Hold the phone on your skepticism about Microsoft and VoIP

Oh frabjousday! A new hot button. I hardly expected the reader feedback I’d get writing about VoIP, but considering I was writing about it in a column devoted to Windows management in the enterprise, I suppose I should have expected it.

The gist of most of your feedback is that you agree VoIP will be a live wire for the next couple of years, but that I’m nuts for bringing mention of it anywhere near the Microsoft logo. Voice is voice, voice is dial tone, voice is always there. Always. Microsoft is, well, not always there. And never the twain shall meet.

Wrong again, gentle readers. Not only will they meet, they have met -- and the results are impressive, as I indicated last week. If you get a chance, check out the specifics on LCS (Live Communications Server) 2003 and you’ll see why.

Previous versions used the Rendezvous protocol to establish secure, in-house IM for those companies with employees who were the victim of many finger-amputating accidents and thus lacked the ability to dial phone extensions to chat.

LCS 2003, however, has dropped Rendezvous, so in case you read the books Rendezvous Unleashedor MCSE Prep Guide to Rendezvous, those are two or three days you’ll never get back. Instead, Microsoft has recentered LCS around SOAP (no surprise) and (hooray!) SIP (Session Initiation Protocol). That drops LCS 2003 square in the midst of the VoIP hubbub.

All the companies rolling out new VoIP routing and PBX-style appliances today are yodeling about SIP. It’s the voice protocol of the near future (just as soon as it’s black and white instead of dark gray and eggshell). Combine an Internet standard with complete integration with Microsoft Exchange Server and Active Directory, and LCS becomes one powerful communications platform for the Windows-centric enterprise.

OK, you’re mildly concerned about security. Well, LCS has the capability of encrypting traffic whether it's server to server or server to client. This uses DES (Data Encryption Standard) and has even been optimized for audio and video streams, so it should work for VoIP conversations. Optimistic, I know.

We’ll probably get spotty encrypted performance until LCS 2005, but think of what you’ll get when we do. Straight desktop administrators will be able to Ghost operating images onto brand-new notebooks. These images will work for whatever department the new employee is working in. A few extra key strokes, and the box is customized for that particular user, including any existing mailbox information as well as his or her office phone extension.

That’s right. If the PC becomes the phone, then the cost of adds-moves-changes drops hugely. The user can even take it home and the box should be intelligent enough to establish a VPN connection automatically; co-workers will still be able to reach that worker on the user's in-office extension as long as the PC is talking to the server. Moving employees around is simply a matter of moving a laptop and updating Active Directory. And that’s saying nothing of the boost this can give applications such as CRM, telephone sales, HR, and similarly directory-centric applications.

Now think Windows crash. A server or even a whole network segment crashes, its PCs go dark, and that department is off the server and off the PBX at the same time. You’re hemorrhaging lost revenue by the minute, cursing my name, and questioning the validity of my progeny. I’ve got three words for you: Drop to POTS (plain old telephone service).

Most in-house VoIP appliances can manage a WAN outage by simply dropping users to POTS. All your cubes are prewired for twisted-pair already, so until VoIP settles down, each IP phone can be setup the same way if need be. If the network is there, you’re George Jetson. If it’s not, you’re James Earl Jones. Either way, you’re still talking.