technical solutions and commentary

Microsoft released a Lync Adoption and Training Kit that is designed to assist IT Pros, PM’s, Helpdesk Agents, and Trainers to deploy Lync into an organization. The kit provides:

• A workbook providing step-by-step guidance for each phase of the rollout and adoption process
• Adoption and training resources, such as primers, email templates, and templates for a custom Lync 2010 intranet site to help organizations successfully roll out Lync
• Modular, reusable, brandable, and customizable user education and training materials, including frequently asked questions, Quick Start guides, how-to videos, Work Smart guides, and training videos
• Applications such as “IM an Expert” and learning tools such as the “Lync How-to” that you can use to generate user excitement and drive the adoption of Lync

Here are the add-on apps in the kit:

• IM an Expert: (Server Add-on) a social networking tool which helps people “find an expert” inside their organization. The tool parses the question to determine the topic area, finds topic area experts in its user-populated expert database, and forwards the question.
• Conversations Analyzer: (Server Add-on) an app that reviews Lync instant messaging conversation history and applies trust rules to determine the occurrence of words and phrases that have a positive or negative effect on trust.
• Conversation Translator: (Client Plug-in) a real-time language translation service for Lync IM conversations. Supports 35 different languages.
• Information Dashboard: (Client Plug-in) returns information about an intended contact, including the date/time, weather forecast, and a news feed of articles related to the location.
• Tabbed Conversations: (Client Plug-in) tabbed conversation window allows multiple IM conversations in a single window.
• Group Chat Stress Tool: (Server Add-on) a helper app for establishing the infrastructure needed to do group chat.

All of these add-on Apps can be downloaded and used in Lync On-premise deployments. All of the Client Plug-in Apps can be used with Office 365 as well.