They should call it Lyp Sync
Microsoft links Skype to Lync
Microsoft has connected its consumer voice over IP tool Skype to its business grade unified communications tool Lync. The upshot of the move is that Skype users can now call anyone with a Lync account, after the usual to-ing and fro-ing with invitations. As most Lync users work inside a businesses big enough to either run a …
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Thursday 30th May 2013 04:57 GMT Eddy Ito
the headache
If every yahoo on Skype can hit me up via Lync then it means that Lync doesn't automatically start when I log in at work. Believe it or not, one reason I have business cards is so that I have a general idea of who is ringing my business line. Sorry MS, I don't have any desire to have every online schmuck who happens on my addy 'ringing' me up the instant I go live at 6 am.
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Thursday 30th May 2013 06:55 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: the headache
I believe your IT would have to configure your Lync server to allow the federation of your internal Lync with external Skype. And if you have a problem with that, then surely that's an issue for you to take up with your management rather than getting antsy at Microsoft for adding a feature that many businesses would appreciate. And this is not really such a new feature anyway - Lync was always able to link to Live Messenger. Now that Live Messenger has been retired, they've simply ported the function over to Skype.
Honestly, for a tech site, The Register comments must have one of the highest luddite populations of the Interwebs.
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Thursday 30th May 2013 08:15 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: What I don't understand
"It integrates very nicely with Exchange Server."
Yes, this is the real problem. By putting even more dependence on Exchange, the Skype/Lync move is putting up a huge barrier to exit for many large companies and organisations (including the one I work at now) where the people making these deployment decisions haven't a clue about what costs they are opening themselves up to in the future, nor how many options they are closing off to themselves and their staff.
It's a frigging disaster.
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Thursday 30th May 2013 09:16 GMT BRAINPLAN
Re: What I don't understand
I think businesses are quite aware of what they are buying in to. There isn't a better UC system out there right now, just a hodge-podge of standards. At least MS have actually taken initiative and invested in unifying their products for the benefit of both corporations, and end users.
If your backend and frontend is Microsoft based then it is very likely you will stick with it due to the inherent costs of educating / replacing staff that can administer *nix or whatever else.
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Thursday 30th May 2013 15:47 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: What I don't understand
"If your backend and frontend is Microsoft based then it is very likely you will stick with it due to the inherent costs of educating / replacing staff that can administer *nix or whatever else."
That's the stupid bit here - the admin is all done by smug bastards who have Linux machines. The rest of us have to put up with Windows.
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Thursday 30th May 2013 19:50 GMT TheVogon
Re: What I don't understand
"The alternatives, like asterisk, are much easier to administer through a simple CLI"
Lync is much more powerful and easy to manage in say a 200K user enterprise - and has a much more powerful and object orientated CLI than Asterisk.
Asterisk might work for an SME, but its nothing like the scalable enterprise grade product that Lync is...
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Thursday 30th May 2013 08:13 GMT Anonymous Coward
Puzzled. What's wrong with Live Chat....?
...."Web marketing types....have long lamented the fact that when shoppers go online they often abandon a purchase for lack of information about a product. A technique called “click to call” has been advanced as a fix to that issue, as it allows users to click a button on a web page to start a conversation with a customer service operative."
What's wrong with simple Live Chat....? It doesn't require an extra app, or flash, or java, just JavaScript in the browser. Its anonymous too if you enter rubbish for email address and name. I use the Live-Chat Contact-Us option anywhere its provided as a support option, as you can get near real-time answers to questions. Its fast and simple. But maybe I'm messing something here...
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Thursday 30th May 2013 10:19 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: Puzzled. What's wrong with Live Chat....?
Why would a "click to call" button be less convenient than live chat? There's no need for extensions to make a VOIP call. Javascript can actually register on a SIP-server and the webrtc, now supported in most major browsers (except IE17, or whichever version is out now) can thus make calls without any need for additional plugins.
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Thursday 30th May 2013 08:59 GMT Velv
Vision
"Why?" "Why?" "Why?" "Why?" "Why?" "Why?" "Why?" "Why?" "Why?"
Don't any of the commentards have any vision? Much of the backbone of the telephone network is IP. There are various proprietary IP services out there. There are a multitude of other channels of communication.
