DATA SHEET

nGenius Voice | Video Manager Assuring User Experience in Unifi ed Communications Environments

Highlights • Proactive performance management of video and voice services • Comprehensive service visibility across UC services with real-time network, application and call set-up views • Real-time dashboard with business-relevant Quality of Experience (QoE)-based service- level alerting • Automated troubleshooting workfl ow with guided drilldown to individual user sessions and calls • Deep visibility into end-to-end call quality and session performance Figure 1: nGenius Voice | Video Manager Real-time Dashboard. across all user devices

• Historical analysis reporting by Enterprise organizations invest significantly in Unified Communications (UC) technologies service, fault, location or device with the expectation of improving collaboration and business productivity across their • Innovative service desk capabilities organizations. This adoption of UC services to enable better collaboration assumes to enable IT Staff to interrogate by that service quality will be sufficient for end users to interact effectively. Today’s UC extension, phone number, user ID deployments, however, are very complex, require uncompromising interoperability or IP address between multi-vendor products and traverse a number of different network domains. While • Leverages nGenius Infi niStream traditional performance monitoring approaches have focused on the network-related appliance as a common intelligent performance of these services, there are a myriad of issues that can impair video and data source for analyzing and voice quality. IT organizations must assess the performance of all components involved in generating performance metrics for the call across the entire network from end-point to end-point which includes call signaling voice, video and data applications and evaluate call quality from the perspective of the user. To achieve a true representation of voice and video quality, IT organizations must look inside the packet payload and • Deploy standalone or integrate with analyze the media waveform to understand how echo, signal-to-noise ratio, and other

nGeniusONE platform environmental artifacts are affecting the end-user quality of experience in addition to the network affects such as latency, jitter and packet loss.

Product Overview nGenius® Voice | Video Manager is a UC performance management and analysis solution that enables comprehensive real-time service management for UC services. It can be deployed as a standalone UC Performance management solution or in conjuction with the nGeniusONE™ unifi ed performance management platform for comprehensive service delivery management capabilities encompassing voice, video and data services.

nGenius Voice | Video Manager delivers granular application-specific metrics for IP- based Telepresence, Video and Voice session transmission and conversation quality to characterize real-time service performance and the true user experience. This enables IT organizations to obtain actionable visibility into the end-to-end behavior and quality of UC applications and services. Supporting a broad complement of UC technologies, vendors and services, nGenius Voice | Video Manager combines proactive service management, intelligent troubleshooting, automated diagnostics, fl exible reporting and innovative service desk support to reveal UC application-level behavior on a per-user, per-call basis.

ENTERPRISE DATA SHEET | nGenius Voice | Video Manager

nGenius Voice | Video Manager

nGenius Voice | Video nGenius Voice | Video Data Collector Engine Appliance

Signaling Metrics nGenius InfiniStream Appliance Branch Office Endpoint 3rd Party Call Path Call Path Metrics CDRs Metrics Metrics PSTN

Campus WAN Data IP Network SBC PSTN Center SBC Far End

Figure 2: Collecting user experience metrics end-to-end.

