You’re repeatedly prompted for Exchange credentials after you sign in to Lync

Issue

After you successfully sign in to Skype for Business Online (formerly Lync Online) by using Lync 2010 or Lync 2013, you may experience the following issues:

You receive a message in Lync that says it cannot connect to Exchange.

You're repeatedly prompted to provide a user name and a password to connect to Exchange. You may also receive the following message: 

Credentials are required

 

Note The message that you receive may vary, depending on which service Lync is trying to connect to. You may be prompted for credentials when Lync tries to connect to any of the following services:

Calendar and Free/Busy information from Outlook

Exchange Web Services (EWS)

Response Group Service

Address Book Service

Solution

How to collect log files from Office Communicator, Lync, and Skype for Business Client

To create and collect log files from Office Communicator, Lync, or Skype for Business Client, follow these steps:

1.    Make sure that logging is enabled. To do this, use one of the following methods, as appropriate for your situation:

Skype for Business : Video Interop Server (VIS)

Video Interop Server (VIS)

VIS is a standalone server role implemented in on-premises deployment and provides interoperability with Cisco/Tandberg Video TeleConferencing endpoints (VTC) in this release. (Potentially, other systems will be included in future releases). VIS acts as B2BUA between SfB deployment and Video Gateway (CUCM).                                                                                                                              

Skype For Business : What is New

Microsoft has re-branded Lync 2013 Client as Skype for Business (SfB) Client and released that update on 14 April 2015. It will rebrand next version of Lync server as Skype for business (SfB) server 2015 and will release officially it on 1 May 2015. This article’s objective is to explain what new features it brings along.

Skype for Business: What’s New

Integration of Lync 2013 and Exchange 2013 for Voicemail

1        Integration of Lync 2013 and Exchange 2013 for Voicemail

1.1            Basic Signalling traffic between Lync 2013 and Exchange 2013

1.2            Configure Certificates

1)      Make sure Exchange 2013 and Lync Server 2013 are fully installed and up and running.

2)      After the servers are up and running you must assign server-to-server authentication certificates to both Lync Server 2013 and Exchange 2013

a.       Self-signed certificate with Exchange server name for Exchange Server

b.      Existing Lync Server certificate for Lync 2013

3)      Verify certificate on Lync FE server

Can not run DHCP utility in Windows Server 2012 for Lync 2013

Recently while deploying Lync 2013 for client I came across this little issue.

I copied  DHCPUtil.exe and DHCPConfigScript.bat files as usual to DHCP Server and try to run DHCPUtil.exe but got following error

 

 

To solve this issue, go to "C:\Windows\System32" on your Lync server and copy msvcp110.dll and msvcr110.dll and paste it in System32 folder of DHCP Server.



Enable IM Mute

Turn off IM in a Lync Meeting (Enable IM Mute)

Turning off instant messaging (IM) in a Lync Meeting allows you to help participants stay focused on the meeting content. You can disable IM when scheduling the meeting or during it.

Keep in mind that when you disable IM at the time of scheduling, you can’t turn it back on during the meeting. But if you turn off IM during a meeting, you can turn it back on at any time, to allow shared conversation.
To disable IM when scheduling, you must have Outlook.

Disabling IM when scheduling a Lync Meeting

1. On your Outlook ribbon, click New Lync Meeting.
2. Click Meeting Options on the ribbon.
3. Under Do you want to limit participation?, click Disable IM.
4. Click OK and set up the rest of your meeting as you normally would.

Disabling IM during a Lync Meeting

Any of the presenters can turn IM off or on during the meeting, if it hasn’t been disabled at the time of scheduling.

1. In the meeting window, point to the people icon.
2. Click the ACTIONS tab
3. Click No Meeting IM.

Lync notifies the meeting participants that the IM has been turned off.

To turn IM back on, go back to the ACTIONS tab, and click Allow Meeting IM.

SIP Option from Mediation Server to Peer Gateway

1.1             Step 1

Lync Mediation server sends out SIP OPTIONS requests continuously to try to communicate with its next hop.