UNIFIED COMMUNICATIONS starts with bringing things together one by one. So Skype now works for Microsoft users. Cisco are working on other business integration offerings. Telephony vendors see the benefits. Slowly the interconnects will join up and we end up all being able to communicate from anywhere (how you as a business manage that is up to you). The underlying stuff will be come irrelevant. Just because the user happens to be on Skype won't mean you need to be.
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Thursday 30th May 2013 12:16 GMT Sammy Smalls
Re: Vision
'Slowly the interconnects will join up and we end up all being able to communicate from anywhere'
Nice theory, except they wont. Sure, it all runs over IP, but the interop Vision is just that. There's a reason Google dropped XMPP. They want you on their platform, not someone elses that 'plays nicely' with Google+. Sure, this may be shortsighted, but hey, these decisions arent made for our benefit. Until someone can come up with a fully IM/presence aware PSTN like service, you will always have to choose the lesser evil.
The one good thing is that this will force other vendors like Cisco or Avaya to become more open, because they become the lesser evil. m2c.
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Thursday 30th May 2013 09:23 GMT Charlie Clark
Not the whole story
The integration only works if you have a Microsoft account and use the awful new Skype clients. AFAIK users with pre-Microsoft accounts still use the classic Skype infrastructure, which Microsoft is obviously keen to drop.
I have Lync for one of my customers and it's not a patch on my > 10 year old Skype client for ease of use. VoIP doesn't work even on the same network, though this probably an issue with the VPN not being able to handle audio packets very well - video seems to be fine.
As the future of Skype classic is in doubt I'm still looking for a replacement. Google's chat has the better interface (because less cluttered) on my tablet. For IM I'm hoping that Wickr will at some point actually make it to other platforms.
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Thursday 30th May 2013 20:10 GMT TheVogon
Re: Eventually Skype will replace lync
"MS will use its leverage on Exchange to get into the VOIP PBX business"
Erm, but MS has been in the VOIP PBX business for a number of years now....
"MS will launch a very expensive voice server at some point."
It's called Lync - and it's almost always the lowest TCO solution.....
Unless you mean Voicemail server - in which case the Exchange Unified Messaging Server role did that for years too.....
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Thursday 30th May 2013 12:55 GMT Wardy01
You lot are stuck in the dark ages
Lets face it the concept of a traditional land line for calling is basically a dead end now.
The internet has grown to a point where people expect integration and quality and a call made through a telephony based line gives neither.
Businesses want to have call center applications that automatically show them the contact / account details of a caller on receiving the call.
They also want to see more technology that puts them in control of cost not the likes of BT.
It's a choice of the business / infrastructural managers on weather to do any of this not a requirement, microsoft simply state that you can.
I believe microsoft want to make all calling effectively free so all you need is an internet connection and can get in touch with anyone in the world.
And to all those dumb shits out there that think this only works if your pc is on ... ever heard of a voip phone?
You can plug the dam thing directly in to an ethernet port requiring no PC at all!
Oh and if someone calls you at 6am do what you do at the moment with your mobile ... DON'T PICK UP!
It's not difficult, skype / lync is basically a 21st century replacement for telephony.
Sad that you are so blinded by rage from a rep Microsoft got like 20 years ago and haven't moved on!
I bet if Microsoft invented something like an unlimited free power source you dumbasses would still troll places like this just to get your kicks complaining about how the oil industry will crash or some other crap like that.
Retards, its progress - DEAL WITH IT!
Begin down voting if you are a retard and up voting if you have even a tiny bit of common sense.
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Thursday 30th May 2013 13:54 GMT James 36
bleurgh
“we think it’s important to re-humanize technology so that consumers, professionals and decision-makers can interact with technology how and when they want – from the living room to the boardroom.”
has to win most vomit inducing marketing bo***cks so far this year, I mean what a terrible way to say "we let people make IP calls to one another"
the person who came up with that statement should be put down , or locked in a dark room with only themselves for company
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Thursday 30th May 2013 20:01 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: Click to call
"IMHO. old landlines usually have better call quality than new-fangled VOIP"
Only if you have a Cisco type solution. Lync uses wideband codecs that exceed analogue line call quality and audio bandwidth...at a lower network bandwidth and better resistance to network latency and jitter than most other codecs - Google 'RT Audio' if you want to see the details....
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