He has a customer who has a centralized Lync deployment located in the United States. There are several small offices located in other countries who connect to the US Lync server and use it for Enterprise Voice. He wanted the users in the small offices to be able to dial phone numbers as if they were logged into a local Lync server.
For example, a UK user wants to be able to dial local UK numbers by dialing 6 or 7 digits. They dial national numbers by prepending a 0. They know they have to prepend 00 for international calls. They don't want to have to dial 01144xxxxxxxx for what they perceive to be a local call.
After some thought, I've updated the Optimizer to be able to handle this situation. If you want to provide localized dialing rules for different countries, just do the following:
- Start with a clean Enterprise Voice slate
- Run the Optimizer against your Lync site using the generated script appropriate for your country, which will generate the necessary dialing rules for the country where your Lync server resides.
- Run the Optimizer for each country you want to create localized dialing rules and apply the generated script against your central Lync site.
By default, the rulesets for all countries use the official language for that country. If you want the Optimizer to use English for all rulesets, then click on Click for English-Only Version, on the top-left corner of the page (or go directly to http://ucdialplans.com/english.htm).
When you run the Optimizer script for the first time, it will create a site-level dial plan with normalization rules for the desired country. When you run the Optimizer script additional times, using scripts generated for different countries, it will detect the existence of a site-level dial plan and will create a user-level dial plan with normalization rules appropriate for that country.
Assign the user-level dial plan to the appropriate users and they will be able to dial phone numbers as they are accustomed to. Continuing the previous example, US users will dial local and national numbers using either 10 or 11 digits, and international calls starting with 011. UK users will dial local numbers using 7+ digits, national numbers starting with a 0, and international numbers with 00. The UK users won't be aware that when they dial a 7 digit local number, it actually gets dialed out from the US Lync server as 01144xxxxxxx.
Again, thanks to Pat Richard for the feedback and the suggestion, and for being the first person to actually give me a Paypal donation!
Hi Ken,
ReplyDeleteI saw that Brazil is not include in Lync Optimizer....Could be possible to insert Brazil in this list? Please feel free if you want to contact me to any information.
Thanks
Hey Mauricio,
DeleteI can definitely include Brazil. To do this, I would need help with Portuguese translations. If you provide an email address, I'll send you the phrases and words I need translated.
Thanks!
Ken
Hi Ken,
ReplyDeleteThe last "The UK users won't be aware that when they dial a 7 digit local number, it actually gets dialed out from the US Lync server as 01144xxxxxxx" is a bit unclear. So that means that UK Local users will call from a US lync server back to a local UK number assuming they configured a local PSTN gateway for the appriopiate route?
Thanks
Hi Anonymous,
DeleteYou've got it exactly right. The Optimizer will automatically assign the route to the available gateway. You'll be all set!
Ken
UK local numbers have varying length around the country. Within a single area code, the following number lengths are possible:
Delete8 only (2+8), 7 only (3+7), 6 only (4+6), 6 or 5 (4+6/4+5), 5 only (5+5), 5 or 4 (5+5/5+4).
There's a handy list for 01 numbers and 02 numbers as well as a complete list of local dialling rules in the UK.
The local dialling rules for the UK are also available as an XML file.
Beginning with version 8.2, Lync Optimizer uses the data from the above XML file to create local dialling rules specific to each UK area code.
DeleteGone is the generic ^\+44{{areacode}}(([2-8]\d\d|9[0-8]\d|99[0-8])\d{1,5})$ pattern for UK local numbers and in its place are patterns such as these:
^\+4420([378]\d{7})$ for London (20) with 8-digit numbers beginning 3, 7 and 8,
^\+4429(2[0-3]\d{6})$ for Cardiff (29) with 8-digit numbers beginning 20, 21 and 22,
^\+441524(([3-8]\d\d|9[0-8]\d|99[0-8])\d{3}|(3[2-79]|6\d)\d{3})$ for Lancaster (1524) with its mix of 6-digit and 5-digit local numbers and restriction that local numbers cannot begin with a 2 as it is a "mixed" area,
^\+441460(([2-8]\d\d|9[0-8]\d|99[0-8])\d{3}|(30|5[2-57]|6[1-8]|7[2-8])\d{3})$ for Chard (1460) with its mix of 6-digit and 5-digit local numbers,
^\+441539(([2378]\d\d|9[0-8]\d|99[0-8])\d{3})$ for Kendal (1539) with its restriction that local numbers cannot begin with 4, 5 or 6 as it is a "mixed" area,
and so on.