nGenius Voice | Video Manager collects vendor platform and can assess virtually extracts granular call and session quality, and analyzes in real time UC application any UC technology vendor environment. user experience and call signaling metrics stream data (RTP) and call signaling (SIP, Whether the service is voice or video, from active UC media streams. Granular SCCP, H.323) messages from strategic desktop or room-based, soft-client or fixed per-user, per-session QoE assessments visibility points along the call path, from phone, assessment methods are applied and call signaling performance is collected endpoints, and from data collected from in a consistent manner. Measurements from appliances deployed along the call VoIP call controllers, call manager and can be made across service types and path, at traffic aggregation points, at the Session Border Controllers (SBCs). for complex multi-vendor deployments. points of network demarcation, from soft- Measuring Real Time Protocol (RTP) nGenius Voice | Video Manager enables clients or from physical desktop devices streams and signaling protocols such the IT organization to understand network, and other endpoints. as ITU Session Connection Control Part application and call signaling behavior (SCCP), IETF-defi ned Session Initiation Call Data Records (CDRs) from call or and its impact on user experience to session managers can also be collected quickly isolate the source and identify Protocol (SIP) and ITU H.323, nGenius to identify called and calling party the location of what is impacting service Voice | Video Manager can assess UC information. CDR data is matched with quality. Powerful data search filters enable service performance across a wide range ® ® quick analysis by traffic type, location, of VoIP platforms including Cisco , Avaya , call/session media stream metrics and ® ® ® ® geography, function and specific user Nortel , ShoreTel , Siemens , Mitel , combined into a single call/session record. ® groups. Rich quality measurements for NEC and many others. Video systems are Utilizing a wide range of measurement voice services include echo, speech level, supported from vendors including Cisco, ® ® ® points to fully assess the quality and noise level, speech distortion, and listening Tandberg , Polycom and LifeSize . Most performance of UC services, nGenius and conversational quality. Video-related unified desktop solutions are supported, ® ® ® Voice | Video Manager leverages the measurements identify the impact of including Microsoft Lync and IBM ® following for measurements: IP impairments and application issues. Sametime . Signaling measurements for call set-up • nGenius InfiniStream® appliance – include phone number, user ID, Post Dial Real-Time UC Session and Call combined measurement of data, UC Delay (PDD), call success, Answer/Seizure Measurements signaling and UC traffic from a single Ratio (ASR) and Network Effectiveness device Ratio (NER). Phone and extension nGenius Voice | Video Manager collects • nGenius Voice | Video Data Collector numbers are correlated with media UC performance metrics in real-time along - voice and video performance streams for a comprehensive view of call call paths using high defi nition packet flow measurements from IBM and Microsoft performance. analysis from intelligent data sources and appliances deployed along the call path, UC endpoints as well as the CDR data and endpoints to deliver a highly accurate leveraged from IPT session managers Supporting UC Vendors assessment of UC media stream quality and SBCs nGenius Voice | Video Manager supports and performance. • nGenius Voice | Video Engine Appliances highly complex multi-location, multi-vendor - dedicated UC traffi c deep packet environments. Quality measurements and nGenius Voice | Video Manager also analysis appliances assessments are agnostic of any particular dynamically measures in real-time and

ENTERPRISE 2 DATA SHEET | nGenius Voice | Video Manager

Figure 3: Displaying real-time signaling metrics in nGenius Voice | Video Manager.

Comprehensive Performance of proactive and reactive service identified event provides contextual Management with Seamless management tasks. Consequently, IT staff linkage to underlying metrics needed to Integrated Workfl ows can quickly assess large call volumes, triage and resolve problems as they occur. with guided diagnostics, drilling into a The Monitor View is updated in real time, nGenius Voice | Video Manager supports specific user call to quickly identify quality including updates for calls in progress, at a wide range of UC service performance problems, triage impact and isolate the user definable increments while IT staff management and analysis tasks. root cause of degradations. For less can define relevant alarms and alerts to The intuitive, integrated dashboard technical IT staff, automated diagnostics meet their particular operating environment provides real-time proactive service- enable a guided troubleshooting workflow requirements. level alerting and quality indicators for with plain English explanations, which all video and voice sessions. Alarms simplify and accelerate problem resolution. Troubleshoot from nGenius Voice | Video Manager These views range from high-level service The Troubleshoot View provides IT can also be viewed by category in the summaries down to individual users operations staff with a contextual analysis dashboard of nGeniusONE Real-Time session and stream analysis. path into network, payload and call set-up Service Dashboard. nGenius Voice | details for UC sessions. This view enables Video Manager proactively analyzes all nGenius Voice | Video Manager offers more technically skilled users the ability UC service traffic to identify emerging five cross-integrated views that provide to drill down into a range of detailed quality affecting issues. When service progressive, meaningful and relevant performance metrics to quickly identify performance degradations are identifi ed, metrics that allow IT staff to quickly retrieve problem areas and pinpoint the source alarms and QoE events are generated, the precise information needed to resolve of UC service degradation. Sessions prompting further investigation. The event problems with video and voice sessions as and calls can be organized by grouped is paired with links to the calls that are they occur. endpoints, by grouped conference calls affected by the issue, source devices and by a per user session with detailed of the problems and targeted service Monitor call-level performance metrics and powerful characterization reports. Although events The primary Monitor View delivers a filters, enabling flexible analysis based are used to resolve issues proactively in powerful at-a-glance, real-time summary of upon traffic type, location, geography, real-time, they are also stored for historical overall UC service health and performance function and user groups. Calls or sessions reporting and performance trending. levels. IT staff can progress from this that have been assessed across multiple dashboard to underlying data for more IT staff can seamlessly progress from locations are presented in an easy-to- detailed analysis to quickly identify a high level status view in the nGenius view, network-oriented visualization that problems affecting users. IT staff has Voice | Video dashboard into specific displays correlated metrics from along a unified view of enterprise-wide video user call/session analysis based upon the service delivery chain. Consequently, and voice application performance with measurements correlated from all IT staff can quickly identify which users up-to-the-minute insight into QoE events, data sources and assessment points. are experiencing video and voice quality service degradations, call counts, active Streamlined and flexible workflows enable problems and can rapidly identify and alarms/alerts and call success along with powerful analysis and troubleshooting triage performance problems and assign a breakdown of video and voice Key activities that support a wide range issues to the correct service teams. Performance Indicators (KPIs). Each

