New Releases: OCS November Updates & the Lync Resource Kit Tools

The November 2010 updates were just released for OCS 2007 R2 and the Clients (Communicator, Communicator Phone Edition, Live Meeting, and the Live Meeting Add-In). As Aaron Tiensivu reports, this round of udpates is apparently the true CU7 (the previous release was apparently just a CU6 add-on hotfix for the Routing Group Service).

OCS 2007 R2 Server Update: can be found in KB 968802: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/968802/en-us (binary version 6907.221). Remember to use the Cumulative Server Update Installer can be used to update all components on your server.

> Note: there are several fixes which address Lync coexistence issues.

Client Updates:

• Communicator 2007 R2:  Microsoft Office Communicator 2007 R2 Hotfix KB 2291453 (Note: this updates the client to version 3.5.6907.221).
• Live Meeting:  Description of the update package for the Windows-based Live Meeting 2007 client: November 2010
• Live Meeting Outlook Add-In:  Description of the update for the Live Meeting Conferencing Add-in for Outlook: November 2010
• Communicator Phone Edition: Description of the cumulative update for Office Communicator 2007 R2, Phone Edition: November 2010

XMPP Gateway: Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 R2 XMPP Gateway Hotfix KB 2404570

AND

The Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Resource Kit Tools were recently released.  It is available here: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=80cc5ce7-970d-4fd2-8731-d5d7d0829266.

In addition to a new version of Snooper.exe (v4) that can be used to analyze Lync server call logs, there are some interesting new tools I am looking forward to trying out:

• Bandwidth Utilization Analyzer – reports on bandwidth capacity and utilization of audio traffic across WAN links.
• Bandwidth Policy Service Monitor – view a list of bandwidth policy services, and the bandwidth usage as reported by each bandwdith policy service.
• TopologyValidator – validates the health of a Lync Topology by running sythetic PowerShell transactions.
• Network Configuration Viewer – view call adminission control (CAC) network topology
• MsTurnPing - check the status of servers running the Lync Server A/V Edge & Authentication Services, Lync Server Bandwidth Policy Service (Authentication), and the Lync Server Bandwidth Policy Service (Core).