What follows is a collections of tips, tricks, or good practices gathered from those deploying Lotus Sametime 8.5 and 8.5.1. Add your experience or tips to the list.

Client

• Installation issue specific to Sametime upgrades for users of Notes 8.5.1 Fix Pack 1 - http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?uid=swg21425365
  
• The following technote is available to customer if they have not yet deployed Notes 8.5.1: How to add Sametime 8.5 rich client to the Notes 8.5.1 Install Kit

http://www.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?rs=899&uid=swg21420476

Media Manager clients

• All participants must be connected to the same community used by the Media Manager
• A minimum of 128 MB of memory is required for video
• Camera manufacturer's drivers should be used instead of the generic windows drivers
• Default bitrate (CIF 352x288@15Fps 384kbps)
• All participants must be using Sametime 8.5 clients
• Point to point AV and n-way audio has been radically changed in standalone and embedded clients. A media server is now required to perform all types of AV calls
• 8.5 client doesn't support legacy phone grid based audio/video instead it uses SIP and TCSPI to establish AV calls
• There is no backward compatibility with older clients. All participants must use 8.5 client to use AV
• If 8.5 client has access to Media Server, call invitation from older client will be declined automatically
• If 8.5 client does not have access to Media Server, older client may display error message when trying to call 8.5 client (depends on release)
• Even with a Media Server, 8.5 clients cannot make audio/video calls to older clients (including SUT 8.0 clients and embedded clients)
  

Community server

How to install IBM Lotus Sametime Community Server on pure IPv6 machine.

• For pure IPV6 environment:
• Through installer install Community Sever without SSC.
• Later register this server with SSC using utility.
• For mixed environment (IPv4 and IPv6) look at the document here: http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/sametime/v8r5/topic/com.ibm.help.sametime.v85.doc/install/inst_config_chat_ipv6_deployplan.html

Environment

Installation

Here are the top installation and deployment issues for Lotus Sametime 8.5.

• Read the System Requirements carefully.
• Acceptable Configurations
• Multiple cell components installed on the same server
• Unacceptable Configurations
• Multiple Primary/Secondary Nodes installed on the same server
• Primary/Secondary node installed on a server hosting another Sametime component.

• When installing the Sametime Community server, its possible that it may fail but the deployment plan may be marked as installed. For example, if a da.nsf is defined in the server document, but the database is not available. Workaround: Correct issue that caused failure, unregister server from Sametime System Console, and rerun installation. See next item for instructions on removing a server from SSC
  
• How do i remove a server from the Systems console ? You can use the 'unregisterProductNode.bat/sh' command in the console directory of your install - insure the console.properties and productConfig.properties files are correctly configured (you usually only need to add username/passwords to them)
  
• If you're having trouble with the Installaion for a product - most commonly Meetings - it usually fails about 20-30 minutes in and there is a WIM exception in the ant logs - and you have specified custom login attributes in the LDAP PreRequisite. The easiest way to work around this is to install the meeting server without the system console, and then to manually register it after the install is complete.
  
• It is far easier to begin with the default login attributes (mail,cn, uid) during the initial install and then modify to include your preferred attribute than the other way around.
  
• Sametime 8.5 silent installion.
  
• When installing Sametime 8.5 System Console and DB2 on SLES 10 SP2 64 Bit, know that DB2 32 bit version is not supported on 64 bit SLES 10. See this technote: DB2 supportability when running Sametime 8.5 on Linux 64-bit, http://www.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?rs=899&uid=swg2142009 Be sure to turn off IP6 and remove the IP6 references from the /etc/hosts file
  
• While creating plan for a product or installing the product, make sure all the servers should be reachable from each other. Add hosts entries in all servers if not present in DNS.
• While creating databases, make sure same database is not shared between two products.
• While getting plan from SSC from installer, if the connection is too slow, you may have to increase the time-out period. Create an environment variable ST_SSC_CONNECT_TIMEOUT=60/120 (Time in secs)
• Do not include "=" signs in Deployment name in productConfig.properties required for registration.
• To register Secondary Node using registration utilities, DB and LDAP host entries should be entered manually before registrations

DB2

• Do NOT use the same name for the server and database.
• Confirm the download package name:
  

LDAP server

• When connecting to an LDAP server, see this page for additional help with filling out the LDAP configuration pages: http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/sametime/v8r0/topic/com.ibm.help.sametime.801.doc/Entry/st_adm_ldap_dir_settings_r.html
• LDAP details need to be entered it productConfig.properties file while registering Gateway server
• To change an existing LDAP for a product Server(e.g. Sametime Meetings). Add a new LDAP with SSC, and manually configure with meeting server

Media Manager

• Related article: Sametime 8.5 audio and video installation and limitations
• Sametime Media Server (and Client) do not support IPV6 in 8.5 release
• If IPV6 is enabled, you will need to disable it, even if its not in use - newer versions of Windows enable IPV6 by default.
• Media Sever can be installed with or without SSC
• SSC can only manage one media manager server
• Use “All components” deployment plan to install standalone media server
• Clustering Media Manager servers
• Requires proper planning
• Only Conference Manager and SIP Proxy/Registrar can be clustered
• Packet Switcher can not be clustered but there can be multiple
• “All components” installation can not be used for clustering
• At least 3 machines are required for vertical clustering where each component uses the SSC DM
• 1 x Conference Manager: Network Deployment – Primary node
• 1 x Proxy/Registrar: Network Deployment – Primary node
• 1 x Packet Switcher: Network Deployment – Primary node
• WAS Proxy server can be used on the same machines
• Additional Packet Switchers can be deployed on different machines

Meeting server

Miscellaneous

Proxy server

• Is LDAP a requirement for the Proxy Server? No. You can install the Proxy Server against the Community and will use whatever directory server the Community server is using. If you wnat to use the System Console, you need to use LDAP.

System console

Upgrade

• Upgrading from 7.5.1 to 8.5. First you need to upgrade the Domino server to 8.0.2 or 8.5 (8.5.1 is not supported yet). Then you can upgrade the servers to the Sametime 8.5 level. Then register the server to the SSC. Registering the Community server with SSC is optional, but recommended if you want to take advantage of the new meeting server in 8.5. You can do a fresh install or upgrade install.
• ST 8.0.2 single server with desktop MS Office Integration -- need to upgrade to ST 8.5. Install-based upgrade, upgrade the desktops with the client installer.When pushing out client you can comment out features you do not want users to have. Can do this in silent mode. Video/audio conferencing. Split audio / video portion (Media Server) onto separate machine recommended. Media Manager is required for video/audio.

Usage questions

• Where are chats stored in meetings? The new meeting server, not the Community server, stores the chat history in DB2. The Meeting server has chat logging built in to it. You can pick the meeting room, pick the day, and pull a chat report for a specific meeting.
• The new meeting server is completely integrated into the Sametime 8.5 Connect client. No need to schedule a meeting, time or date. You can create meeting rooms and use them over and over again. If you set up 8.5 and let it co-exist with your 7.5.1 server, people will naturally start using the 8.5 server because of the new Sametime 8.5 client with the meetings plugin. You can keep your 7.5.1 meetings server for awhile and then gradually phase it out.
• IBM installation manager will guide you in install the components. But you need to go through different activities to install those.
• Can rooms be set to expire after a period of inactivity? Admins can sort by rooms, counts, sizes. Admin can engage with people who have too many rooms. Policies in place to prevent overflow. No user can have more than 20 rooms.