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CONFIDENTIAL

© Copyright 2013. Aruba Networks, Inc.

All rights reserved1 @arubanetworks@arubanetworks

Microsoft Lync, Unified Communications,

Cloud Application Control,

and Aruba Networks

Technical OverviewRich Langston, PLM

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All rights reserved

CONFIDENTIAL


All rights reserved2 @arubanetworks

• Why should I be interested in Lync/UCC?

• What challenges will I face?

• How do I solve these challenges?

• RF Optimization

• QoS

• Troubleshooting

Agenda

LyncAruba

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Although we will talk about Lync today, many of these techniques and features are applicable to other types of VOIP and Unified Communications, and enable delivery of things like next-gen cloud apps.

FYI

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Desk Phones Are So 20th Century

Mobile UCC Applications are eliminating the need for desk

phones completely

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Lync Brings Opportunities for Big Savings

Deployment savings from using

UC over Wi-Fi instead of wired

LAN1

Rightsizing savings from consolidating

unused legacy switches, lower

operating costs 2

Wire

d

Edge

Co

sts

Of

Ru

nn

ing

Th

e E

dg

e

Infrastructure savings from extending

UC network to remote sites, branch

offices, homes4

Rightsized

Edge

Co

sts

Of

Ru

nn

ing

Th

e E

dg

e

Application savings from using one

common network for all multimedia,

locationing, telemetry applications3

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• Employees are more productive – they can work from anywhere

• Reduce spending on conference calling services

• Reduce toll costs

Additional UCC Advantages

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Is Your Network Ready For Mobile UCC?

Microsoft Lync

• Lync is 5 applications but one encrypted stream.

• How do you set QoS for different Lync media?

Device Explosion

• The average knowledge worker has 2-3 devices.

• Can you provide the speed and connectivity they

need?

Converged Devices

• UCC, Voice, Video, Facebook, Email, YouTube,

Games, Twitter, and Music on the same device.

• What priority should the traffic receive?

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End-to-end UCC challenge (simplified)

• Diversity of client types

• Diversity of operating

systems

• Mix of managed and

unmanaged

• Server health

• Server capacity

• Configuration

inconsistencies

• Network bottlenecks

• QoS markings not being

honored

• Interference sources

• Different RF

environments

• Channel conflicts

• Variable numbers of

clients

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Recipe for a successful Lync/UCC Wi-Fi Implementation

Ensure adequate Wi-Fi density

Optimize Wi-Fi to account for UCC

Ensure proper prioritization of UCC traffic

Ensure the right instrumentation is in place to measure and troubleshoot end-to-end

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Optimize the Wi-Fi Environment

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UCC RF Design Best Practices

• Pervasive RF Coverage

• Distance between APs to not exceed 50 Ft

• Minimum RF signal (RSSI) levels of -65 dBm

• Minimum signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of 25 dB

• Co-channel separation of 20 dB

• Minimum and maximum AP power difference no greater than two steps

• On the SSID profile• Set max-tx-fail to 20

• Set max-retries to 4

15M

15M

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2.4 GHz

Ch 1

2.4 GHz

Ch 12.4 GHz

Ch 115 GHz

Ch 36

5 GHz

Ch 149

5 GHz

Ch 52

5 GHz

Ch 161

X2.4 GHz

Ch 6

X

ARM: Optimize Wi-Fi In Real-Time

Zero-Touch RF Management And Optimization

Band Steering – Move 5 GHz capable clients to 5GHz radios

Spectrum Load Balancing – Distribute clients across APs

Airtime Fairness – Keep slow clients from taking all the bandwidth

Lync-Aware ARM Scanning – Don’t change channels during a call

Self-Healing – Adjust power to cover gaps

X

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Aruba ClientMatch™ Enables High Performance Wi-Fi

Match to

another AP

DEVICE

TYPE

INTERFERENC

E

LOCATION CONGESTION

REAL-TIME RF CORRELATION

Enables use of

High Wi-Fi data rates

98% of mobile devices

with higher SNR

94% better performance

for “sticky” clients

No client-side software

required

Patent:

8,401,554

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802.11ac – Not required, but helpful

• 3x3:3 Dual Radio

• 5GHz 11ac: up to 1.3Gbps

• 2.4GHz 11n: up to 450Mbps

(600Mbps with Broadcom clients)

• 2x GE link aggregation

• Enabling >1Gbps TCP throughput

• Operates with 802.3af, requires

802.3at for full functionality

• More bandwidth

• Faster data rates

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AppRF – Control Access to the Air

• Even with 802.11ac, there is only so much air available

• Unlike wired networks, this is a shared resource

• Enterprises should monitor, and, if necessary, control what applications have access to the air

• Reduce the bandwidth provided to completely recreational apps

• Block bandwidth-hogging apps of no value to the business

15

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AppRF: Identify traffic for special treatment

• Classify based on priority

• Fix missing or incorrect QoSpriority tags

• Block or rate limit bandwidth hogs

• On-Controller visualization and reporting for real-time flows

• Export to AirWave for historical trending and debugging

• Inspect traffic with DPI engine

• Determine applications and categories

• 1500 apps

Identify Report Prioritize/Block

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AOS 6.4 - Late 2013 - AppRF 2.0

• Incorporates Application-Aware Deep Packet Inspection technology

– Uses next-gen techniques, not just signatures

– Over 1500 Applications

• Operates at user role level to provide application control

– Block application or categories of apps

– QoS applications

– Bandwidth contracts for applications

• New Category Dashboard element• Shows apps by category such as Peer-to-

Peer, Streaming video

• Graphically based application blocking work flow

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What is Application-Aware DPI?

