When I’m not at my desk and someone calls my office number, they often leave me a voice message. Exchange Unified Messaging (UM) ensures that the message is delivered to my Exchange Inbox.
If I happen to be logged into my mailbox with Outlook or OWA (Outlook Web App) or some other mail client, I’ll see the voice message when it arrives, and may even be able to understand what it’s about without listening to it, just by reading the Voice Mail Preview.
If instead I’m not logged in, but just carrying my mobile phone, there are other ways to get the message. If I have a smart phone that can connect to Exchange, I’ll see the voice message in my Inbox. But even a cell phone with out a data plan can give me useful information in cases such as this. Exchange 2010 can use text Messaging (SMS) to send a notification to my phone.
In my personal Exchange Control Panel (reached from the Options link in the Outlook Web App), I can turn on text messaging notifications. (Note that this feature is not supported in all countries).
In the Voice Mail section of the phone configuration, there are several configuration choices for using text messaging notifications for voice messages arriving in Exchange. Here’s a picture of my current setup:
As you can see, I’ve asked to receive SMS notifications when I receive voice messages or missed calls (when people can’t reach me at my office phone).
The photograph shows part of a text message that I received recently, shortly after a voice message arrived for me in Exchange.
As you can see, the message contains the beginning of the Voice Mail Preview. This allows me to get some idea of what’s in the voice message, even though here I’m using a very basic phone and service plan.
If I want to listen to the message, I can of course call into Outlook Voice Access (the speech-enabled interface to Exchange and Active Directory), review it, and perhaps ask UM to call back the sender.
Unified Communications sometimes uses familiar technology in unexpected new ways.