1.2             Step 2

Lync Room System ( LRS ) Configuration Guide

Microsoft has recently published document that guides you through provisioning Microsoft Lync Room System (Beta version) in Lync Server and Exchange Server

Click here to download it

Upgrading Polycom CX series phones for Lync Server

Step 1: Obtain the latest updates from Microsoft website, Store the .cab file in C:\Polycom
Step 2: Find the web server identity in pool

• Get-CsService

Step 3: Construct the command in notepad

Import-CsDeviceUpdate -Identity "service:xxxxxxxx" -FileName C:\Polycom\UCUpdates.cab

Step 4: Run it in Lync Server Management Shell

Step 5: Verify import in Lync control panel

Step 6: Approve it after hours.

The Device Update Process

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The device update process begins with you downloading an update from the Microsoft website, and then using the Lync Server 2010 Control Panel to test, approve, or reject the update. Approved updates become pending updates that devices retrieve by using the following process.
The first time a user starts an IP phone and signs in, the device gets information by using in-band provisioning from the server. The information contains the internal URL of the server running the Device Update Web service.
If the device is turned on, but no user signs in, and no user has ever signed in on the device, then the device sends a DNS lookup request to ucupdates-r2.<DNSDomainNameProvidedByDHCP>, and obtains the internal URL of the server running the Device Update Web service.
The device checks for updates every time it is turned on, every time the user signs in, and every 24 hours, by default. It checks by sending an HTTP request over port 443 to the Front End Server that hosts the Device Update Web service. The request includes the current version of software that the phone is running, and the response is determined by the device and whether there is a new update on the server to download.

Lync Edge Server - RSS configuration

One of the note on TechNet ( http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/gg615015(v=ocs.15).aspx) recommends following

To improve the performance of the A/V Conferencing Edge service on your Edge Servers, you should enable receive-side scaling (RSS) on the network adapters on your Edge Servers. RSS enables incoming packets to be handled in parallel by multiple processors on the server. For details, see http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/p/?LinkId=206013. For information on how to enable RSS, see your network adapter documentation.

Lync 2010 Server Version List

This is just copy/paste from one of the blog on TechNet I found very useful, ( Link to the blog
http://blogs.technet.com/b/hot/archive/2012/09/24/update-version-information-for-lync-server-2010.aspx)

Network Planning, Monitoring and Troubleshooting with Lync Server

Download Guide from Official Microsoft Download center

Lync Server 2013 is a real-time unified communications application that relies on an optimized network infrastructure to deliver high-quality media sessions. This guide provides a model for managing the network infrastructure for Lync Server 2013—planning, monitoring, and troubleshooting.

Provisioning Guide for Lync-Skype Connectivity

Download Provisioning Guide for Lync-Skype Connectivity from Official Microsoft Download Center.

Lync 2010 Client Version Lists

For quick reference, the following table lists the versions, release month, year, and a link to the KB article for all Lync 2010 updates released through March 2013.

Useful Lync Powershell Commands

While deployment or troubleshooting I always need number of useful powershell commands ( I don't trust my memory ) So I thought I will dump all in here for my reference in future. ( May be useful to someone else as well )

·         Enable user for Lync
Enable-CsUser "Fname Lname" -RegistrarPool "poolname.domain.com" -SipAddressType EmailAddress
·         Enable user for Enterprise Voice
Set-CsUser "Fname Lname" -EnterpriseVoiceEnabled:$True -LineURI "tel:+613xxxxxxxx;ext=xxxx"
·         Create Common Area Phone
New-CsCommonAreaPhone -RegistrarPool "poolname.domain.com" -DisplayName "Warehouse" -OU "OU=Lync,DC=domain,DC=com" -DisplayNumber "+613xxxx xxxx" -LineURI "tel:+613xxxxxxxx;ext=xxxx"
·         Assign a PIN
Set-CsClientPin "Fname Lname" -Pin 2468
·         Determine number of users enabled for EV
(Get-CsUser | Where {$_.EnterpriseVoiceEnabled -eq $True}).Count
·         Determine number of common Area phone
(Get-CsCommonAreaPhone).Count
 
