The tool was born out of my former MOCLogin troubleshooting tool, but I decided to rename it because of the expanded features and all [...]]]> I haven’t done a blog entry for awhile on InsideOCS because I have spent a lot of my extra time developing a small free tool called: The Remote UC Troubleshooting Tool (RUCT).

The tool was born out of my former MOCLogin troubleshooting tool, but I decided to rename it because of the expanded features and all the great things it can do besides just troubleshoot DNS entries with Communicator and Lync client automatic sign-in.

I’ll go on record as saying that I think this is one of the best tools available for troubleshooting Lync and Communicator certificate issues!

A full description of RUCT is available here, and the tool can be downloaded here.

Here is a summary of what the tool can do:

1.    Easily Query Important DNS Records used by Microsoft Lync Server and OCS.

DNS queries for the following Lync and OCS records are issued with one-click:

• All Lync and Communicator internal and external records used for automatic sign-in.
• Lync sign-in records used for Lync Online (in Office 365).
• Lync simple URL records used for Dial-In, Meetings, and Administration.
• Home registrar location records used by Lync devices.
• The automatic partner discovery record used in an Open Federation configuration.

2.    Test Network Availability.

• Easily test the network connectivity to the hostname and port belonging to any matching DNS SRV record, or IP address belonging to an A record.
• A TCP connection is attempted for hostnames and ports, and a ping is attempted for IP addresses.

3.    Certificate Retrieval, Installation, and Export.

• The tool can remotely retrieve X509 Certificate information on any Lync or OCS port that is secured using TLS (or SSL).  Certificate information returned includes the Common Name (CN), Subject Name, Issuer, Certificate Authority, Expiry Date, Creation Date, and Subject Alternative Names (SANs), and the complete certificate chain.
• The remote certificate can also be installed locally or exported to a file. This makes client access to labs and self-signed certificates much easier to setup.

4.    Easily Retrieve Important Client-Side Troubleshooting Information.

• Important client-side environment settings such as O/S version, 32-bit or 64-bit, current domain credentials, and Lync/Communicator sign-on settings are automatically retrieved and consolidated in one place.
• Recent Lync and Communicator specific event log errors and warnings can be retrieved with one-click.

Screenshots

DNS Information

Certificate Functionality

Client Troubleshooting

I hope this tool is a big help to people troubleshooting Lync Server and OCS issues.  Feel free to provide any feedback.

OCSLogger.exe Overview

The Office Communications Server 2007 R2 Logging Tool (OCSLogger.exe) is installed by default on most OCS server roles. It can be used to capture logging and tracing information while the server is running. You can analyze protocol logs for the [...]]]> Here is a quick getting-started reference for debugging direct SIP traffic between OCS and an IP-PBX.

OCSLogger.exe Overview

The Office Communications Server 2007 R2 Logging Tool (OCSLogger.exe) is installed by default on most OCS server roles. It can be used to capture logging and tracing information while the server is running. You can analyze protocol logs for the following components:

• Office Communications Server SipStack (SIP)
• Office Communications Server S4 (SIP)
• Office Communications Server Conferencing signaling traffic (C3P), including MCU Infra C3P and Focus C3P
• Office Communications Server Web conferencing traffic (PSOM)
• Office Communications Server Unified Communications Client Platform client (UCCP)
• Error reports from the archiving database

To Start a Debugging Session

1 .Run the OCS logging tool: OCSLogger.exe. It is located in “%ProgramFiles%\Common Files\Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 R2\Tracing”
2. Set a folder for the OCSLogger.exe log files (e.g. C:\Windows\Temp)
3. Select your logging level:  If you are trying to debug a problem, start with just “Errors”. If you are investigating something, start with “All”

To View the Incoming SIP traffic from the IP-PBX to the OCS Mediation Server & the Protocol Traffic from the OCS Mediation Server to the OCS Front-End

4. Select the following Components in the Logging Options:

• Mediation Server (this will give all the Mediation server protocol in/out processing)
• S4 (this will log the SIP protocol requests – including the SIP traffic to/from the IP/PBX)

5. Select “Start Logging” and place a sample call. Select “Stop Logging” after the sample call is finished.
6. After you have ended the debug session, click Analyze Log Files to view the log files. Note, the Snooper tool is launched to view the log files.
7. Notes:

• The underlying log files are in .ETL format.
• The times displayed in OCSLogger are in GMT!

