PBX Settings - HELP! (cti related) 1

[Zowwie438]

All,

I have been doing TSAPI development for several years and I have a good handle on it. However, I have the need to know when an agent goes ready/not ready from a given skillset.

I know I can placed a monitor on the skillset VDN and get logon/logoff events... But when I utilize the TSAPIExcerciser from Avaya and pass the GetApiCaps command... It is telling me "NO" for the following capabilities:
"DND Event", "MWI Event", "Rdy Event", "Work Rdy Event", Out of Srv Event", etc... I am basically missing about 10% of the capabilities?

I thought I recalled reading someplace that in order for the G3PD driver to utilize these features of the API... It must be "turned on" or permitted from the PBX configurations and/or we may have to purchase a new license from avaya to activate some of these features on the PBX.

Could someone please provide me some insight and/or ref me to some PDF docs that explain why these features are missing?

PS: I am not an info hound on the forum just wanting info and not giving back to the group... I am a long time contributor to others here who may have CTI issues... So whatever you can do to help me out is greatly appreciated.


Thanks,

Zowwie

 

[Zowwie438]

ok all... I got a response frm avaya and they are telling me i can the ready/not ready events by purchasing their product suite known as contact center express.

My concern is... The CCE also uses a CTI server to communicate to/from the PBX. So if this external product is able to see the unsolicted ready/not ready events... Then why can't any other CTI application?

Does anyone know who to turn this on inside the PBX so it can send these events to the CTI? Is it just a setting or is a license required to enable this feature?

 

[nohuhu]

Zowwie438,

the feature you're talking about is called Agent States. in previous CM versions it was called Proprietary Agent States. CCE does indeed know how to use it, however i don't think it is documented anywhere. i think it is possible to reverse engineer it using tsapi spy, however to do that you would need to purchase CCE, there is a special SAP code that goes with it that enables Agent States in CM. the feature is system-wide and it doesn't rely on CCE licensing so one (1) CCE Voice agent license would be enough.

 

[Zowwie438]

dwalin,

YOU ARE THE MAN! Thank you so much! The information you provided me allowed me to search google for additional info and I was able to find the screen shots of areas that needed to be changed on the PBX to enable this feature as well as finding out the license information required by avaya! You are indeed a life saver!

So... because I hate to be selfish, I will share my discovery with everyone else so you don't have to look for it!

If you are trying to enable "Agent States" to your CTI application... You must have what is known as AES and/or a CT server that can perform TSAPI 2 and Private data version 6. In addition you will need a License Class B on your CTI server and you have to enable "AGENT STATES" to "Y" on the PBX.

And you must logoff the PBX and restart the G3PD driver in order for it to take effect. From what I can tell, once enabled... your ready/not ready events will arrive to your CTI application as a cstaLogOn event and your ready/not ready state will be embedded inside the attPrivateData section of that event.

Here are the links on the license stuff and configs that have to be set for both AES and CT Server.

http://support.avaya.com/japple/css...&temp.productID=162774&temp.documentID=299244

AND

http://support.avaya.com/elmodocs2/PSN/PSN1015u.pdf

If you need info on the structures or the method of the unsolicted message that will arrive... See page 505 of 678 of defprog.pdf that can be found on google or avaya's site.

Thanks again dwalin!

--Zowwie

 

[nohuhu]

Zowwie438,

no problem, though i'm not a programmer and do not posess deep knowledge of tsapi guts, i do a lot of design work and i know what products you need to mix and match to get desired results at less possible expense. so you did found that "Agent States" field in customer options, now you need to enable it. there's a separate no-cost ($0) SAP code for that but it is not piece part orderable. it means that you can't order it alone without CCE. however you can order one CCE Voice license and get that special code with it for a small price. you don't have to use CCE afterwards, you just need it to enable Agent States feature in the switch.
tell me your switch model and version and avaya ct version and class and i will tell you approximately how much money you'll need to spend to get that feature.

 

[Zowwie438]

dwalin,

We have the Avaya tServer product formerly known or may be known as CT Connect. It's basically a gateway that accepts TSAPI/JTAPI/CVLAN and communicates it to the mapd.

We have the newest version with bug fixes and patches and a class B license (2,500 seat).

From what I can tell from the avaya docs, the tServer is ready to utilize this feature and I have already researched the attPrivateData portions of the API.

As far as I can tell... I am just awating confirmation from our PBX team to see if they have the screen that says "Agent States N/Y". I have no idea why it's taking them two days to respond, but they may be busy.

As far as this SAP code you speak of... Based on my reading, when they avya prof services installed the tServer, they also installed the MAPD and configured the appropriate codes on the PBX so we could use ADJLK and other extended features such as UUI. We also have predictive dialing exposed and functional to us and that utilizes the "Detect Answering Machine" feature.

So.. I would ASSUME that the "Agent States" is there as well, just not turned on or set to "Y".

Let me see what they come back with... If they can't find it, then I will drop you a line.

Thanks,

--Zowwie

 

[Zowwie438]

All,

I am getting tons of static from our PBX team. They are not releasing the settings for "agent state" to me. They will not even tell me if it's there or not.

All I am receiving is information from avaya saying that the agent state information is proprietary and that it only work with other products.

What burns me is... The api docs that i have for the CT Server clearly indicate that the information is available and can be read.

Can someone please tell me what this so called 'proprietary information" is with respect ot "agent state" unsolicted messges?

Are they basically saying that it will come across the acs stream as an attPrivateData event or what?

Thanks,

--Zowwie

 

[XAvayaCTI]

Zowwie, "Agent States" is an ASAI ENHANCED FEATURE that Avaya will only enable when you purchase one of their CTI products, ie, Contact Center Express, Interaction Center, etc etc. Thats why it used to be called "Proprietary Agent States". Other Vendors like Cisco, Genesys, IBM would die for agent events and are currently forced to either perform a "value query" via ASAI or incorporate a customer RTA feed from CMS. If Agent States is enabled in your pbx "Display System-Parameters Customer Options" page 9, their is indeed a "proprietary" TSAPI Exerciser that will log those events via Avaya CT 1.3 and AES.

 

[Zowwie438]

XavayaCTI,

Yeah... Thanks for the info. I figured it was some kind of run around by Avaya! I decided to go directly to CMS to get the data and then I saw that someone had to pay avaya 15K for an informix ODBC driver!!!!

Sheeezzz... Unreal! I could write one for far less than that!

Anyway.. I allowed the topic to die down for awhile internally and politically... But I think it's time to bring it back up again.

We paid for the avay CTI server and the api's came with it... And the API's ARE capable of receiving the agent state unsolicited events.

The whole issue is that setting on the PBX. I heard that our PBX team can see the screen, but I can't get them to change it to Y because avaya said "if you do, it's unsupported". But who cares! They don't support our internal TSAPI applications anyway.

Anyway... Be good.

--Zow

 

[nohuhu]

Zowwie438,

cms is another matter altogether. check with your pbx boys which cms version you're running. if it's r13 or latest r14, chances are that you already have odbc enabled in cms. starting nov '05 this feature is free of charge.