Integrating Lync 2010 with Sharepoint 2010

MS Lync 2010 integrates seamlessly with MS SharePoint. This article covers Lync 2010 and SharePoint integration in-depth. MS designed with integration in mind meaning no special installations or customizations for Sharepoint 2010 integration.Integration of Lync 2010 with SharePoint provides users a seamless experience with features including Presence within SharePoint site, Skill search, photo displayed in Lync 2010, Export meeting recordings to SharePoint.

Configure Lync 2010 for Presence Integration with SharePoint

Presence within SharePoint does not need any special config to neither the SharePoint site collection nor Lync Server. Presence is shown by using an ActiveX controls and Lync APIs. The only configrequired to make this work is to ensure that MS Office 2010, Office 2007, or Office 2003 is installed on the client system where presence will be displayed. If deploying Office 2007 or Office 2003, ensure that the latest SPs and hotfixes are installed. Presence may not appear by default in these versions of Office. By deploying Office, the names.dll ActiveX control is registered on the system and retrieves presence information directly from the Lync APIs. They are automatically installed as part of the Lync 2010 client installation.

Configure SharePoint Skill Search Integration

Skill Search integration is done by using the set-csclientcmdlet. From this command, the SPSearchInternalUrl and SPSearchExternalURl parameters are set; this enables Skill Search in the Lync 2010 client through in-band provisioning.

Below are required to set up skill search integration between Lync 2010 and SharePoint:

SharePoint 2010 or SharePoint 2007 essentialbe set up with People Search configured by using out-of-the-box attribues. If any of the SharePoint people search attributes are modified or removed, Lync 2010 skill search fails and displays an error message.
The SPSearchInternalUrl and the SPSearchExternalUrl settings must be configured through the Lync Server in-band setting. The value of these settings must be in the form of http://hostname/_vti_bin/search.asmx.

For a highly seamlessLync and SharePoint end user experience, consider configuring the SPSearchCenterInternalUrl and SPSearchCenterExternalUrl in-band settings. Changing these settings allows a link at the bottom of the search results, enabling the user to click the results within Lync 2010, and then go directly to the search results within the SharePoint Search Center. The URL entered for these two settings should be in the following format: https://hostname/searchcenter/pages/peopleresults.aspx.

Configuring Skill Search Integration

ForSharepointskill search integration, you will want to set the search URL through the in-band setting in Lync Server. The skill search in-band setting is set on global, site, or user. This in-band setting is configured by using the respective Windows PowerShell cmdlet for the particular config scenario. The config commands for global, site, and user are shown in the following sections.

For Individual User:

Set-CsClientPolicyTag:bobkelly -SPSearchInternalURLhttps://sharepoint.domain.net/_vti_bin/search.asmx
Set-CsClientPolicyTag:bobkelly -SPSearchExternalURL https://sharepoint.domain.com/_vti_bin/search.asmx
Set-CsClientPolicyTag:bobkelly -SPSearchCenterInternalURL https://sharepoint.domain.net/sites/pages/peopleresults.aspx
Set-CsClientPolicyTag:bobkelly -SPSearchCenterExternalURL https://sharepoint.domain.com/sites/pages/peopleresults.aspx

For each site:

Set-CsClientPolicySite:Redmond -SPSearchInternalURL https://sharepoint.domain.net/_vti_bin/search.asmx
Set-CsClientPolicySite:Redmond -SPSearchExternalURL https://sharepoint.domain.com/_vti_bin/search.asmx
Set-CsClientPolicySite:Redmond -SPSearchCenterInternalURL https://sharepoint.domain.net/sites/pages/peopleresults.aspx
Set-CsClientPolicySite:Redmond -SPSearchCenterExternalURL https://sharepoint.domain.com/sites/pages/peopleresults.aspx

To set this globally:

Set-CsClientPolicy Global -SPSearchInternalURL https://<sharepoint fqdn>/_vti_bin/search.asmx
Set-CsClientPolicy Global -SPSearchExternalURL https://<sharepoint fqdn>/_vti_bin/search.asmx
Set-CsClientPolicy Global -SPSearchCenterInternalURLhttps://<sharepointfqdn>/sites/pages/peopleresults.aspx
Set-CsClientPolicy Global -SPSearchCenterExternalURL https://<sharepoint fqdn>/sites/pages/peopleresults.aspx

Configure Lync 2010 to Use SharePoint Photo

Lync 2010 includes several choices to configure the picture of the signed-in user that is showed in the Lync 2010 client. These choices can be controlled by the admin to either impose the use of the company picture from SharePoint 2010 and AD or allow users to select whether they want to use the corporate picture or use another picture of their choosing. In this article, we will be configuring Lync 2010 to use photo only from SharePoint. To configure Lync 2010 to use SharePoint photo, the end user simply selects the corporate picture option in the Lync 2010 client. To use SharePoint photo in Lync 2010, the picture must be synchronized to AD. Users must also have a picture added to their SharePoint My Site. Users then perform the following steps to display their SharePoint picture in the Lync client.

Click the picture at on Lync client. The Lync Options dialog box opens.
In the My Picture section, select the option to show Default corporate picture.
Depending on the SharePoint config, a newly uploaded picture could take up to 24 hours to appear in AD

Lync Server admins can use in-band provisioning to configure Lync to always display a user’s corporate picture instead of giving them the option to choose between the corporate picture or one of their own. Additionally, an admin can completely disable the ability to display photo in Lync 2010. The Lync 2010 picture in-band setting is configured by using the Set-CSClientPolicy Windows PowerShell cmdlet with the DisplayPhoto parameter.

NoPhoto - Disables the feature that allows photo from being displayed in Lync 2010.
PhotosFromADOnly - Only photo published in AD can be displayed in Lync 2010.
AllPhotos - Either AD photo or custom photo can be displayed in Lync 2010.

To set the above-mentioned parameter, run the following:

Set-CSClientPolicy -DisplayPhoto<option>

Troubleshooting the Integration

SharePoint Error Code	Corresponding Lync 2010 Error Message
ERROR_ALL_NOISE	Your query did not contain any words that can be searched. No results are available. Please enter a new query.
ERROR_NO_RESPONSE	Unable to connect to the server. Please try again later. If the problem continues, contact your sysadmin
ERROR_BAD_QUERY	SharePoint people search failed due to a malformed query.
ERROR_BAD_SCOPE	SharePoint people search failed due to a malformed query.
ERROR_BAD_REQUEST	SharePoint people search failed due to a malformed query.
ERROR_NO_RESULTS_FOUND	No results found.
ERROR_NO_QUERY	SharePoint people search failed due to a malformed query.
ERROR_NO_AUTHORIZATION	You do not have permissions to connect to the search server. Please contact your sysadmin.

If Lync is unable to connect to SharePoint, one of the following error messages is displayed:

“Unable to connect to the server. Please try again later. If the problem continues, contact your sysadmin.” This is a general error that is displayed when Lync 2010 cannot make a connection to SharePoint.
“Skill Search is not available. Your sysadmin might not have configured Skill Search to work using your current network, or there may be a problem accessing the SharePoint.” This error message is displayed when one of the two in-band provisioning settings is not configured. If one of the two settings (SPSearchInternalURL or SPSearchExternalURL) is not configured properly, Lync 2010 cannot determine if the problem is related to network connectivity or to an improperly configured URL.

All other SharePoint error codes display the following error message:

“SharePoint people search failed. Please try again later. If the problem continues, contact the sysadmin.”