ENTERPRISE 3 DATA SHEET | nGenius Voice | Video Manager

Figure 4: Proactive View with Alerts.

Proactive diagnosis. This enables the immediate the assessment of each direction of a Building on the Troubleshoot View, the identifi cation of service-affecting issues as user session to quickly determine where Proactive View is specifically designed to well as recurring faults for any endpoint. performance impairments may have been provide a more automated troubleshooting As with the Proactive View, the Service introduced. For video and Telepresence workflow. Optimized to empower the Desk View provides IT staff with a guided environments, nGenius Voice | Video less technical IT staff, the Proactive workflow that delivers simple, non-technical Manager can assess dual-party and multi- View displays critical video and voice assessments with suggested actions. party conferences, providing a combined service events, with a guided workflow to Context-sensitive help with simple English view into the multi-party conference help quickly pinpoint and isolate service explanations is also available to speed session as well as visibility into each problems. To simplify the troubleshooting diagnosis and enable support staff to raise individual user session. process, plain English contextual help trouble tickets with the correct resolution is available as the IT user progresses teams for immediate resolution. Unique End-Device Calibration through the workflow. This simplified Innovative device-specific calibration and automated view enables much Report enables the adaptation of quality broader use across IT organizations while The Report View provides a measurements to match the unique promoting better cross-team collaboration comprehensive range of reporting characteristics of specific endpoints. as the entire IT organization will be capabilities that enable the on-demand This ensures that quality measurements working from the same data and metrics. or scheduled generation of business- and the resulting metrics provide a true relevant reports. IT staff can generate representation of a particular device’s Service Desk custom reports based upon a wide range performance and compensate for error of metrics or leverage a number of pre- The Service Desk View enables integrated recovery methods and a specific firmware defined report templates for profiling of service desk support for reactive customer release. complaints and is specifically targeted for common performance metrics, service use by first-level support, help desk and summaries, trending and detailed service staff. The Service Desk View enables the characterization and service-level reports. support staff to make informed, accurate IT staff can automate reports to generate and factual decisions based on the problem regular snapshots or leverage the view to the user may be having, enabling the quick create reports on demand. escalation of the user’s issue to the right IT team member for decisive resolution. Granular Bi-Directional With the Service Desk View, a specific Session Visibility voice or video session can be accessed based upon the user’s name, extension or nGenius Voice | Video Manager provides IP address. Upon query, support staff will granular visibility into the bi-directional see a historical list of all calls or sessions stream of a specific user video and voice for a given user with session-specific sessions. The granular visibility into details along with identified problems and bi-directional session streams enables

ENTERPRISE 4 DATA SHEET | nGenius Voice | Video Manager

Voice/Video Streams

RTP Signaling

Header Payload Messages

Packet Bit Rate Phone Call MOS Jitter Echo Volume Distortion PDD Loss Effects Number Success

Network View Application View Call Setup View

Figure 5: Standards-based UC user experience measurements.

