While working on a global Skype for Business deployment, I was moving a test user account between 6 pools and ran into DCOM errors when trying to move the account to two of the pools.

The following issue is with the SkypeforBusinessRetail Click-to-Run (C2R) product ID, which causes roadblocks for organizations looking to roll out a standalone full Skype for Business client.

When using the Office Deployment Tool (ODT) for Click-to-Run 2016: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=49117 you have the ability to pass specific product IDs for deployment. The supported product ID list can be found at: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/2842297

While working on some slides for my upcoming session: Path to Skype for Business client deployment on The Skype Show: Episode 3 – Backing Up, Desktop Client and Security I wanted to come up with a few lines of code to list how the Skype for Business/Lync client was deployed to a computer. There’s quite a few options these days standalone, basic, part of Office, not to mention the versions and builds on top of that.

Call Recording Pro for Skype for Business was released from Landis Technologies this week.

Today a tweet from Doug Routledge @droutledge from Bridge Communications caught my eye: BOC Call Recorder is a free client side call recording application enabling on-demand or automatic call recording for Windows (Vista, 7, 8, 8.1 and 10) Skype for business and Lync 2013 clients, no matter where the server infrastructure is located (on-premises, hosted or cloud). The call recorder is optimized for post call conversion of the 2 channel recordings to a single MP3 file, seeing a 40 minute 600 MB conversation converted to a 7 MB MP3.

Working with a client to ease the transition of Office 2010 (MSI) using KMS licensing to Office 2013/2016 (Click-to-Run) with subscription licensing to use the new Skype for Business client. It quickly became apparent that enabling thousands of globally dispersed users for a certain feature set via Office 365 Admin Portal wasn’t going to work. PowerShell always to the rescue!

While testing a new conference bridge that was added to an existing Lync Server 2013 deployment, the Lync client would report the bridge number “is in another call”.

While verifying a new conference bridge for a client, I came across a phantom conference bridge entry listed on the Lync Server Dial-in page but not on the Outlook meeting invites.

While working with a client on end user training material, it was reported that the option to move or copy a contact to the “Other Contacts” group in the Skype for Business/Lync 2013 client was unavailable.

Test-IPV is a PowerShell script leveraging the LyncValidator back-end Web Services APIs ( http://masteringlync.com/2014/07/15/using-tcpudp-port-checker-web-service/ ) to provide an Internet Point of View collection of tests. Commands run from console or GUI wrapper. Although leveraging the LyncValidator APIs, this tool is not exclusive to testing Lync.