• Uses a combination of advanced techniques for application identification

• Uses protocol grammar analysis to understand complex applications and their current state

• Uses advanced heuristics when required

• Signatures are used for “easy to identify” applications

– Allows advanced REGEX to be used for performance scaling

• Detects encrypted applications via certificate common names

• To be leveraged in a future releases:• Decodes applications inside unencrypted tunnels such as ICA

• Understands and extracts metadata to increase context

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Encrypted Applications

• Primary method of classification for encrypted flows is use of the unencrypted certificate information

– Primarily Common Name

• Certificate is exchanged as part of the initial application startup

• Only allows granularity reflected in the cert name

– All of facebook, for example, uses a cert with “Facebook” as the CN

• Extraction of metadata or any deeper analysis isn’t possible

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Application Categories

• This is an initial list – will probably evolve slightly

• Block/QoS/Bandwidth contracts can control these categories with a single configuration line

• User-defined categories will be available in a post 6.4 release

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AirWave 7.7 Historical Trending

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Prioritization via QoS

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End-to-End: Different QoS Techniques

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End-to-End Prioritization

• For QoS and WMM to work effectively, they must be deployed end-to-end throughout the network

• All components must recognize the packet marking and must react in the same way to ensure proper handling

• Complete deployment of QoS ensures consistent delivery of data

• WMM/802.11e is used for QoS on the Wireless side

• DiffServ Code Point (DSCP) and 802.1p tagging is used on the wired side

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• Distributed Coordinated Function (DCF)

– Transmission rules followed by all clients

• Carrier Sense Multiple Access with Collision

Avoidance (CSMA/CA)

– Responsible for mediating access to the air

802.11 Access Rules Basics

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All rights reserved26 #airheadsconf

Access Categories with EDCA

1. Voice Data

2. Video Data

3. Best Efforts

4. Background

“Air”

High Priority

Low Priority

Application

Data

• WMM Specifies how priority queues map to DSCP and dot1P tags

• Different access categories, different contention parameters

• 4 queues per radio; 8 queues total; supported on all APs

• Voice and video gets priority over data

• EDCA parameters decides a unique delay and random back off for each queue

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Why it is important to understand DSCP

• End-to-end prioritization is important for quality of Lync calls

• Clients can send Lync traffic with DSCP tags

• DSCP Tag is mapped to WMM-AC tag to prioritize the packets over the Air

• In tunnel mode, since lync packet is encrypted, AP can only see WMM-AC prioritization from the outer header and puts DSCP tag corresponding to WMM-AC prioritization flag defined in DSCP-WMM mapping in SSID profile

• If there is no mapping in SSID profile, AP derives DSCP tag from standard WMM-DSCP conversion algorithm

• Controller can retag the packet as per DSCP-WMM mapping in SSID profile if the tagging in the incoming packet is not correct

• In d-tunnel mode, AP decrypts the packets and puts the inside DSCP tag on the wire

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WMM-DSCP Configuration on Controller

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UCC Visibility, Control, and Debugging

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Typical Lync QoS Services

• Basic WMM prioritization for Lync RTP traffic based on ports or incoming DSCP tags

• Configuration heavy

• Prone to mis-classification of traffic

• Tagging video on the high queue is a bad idea…

WLAN

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Aruba’s Solution: Application Level Gateways (ALGs)

• ALGs are deep packet inspection technology

• Listen on particular ports and take action when the traffic is recognized as being part of the supported VOIP traffic streams

• QoS packet flows

• Collect call and protocol statistics for troubleshooting

• ALGs are handled in the controller using the control plane

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VOIP/UCC ALGs Supported

• Cisco SCCP, a.k.a. “Skinny” – Cisco’s original VOIP protocol. Many customers have moved on to Cisco’s Jabber protocols

• NOE – This is Alcatel’s original VOIP protocol. Modern Alcatel systems use SIP

• Vocera – This is Vocera’s version of SIP

• SVP – SpectraLink Voice Protocol

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Standards-Based UCC Signaling Protocol Support

• H323 – A protocol for streaming media control used by many UCC and video solutions

• SIP – Session Initiation Protocol – another signaling protocol used by most modern VOIP

• RTSP – Real Time Streaming Protocol – Another protocol for control of streaming audio/video

