Configuring Meeting Policies
Topic Last Modified: 2009-05-22
If your Office Communications Server 2007 R2 deployment includes servers or Enterprise pools that are configured for Web conferencing, any user who is enabled for Office Communications Server can join a meeting. If enabled for Web conferencing, a user can organize a meeting and invite internal participants or federated users. Additionally, you can configure Office Communications Server 2007 R2 to permit users to invite anonymous participants. Anonymous participants are external users that do not belong to your organization or a federated partner. For example, you may want to invite a vendor to participate in an internal meeting. In this case, a user could send this vendor an invitation to the meeting and, when this vendor joins the meeting, the vendor’s identity is verified through a meeting key. To invite an anonymous participant to a meeting, however, the account of the user who organizes the meeting must be configured with the necessary permissions. You have the following configuration options for anonymous participation:
- Give permission at the global level to invite anonymous participants to meetings, in which case all users in an Active Directory forest can invite anonymous participants to meetings.
- Deny permission to all users at the global level, in which case no users in the forest can invite anonymous participants to meetings.
- Enforce a per-user meeting policy, in which case only individual user accounts configured to allow anonymous participation can invite anonymous participants. For details and procedures for configuring a user account to work with per-user settings, see Allowing or Disallowing Invitation of Anonymous Participants to Meetings by Individual Users.
To support anonymous participation in meetings, you must also configure Edge Server support to allow anonymous users to connect to your network. For information about configuring Edge Servers to support anonymous participation in meetings, see Enabling and Configuring Anonymous Participation in Meetings.
You group and manage meeting features, except anonymous participation, by using meeting policies. You control which meeting features a meeting organizer can use during a meeting by configuring and applying specific policies. The meeting organizers meeting policy controls the meeting and applies to all meeting participants, not the meeting policy of the participant. For example, Bob is configured with a meeting policy that has Internet Protocol (IP) audio enabled, and Sue is configured with a default meeting policy that has IP audio disabled. As an attendee of Bob's meeting, Sue can use IP audio because the meeting uses Bob's meeting policy. However, when Sue organizes a meeting, all attendees of her meeting use her meeting policy, so IP audio is not available for Sue’s meeting. For details about configuring meeting policies for individual users, see Configuring the Meeting Policy for Individual Users.
By default, Office Communications Server 2007 R2 has five meeting policy definitions. All meeting policies include the same features, but any or all of the features can be configured differently for each meeting policy. Table 1 shows the policy settings that you configure for each policy to manage features.
Table 1. Policy settings for meetings
| Policy setting | Description |
|---|---|
Policy name |
A name that you specify. We recommend that the name describe the purpose of the policy. The name cannot exceed 256 Unicode characters. |
Maximum meeting size |
The maximum number of participants that an organizer’s meeting can admit. An organization can invite more participants than the maximum meeting size, but no one else can join the meeting when actual attendance reaches the maximum meeting size. The maximum number is 1000. |
Enable Web conferencing |
Enables Web conferencing for users of the policy. If you select this option, you also need to configure the following options:
These options are covered later in this table. |
Use native format for PowerPoint files |
When a user uploads PowerPoint content, it is converted to .png files that the server renders (.png files are similar to screenshots). If this option is enabled in a policy (the default), when a presenter makes a slide deck active, each attendee’s Microsoft Office Live Meeting 2007 client automatically downloads the Microsoft Office PowerPoint presentation in its native format (.ppt file) as well as the converted .png files. The PowerPoint data is only available for the duration of the meeting. If the policy does not enable this option, when a presenter makes a slide deck active, each Live Meeting 2007 client automatically downloads only the converted .png files. If you do not use native PowerPoint format, the original source is unavailable and cannot be changed. Also, attendees cannot see any active content or animation. Preventing native format increases security because the original source is unavailable and cannot be modified. Allowing PowerPoint files to be uploaded in their native format can impact performance and the Office Communications Server infrastructure. This option is generally not selected if there are concerns about the bandwidth required to download slides in native mode, or if original files should not be shared with participants. If this option is not selected, PowerPoint slides are downloaded as .png images (equivalent to screen shots). |
Enable program and desktop sharing |
This setting enables presenters in a meeting to share applications or an entire desktop with other participants. If selected in a meeting policy, the presenter can allow all participants with Active Directory accounts to take control of the organizers desktop or a program that is running on the desktop. You can specify the range of colors (that is, color depth) used by the Live Meeting client to display slides and other meeting content by selecting one of the following options:
