Configuring Custom Presence States in Communicator 2007 R2

Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 and Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 R2 will reach end of support on January 9, 2018. To stay supported, you will need to upgrade. For more information, see Resources to help you upgrade your Office 2007 servers and clients.

To define custom presence states in Office Communicator, you create an XML custom presence configuration file, and then specify its location with the CustomStateURL registry key.

Warning

Incorrectly editing the registry may severely damage your system. Before making changes to the registry, you should back up any valued data on the computer.

Configuration files have the following properties:

• Custom states can be configured with Available, Busy, and Do Not Disturb.

• The availability attribute determines which Presence button is associated with the status text of the custom state. In the example below, the status text, Working from Home, is displayed to the right of the Presence button.

• The maximum length of the status text is 64 characters.

• A maximum of four custom presence states can be added.

• Valid address types for the CustomStateURL registry key are FILE:, HTTP:, and HTTPS:

Examples of valid addresses are as follows:

http://lspool.corp.contoso.com/LSFileShare/ClientConfigFolder/Presence.xml

https://lspool.corp.contoso.com/ClientConfigFolder/CustomPresence.xml

file:///c:/LSFileShare/ClientConfigFolder/Group_1_Pres.xml

file://\\\\lspool.corp.contoso.com\\LSFileShare\\ClientConfigFolder\\Presence.xml

Important

If you implemented a custom presence state URL in previous versions of Communicator by using the CustomStateURL group policy, you might have to modify the URL or change the EnableSIPHighSecurityMode security level so that the custom presence state URL will work in Communicator 2007 R2. If the custom state presence URL no longer works, do one of the following:

• Reformat the custom presence state URL to an encrypted http (https) URL.

• Set EnableSIPHighSecurityMode group policy to any setting other than 2 (Medium).

To localize custom presence states using Locale ID schemas

Localize your custom presence state by specifying one or more Local ID (LCID) schemas in the XML configuration file. The example in the next section, To add custom presence states to Office Communicator 2007 R2, shows localization into English - United States (1033), Norwegian - Bokmål (1044), French - France (1036), and Turkish (1055). For a list of LCIDs, see List of Locale ID (LCID) Values as Assigned by Microsoft at https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?Linkid=157331.

To add custom presence states to Office Communicator 2007 R2

1. Create an XML configuration file, following the format of the example below and modifying the attribute values shown in bold.

   <?xml version="1.0"?>
   <customStates xmlns=
   "https://schemas.microsoft.com/09/2009/communicator/customStates" 
   
   xmlns:xsi=
   "http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" 
   
   xsi:schemaLocation=
   "https://schemas.microsoft.com/09/2009/communicator/customStates
   http://livecommteam/sites/main/ice/Wave%2012%20Docs/CustomActivities.xsd">
   
     <customState ID="1" availability="online">
       <activity LCID="1033">Working from Home</activity>
       <activity LCID="1044">activity 2 for 1044</activity>
       <activity LCID="1055">activity 3 for 1055</activity>
     </customState>
     <customState ID="2" availability="busy">
       <activity LCID="1033">In a Live Meeting</activity>
       <activity LCID="1036">Equivalent French String for - In a Live Meeting </activity>
     </customState>
     <customState ID="3" availability="busy">
       <activity LCID="1033">Meeting with Customer</activity>
       <activity LCID="1055">meeting with client</activity>
       <activity LCID="1036">Equivalent French String for - Meeting with Customer</activity>
     </customState>
     <customState ID="4" availability="do-not-disturb">
       <activity LCID="1033">Interviewing</activity>
     </customState>
   </customStates>
   

2. Save the XML configuration file to a location on a trusted network site or on the local computer. In this example, the file is named Presence.xml, and is placed on the network share \\server\comshare.

3. Exit Communicator.

4. In a text editor, prepare a Registry Editor (.REG) file similar to the following:

   Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
   [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Communicator]
   @=""
   "CustomStateURL"="file://\\\\server\\comshare\\Presence.xml"
   

5. Save the file with a .REG extension, and then double-click it to add the CustomStateURL value to the computer's registry. Note that you can also add this registry key to the HKEY_CURRENT_USER section of the registry, but entries in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE take precedence.

6. Restart Communicator as usual. The Office Communicator Status menu now contains the custom presence states you defined.