ARCHIVED: Using Office Communicator, how can I host or join a conference call?

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At Indiana University, the Office Communicator client for Windows no longer works with the UniCom service. Windows users should download the new Lync client instead. See ARCHIVED: About the UniCom Lync deployment.

You can use UniCom to communicate with multiple people via phone, instant messaging, video, and desktop sharing. The following instructions focus on audio conferences, but many of these steps will also allow you to start a group IM session or video call. For more about sharing your desktop, see ARCHIVED: Using Office Communicator for Windows, how can I share my desktop? or ARCHIVED: Using Communicator for Mac, how can I share my desktop? The maximum number of participants for any type of conference is 100.

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Scheduling a conference call

If you're activated for UniCom Enterprise Voice, you can schedule a conference call in advance using Outlook; you and others can then join using Office Communicator, using a browser, or by dialing in.

To schedule a conference:

In Outlook, from the Conferencing menu, click Schedule a Conference Call.
Note: The first time, you may be prompted to enter your UniCom or ADS username and passphrase.

Note: If you don't see the Conferencing menu, see Microsoft Help and Support article 940782.

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You'll see an email message with clickable links to join the conference and phone numbers for dialing in. Enter addresses of attendees, subject, and time as with any Outlook appointment invitation, and send the message.

When the time arrives for your conference call, join as described below. You can join with Office Communicator with no additional authentication, but if you (the leader) plan to join by phone, you need to configure a PIN first; you can do so in three ways:

In a browser, go to Dial-in Conference Settings and sign in with your Network ID.
In Office Communicator, in the upper left, click the downward arrow next to the blue square. Select Tools and then Dial-in Conferencing Settings... .
In Outlook, from the Conferencing menu, select Dial-in Conferencing Settings... .

Note: If you schedule a conference call, you'll be the leader by default, and the conference won't begin until you join it. You can make someone else a leader, but before you do so, you need to change the conference ID, which is accessed with the audio options. For more about audio options, conference IDs, and designating leaders, see Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 R2 Quick Reference for Dial-in Conferencing.

Initiating an ad hoc conference call

Among UniCom users

If all the people you want to include in your conversation are UniCom users, you can:

Select multiple names from your Contact list. Ctrl-click individual names, or Shift-click at the end of a range you want to select. Then right-click one of the highlighted contacts, and select Start a Conference Call.
Invite additional people into an ongoing conversation. In the Conversation window, click Invite. You'll see a new window with your contacts; select one or more, or type a name in the search bar. When you click OK, Office Communicator will send either a phone call or an IM invitation to the contact(s), depending on the type of conversation you were in when you invited them.

Note: People who use Office Communications Server (OCS) at a federated institution can join your conversation, as well as people at IU. See ARCHIVED: In UniCom, what is a federated contact, and what organizations is IU federated with? Federated contacts cannot initiate a conference call on the IU UniCom system, but you can make a federated contact the leader of a call once that person has joined the call.

Including anyone

You can include non-UniCom users, including people outside IU, in your conference by sending email invitations to any email address.

Note: You can include one non-UniCom user who does not have a phone number local to IUB or IUPUI by placing a long distance call to his or her number first and entering the long distance code as usual. Once you've established the long distance call, invite other participants as described below. To include more than one non-UniCom long distance user, you'll have to schedule a conference call.

Note: All UniCom users can invite anyone to join an instant messaging conference. However, you can only invite someone without an IU UniCom account to a conference call if you have UniCom Enterprise Voice. If the leader of the conference is using UniCom Basic, those who join via a web browser may see the option to join the conference call, as described below, but the call to the phone numbers they enter will not complete.

If you're in an existing conversation, skip to step 2.
If not, in the top left corner of the main Office Communicator window, click the downward arrow next to the blue square, and select Meet Now. A Conversation window will appear, with you as the only participant.
Click the phone icon in the upper left of the Conversation window to switch from instant messaging to a conference call.
Click the arrow next to the Invite button. To send an invitation to any email address, select Invite by E-mail... . (You can invite UniCom users directly by selecting Invite a Contact... , or invite them by email.)
If you use Outlook, an email message window will appear; enter the email addresses of the people you want to invite, and send the message.
If you use another email system, you'll see text that you can copy and paste into an email message, containing the links that allow the participants to join the conference.

Note: The Outlook conferencing plug-in, which you installed if you downloaded Office Communicator from IUware, has a Meet Now button which generates a Live Meeting invitation, unlike using Meet Now in Office Communicator, as described above.

Joining a conference call

Dialing in

You can dial into a scheduled conference call from any phone number. Two phone numbers are given in the email invitation or Calendar appointment, one on the IUB campus (812), and one at IUPUI (317). All long distance charges are the responsibility of the calling party. You'll be prompted to enter the conference ID, which is listed in the invitation. The conference begins when the leader joins.

Note: The leader must enter a PIN to join by phone, but other participants do not need one. To set your PIN, see Scheduling a conference call above.

Using Office Communicator

If you have a UniCom account and the Office Communicator client, you can join using Office Communicator:

Open the email message or Calendar appointment, and click Join using Communicator.
To join on a Communicator call (i.e., with your default phone number), click Join conference call.
To join using a different number, click Join From, and enter or select a number; this must be a local call from the IUB or IUPUI campus. The system will call that number.

For local telephone exchanges from the IUB campus, see How can I find out what telephone numbers are local? From the IUPUI campus, all phone numbers in the 317 area code are local.

Using a browser

Anyone can join the conversation using a browser and a local phone number. If you have a UniCom account, you can log in (as you normally would for Communicator Web Access), but you then cannot join by phone if you are using UniCom Basic (mode 1). To join the conference call, enter as a non-authenticated user instead, as follows:

In the email message or Calendar appointment, click Join using a Web browser.
Under "Do you have a user account on the unicom.iu.edu network?", select No. You will then be able to enter your name under "Display Name".
Click Join.
You'll join the conversation in chat (IM) mode initially. To join the audio conversation, near the top of the Conversation window, click Join conference call. In the box that appears, enter a ten-digit local number, and click the phone icon. The system will call that number.

For local telephone exchanges from the IUB campus, see How can I find out what telephone numbers are local? From the IUPUI campus, all phone numbers in the 317 area code are local.

Note: Non-authenticated users will not be able to see or share video.

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Last modified on February 24, 2012.