View the Protocol Communication and Internal Tracing of the Microsoft Office Communicator End-point

When debugging direct SIP sessions, it is also useful to see the full end-to-end information. In some circumstances the call will make it through to the Communicator end-point, and Communicator will reject the call. Do view the internal tracing of the Communicator end-point:

1. Turn on tracing in Microsoft Office Communicator 2007 R2: Tools | Options | General | Turn on logging in Communicator.
2. Navigate to the Communicator 2007 R2 trace file directory (i.e. C:\Users\<user-id>\Tracing)
3. Open the most recent Communicator trace file named Communicator-uccapi-<integer>.uccapilog with the Snopper.exe tool. Snooper.exe is a tool included in the OCS 2007 R2 Resource Kit that can be used to help you analyze SIP and C3P protocol logs.
4. Note: the Resource Kit installed into “C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 R2\ResKit”.

More Information

• TechNet: Using Office Communications Server 2007 R2 Logging Tool
• Office Communications Server 2007 R2 Resource Kit Tools

Clients

The April 2010 cumulative update for Communicator 2007 R2 can be found here:  Description of the cumulative update package for Communicator 2007 R2: April 2010

This update brings the Communicator version up to 3.5.6907.196 from the last update in January 2010 (3.5.6907.83).

It mostly addresses [...]]]> Microsoft has released new cumulative updates for all the UC Clients and the OCS Server.

Clients

The April 2010 cumulative update for Communicator 2007 R2 can be found here:  Description of the cumulative update package for Communicator 2007 R2: April 2010

This update brings the Communicator version up to 3.5.6907.196 from the last update in January 2010 (3.5.6907.83).

It mostly addresses minor issues with the possible exception of these 2 issues:

1) “Microsoft Office Communicator may no longer make daily synchronize changes to its address book“.  If an OCS administrator had made manual updates to the OCS address book files, Communicator would take a long time to synchronize it’s address book and see those changes.

2) “When a delegate tries to use the Conferencing Add-in for Outlook to schedule a live meeting or to schedule a conference on behalf of a manager, the delegate’s information instead of the manager’s information displays in the conferencing request” (KB 971628).  Note: to resolve #971628 you will need the April 2010 Communicator 2007 R2 update along with 2 other updates:

• Description of the update for Live Meeting Conferencing Add-in for Outlook: July 2009
• Description of the update package for Office Communications Server 2007 R2: July, 2009

There are also April 2010 update for Live Meeting and the Live Meeting Conferencing Add-in for Outlook:

• Live Meeting client update for April 2010:  Description of the update package for the Windows-based Live Meeting 2007 client: April 2010.
• Live Meeting Conferencing Add-in for Outlook: April 2010:  Description of the update for the Live Meeting Conferencing Add-in for Outlook: April 2010.

Server

The new cumulative updates for all the OCS 2007 R2 server roles can be found here:  Updates for Communications Server 2007 R2 (KB 968802).

Net new updates are available for the Standard/Enterprise Front-End & Back-End, Application Sharing, Audio/Video Conferencing, CWA, Conferencing Attendant, Mediation Server, Outside Voice Control, and the Web Conferencing server.