Further details can be found in this post and the list of local dialling rules for the UK is available on another site.
Hi Ken,
ReplyDeleteThanks for a great tool! Nothing major, but one improvement would be to specify the language before creating the PS script. I used the tool to create dial plans for The Netherlands but the PS script and descriptions are in Dutch. It would be nice to be able to keep these in English. Other than that it worked great and saved me a lot of time!
Regards
Chris
Just realised I could use the "English Only" version!
Deletehttp://lyncoptimizer.com/english.htm
Many Thanks!
Hi Ken,
ReplyDeleteBtw, i wanted to mention; in your lync optimizer tool there isn't a dialplan,route and pstn usage for 088 numbers. These numbers are used in Netherlands for voice. It's like a number which can be used in all states in the Netherlands regarding where they are located.
I added it manually but perhaps you can add it to the tool. Btw Great tool. Donating for you!
Hi Anonymous,
ReplyDeleteFor the 088 numbers, should it be part of the Tollfree route/usage? Should I also add routes/usages for 084, 085, or 087?
And thanks for donating!
Ken
Hi,
DeleteActually, it's the same as a national call so maybe you can put it in there. 084 085 and 087 don't have any function.
Hi Ivan,
DeleteSorry it took so long to reply, but I was on vacation for the past 2 weeks.
I updated the NL national rule to include 088 numbers. I'm assuming they are 9-digits long, not including the leading 0, correct?
Ken
Hi Ken,
DeleteThanks for adding the 088 numbers to the national rule.
I'm missing this range also in the area code drop box.
In the Netherlands you can choose to use a regional range of numbers or a national range. The National ranges are 088 (corporate range).
You can find a good overview of the dutch ranges on this website: http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lijst_van_Nederlandse_netnummers
If you need help translating/understanding this page you can reach me on martijn at van-unen dot nl
How about adding China?
ReplyDeleteis this Lync 2013 Compatable?
ReplyDeleteYes, the Optimizer is fully compatible with Lync 2013.
DeleteKen
Hi Ken excellant Site but could include China, Singapore and India into the Lyncoptimizer which will be of grate help and if you could give bit more explanation on the complex expressions.
ReplyDeleteYes, those countries are on my list of countries-to-add-to-Optimizer. Its been a busy year so far doing my real job, and I haven't been able to put much time into it. Soon!
DeleteKen
Hi Ken,
ReplyDeleteFirstly, thanks for the work you do here. Very useful and appreciated!
I have a centralised Lync 2013 system based out of the UK using a SIP trunk from our network provider, and I'm about to deploy EV to France. I have run the UK script and it has created the dial-plans, PSTN usages and voice policies as expected for the UK. I have run the France script but it has only created the FR dial plan, no PSTN usage or voice policies. Are the PSTN usages and voice policies that the UK script created all-encompassing? As in, should I expect to see PSTN usages and voice policies or do the regular expressions in the existing UK ones cover all the countries?
I'm guessing that the normalised numbers from France would be treated as an international call by Lync and go down the SIP trunk as usual. Would that therefore mean I have to make sure that all the France users have are assigned the International voice policy from the UK?
Thanks again!
Matt
If you don't have a PSTN gateway in France, then the Optimizer will only create the dial plan. Its meant to allow users in other countries to dial numbers as they are accustomed to. The dialed number will go out the UK gateway as you said. And yes, if you want your French users to be able to dial French phone numbers, you will have to assign them the UK-International voice policy.
DeleteAlternatively, if you want to limit their international dialing to just France instead of the entire world, you will have to manually create a route/usage combo that only allows international calls to France.....which gives me an idea. It might be a good idea to set this up automatically via the Optimizer. You may see that option in a future update.
Brilliant - thanks again Ken! Looks like I have an idea about how it's working :-)
Delete