In this post I like to highlight a very special date, the 31st of July 2021. The date marks the end of an era of the communication and collaboration with Skype for Business Online.
Microsoft officially announced the retirement of Skype for Business Online by 31st of July 2021.
We had a great time Skype for Business Online. Thanks. However, time changes and so do people, technology and work. Therefore, Microsoft Teams enables ways of modern communication and collaboration which Skype for Business (Online) did not. The retirement date is not that close. So, you’ve got a time frame which should provide sufficient time to plan and migrate to Microsoft Teams.
Microsoft released a change for Skype for Business (SFB) meetings on Mac which enables you to use the desktop app for SFB on Mac instead of the SFB meeting app.
This is primarily applicable for SFB Online. It works for SFB Server 2015, too BUT it requires that the Microsoft Content Delivery Network (CDN) is used instead of the bites coming from your SFB Server 2015.
Configure SFB Server 2015 for CDN to enable SFB desktop app for meetings on Mac
First you can check your current SFB Server 2015 configuration.
This return your SFB Server web service configuration. If MeetingUxUseCdn is set to “True” everything is ok and CDN is used. If it is “False” you can enable it as follows.
Additionally and optionally, you could also enable Meeting Telemetry and / or change the join launcher CDN timeout (in case a client might be unable to connect/receive data from the CDN an needs to failback to the SFB Server meeting app binaries.
To use the SFB desktop app on Mac for meetings should offer you a much better user experience. Microsoft says that this makes audio, video and sharing communication and collaboration more stable and reliable than it is with the SFB meeting app on Mac.
In this post I’ll
describe how federation towards federated partners can work. I’ll not describe meetings and guest access for
Teams which are great capabilities for modern teamwork across companies but not
subject for this post. Teams provides options for federation with external
organisations like suppliers, clients and partners.
Basically there are eight federation scenarios
I’d like to describe below. The federation scenarios are based on Microsoft
Teams as well as Skype for Business.
Skype
for Business Federation
Let’s take a look on
federation with Skype for Business. In Microsoft Skype for Business Server /
Online (hereinafter: SFBx) there are two major
federation types:
open
federation:
Users can communicate openly to everyone except users behind blocked
domains.
closed
federation:
Users can communicate only to federated domains configured by the SFBx
admin.
Teams
Federation
Now, with Microsoft
Teams federation is similair to SFBx federation but not 1:1 alike.
You can decide to
federate with everyone, openly, except towards blocked domains (blacklist).
Or you can decide to
federate only with allowed domains (whitelist).
Another thing to
keep in mind is what’s your current Teams upgrade mode or status?
In Microsoft Docs
there are five modes listed but not all are available by now.
Islands: All workloads on SFBx +
Teams
Skype for
Business-only:
SFB for all workloads. Single client.
Teams-only: Teams for all workloads.
Single client.
(not in
Admin Center, Feb. 2019, TAP customers-only) Skype for Business with Teams
(collaboration-only): SFB for chat, calling and meetings. Teams for collaboration.
(not in
Admin Center, Feb. 2019, TAP customers-only) Skype for Business with Teams
(collaboration and meetings-only): SFB for chat and calling, Teams for meetings and
collaboration.
Scenario
1a+1b
You are on Microsoft
Teams.
You can federate
with other organisations having a) SFBx or b) Microsoft Teams, too.
Scenario
2a+2b
You are still on
SFBx.
You can federate
with other organisations having a) SFBx or b) Microsoft Teams, too.
Scenario
3a+3b
You are on SFBx as
well as Microsoft Teams but your Teams Upgrade mode is “Islands”.
Your users are
having two clients installed and only the SFBx works for federation
communication.
You can federate
only via SFBx with other organisations having a) SFBx or b) Microsoft Teams,
too.
Scenario
3c+3d
You are on SFBx as
well as Microsoft Teams but your Teams Upgrade mode is “Islands”.
Your users are
having two clients installed and only the SFBx works for federation
communication.
Your users cannot
have an internal cross-client chat or else c) from SFB to Teams or d) from
Teams to SFB.
Teams federation
provides the ability to federate with external organisations similair to what
we’ve used to from SfBx. Nevertheless we need to pay attention to the user
experience and federation experience which migh be slightly different during a
coexistence of SFBx and Teams.
Last week (24. – 28. of September 2018) Microsoft Ignite 2018 took place in Orlando, FL, USA. There were several news and announcements regarding intelligent communication based on Microsoft Teams, Skype for Business (Server) and related technology and services.
You can find a link list of interesting sessions regarding Teams and Skype for Business, here and of course you can watch the recordings of the sessions on demand, if available.
In case you wan a bulk download of the contents, there is a useful PowerShell script you can get from the TechNet Script Gallery.
Since May 25th, 2018 companies/organisations need to comply with the General Data Protection Regulation (de: DSGVO, Datenschutz-Grundverordnung) if they don’t massive penalties can be the consequence. During a project I was asked regarding Skype for Business (Server) GDPR-compliance. I assume that many SFB admins or service owners were also asked this?
Therefore I’d like to note that Microsoft provides a page on docs.microsoft.com explaining the key aspects for GDPR/DSGVO regarding Skype for Business (Server).
Microsoft’s Ignite 2017 in Orlando took place and some very interesting announcements were made. This post sums up some contents and highlights regarding Skype for Business and Teams which were mentioned in one of the sessions (see link/video at the bottom). All contents might be subject to change and only provide a high level overview and summary.
Probably no SBA but backwards compatbility might be provided
Skype for Business Server (SFBS) 2019 Migrationpaths
Server 2013 -> Server 2019
Server 2015 -> Server 2019
Minimum OS: Windows Server 2016
Minimum SQL: SQL Server 2016
Current State –> Migration Proposal towards Teams
No onpremise Lync/SFB server–> Go for a TEAMs pilot (IMP, Meetings, Voice)
Onpremise SFB server without Enterprise Voice–> Go for TEAMs pilot in coexistence with SFB, migrate to TEAMs over time
Onpremise SFB server with Enterprise Voice–> Assess current capabilities incl. third-party integrations, service contracts etc., go for TEAMs pilot in coexistence with SFB, evaluate migration feasability to TEAMs or SFB Server 2019
Call Analytics and Retention in one portal for all useres
Voicemail Services provided via Cloud Backend for SFB Server 2019
Auto Attendant provided via Cloud Backend for SFB Server 2019
Call Queues provided via Cloud Backend for SFB Server 2019
One experience for all users
Modern Auth (in Public Preview for SFB Server) –> AAD
Meeting Migration Service
Scheduled Meeting Update Service
Replaces Meeting Migration Tool
Supports moving user from SFBS to SFBO
Supports Exchange Online or Exchange Server 2016 User Mailboxes
CloudPBX
Bring your own trunk
No CCE
Skype for Business Server (SFBS) 2019 Response Groups News?
No news/no new features regarding on premise response group/s
High Availability – Windows Fabric
New Fabric
EE 1 – 16 Frontends (not 2!)
EE 2 does not work –> Quorum problem! Not usable
Future Roadmap Microsoft UC?
More details might be provided on the October 2017 Roadmap of TEAMs.
Source of the above information
To stay up to speed do not forget to check out http://skypepreview.com for new (preview) features and functions on SFB/Teams as well as the other links listed in my previous posts here on this blog.
