Coming soon: instant messaging, presence awareness and video calls

15 Sep 2011

Over the coming weeks all University staff and Postgraduate Research students with a Microsoft Exchange email account, will be given access to Microsoft Lync.

Lync is an intuitive tool to use, and anyone who has familiarity with services such as MSN or Skype will find it very easy to get started.

For anyone who hasn’t used communications tools like these before, basically Lync allows you to:

• know whether colleagues across campus are available with ‘presence’ icons that display in Lync and Outlook, which show you their available/busy status;
   
• reach colleagues in more ways than before, with a managed contacts list that lets you:
  
  o instant message:
  o voice call (you will need speakers and a microphone):
  o video call (you will need a webcam, speakers and a microphone).

IT Services will contact you over the coming weeks to let you know when you will be given access to Lync and to help you get started. In the meantime, if you would like to know more, we have set up some web pages, with links to Microsoft’s quick-start guides and how-to videos on Lync.