Standards-Based Measurements Audio Performance Assessments Complements Vendor-Specifi c nGenius Voice | Video Manager For voice sessions, nGenius Voice | Video Management Tools quality assessment measurements are Manager assesses network, application, nGenius Voice | Video Manager empowers based upon a number of International and call set up performance to reveal the IT organization to effectively and Telecommunications Union (ITU) session quality and identify the impact decisively manage the delivery of UC standards for real-time video and of any IP impairments and application services with a unified, independent voice quality assessment, including performance issues. Assessments view of application, network and call ITU P.564 for IP network impairments are calibrated to specific endpoint set-up performance characteristics. and ITU P.561, P.562 and P.563 for characteristics and measurements include: This approach complements UC vendor packet payload condition. In addition, payload analysis, listening quality and platform management tools by allowing the measurements and quality assessment conversation quality. These measurements assessment of the end-to-end performance ratings performed by nGenius Voice | will help to identify common quality of UC services across multi-vendor Video Manager are verifi ed against more impacting issues such as acoustic echo, environments independent of a specific than 500,000 subjective tests of user delay, noise, signal-to-noise ratios, speech UC vendor platform. This independent perception of quality for video and voice level and speech distortion. oversight enables the IT organization to communications. These measurements readily identify performance and QoE- will help to identify common quality Video Performance Assessments related issues missed by platform-specific impacting issues such as acoustic echo, For video sessions, nGenius Voice | Video management tools such as multi-vendor delay, noise, signal-to-noise ratios, speech Manager assesses network, video interoperability, gateway issues as well as level and speech distortion. application and call set-up performance network performance, carrier issues and to reveal session quality and identify outside environmental factors. the impact of any IP impairments and application performance issues. OSS Integration Assessments are calibrated to specific endpoint profi les and measurements nGenius Voice | Video Manager can include video application analysis, video deliver a wide range of performance compression artefacts, frame-rate, and service-level metrics to third-party bit-rate and mid-call coding changes. management systems that enables Measurements will help to identify issues customized reporting and real-time alert with video codec performance and errors, access. Integration is available for many video payload application behavior and industry-leading platforms including those platform-driven bandwidth throttling. from HP, IBM, Microsoft and Cisco. Measurements will assess audio and video together and identify specific video frames (I/P/B) that may be affected.

ENTERPRISE 5 DATA SHEET | nGenius Voice | Video Manager

Supported Codecs and Protocols

Protocols Supported SIP, SCCP, H.323, RTP, MPEG-2 TS, MSB, RTCP, RTSP Voice Codecs Supported AMR-NB, GSM-EFR, GSM-FR (06.10), GSM-HR, EVRC, EVRC-B/SMV, QCELP, G.711, G.726 16kbps, G.726 24kbps, G.726 32kbps, G.726 40kbps, G.728, G.729, G.729D, G.729E, G.723.1, RTAudio NB, iLBC, SMV, Speex NB, AMR-WB, EVRC-WB, G.711.1, G.722, G.722.1, iPCM-WB, iSAC, RTAudio WB, Siren 16kbps, Speex WB, G.722.1C, Speex SWB, AAC-LC, AAC-LD, G.719 Video Codecs Supported H.264, MPEG-1 Video, MPEG-2 Video, MPEG-4 Visual, VC-1, WMV9, H.261, H.263, H.263+, H.264, MPEG-2 Video, MPEG-4 Visual, RTVideo, VC-1

Assessments are based on ITU-T recommendations : P.561, P.562, P.563 and P.564

Deployment Specifi cations Supported Data Sources • Appliances Per Server: 20 • nGenius Infi niStream Appliance – media and signaling • Interfaces per Manager: 50 • nGenius Voice | Video Engine Appliance • Concurrent Streams across solution: 100,000 • nGenius Voice | Video Data Collector – Microsoft® Lync® (endpoint voice quality via Microsoft Lync Server) – IBM® Sametime (endpoint video and voice quality via client plugin) – Cisco® Call Data Records – Acme Packet SBC Call Data Records – Custom (integrate custom data types using the Data Access Module API)

Minimum System Requirements

Client Server • Category Requirement • Operating System Software-only options are supported with • CPU RedHat®/Centos 5.6, 64-bit – Minimum: 1.8 GHz Intel Pentium M processor, or equivalent • Storage 200 GB – Recommended: 2.0 GHz Intel Pentium M processor, or higher • RAM 8 GB • RAM • Processor 2.33 GHz, single quad-core or higher – Minimum: 512 MB (Virtual machines that fully meet the hardware and operating system – Recommended: 1GB specifi cation are supported) • Monitor with 1280x1024 resolution • Link Bandwidth: 1.5 Mbit/s • Web Browser – Minimum: Microsoft Internet Explorer v7; Firefox v3.0 – Recommended: Microsoft Internet Explorer v9, Firefox v11

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