Cisco Unity Express 3.0, 3.1, and 3.2

Cisco Unity Express 3.0

●   Capacity: Cisco Unity Express 3.0 adds support for the Cisco Unity Express Network Module NME-CUE, which supports up to 24 ports for use by integrated messaging, voicemail, and Automated-Attendant functions or optional interactive voice response (IVR) sessions. The network module can support up to 50 Internet Message Access Protocol (IMAP) sessions. The new hardware also supports features such as Graceful Manual Shutdown and an LED status display that increases the robustness of the Cisco Unity Express application. Cisco Unity Express 3.0 also adds support for up to 20 IMAP and 3 VoiceView Express sessions on the Advanced Integration Module (AIM-CUE).

●   Concurrent language support: Cisco Unity Express 3.0 can support up to five concurrent languages on the enhanced network module (NME-CUE), the enhanced-capacity network module (NM-CUE-EC), and the standard network module (NM-CUE). On the advanced integration module, Cisco Unity Express can support up to two concurrent languages—particularly important for Automated-Attendant and IVR applications.

●   Live Record: You can use this feature to record a call temporarily. The recorded call is stored as a voicemail message in your mailbox and you can access it through the Telephony User Interface (TUI), VoiceView Express, and IMAP. You can generate periodic tones to indicate that a conversation is being recorded.

●   Live Reply: This feature allows you to select an option to automatically call back the sender of a voicemail message. When listening to a voicemail, you are prompted to reply to the message or return the person's call.

●   Message Notification Cascading: This feature allows you to set up a series of notifications to a widening circle of recipients. For example, to create a hierarchy of message notifications for a technical support department, you can set the first message notification to be sent immediately to the front-line technical support representative’s pager. You can then set a notification to be sent after a delay of 15 minutes to the department manager’s pager, and a third notification to be sent after a delay of 30 minutes to an employee in the problem resolution group. Notifications continue to cascade until a recipient reads or deletes the message.

●   Nonsubscriber Message Delivery: You can compose a voice message for delivery to internal or external numbers. You can record a message and schedule it to be delivered at a particular time to a maximum of five recipients.

●   Other voicemail enhancements include the following:

◦     You can play a brief format of the message envelope while checking voicemail.

◦     You can expand the current message envelope to identify the day the message was left.

◦     After leaving a voice message, you can leave another message for the same user or a different user without having to dial back into the system.

◦     Upon login to your personal mailbox, you can hear a summary for all the general delivery mailboxes (GDMs) to which you are subscribed.

◦     While sending a message, you can configure Cisco Unity Express to dial by extension by default.

●   Fax support: Inbound fax capability is provided by using a combination of the native T.37 fax processing on the Cisco integrated services routers, combined with the message management of Cisco Unity Express. You can receive faxes using a single or separate direct inward dialing (DID) number for each user, and you can store messages in your mailbox, send them to your e-mail client, or deliver them to a GDM.

●   Web-based Automated-Attendant Editor: You can create simple Automated-Attendant scripts and modify them using the Cisco Unity Express GUI. For more advanced functions where the Automated-Attendant structure needs to be modified, you can use the feature-rich Cisco Unity Express Editor.

●   Security enhancements: Secure HTTP or HTTP over Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) access to the GUI is added for secure connectivity to the system. Additional Cisco Unity Express 3.0 security features include configurable system behavior when you erroneously log in to TUI handling. This approach gives you the flexibility to apply security policies specific to your business.

●   Real-time and historical reporting: Cisco Unity Express 3.0 introduces an extensive set of real-time and historical reports, giving you powerful information for network resource planning and assessment purposes. The reports cover Cisco Unity Express applications such as voicemail, Automated Attendant, fax, and optional IVR and overall system status such as active calls, incoming calls over time, and rejected calls, with thresholds that you define for each.

●   IVR: Because IVR provides caller self-service, it improves customer satisfaction and lowers operational costs. The Cisco Unity Express optional IVR feature allows you to update personal information and preferences, order products, track delivery, check payment status, and request product information, thereby alleviating the burden on the customer service representative or contact center agent.

Cisco Unity Express 3.1

●   Autoregistration to the Cisco Unified Messaging Gateway is performed by shared secret information (username and password) between the Cisco Unified Messaging Gateway and Cisco Unity Express. The autoregistration process enables Cisco Unity Express to integrate into a Voice Profile for Internet Mail (VPIM) network administered by one or more Cisco Unified Messaging Gateways.

●   Directory exchange between Cisco Unity Express and a Cisco Unified Messaging Gateway uses the Simple Message Transfer Protocol (SMTP) and is automatically started after a successful Cisco Unity Express registration. The information shared during directory exchange helps enable message routing, delivery, spoken-name confirmation, and remote lookup across Cisco Unity Express systems in a unified messaging network.

●   New TUI prompts allow you to invoke a Cisco Unified Messaging Gateway for a remote directory lookup when Cisco Unity Express cannot find called location ID information in the Cisco Unity Express local or remote tables. Prompts offer you a menu option to confirm that allows Cisco Unity Express to query remotely to validate your input called location.

●   New VoiceView Express (visual voicemail) user options are introduced in order to include a Cisco Unified Messaging Gateway query for a remote user and location information. When a number or name is not found on the Cisco Unity Express local database, you get a new report with the message “Your criteria yielded no results. Refine your addressing criteria or search the global directory” on the phone screen, with a new softkey on the phone panel for the option to look up the number or name on the Cisco Unified Messaging Gateway.

Cisco Unity Express 3.2

●   Integration with multiple Cisco Unified Communications Manager Express sites: Cisco Unity Express (on NME-CUE only) can integrate with up to 10 Cisco Unified Communications Manager Express remote sites. This solution allows centralized voicemail and Automated-Attendant features for up to 10 sites when voicemail at each remote site branch is not essential and there is a small number of users at each site.

●   PINless login to voicemail: Release 3.2 gives you the ability to configure Cisco Unity Express to allow for PINless login when you call in from any phone. This feature allows for access to voicemail in trusted environments, with the click of the messages button on a Cisco IP phone or a call into a mailbox, without the need for any more key-presses.

●   Integrated Messaging: Cisco Unity Express supports voicemail access via IMAP using Microsoft Outlook, Outlook Express, and Lotus Notes. With the 3.2 release, Cisco Unity Express extends this support to Apple Macintosh computers running Microsoft Entourage 2004.

●   Nonsubscriber distribution list: With Release 3.2, Cisco Unity Express administrators and end users can program distribution lists to include nonsubscribers along with subscribers. When you send a message to this distribution list, Cisco Unity Express delivers the message directly to the mailboxes of subscribers and calls the nonsubscriber numbers and plays the message.

●   Password synchronization: With Release 3.2 of Cisco Unity Express, passwords are automatically synchronized across Cisco Unity Express and Cisco Unified Communications Manager Express.

●   Ease of software upgrade: With Release 3.2, Cisco Unity Express supports upgrades from Releases 2.3, 3.0, and 3.1, making it easier for you to migrate from any of these prior releases. Release 3.2 is also structured such that a full install and an upgrade use the same file sets to minimize the number of files that need to be managed as part of a large deployment.

●   Localization: Cisco Unity Express Release 3.2 adds localization support in Arabic, Russian, and Turkish languages.