| There are many ways to do it...
1. Use SoftConsole to contol conferences. The receptionist can add incoming calls into conferences
2. I'd suggest this for it's ease of use - for no security for entering the conference - create a System Short Code eg S/C=299, T/N=299, Feature=MeetMeConference. All users can dial 299 from their phone and enter a 'conference room'. There is no security and callers hear a single beep when entering a conference and other users hear a double beep when a caller exits.
3. To add to option 2, make the T/N="Sales" and users will see Sales on their phone screens (or Phone Manager). You could then make S/C=298, T/N="Support" so you can see which conference you're in.
4. To add to it further, bring VMPro into the mix. Create a VMPro ShortCode (or Module) called eg Conference. Create the System Short Code as follows - S/C=299, T/N=#Conference, Feature=VoiceMailNode. In VMPro, setup the node to use the Enter Digits action (I think that's what it was called) and follow the manuals on how to set this up. You'll have to have a transfer action on the Success option to actually transfer it into the conference. To do this, you'll need another System Short Code as per option 2 above but use eg 298. This way you'll get a PIN to stop unauthorized access. Users dial 299, it goes to VMPro and asks for a PIN. But you may have spotted the flaw - users could still dial 298 without having to go through VMPro. To get around this, change the 299 Short Code to the following S/C=SalesConf, T/N="Sales", Feature=MeetMeetConference and change the VMPro Transfer action as needed. This way the only way in is to dial 299 and enter a PIN because no user can dial SalesConf from a phone (still can with Phone Manager but they'd need to know the exact name).
For all the above examples, an incoming call can be answered and transferred to 299. Internal users dial 299 as well and all end up in the same conference. You could also point a DDI directly to System Short Code 299 but I'd put some security on this otherwise someone could dial in and listen to whatever they want with just a small beep notifying others.
5. To complicate it more, user the Conference Centre application (license is required). It's basically the same as option 4 but with additional options including name announcements, personal PIN access, email notification, web hosted conferences including questions and summaries to the host.
This should give you enough to go on. If you want more help, I'd suggest reading the Engineer's Toolkit as it's quite detailed in how to setup this. |