Teams Shared Line Appearance

This article describes how to implement Microsoft Teams Shared Line Appearance with Azure Communication Services. Shared line appearance lets a user choose a delegate to make or handle calls on their behalf. This feature is helpful if a user has an administrative assistant who regularly handles the user's calls. In the context of shared line appearance, a manager is a Teams user who authorizes a delegate to make or receive calls on their behalf. A delegate is a Microsoft 365 user who can make or receive calls on behalf of the delegator. You can find additional information about shared line appearance in Teams documentation.

Prerequisites

• An Azure account with an active subscription. See Create an account for free.
• A deployed Communication Services resource. See Create a Communication Services resource.
• A user access token to enable the calling client. For more information, see Create and manage access tokens.
• Licensing requirements for delegator and delegates. See Teams Phone license.
• Enable delegation and shared line appearance. See Enable delegation
• Assign delegates using Microsoft Teams Client or Teams PowerShell.
• Learn more about Team Shared Line Appearance in Azure Communication Services
• Optional: Complete the quickstart to add voice calling to Microsoft Teams user. See Quickstart: Add voice calling to Microsoft Teams user.

Support

SDKs

The following table shows support for shared line appearance feature in individual Azure Communication Services SDKs.

Support status	Web	Web UI	iOS	iOS UI	Android	Android UI	Windows
Is Supported	✔️

Note

This API is provided as a preview for developers and might change based on feedback that we receive. Don't use this API in a production environment. To use this API, use the beta release of the Azure Communication Services Calling Web SDK (1.31.1-beta.1 or higher).

Install the SDK

Use the npm install command to install the Azure Communication Services calling and common SDKs for JavaScript.

Console

npm install @azure/communication-common --save
npm install @azure/communication-calling --save

Initialize required objects

Create a CallClient instance to initiate the calling stack. You can configure logging of calling SDK with the AzureLogger instance and setLogLevel method. You can get access to deviceManager for the operating system with the method getDeviceManager.

Then use the method createTeamsCallAgent to create asynchronously a TeamsCallAgent instance that will manage incoming and outgoing calls for a Teams user. The method takes CommunicationTokenCredential as an argument representing access token for Teams user.

JavaScript

const { CallClient } = require('@azure/communication-calling');
const { AzureCommunicationTokenCredential} = require('@azure/communication-common');
const { AzureLogger, setLogLevel } = require("@azure/logger");

// Set the logger's log level
setLogLevel('verbose');

// Redirect log output to wherever desired. To console, file, buffer, REST API, etc...
AzureLogger.log = (...args) => {
    console.log(...args); // Redirect log output to console
};

const userToken = '<USER_TOKEN>';
callClient = new CallClient();
const tokenCredential = new AzureCommunicationTokenCredential(userToken);
const teamsCallAgent = await callClient.createTeamsCallAgent(tokenCredential);
const deviceManager = await callClient.getDeviceManager();

Place a call on behalf of a Microsoft Teams user

Before placing a call behalf of a delegator, make sure delegate placing the call has make calls permission through delegator call settings in Microsoft Teams

To place a call on behalf of a Microsoft Teams user, specify OnBehalfOfOptions during start call. Replace xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx with the userId of the delegator and yyyyyyyy-yyyy-yyyy-yyyy-yyyyyyyyyyyy with the userId of the callee.

JavaScript

const onBehalfOfOptions = { userId: { microsoftTeamsUserId: "xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx" } }
const teamsCallOptions = { onBehalfOfOptions: onBehalfOfOptions };
const call = teamsCallAgent.startCall([{ microsoftTeamsUserId: "yyyyyyyy-yyyy-yyyy-yyyy-yyyyyyyyyyyy" }], teamsCallOptions);

To place a call to a PSTN user on behalf of a Microsoft Teams user, use PhoneNumberIdentifier for call participant.

JavaScript

const call = teamsCallAgent.startCall([{ phoneNumber: "+1xxxxxxxxxx" }], teamsCallOptions);

Receive a call on behalf of a Microsoft Teams user

To receive calls on behalf of a delegator,

• Update delegate permission to enable "receive calls" through delegator call settings in Microsoft Teams
• Set up simultaneous ring for delegates through delegator call settings in Microsoft Teams

Next steps

• Learn how to manage calls