Command Line Options in Lync Optimizer Scripts

A lot of what drives development in the Lync Optimizer is my own personal needs. Every once in a while, I come across a deployment that has some requirement that the Optimizer doesn't cater to.  Most often, it's related to a country that isn't in the Optimizer, which is easy enough to remedy in most cases, with a lot of research and testing. Other times, its a quirk of the deployment that forces me to change how the Optimizer script runs.

On my latest project, there are over 100 sites that have to have their own routes/PSTN usages for places around the globe. Normally, I generate all the dial rules, and run the resulting scripts, answering the questions as they come up (Site ID? Least cost routing? Location based routing? Would you like fries with that?).  Until this past week, I was happy to press 1, Yes, No, No, Supersize me etc.  Not anymore.

Many of the finest PowerShell scripts out there (I'm looking at you, Lync Scriptboy) allow you to enter parameters as required for execution.  I figured it was time to add that feature to the Lync Optimizer generated scripts.

So, if you don't want to answer questions as the Lync Optimizer script is running, you can enter answers to those questions as parameters in the command line prior to execution. All parameters are optional. If you don't add the parameter in the command line, the script will ask you during execution as it always has.

An interesting new feature I enabled along with the command line options is the ability to control which sites are included as part of the least-cost/failover routing logic. Previously, if you have lots of sites with Enterprise Voice routes/policies etc. and you choose to enable least-cost/failover routing in the script, your resulting voice policy PSTN usage list would be very long.  This option now allows you to limit which sites to apply least-cost/failover routing to.  Just use the option -LCRSites followed by the ruleset prefix of the sites to apply least-cost failover routing enclosed with quotes.  For example:  Scriptname.ps1 -LeastCostRouting:$TRUE -LCRSites "CA-ON-Toronto, UK-London, SG-Singapore"

If you need to run a bunch of Optimizer-generated scripts, this can be a real timesaver, especially when you have to run the same script multiple times to account for multiple gateways, or applying least-cost routing and that sort of thing.

The Optimizer script also now has the proper syntax for getting help, so you can type HELP and it will spit out all the available options.

The available options are:

SiteID
The numeric identifier associated with the Lync site to apply the script to. If a value is not provided, script will ask during execution. To see a list of sites and the associated site IDs, run Get-CSSite

DialPlanType
Create a site-level or user-level dialplan. Site-level applies to all users at a site, while user-level have to be explicitly applied. Possible values are 'Site' or 'User'. If a value is not provided, script will ask during execution.

LeastCostRouting
Either apply or don't apply least cost routing to the given site. Only applies if multiple Lync Optimizer generated rulesets are detected. If a value is not provided (and multiple rulesets are detected), script will ask during execution.

LCRSites
Apply least-cost/failover routing only to rulesets defined in this list. Separate site names with commas. Input site names exactly the same as the prefix for the desired site (ie CA-ON-Toronto, UK-London etc).

OverwriteSiteVoicePolicy
Overwrite any existing site-level voice policy if values are already there. Only applies if a site-level voice policy exists. If a value is not provided, script will ask during execution, if necessary.

LocationBasedRouting
Apply location-based routing to a selected site. Only applies if Lync network sites have been created. If a value is not provided, script will ask during execution, if it detects Lync network sites.

LBRNetworkSite
The name of the Lync network site to apply location-based routing. Only applies if Lync network sites exist. For a list of Lync network sites, run Get-CSNetworkSite. Works in conjunction with LocationBasedRouting parameter. If a value is not provided, script will ask during execution, if network sites exist, and the user selects location-based routing.

LocalOnly
Creates only local routes and PSTN usages for the selected site. Useful when using a central SIP trunk for all dialing but want to have local-only voice policies for remote sites without their own local PSTN access. Assumes that the users at the remote site are assigned numbers appropriate to their site, and the SIP provider enforces the appropriate local dialing area for those numbers.

MediationPool
The FQDN of a mediation pool to apply the script to. Only applies if multiple mediation pools exist within the selected Lync site. If a value is not provided and multiple mediation pools exist, script will ask during execution.

PSTNGateway
The FQDN of a PSTN gateway/trunk to apply the script to. Only applies if multiple PSTN gateways/trunks are assigned to the selected mediation pool. If a value is not provided and multiple PSTN gateways/trunks exist, script will ask during execution.

ApplicationPool
The FQDN of an application pool to apply the script to. Only applies if multiple application pools exist within the selected Lync site, and call park or premium call blocking is being used. If a value is not provided and multiple application pools exist, and either call park or premium call blocking is being used,  script will ask during execution.

Enter any desired options on the command line using the following syntax:

ScriptName.ps1 -SiteID digit -DialPlanType user/site -LeastCostRouting true/false -LCRSites "sitename1,sitename2,sitename3" -OverwriteSiteVoicePolicy true/false -LocationBasedRouting true/false -LBRNetworkSite NetworkSiteName -MediationPool MedPoolFQDN -PSTNGateway PSTNGatewayFQDN -ApplicationServer AppServerFQDN

November 2013 Lync Dialing Rule Optimizer Updates

Since the move to use authentication in the Lync Dialing Rule Optimizer, I've been busy working behind the scenes to prepare the back-end for some cool new updates.

Back-End Changes

Firstly, I've been steadily moving away from XML for my data sources to a full-fledged SQL back-end. XML was great for the first while, but its been getting difficult to manage.  SQL offers much more robust querying, searching and sorting than XML, and opens up all kinds of possibilities for future features.  Now, changes and updates only have to be done in the database, and I don't have to touch the web pages.

Area Code Improvements

With the change to SQL for back-end databases, I've been able to drastically increase the number of area codes stored for countries like Germany.  Germany has thousands of area codes, which would overwhelm the drop-down style of listing area codes I've always done.  So for countries like Germany, you now enter the area code, and the Optimizer will show you the available cities from that area code.

Extension Extensions

You may notice additional options for extension entry than before.  Firstly, I've upped the extension limit from 10 to 20.  Secondly, I've added options to create your own rule suffixes for extension ranges.  So, if you're creating an extension range for your London, UK head office, you can assign a suffix like "HeadOffice", which will make the resulting normalization/routing rules use UK-London-20-HeadOffice, instead of the default UK-London-20-Internal-1.

You may also notice an additional checkbox column for "Single".  Sometimes, you may have users with their own DID, but maps to an internal extension that doesn't hold any relation to the DID.

For example, the company president may have a DID of +14165551234, and an internal extension of x200.  Your vice president may have a DID of +14165559876 and an extension of x201. Since there is no relationship between the DID and extension, you can't create a blanket normalization rule that will work with both of these.

With the new iteration of the Optimizer, you can easily tell the Optimizer to create individual normalization rule for each of these, simply by entering their DID and extension, and checking the box for Single.

Future updates may include a more Excel-like interface for extension entry that would allow cutting-and-pasting from Excel spreadsheets.  If you have the information already in a spreadsheet, it will make data entry MUCH simpler. 

Until then, enjoy, and if you have questions or problems, let me know.