Configuring the Cisco UE AA

You set up the Cisco UE system-provided AA when you worked through the Initialization Wizard (see the section "Cisco UE Initialization Wizard" in Chapter 13). The configuration needed for the system AA includes the business hours, holiday list, operator extension, AA pilot number, and a few prompts spoken to callers by the system AA.

Configuring the System AA

Figure 14-19 shows the customization of the Cisco UE system AA. You start in the Voice Mail > Auto Attendant menu, and then click autoattendant in the list of AA scripts. This opens the AA Configuration Wizard. Go to the second step, Script Parameters, and set the parameter operExtn to the extension in your office where you want calls transferred when a caller chooses to speak to the operator. Figure 14-19 shows the operator extension set to extension 1001.

Figure 14-19. Cisco UE System AA Configuration

To replace the system-provided prompts (shown in Figure 14-19), log into the AVT TUI (called the Greeting Management System [GMS] in Cisco UE releases before release 2.1), and record the following customized prompts for your office:

• welcomePrompt The welcome greeting spoken when the AA answers a call.
• busOpenPrompt The prompt following the welcome prompt, spoken if your office is currently open (based on the system time when the call arrives).
• busClosedPrompt The prompt following the welcome prompt, spoken if your office is currently closed (based on the system time when the call arrives).
• holidayPrompt The prompt following the welcome prompt, spoken if the current system date is listed as a holiday in the system.

The business hours and holiday list configurations that the system AA consults to determine which prompt to play to a caller are general Cisco UE system configurations. They are not particular to the system AA. All system and customized AA scripts can use these business hours and holiday definitions to branch appropriately within an AA script. The following two sections discuss configuring the business hours and holidays for your office.

Configuring Business Hours

You can define several business hours schedules in your Cisco UE system. A default schedule (named systemschedule) ships with Cisco UE software. You can add others or customize the system default.

Figure 14-20 shows the customized system default business hours schedule. You access this configuration by navigating to the Voice Mail > Business Hours Settings screen. The office is open Monday through Friday from 07:00 to 18:00 and Saturday from 10:00 to 15:00 and is closed on Sunday. The column titles have scrolled off the screen, but Monday is on the far left and Sunday is on the far right.

Figure 14-20. Cisco UE Business Hours Configuration

The Cisco UE CLI configuration commands shown in Example 14-10 are created as a result of the preceding GUI configuration. Day 1 corresponds to Sunday.

Example 14-10. Business Hours Customization Configuration

CUE#show running-config
calendar biz-schedule systemschedule
 closed day 1 from 00:00 to 24:00
 open day 2 from 07:00 to 18:00
 open day 3 from 07:00 to 18:00
 open day 4 from 07:00 to 18:00
 open day 5 from 07:00 to 18:00
 open day 6 from 07:00 to 18:00
 open day 7 from 10:00 to 15:00
 end schedule

 

Configuring Holidays

You can define up to 26 holidays per year in your Cisco UE system. The system ships with no holidays predefined.

Figure 14-21 shows a list of holidays configured for the year 2005. You access this configuration by navigating to the Voice Mail > Holiday Settings screen. If the system date matches any of these days, the system AA automatically speaks the holiday greeting you recorded in your system. Your custom AA scripts might also use the holiday list definition to branch to special menus.

Figure 14-21. Cisco UE Holiday List Configuration

The Cisco UE CLI configuration commands shown in Example 14-11 are created as a result of the preceding GUI configuration.

Example 14-11. Holiday List Customization Configuration

CUE#show running-config
 calendar holiday date 2005 01 01 description "New year"
 calendar holiday date 2005 05 30 description "Memorial day"
 calendar holiday date 2005 09 05 description "Labour day"
 calendar holiday date 2005 11 24 description "Thxgiving"
 calendar holiday date 2005 12 21 description "Summer/winter solstice"
 calendar holiday date 2005 02 23 description "Full moon"
 calendar holiday date 2005 02 14 description "Valentines day"
 calendar holiday date 2005 03 17 description "St Patricks day"
 calendar holiday date 2005 05 08 description "Mothers day"
 calendar holiday date 2005 06 20 description "Summer/winter solstice"

 

Creating a Custom AA

Chapter 9, "Cisco IPC Express Automated Attendant Options," covered the AVT and a step-by-step approach to setting up a custom AA.

Cisco UE lets you define up to five different AAs, each with an individual pilot number. The system shown in Figure 14-22 has three AAs defined:

• The system AA, titled autoattendant, which is associated with 1100 as the pilot number. It cannot be changed or deleted, so it always shows up.
• A custom AA titled officehours, associated with 1102 as the pilot number.
• A custom AA titled salesmtg05, associated with 1101 as the pilot number.

Figure 14-22. Defining Multiple Custom AAs

Note

If an AA consists of multiple scripts (the main script and some subflows called by the main script), only the script parameters defined in the main script can be seen and the values changed in the Script Parameters window of the AA Configuration Wizard. This window was shown in Figure 14-19. (This is just an example. Remember that the screen is different for every script because the parameters for every script differ.) Parameters defined in subflows do not show up in the Script Parameters window.

 

Viewing the List of AA Scripts

Each AA might use one or more scripts. You can see all the scripts in the system by selecting Voice Mail > Scripts, as shown in Figure 14-23.

Figure 14-23. AA Scripts

The list of scripts shown in Figure 14-23 includes a number of system scripts (denoted by an asterisk following the name) and several custom AA scripts.

System scripts might not be uploaded, downloaded, or deleted. You might perform these operations on any custom scripts you have loaded on the system by selecting the script and clicking the appropriate button at the top of the screen, as shown in Figure 14-23.

You can upload a maximum of four custom scripts on the AIM-CUE and eight on the NM-CUE. Scripts support an unlimited number of steps and nesting levels so that you can build very sophisticated AA menus with the Cisco UE AA application.

Recording and Deleting AA Prompts

The AVT allows you to record and delete prompts used by your AA scripts. You can also record the prompts offline and upload them to Cisco UE. However, if you do not have a recording facility, or you just want to test the system before you do the professional recordings, you can use the AVT. The functionality of the GMS was covered in Chapter 9.

To log into the AVT, you must define a user on the Cisco UE system who has administrative privileges (that is, a user who is a member of the administrators group). This user must also have a mailbox defined. The PIN for the mailbox is used as the login authentication for the AVT.

If you record prompts by using the AVT, the system assigns automatic filenames to the prompts. You cannot change these filenames on the Cisco UE system, but you can download the prompt file to your PC, rename it there, and then upload it to the Cisco UE system. Associate this new filename with your script, and delete the original prompt file. Figure 14-24 shows a list of the prompts in your Cisco UE system, which you can see by going to the Voice Mail > Prompts GUI menu.

Figure 14-24. AA Prompts

The AVT has a pilot number associated with it, just like the AA and voice mail pilot numbers. This is the number you call when you want to log into the AVT to change AA prompts. You define the pilot number in the Voice Mail > Call Handling GUI window.

Configuring Cisco UE Voice Mail