MWI for IP phones on 4000 V5

[donb01]

Hi all,

I never ask too many questions here because I can usually figure out all but the hardest ones ) I do have E-mails out to 3 different techs on this, but I think they were recently yelled at for giving me free advice because they don't respond as often now.

I have a working network with CallXpress 8.0, Hicom 300s, and one HiPath 4000 V5. It took them a while to sort out the MWI set up when we installed CX, but it has been stable for a couple years. I get MWI notifications on my optiset phones on the 4000 without a problem.

When we set up CX we only had 2 IP phones on the network. One in the switchroom with no voicemail, and one on my desk that had my primary TDM phone sitting right next to it. We couuldn't get the MWI working right on the openstage 40, but I wasn't concerned because it wasn't my main phone, plus I thought it just was because I didn't understand how to program the button table on it yet.

Anyway, now I have built a new clinic and rolled out some remote optipoint 410s off of the 4000. The faceplates have MB buttons on them just like the optisets do. I can watch the line monitor in CallXpress realtime and I can see that it is sending out the MWI notification to the phone, but the message light is not coming on. Now that I have this problem I am suspecting the problem I had with my openstage 40 wasn't me, but has something to do with MWI handling on the STMI board and something may not be set up correctly - some option in the COS or whatever. That or I may need some extra parameter set in the phone's station data that is not there.

So does anyone out there have any info on special settings that have to be done to support message lights on IP phones off the 4000? If I hear back from a tech with a working answer I will also post it on here for anyone else who might need it.

Thanks

 

[donb01]

The answer to this question is that in addition to having a Mailbox key on the phone you must also have a checkmark in the "Callback - No Answer" box on the Basic1 tab.

 

[sbcsu]

yes you can have 'callback on no answer stored in the mailbox' turned on but all that does is to light the message lamp if someone puts a callback on your phone....

you need to check the following:

have a code setup in wabe for MBON and MBOFF
have MB in the COS of the phone

 

[donb01]

Thanks for that. I'm sure that's the way it's probably supposed to work )

I am using CallXpress voicemail, and I'm not completely sure of the details because I was too busy arguing that I was not happy about how it was going to work and didn't pay attention to the more intricate details of how it finally started working, but....

Supposedly CallXpress can only support ONE way of activating MSW, and I had a whole network of Hicom 300's with one HiPath 4000 mixed in just for fun. I guess the 300's have one way of doing it, and the 4000 does it another way. When I had Siemens PhoneMail everything was great because a message came in, and the PHML button lit up. You pressed the button and went right to asking for your password. The only exception was display phones on the 300's, in which case you had to have an MB button, and when you checked your mail you had to first press the MB button and then CBK. That was the way life was for 13 years and all was well.

When we turned up CallXpress and ran into this issue with MSW - ALL of the phones had to be given an MB button whether they had a display or not. However CX sends out the MWI ON command basically programs the MB button for callback - if you press the button you get voicemail. Unfortunately you do not get the voicemail hunt group like the PhoneMail function did - the call goes directly back to the port that turned on the lamp. You can see where this is going... The top 3 or 4 ports were always the ones that turned on all the lamps, and if the user pressed the button they usually ended up hitting a busy port. Also if they pressed the button the light went out immediately, whether or not they had actually cleared all the messages out of their mailboxes... This caused many many nightmares for me, and I spent over a year brainwashing my users to NOT press the MB button and to actually dial the access number for voicemail. In some cases I programmed a repdial key right under the MB button and named it "Call VM" to make it easy on them, plus I spent many months setting up elaborate CFW schemes on all my voicemail ports so if someone misbehaves and presses the button they do not get that port but get forwarded into the hunt group.

So that whole long winded point is that the problem I was having is that CallXpress is actually programming the mailbox button for callback, and when they built the sample IP phone for me that I have been cloning in expert mode they did not have the box checked for "Callback - No Answer" and that was preventing CX from turning on the light, resulting in my problem.

In 2013 we are supposed to be upgrading all of the hardware to current tech, and I am hoping to stay with Siemens because I think it will be the best choice to minimize disruption to our company. When we finally get everything the same I think we will finally be able to fix the MWI problem for good!!

)

 

[sbcsu]

If you have an analogue extension setup on your system you can test the MWI ON/OFF codes by dialling the code and then the extension number that you want to turn on/off the lamp on.

For an analogue integrated voicemail (voicemail with analogue extension ports) you need to setup ZAND VMI and ZIEL EVMTAB.
Also you will need a hunt group for dialling back from the lit button.

If you have a digital voicemail (ISDN or SIP) you will need to setup RICHTM for the lamp functionality to work.

PM me for more details if you like