The Avaya Systems Interoperability Test Lab has a
large deployment of Cisco network infrastructure equipment
and provides updated documentation for many configurations
of Avaya Communication Manager and Cisco routers.
(Review Application Notes on avaya.com. Go to Do Your
Research/Resource Library/Application Notes.)
Most enterprises need assurances as to the tangible
benefits to be gained by integrating components from
different vendors. Discussion is mostly around features,
functionality, and integration requirements.
By integrating Avaya Business Communications Applications
into a Cisco data network, the full 700+ Communication
Manager features become available. There are two general
categories of features:
- Features that users directly take advantage of,
including Extension to Cellular, Whisper Page, and
Bridged Call Appearances
- Features that administrators take advantage of,
such as Stateful Failover Between Servers, and Enterprise
Survivability
Your Avaya representative or BusinessPartner can
help define which features will make the biggest impact
on your business.
The most important requirement for any deployment
of IP telephony is that the network (Cisco for this
discussion) needs to provide end-to-end Quality of
Service (QoS) based on DiffServ Code Point (DCSP)
and/or COS (Layer 2 Class of Service).
Avaya servers, gateways, and endpoints can tag packets
using combinations of DSCP and/or COS. Tagging is
performed independently for signaling and bearer (voice
and/or video), allowing for a granular configuration.
Tagging can also be configured independently for each
location, although it is recommended that the same
tagging scheme be uniform throughout the enterprise.
In addition Avaya supports RSVP, although it is not
commonly used today. This assures that the voice communications
will work over any data network that supports these
tactics for QoS, like Cisco.
This does not mean a crazy router configuration, but
rather a similar configuration to what is used for
Cisco’s IP telephony. Avaya recommends using Low Latency
Queuing (LLQ) for WAN circuits, which is what Cisco
recommends. Since our CODECs are the same, and based
on the Real Time Protocol (RTP) standard, taking advantage
of Compressed RTP (cRTP) on lower speed WAN circuits
is supported.
There are many existing companies that have implemented
Cisco/Avaya interoperability. When considering your
options, contact your Avaya representative to review
some case studies and to explore design specifications
and configuration options that will optimize your
current infrastructure.
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