·         Set Location Policy
Set-CsLisSubnet -Subnet 172.17.181.0 -Description "" -Location "Melbourne" -CompanyName "Company Name Here" -HouseNumber "53" -HouseNumberSuffix "" -PreDirectional "" -StreetName "Lync" -StreetSuffix "St" -PostDirectional "" -City "Melbourne" -State "" -PostalCode "4000" -Country "AU"
·         If you’ve not been disabling users in Lync while disabling them in AD, here’s a one liner to find those users: ( Thanks to Ehloworld – Blog link )
Get-CsAdUser | ?{$_.UserAccountControl -match "AccountDisabled" -and $_.Enabled -eq $true} | ft Name,Enabled,SipAddress -auto
·         You can get a count of the users using:
Get-CsAdUser | ?{$_.UserAccountControl -match "AccountDisabled" -and $_.Enabled -eq $true} | Measure-Object
·         if you want, can disable them in one line using
Get-CsAdUser | ?{$_.UserAccountControl -match "AccountDisabled" -and $_.Enabled -eq $true} | Disable-CsUser
·         Get list of users with format table

 
Get-CsUser | Format-Table -wrap -Property DisplayName, SipAddress, Registrarpool, LineUri  >C:\Extensions1.txt

 

 

Find Certificate Authority by DOS command

Easiest way to find Certificate Authority in unknown environment is by running following command into DOS prompt

certutil -config - -ping

Databases in Lync2010

 

Central Management Store ( CMS) 

•         Xds ( Maintains the Lync configuration as published by Topology Builder )

•         There is only one master copy of CMS database which is automatically installed on the first instance of a Standard or Enterprise Edition Lync pool. For Enterprise Edition pools this first instance will reside on the SQL back-end database for the pool

Pool Configuration Store

•         Rtc (stores persistent user data such as user contact lists, scheduled conferences, and access control lists)

•         Rtcdyn (stores dynamic Lync user data such as presence information.)

•         Rtcab & Rtcab1 (stores the raw Lync address book information (i.e. that is pulled from AD))

Application Store

•         Cpsdyn (stores dynamic system information for the Call Park application )

•         Rgsdyn (stores dynamic runtime operational information for the Response Group application)

•         Rgsconfig (stores persistent configuration data for the Response Group application )

Archiving and Monitoring Store

•         LcsLog (stores Instant Messaging and Conferencing data for archiving purposes)

•         LcsCdr (stores the Call Details Records (used by the Monitoring Role))

•         QoEMetrics (stores the Quality of Experience data (used by the Monitoring Role) )

Location Store

•         Lis (hold a network ‘wiremap’ that maps network elements (e.g. subnet, WAP’s, routers) to real civic addresses )

Force Lync2010 Client to update Address book

Step 1 : Update Servers

Run following command from Lync Server Management Shell

Update-CsAddressBook –Verbose

Step 2: Update Clients

Run following command from cmd ( run as an Administrator )

reg add HKLM\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Communicator /v GalDownloadInitialDelay /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f

Exit the Lync client and delete the GalContacts.dband GalContacts.db.idxfiles from the user’s profile directory ( following location )

%userprofile%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Communicator\sip_<username@domain>\

Log back in and Lync client will now update the address book.

Call transfer to user doesn't work

Not able to transfer calls to one user

 

Recently I came across this very weird issue whereby any users in lync 2010 environment can not transfer calls to particular users ( i.e if they transfer it by searching name in lync client ) however, if they transfer calls by that user’s extension number then they could successfully transfer the calls.

In nutshell, if they transfer call to user’s SIP uri then call will fail and if they transfer it to his extension then call will connect.

After obtaining debug logs on Lync FE server, I found that Lync was trying to transfer call to  “ 0867588” number because of refer message. ( As this site had media bypass enable )

So main issue was that user’s sip uri : 0867588@domain.com

If in your environment any usre’s SIP URI is number and if you have media bypass enable then any other user won’t be able to transfer external calls to that particular user ( who has number in SIP URI) because of the refer message only gives number to front end server and then instead of trying to send call to sip uri , lync will try calling that number and call will fail.