If you have never used them before, the Microsoft OCS TechNet Forums are a great resource for asking questions and resolving problems. As of last [...]]]> There have recently been several noteworthy changes to the Microsoft TechNet OCS and UC resources available on TechNet.  Here is a summary of the changes:

1) The OCS TechNet Forums have Moved

If you have never used them before, the Microsoft OCS TechNet Forums are a great resource for asking questions and resolving problems. As of last week (Nov 9, 2009) Microsoft moved and re-organized the OCS community discussion forms. One major drawback to this is that the old content could not be moved into the new forums.

The old Office Communications Server TechNet Forums can be located here: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/category/ocs and are now locked down (no new posts), but you can still search and read the old content.

The new Office Communications Server TechNet Forums is located here: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/category/ocs.

Jeff Schertz has a good article detailing the re-organization of categories if you want more detail.

2) New OCS Troubleshooting and UC Update Resource Center Pages

The Microsoft Office Communications Server Team have released several two new OCS web resource portals in the last month.  Here is a summary:

a) Office Communications Server and Client Troubleshooting and Support Page

This is a round-up of resources available for solving problems:

1. An embedded Knowledge Base search – surprisingly not customized for OCS or Communicator.
2. Links to the OCS forums.
3. Contact information for Microsoft support.

b) Updates Resource Center for Office Communications Server 2007 R2 and Clients

A web page detailing the most recent updates (information and links to the actual update) for OCS and the UC Clients (Communicator, Live Meeting, etc…).

3) The ‘Next Hop’

Recently announced at PDC, there is a new TechNet resource portal called NextHop which is designed to offer helpful hints and information on OCS.

I had always assumed the root cause was that the Live Meeting client was getting confused between on-premise and  hosted live meetings because I [...]]]> On a desktop I use regularly, I had a nagging Live Meeting issue when trying to attend a hosted Live Meeting. After clicking the “Join Meeting” link I received the following error:

I had always assumed the root cause was that the Live Meeting client was getting confused between on-premise and  hosted live meetings because I use the same client to attend both. BTW, I good tip - if the meeting URL starts with “meet:”  it is an on-premise OCS server hosting the meeting, and if it starts with a “https:” it is a hosted live meeting.

I dug into the issue, found the problem, fixed it, and wanted to share my experience for the benefit of others.

The fixed turned out to be an Internet Explorer setting (see KB article: You are prompted to open or to save a file that is named “Launch.rtc” when you try to join a meeting in Live Meeting 2007).  This article discusses many causes for this error, but after taking the first action (Disable the “Do Not Save Encrypted pages to disk” option in Internet Explorer”) everything worked like a charm.

Below is high level description of what happens when a hosted Live Meeting is launched from the web browser. When the user clicks on the “Join Meeting” link:

1. The meeting URL launches in the browser with the meeting details (e.g. https://www.livemeeting.com/<meeting url, id, and role>).
2. The web site redirects the client to a Microsoft RTC Connection File (i.e. “launch.rtc” file).  The RTC file contains the meeting information (role, meeting start time, end time, etc…)
3. The RTC file is (should be) associated with the program “Microsoft Office Live Meeting Router” application.
4. The “Microsoft Office Live Meeting Router” starts the local Live Meeting Console with the information about the meeting from the RTC file.

In general, users can minimize chances of other Live Meeting client issues by running the most up-to-date client.  The new OCS Update Resource Center makes this easier.

Users can also point their browsers at the Inside OCS Client Version Tool to easily see what versions of each client they are running.

From [...]]]> The ability to transfer files in Office Communicator is an effective collaboration feature (and is often underused). A file can be shared in the context of a discussion by dragging-and-dropping it directly in the Communicator conversation session window. It is real time, and you avoid the storage headaches and application-context-switch that email attachments can bring.

From experience here the facts that matter most about file transfers and solutions to some common problems.

