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VOIP – Planning & Design
Unlike the growth of many corporate data networks – often an organic process of
‘fitting-in’ with the business – less proactive, more reactive – the almost
inevitable move towards convergence and VOIP demands a more systematic,
step-by-step approach for the project to be a success.
Applying such an approach will uncover other opportunities to leverage
the investment, reinforce the ROI argument, and ultimately grow the business
further.
- Planning
- Design
- Implementation
- Operation
- Optimisation
Each of these stages has their own smaller sets of steps that must be achieved
and verified.
In this article, we briefly consider the first two stages,
Planning and Design, and their respective steps. The outcome will
likely necessitate some form of facilities, SLA and equipment upgrade.
The Planning Stage
Identifying critical factors and accessing current systems is necessary in planning a VOIP solution. The key motivators must be clearly identified and justified. In addition, operation and performance goals for the voice applications need to be clear so that expectations can be realised.
The Planning stage includes the important precursor of clear identification of the motivators and objectives of the project.
As the old adage goes ‘having lost sight of your objective, you redouble your efforts’, and so it is true here.
With today’s highly competitive and deregulated world of telecommunications, it is now unlikely that cost-savings, due to least-cost routing and by-passing those long distance call charges, will be the single or even main motivator.
More likely is the appeal to any business of the new generation of standards-based (TAPI, JTAPI, XML, H323) converged applications such as unified messaging, CRM, phone mobility, and so on.
Still further, is the appeal VOIP offers as an integral part of a well-engineered, well-oiled supply chain bound together by a corporate extranet; or a VOIP enabled corporate intranet providing extensive and very real workforce optimisation benefits. As a simple example, one key motivator has often been the ability to route incoming calls easily and flexibly to a receptionist that might be located in another town or even country. This will improve customer service and reduce related costs.
VOIP deployments and their related applications typically demand faster response and repair times than traditional data. If there is no dial-tone, the business suffers. Planning for these maintenance and support requirements is a critical step.
In any plan, there must be a clear description of the system assurance and the minimum system features required to support the business. The existing network must have these infrastructural features in place to properly support the converged applications.
The three R’s: Redundancy, Resiliency and Robustness is key to achieving the five 9’s (99.999% availability – no more than 5 minutes downtown per year).
This must begin at the hardware level. Redundant paths and circuits, redundant power supplies for telephones, redundant modules for switches, gateways and routers must all be considered and planned for. Redundant OS features such as rapid Spanning Tree (IEEE802.1w), VRRP and Cisco’s HSRP should be selected. To avoid unnecessary delays, routing protocols should be chosen that offer rapid reaction to change, offering speedy alterative routes around failed or congested paths. OSPF or Cisco’s EIGRP are obvious examples.
Whether deployed on a single site or multisite, call processing software such as Cisco’s CallManager should ideally be deployed in clusters of servers. With a centralised deployment, branch offices need call processing autonomy when the WAN is not available. This is achieved by deploying some sort of remote site intelligence such as Cisco’s Survivable Remote Site Telephony (SRST) IOS feature set. A distributed deployment could also consider Cisco’s CallManager Express for the smaller branches.
Responsive support from the hardware vendor is crucial in this regard.
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