Distributed Conference Call Considerations

CIC can support conference calls with many participants by creating smaller conference calls on multiple Interaction Media Servers and joining them together.

Following are some of the limitations of this feature:

• Delays in audio communications: Distributed conference calls can encounter delays based on the quality of the network connections between regional locations and hub locations, and the number of nodes in each communication path.

• Restricted communication paths: It is possible for you to configure CIC locations with restrictions communicating with other CIC locations. These restrictions are compounded with distributed conferencing as regional conference calls in separate locations require hub connections. If you have restricted the number of hub locations and have restricted communication between locations, it is possible that callers in some locations cannot join a distributed conference call.

• Unnecessary, numerous locations: The more CIC locations that you create, the more complex your environment is to configure with regards to protocols, hub locations, and Media Server Selection Rules. Ensure that you do not create superfluous locations that do not require features, configurations, or capabilities that are already available through existing locations.

• Merging existing conferences: You cannot merge two or more existing CIC conference calls using this feature. CIC can only expand one existing conference call by creating other conference calls on other Interaction Media Servers and joining the audio communications through Interaction Media Servers in hub locations.

• Coaching sessions: Each CIC distributed conference call supports only one coach connection.

• Disconnection: If an added regional conference call disconnects from the original conference call because of a brief network outage or some other temporary problem, CIC cannot reconnect it to the original conference call.

• Insufficient resources: Distributed conference calls rely on the presence and proper configuration of enough Interaction Media Servers to host (regional), process, and connect (hub) all conference call participants. The number of available Interaction Media Servers and their available resources limits the number of participants supported for distributed conference calls. For example, if you configure a single Interaction Media Server that also processes regular calls, records calls, conducts call analysis, and does keyword spotting within the only hub location in your entire CIC network, it can quickly exhaust all available resources. Similarly, if you configure the Selection Rules feature to use Interaction Media Servers in only one location for conference calls, you can quickly consume all available resources.

• Selection rule changes not obeyed: When CIC creates a conference call, it reads and stores the existing Interaction Media Server selection rules. All subsequent processing for that conference call uses that stored set of selection rules. If you change the selection rules after a conference call has begun, CIC does not use those changes on that conference call. CIC uses the modified selection rules for the next new conference call it creates.