[Asterisk-Users] Voicemail and MS Exchange Synchronization

[support at sjobeck.com]

))))))))))) Please see comments inline.

 
> >From my perspective, not sure I would want Exchange (Which 
> is difficult enough to manage) to be cluttered up with
> potentially large voicemail files,
 
That's a concern, especially since bugs in current Asterisk versions
require
you to use uncompressed WAV files to get acceptable volume levels.
However,
this *is* a common configuration for other products.  

))))))))) I do not worry about this.  It is 'only' storage space.


We used to have a
CallXpress system that used Exchange as a message store.  It stored
voice
messages in people's Exchange mailboxes, and could even read email
messages
over the phone via text-to-speech.  The interface with Exchange was kind
of
kludgy, though, and not entirely reliable.  It actually used a copy of
Outlook on the voicemail server to talk to Exchange.
 
)))))))))))))) We are not now thinking about using this type of design,
no client running on the Exchange server nor on the laptop.


> I would have thought that most Exchange clients are most likely to be
> Outlook based, who could use pst & IMAP (or POP3 if asterisk 
> could auto
> forward and then delete voice mail) to retrieve voicemail via 
> email without
> having to worry about central Exchange issues.
 
IMAP is no good.  Outlook, at least in older versions, cannot handle
both an
IMAP account and an Exchange account at the same time.  (They can do
POP3
and Exchange together, though.)

))))))))))) Again, no need for IMAP client on the laptop, just ordinary
Outlook connected directly to its Exchange Server or connected to its
IMAP server. Yes, you're correct, old versions of Outlook didn't allow
use of Exchange Server connection & IMAP connection inside the same
Outlook profile, but that is hopefully not a concern for too many folks
& if it is, argh, I don't know what to suggest, other than moving to new
emailer or new version of their emailer.
 
A voicemail app that used an IMAP server as its message store would
still be
a nice feature, though.  It might even work with Exchange, which can act
as
an IMAP server.

)))))))) Yes, Exchange Server would be the IAMPd. We can simultaneously
connect to Exchange via any protocol, as many times, per machines, per
user, etc (to the machines limits).

Please post your bounty to http://tinyurl.com/bf64x


Please also let us keep this on the task of only voicemail-to-email
integration. I know that as soon as someone sees the words Outlook, they
go crazy, wanting everything under the sun, the reason I know this is
that I am that person too, but we will never get all that, let's get the
voicemail synchronization done, it will be huge, it will benefit
everyone, it will be huge step in the right direction. The issue of
tying Outlook all up ought to be a second issue & as such I have created
a second bounty for that. DavidB, you may or may not want to pony up for
that one here:

http://tinyurl.com/8wmrb