for the next 20 weeks.

A. The number of attendees is one possible cause. If only one person attends the meeting, the meeting cannot be extended before the scheduled end time. At least two participants are required to extend the meeting.

A. The Can call out from meetings parameter is set to No in your user profile.

A. No, you must use the Cisco MeetingPlace Web or MeetingTime interface to schedule a continuous meeting.

A. No, you must use the Cisco MeetingPlace Web or MeetingTime interface to schedule a recurring meeting.

A. No. Each meeting scheduled by the deleted user has a unique user ID associated with it. Because of this, the meetings have to be deleted and then rescheduled using the new profile.

A. Yes. By design, this is a condition that should never happen, and the user is allowed to reserve all available ports. If your intention is to reserve all of the ports so that no one can schedule a meeting, then the number of contingency ports plus floater ports should add up to a number equal to the number of access ports minus one. That is, if there are 120 access ports, and you set contingency ports to 2 and floater ports to 117, then no one is able to schedule a meeting because there is only one port left (two ports are needed to schedule a meeting).

A. The ports are reserved for the duration of the meeting plus the time specified in the Meeting Start and End Guard time. To work around this, set Meeting Start and End Guard times to zero.

A. If the Cisco MeetingPlace server is setup for alarm outdial, then the system outdials the number set in the Phone Number to Call field under Alarm Handling when an alarm is detected. If subsequent alarms are generated on the system (regardless of the type of alarm) and if no attempts have been made to clear the alarms, the system continues with its half-hour outdialing cycle from the first alarm that was generated.

Note: Clearing any alarm stops the alarm outdial until the next alarm is detected.

A. The user hears, "To schedule a meeting for a future time, press 2." They do not hear an option to press 1.

A. The Actual # of calling locations parameter is not only incremented for people that call into the meeting, but also for people that enter the conference room in MeetingTime without dialing into the conference.

A. The first one is labeled Internet E-mail address and is used by Cisco MeetingPlace Web to append the meeting schedulers' email addresses to the meeting details pages.

Note: The email addresses included here should be in Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) form.

Here is an example of how it is displayed on the Cisco MeetingPlace Web pages:

Send mail to Marvin Paule <mailto:marvinp@latitude.com> for more information about this meeting.

The second is located under Receiving Notifications and is used by the notification gateways (Outlook, SMTP, Notes) to send calendar invitations or notifications of upcoming Cisco MeetingPlace meetings to the invitees. This address can be in SMTP form but also may be entered in a format understood by the mail system, such as a Global Address Book entry.

A. All file attachments are stored in the voice file system. The Cisco MeetingPlace server does not have any file size limits. There is a limitation in that the directory where these attachments are stored has a limit of about 1GB. The files are compressed before they are stored there, at a rate of approximately 2:1.

Since file attachments are transferred to Cisco MeetingPlace block by block, there is little chance of the process timing out, unless something, such as a network problem, blocks that transfer.

A. Never move a voice drive. If you do that, the recordings on it are lost. Leave the old drive in slot 2 and install the new drive in slot 3.

A. A serial cable (db9 female-to-female, null modem) is used to connect to the front panel of the Cisco MeetingPlace server. This cable can be difficult to find. These Belkin cables are compatible and are sometimes carried by BestBuy:

• Pro Series Serial Direct Cable -6 feet F3B207-06

• Pro Series Serial Direct Cable - 10 feet F3B207-10

• Serial File Transfer Cable - 10 Feet F3X171-10

A. You must perform the reschedule on each server individually. Although the Cisco MeetingPlace Web scheduling action happens simultaneously, the reschedule action does not.

A. No, when using Cisco MeetingPlace server release 4.0 and later, you do not have to be on the same release to have successful MSMs. For example, connecting meetings from Cisco MeetingPlace release server 4.2 to 4.1 is supported.

A. No, the MSM is platform independent.

A. No, with Cisco MeetingPlace Web release 4.0 and later, you do not have to run the same MeetingPlace Web release on all servers for MSM scheduling. For example, it is perfectly acceptable to use MeetingPlace Web release 4.2 to schedule an MSM meeting to connect other servers running MeetingPlace Web releases 4.1 or 4.0.

A. The language does not propagate to the conference servers until they are restarted. The normal procedure is to treat a language tape the same as a minor software upgrade, which means taking down everything for the duration. You can cut the out-of-service time a bit by downing just the network server, loading the tape, restarting it, then individually restarting each conference server and shadow server.

A. Standard, abbreviated, and custom voice prompts can be used.

A. Cisco MeetingPlace voice prompts are configured system-wide.

A. You configure Cisco MeetingPlace voice prompts in a system manager profile over the phone.

A. Custom prompts always take precedence.

A. The two-minute warning prompt cannot be changed. It actually consists of three prompts:

• "Your meeting will be ended in..."

• "Two"

• "Minutes"

Customizing these prompts (especially the second and third prompt) causes a system-wide impact.

A. The EMST does not reserve the ports. It only allows you to join a meeting if there are ports available before the Meeting Start Guard time. Try setting the Meeting ID Start Guard time longer than the EMST.

A. In order to achieve this, set the Meeting ID Start Guard times to be larger values (for example 60 minutes).

A. If you do not want to set-up a continuous meeting, you can set the Disconnect -Empty Port time field to the maximum value (1440).

A. Your lunch lasted longer than the time specified in the Disconnect Empty Port time field. Set the Disconnect Empty Port time field to a larger number.

A. Yes, for any meeting scheduled for less than ten minutes, Cisco MeetingPlace is designed to make it last for ten minutes.

A. During runtime, you can use the command line interface (CLI) tech level of the Activity command to see the status of all current ports.

For the status history, you can run a Port Utilization report using the Capacity Management Tool from MeetingTime. That report shows you the percent of conference ports that were used for a specified time. However, it does not track the number of access ports that were used at the time (for example, ports that are not used for meeting participation, but listening to the meeting recordings, scheduling or rescheduling meetings, and profile updates). A product enhancement request has been submitted to track such port usages.

A. If you dial into the Cisco MeetingPlace server and the remote modem answers, you get a Window pop-up that says all devices connected 198.207.208.242. In this case, employ these steps:

1. Start-up your Telnet session by issuing the telnet 198.207.208.241 command.
2. If, at this point, all you see is a blank Telnet screen (you may try typing but nothing appears in the Telnet session), do this:
   1. You might have to press Ctrl - Alt - Del to end your dial-up networking task.
   2. Re-start dial-up networking, but do not let it dial numbers. Click the More button, then Edit entry and modem properties...
   3. Click the Server tab, then the TCP/IP Setting button. In the resulting window, you see two check box choices:

      • Force IP header compression

      • Use default gateway on remote network

   4. Uncheck Force IP header compression and check Use default gateway on remote network.

A. In Scheduling Parameters, there is a parameter for Max ports per meeting. This parameter applies both when scheduling a meeting and when attending a meeting. That is, if you set the Max port per meeting parameter to 20, then the maximum ports you can reserve for a meeting is 20, and the maximum number of attendees that can be admitted to a meeting is 20 also, even when there are floater ports available.