Key Facts

1. The actual data transfer in a file transfer is peer-to-peer. Several SIP transactions are used to setup the session with the OCS server, but the data transfer is then carried out peer-to-peer between the Communicator clients. One exception to this rule is when Microsoft ForeFront Security for Office Communications Server is installed on the OCS server. In this case, all communication goes through the OCS server.
2. Ports 6891-6901 are used on the client machines to transfer the files. A random port is chosen between 6891 and 6900 (6891 us used to advertise the randomly chosen port).
3. File Transfers across a firewall is not supported in OCS 2007 R2.  See the post “Communicator File Transfers Across a Firewall Are Not Supported” for more information.
4. File transfers between internal users (i.e. clients inside the firewall) do not involve the Edge server.
5. The protocol used to do the transfer is TFTP (Trivial File Transfer Protocol).

Common Problems & Solutions

The best diagnostic to a failed file transfer between two Communicator clients is the usually the error message returned directly in the Communicator client. Here are the most likely reasons for a file transfer failure and what to do about it:

1) Is the File Transfer Going Across a Firewall?  For example, if one Communicator client is inside a corporate firewall, and another is logged in externally through the OCS Edge Access role (with no VPN), attempting to transfer a file will fail. This is not a supported scenario in OCS 2007 R2. See the post “Communicator File Transfers Across a Firewall Are Not Supported” for more information.

2) Ensure that File Transferring is Enabled on the OCS server and Check which File Extensions it is Configured to Block.

By default OCS installs with the Intelligent IM Filter activated. You can then configure it to block or allow certain file extensions. By default .zip, .doc, and .xml are allowed, but executable binaries and script extensions are blocked. To see this setting in the OCS management console, navigate to:

• OCS 2007 R2: Front-End or Pool | Filtering Tools | Intelligent Instant Message Filter | File Transfer Filter tab.
• OCS 2007: Front-End or Pool | Application Properties | Intelligent Instant Message Filter | File Transfer tab.

3) Is Either Client Running VMWare Workstation?

If a user has VMware Workstation installed (not just running) on their client machine, Office Communicator file transfers tend to fail. If you disable the extra NICs that VMware creates in your Network Connections folder they should be able to send and receive successfully (thanks to Tom Pacyk for that nugget of information which I have verified as true). Basically the extra network adapters that VMware Workstation or VMWare Server Console create cause Communicator trouble when it is trying to figure out which network adapter is best to use for the file transfer.

4) Is there Network Access Between the Two Client Machines?

A variety of network architectures or DNS settings can prevent two machines from seeing or accessing each other on the network. A simple ping or attempted access to a network share will let you know whether this is an issue.

5) Is any Anti-Virus or Firewall Software Restricting Ports 6891-6901 on either Communicator Client?

Client-side port filtering or intercepting on either client will cause a failure. The most likely candidates for this is anti-virus software or firewall software.

6) Are File Transfers Explicitly Disabled on either Client Machine via Group Policy?

File transfers can be disabled through a Group Policy setting (or registry setting). The setting is documented in the Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 R2 Client Group Policy Documentation.

7) Are ports 6891-6901 Accessible on any OCS Servers with Forefront Security for OCS Installed on it?

Forefront Security for OCS  can be used to scan Communicator file transfers for viruses. For external file transfers, the firewall needs to be configured to allow inbound connections for the default Communicator file transfer ports. These default ports can be changed via registry keys. See Introduction to Forefront Security for Office Communications Server for more information.

Are the Communicator Clients Up-To-Date?

Communicator clients with the latest updates minimize the chances of a known issue causing a problem.

Read more about the April 2010 updates here: http://blog.insideocs.com/2010/04/15/april-2010-updates-for-communicator-2007-r2-and-live-meeting/.

If all else fails, enabling event logging in the Communicator client  (Options | General | Turn on Logging in Communicator) and checking the event logs after a failed file transfer is usually helpful.  If you want to try to debug the actual file transfer SIP session, a great article on digging deeper into that is available here: A deep dive into the Office Communicator 2007 R2 file transfer process.

Another good resource is this TechNet article: Why Are My Users Unable to Use Communicator 2007 R2 to Transfer Files?