Lync Voice Call Analyzer (Community Edition)
v1.0GMT GA/RTM Version
Copyright (c) 8 Jan 2012. All Rights Reserved.
www.leedesmond.com
Last update: Su 8 Jan 2012
Disclaimer
This tool is provided on an "AS IS" best effort basis with no warranties (implied or otherwise), carries no guarantee, support or suitability for use and confers no rights.
About Lync Voice Call Analyzer
Lync Voice Call Analyzer (Community Edition) was born out of the practical need to have a clear summary of the total number of minutes consumed in all forms of supported Lync voice calls*. Be it Lync voice-over-IP (VoIP) or PSTN conversations in a peer-to-peer (P2P) scenario or conference calls involving multiple parties, Lync VCA consolidates all captured audio conversation historical information with key features:
- search and summarize conversation history based on user criteria
- categorize call types (Lync, incoming, outgoing PSTN)
- capture conversation subject or topic
- show a list of participants and total number in a call
- detail breakdown report of chalked number of audio calls and minutes (see screen shot here)
* similar to your monthly statement for mobile/cell/handy telephone usage bills
System Requirements
Core components (client desktop)
- Windows 7, Vista, XP SP3
- .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 or higher*
- a standalone or domain-joined Windows machine
- at least 3MB of free disk space
- network connectivity to functional EWS and Autodiscover service
Optional components
- Outlook 2007 or higher
- Lync 2010
- an electronic spreadsheet application e.g. Microsoft Excel 2007 or higher
The following Lync 2010 options found under Personal / "Personal information manager" must be enabled (these are the default settings):
- Microsoft Exchange or Microsoft Outlook (drop down box)
- Save instant message conversations in my email Conversation History folder
- Save call logs in my email Conversation History folder
Lync Server Infrastructure
No Lync server backend infrastructure changes is essential i.e. zero dependency
on Lync Server 2010 Monitoring Server (CDR report database). The bare minimum is the installation
of a Standard or Enterprise Edition Lync Server 2010 Front End server pool and integration with
Exchange 2007 or higher.
* ships in Windows 7, Windows Server 2008 R2 or later
Language Support
Lync VCA was developed and only tested with the US-English version of Windows installations (x86 and x64 platforms). However, there is no language dependency and the tool should run on other language versions as well.
In addition, settings such as current location and format set in the Region and Language control panel applet can differ from the installed Windows language version e.g. en-us Windows installation with format set to German (Switzerland) and current location to Switzerland.
Setup/Uninstall Instructions
- Download Lvcasetu.exe to a folder on your local computer.
- Locate and run Lvcasetu.exe with administrative permissions.
- Follow the on-screen instructions to install Lync VCA.
More Information
The installer will extract all application files to "%ProgramFiles%\Lync Voice Call Analyzer (Community Edition)" and create shortcuts in the Windows start menu. No changes are made to the Windows registry.
Uninstall
Open the Windows start menu and choose the option to uninstall Lync VCA. Alternatively, manually navigate to and remove the folder "%ProgramFiles%\Lync Voice Call Analyzer (Community Edition)".
Download
Lync Voice Call Analyzer is only available from the original source here (on www.leedesmond.com).
How To Use
Step by Step Usage
- Provide your valid email or SMTP address e.g. first.last@domain.com
- Enter a participant's name or E.164 telephone number to search. This can be just the given name, surname or both, or the telephone number e.g. Desmond or +41441234567
- Specify the start and end dates to limit the search query range. TIP: To accelerate the query process, selecting a short date range with each run of the application is highly recommended. Nevertheless, the actual processing time depends on the quantity of audio calls besides network connectivity, among other parameters.
- Manually enter a folder path or click to browse for a location to save the output file.
- Use this field to specify the name to save the output file in the previously specified location (extension .csv recommended). This contains a comma separated variable (.csv) text file with the details of all Lync voice calls.
- - optional -
- - optional -
- Click Run/Stop to start/stop executing based on the given criteria.
- To see a detail report of Lync voice calls, navigate to the folder location (step 4) and open the saved file (step 5) with your favoriate spreadsheet application.
Optional steps
- Where appropriate, check one or both of these self-explanatory options. For instance, it is possible that you are using a domain-joined Windows machine but signed in with a local (machine) user account. In this case, Lync VCA will be unable to function as no valid AD user credentials are available (until you input them in the next step).
- Supply all the necessary information in the AD Credentials section if any of the options in the previous step is selected. Failing to do so will prevent Lync VCA from successful authentication against Active Directory.
More information
Lync VCA automatically utilizes the log-in user's AD credentials to make the necessary discovery via Autodiscover to query Exchange Web Services (EWS) as shown in step A. This enables the tool to perform a consolidation of available historical information (conversations) based on the parameters input by the user interactively. Information to steps 6 and 7 must be correctly entered if no valid AD credentials by virtual of the log-in user to the Windows domain is available.
Support
To share with the IT community any questions, feedback and comments around Lync VCA, please sign up for a free account on this blog and post them here. This is the sole method and available public channel to communicate and exchange information around Lync VCA on a best effort basis.
See also the disclaimer section for more information.
Known Issues
- The application appears to hang or is stuck
- The application crashes or terminates unexpectedly
There are many factors that can be attributed to such a behavior, namely:
- incorrect AD domain credentials or sign-in to a Windows machine with a local user account (and steps 6 and 7 not properly performed)
- not correctly specifying your own email address ie. someone else's was used
- SIP URI address was given instead of your personal email address
- reliability and state of network connectivity
- broken Exchange connection or availability ("Outlook has losted connection to Exchange ..." or similar message)
- health of VPN connectivity
Possible cause(s) and fix(es)
- Locate Outlook icon in Windows system tray
- Hold down the Contrl key and right mouse click on the Outlook icon
- Select Connection Status
- Check for "Established" in Status column
If necessary, hit Reconnect to establish connection to Exchange before restarting Lync Voice Call Analyzer. Terminate any open VPN connections may also help.
- attempt to save a file in a folder that the user has no write permissions. For example, the suggested path may not permit a standard Windows user to modify the folder nor its contents.
- the output file with the same name is currently opened and write locked by another application e.g. Excel
- see entry "The application appears to hang or is stuck".
Licensing
Lync Voice Call Analyzer (Community Edition) is a licensed-free tool for private, individual non-commercial use only. Distribution, educational or commercial deployments in any form is strictly prohibited without the explicit written permissions and consent from the author.
Version History
Version 1.0GMT General Availability/RTM Version (Su 8 Jan 2012)