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Aruba’s Lync QoS Services

• Heuristics to identify Lync voice and video seperately

• Lync aware video management

• Full support for iOS, Android, Windows, Mac OS X, Windows Phone

• Works on Lync 2010, 2013, Online

• Traffic retagging

• Inline voice quality assessment

WLAN

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Heuristics: How they work

• Called “Classify Media”

• Create an ACL to trigger deeper inspection of traffic• ACL triggers on ports used for UCC

• May need to include IP address or hostname as well

• Once the ACL triggers, we analyze traffic from the client

• If the traffic looks like a supported audio or video stream format, we will QoS it appropriately

• Supports separate classification of audio and video streams

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UCC Solutions we support using heuristics

• Microsoft Lync• Pre 6.1.3.10 – only Lync 2010

• 6.1.3.10 and 6.3.1 – all Lync including Lync 2013 apps, laptop and mobile

• Lync Online (Office 365) is supported with these builds for heuristics only

• Apple Facetime

• Cisco Jabber – planned for future AOS release

36

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• Heuristics approach works well with Lync Online

• Special configuration is needed we will cover later

Heuristics Work with Lync Online Today!

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• Heuristics are never perfect

• Microsoft SDN API Integration

• Uses information directly from the Microsoft server for fine-grained application identification

• Allows separate detection and QoS for Voice, Video, Desktop Sharing, and File Sharing

• Eliminates the need for deep packet inspection

• Adds Lync “Quality of Experience” (QoE) metrics for debugging

Beyond Heuristics: Direct Integration with Microsoft Lync Server

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Lync

Lync SDN Model

Lync SDN API

REST Architecture

Increased visibility into Lync traffic and events

Ability to correlate network and call information

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Lync SDN QoS Flow

1. User establishes Lync call to another device

– Call setup is through server, call is peer-to-peer

2. Lync server sends session information to Controller

3. Controller uses data for QoSand AppRF visibility

– Voice gets DSCP 56 (0x38)

– Video gets DSCP 40 (0x28)

– Desktop Sharing gets DSCP 40 (0x28)

– File transfers get DSCP 24 (0x18)

4. Controller sends app usage data to AirWave

AirWave

2

1

4

3

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Dialog Event

Lync

LEN Dialog Shim

Networks & Operation Systems

Lync

Dialog Event

Events:• Start, Update, Error & End

Dialog

Attributes:• SIP URIs

• Call ID

• IP SA/DA

• Protocol

• Transport S/D Ports

• Media Type

• Codex & BW

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• Where is the problem? • Is the Wi-Fi network congested?

• Are the wired network tags wrong?

• Is it something else?

UCC Troubleshooting Challenge

Lync Call Problem Help Desk Request

?

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Lync SDN– Collecting call data

1. At the end of each call, the call participants send data on call quality to the Quality of Experience (QoE) server - a component of Lync

2. The QoE server reports stats to the controller

3. Controller builds monitoring pages

1

2

3

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Quality Update Event

Lync

LEN Dialog Shim

Networks & Operation Systems

Attributes:• 5 Tuple Value

• NMOS Value

• Delay Value

• Jitter Value

• Packet Loss Value

• Healer ratio Value

Events:• Quality Update event for

Voice, Video or Data

Lync

Quality Update

Event

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Lync Diagnostics: Getting To Root Cause

• End-to-end insights into call quality and the root cause of problems

• Wi-Fi call metricsinclude R-value, jitter, delay, packet loss, AP-controller packet loss

• Includes caller/callee extension number mapping to MAC address, call status, voice or video call type, active client sessions at time of call, other Lync traffic

• Reports include system-, Wi-Fi AP-, and client-level details, client roaming data, and historical call records

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Examples of Call Statistics

Lync Voice Clients

Call Performance Report

Call Detail Report

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ArubaOS 6.4 – Network-Wide UCC Stats

DONE Select the Trend view for Call Volume

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WiFi and Call Heath View

Speeds troubleshooting UCC issues– Is it the WiFi, or something else

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ArubaOS 6.4 – Per Client Quality View

DONE Click breadcrumb to go back to dashboard

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AArubaOS 6.4 Call Details View

DONE Click breadcrumb to go back to dashboard

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Aruba AirWave – combine call quality and location

DONE Click on ‘X’ in top right of popup to dismiss

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Better Together – MS Lync and Aruba

Lync Ready Wi-Fi

802.11ac APs with

ClientMatch™ reduces sticky

clients and increases speed

Lync client visibility and QoS

per application

Lync Wi-Fi qualified and SDN

API vendor (certification in

progress)

Complete UCC Solution

Voice, Video, Chat, Desktop

Sharing and File Transfer

Presence information with

Exchange Integration

Cross-platform Microsoft

Windows, MacOS, iOS, and

Android

CONFIDENTIAL



• Would you like to learn more about making your Wi-Fi UCC a success?

• Would you like help deciding which approach is best for you?

• Want your users in the fast lane?

• Contact me after the talk!

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