The default color depth for displaying slides and other meeting content in the Default Policy and Policy 5 (Low) meeting policies is now High color (16 bit). For Office Communications Server 2007 and earlier versions, the default for these two meeting profiles was 256 colors. If you install Office Communications Server 2007 R2 in an environment in which a pre-release version of Office Communications Server 2007 R2 was installed, the default will continue to be 256 colors for all servers in the environment. You should change the setting for these two policies on all servers in your environment to either True color (24 bit), which is recommended for the best meeting experience, or High color (16 bit). Original documents are not affected by the color definition settings when viewed outside of a meeting. You can also change the sharing settings that apply to federated and anonymous users (that is, non-Active Directory users). The following options are available:
Restricting control of shared programs and desktops is generally done to address concerns about who might have access to the shared programs or desktops. |
Allow presenter to record meetings |
This setting enables internal presenters to record meetings. |
Presenter can allow attendees to record meetings |
If you selected the Allow presenter to record meetings option, you can also enable the presenter to allow attendees to record meetings. |
Enable IP audio |
This setting enables audio conferencing (that is, Enterprise Voice) over Transport Control Protocol (TCP). This option controls whether streaming of audio over the Internet connection is allowed in meetings organized by users who have been assigned this meeting policy. This option is generally not selected if there are concerns about the bandwidth required for IP audio. Enabling IP audio for meetings requires deployment of the appropriate audio hardware, including head sets, microphones, or speakers. Enabling IP audio can impact performance and the Office Communications Server infrastructure. |
Enable IP video |
If you selected the Enable IP audio option, you can also enable support for IP video. This option controls whether the streaming of video over the Internet connection is allowed in meetings organized by users in this forest who have been assigned this meeting policy. This option is generally not selected if there are concerns about the bandwidth required for video. Enabling IP video for meetings requires deployment of the appropriate video hardware, including webcams or Microsoft RoundTable. Enabling IP video can impact performance and the Office Communications Server infrastructure. |
Enable PSTN conference dial-in |
This option controls whether meetings organized by users in this forest who have been assigned this meeting policy can include dial-in conferencing from the public switched telephone network (PSTN). If you select the Enable IP audio option, you can also enable support for PSTN conference dial-in. Enabling PSTN conference dial-in for meetings requires deployment of the appropriate hardware and server roles, which can include a media gateway and a Mediation Server or a Mediation Server configured to perform Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) trunking. |
PSTN conference dial-in requires passcode |
This option controls whether users can organize meetings in which anonymous users can join dial-in conferencing audio without entering a conference passcode. Conference passcodes, if required by the meeting policy, are used only by anonymous users. In this context, anonymous users do not have Active Directory credentials or an Office Communications Server account with your organization. If you select the Enable PSTN conference dial-in option, you can set the required passcode. |
Each meeting policy defined at the global level is available for use across the forest. By default, the following policies are defined for Office Communications Server 2007 R2:
- Default Policy. This is the default meeting policy configured at the forest level.
- Policy 1 (High). This is the policy of the same name configured at the forest level. By default, this policy grants the highest level of access to meeting features when compared to the other meeting policies available by default when you install Office Communications Server 2007 R2.
- Policy 2 (Medium High). This is the policy of the same name configured at the forest level.
- Policy 4 (Medium Low). This is the policy of the same name configured at the forest level.
- Policy 5 (Low). This is the policy of the same name configured at the forest level. By default, this policy grants the lowest level of access to meeting features when compared to the other default policies.
You can use these meeting policies, define one or more new meeting policies, change the policy definition for any global meeting policy, and delete any policy except the default policy.
Use the procedures in this section to do the following:
- Create a global meeting policy.
- Modify or remove a global meeting policy.
- Select the meeting policy for your organization.
To create a global meeting policy
Open Office Communications Server 2007 R2.
In the console tree, right-click Forest, click Properties, and then click Global Properties.
Click the Meetings tab.
In Policy settings, under the Policy Definition list, click Add.
In the Policy name box, type a name for the policy.
Specify the settings you want in this policy to control the level of access to meeting features granted to users.
To modify or remove a global meeting policy
Open Office Communications Server 2007 R2.
In the console tree, right-click Forest, click Properties, and then click Global Properties.
On the Meetings tab, click the individual policy definition (that is, meeting policy) that you want to modify or remove, and then do one of the following:
- To view or modify a policy definition to control the level of access to meeting features granted to users, in the Policy Definition list, click the name of the policy, and then click Edit. In the Edit Policy dialog box, change any settings, as appropriate.
- To remove a policy definition, click Remove.
To apply a global meeting policy
Open Office Communications Server 2007 R2.
In the console tree, right-click Forest, click Properties, and then click Global Properties.
Click the Meetings tab.
In Policy settings, in the Global Policy list, do one of the following:
- To use a single global policy for the entire organization, click the name of the specific policy in the list. If an appropriate policy does not exist in the list, use the procedure earlier in this section to create it.
- To apply meeting policies on a per-user basis, click Use per user policy in the list, and then specify the policy for individual users, as described in Configuring the Meeting Policy for Individual Users.