Frustration with the Lync 2013 client for Windows Phone 8

Microsoft have released the Lync 2013 client for Windows Phone 8, and it looks great - many more features than the 2010 version, including voice and video calling. However, when I try to login to my account on Office 365 it tells me that "You can't sign in with this version of Lync. Please install Lync 2010."

That's unfortunate and somewhat unexpected, partly because I'm happily using the Lync 2013 desktop client on my Windows 8 desktop, but more so because the app description in the Windows Phone Store gives no real indication that it wouldn't work. What it does say, in all caps, is this:

IMPORTANT: THIS SOFTWARE REQUIRES CONNECTIVITY TO VALIDLY LICENSED COPIES OF MICROSOFT LYNC SERVER OR OFFICE 365 / LYNC ONLINE AND WILL NOT WORK WITHOUT IT. UPDATES TO MICROSOFT LYNC SERVER MAY BE REQUIRED FOR PROPER PERFORMANCE. SOME FUNCTIONALITY MAY NOT BE AVAILABLE IN ALL COUNTRIES. IF YOU ARE UNSURE ABOUT YOUR COMPANY’S LICENSE TO AND/OR DEPLOYMENT OF LYNC, PLEASE CONTACT YOUR IT DEPARTMENT.

That's the only information about requirements for using the app, and you'll notice that it explicitly says that you can use it with Office 365. It's not a case of "some functionality may not be available in all countries" - this client uses something called UCX which isn't supported by Lync 2010 servers, so evidentially we'll have to wait for Microsoft to upgrade our O365 tennancy. I'd be fine with that if the above important information didn't say "UPDATES TO MICROSOFT LYNC SERVER MAY BE REQUIRED FOR PROPER PERFORMANCE." I'd say that "proper performance" implies that some features may not work optimally, not that you won't be able to get so far as signing in!

I'm sure that the people who have Lync 2013 and Windows Phone 8 devices are going to be very happy with this app, and I expect that I may be happy with it in the future* but this is just another example of Microsoft giving mixed/misleading messages around Windows Phone 8 and it isn't good enough! (For the other prime example that annoys me even more, I refer you to the podcast user experience outside the USA. Going into the Podcasts section of the Music + Videos hub tells you that "It's lonely in here. Go to the Store to add some podcasts", but there aren't any unless you're in the USA. This is something that's built in to the core OS and only works in one country of all the teritories where Windows Phones are sold. Shocking.)

On a positive note, as one of my colleagues pointed out, at least the error message in this case is vaguely helpful and doesn't just give you some obscure error code.

UPDATE: I personally have two totally unrelated Office 365 accounts. Lync 2013 for Windows Phone 8 works with one but not the other. YMMV.

UPDATE2: This is also an issue with the Lync 2013 clients that have just been released for iOS. The Lync 2013 for iPhone and Lync 2013 for iPad descriptions both lack the crucial bit of information that the back end server needs to be running Lync 2013 CU1 (which was only released last month - I wonder how many organizations are ready for these great new mobile clients?).

* If I don't switch back to Android first.

Bletchley Park

Back in November I had the privilege to spend two days at Bletchley Park, the home of the legendary WWII code breakers and the National Museum of Computing, along with a number of the UK-based Microsoft MVPs. It's a place that I've personally wanted to visit for a number of years because my grandfather's wartime role was at a Wireless Intercept 'Y Station' that was listening in on Axis communications to be decrypted by the Government Code and Cipher School at Bletchley Park (the forerunner to GCHQ).

The two days were filled with presentations from Microsoft staff and MVPs in the ballroom, a team code breaking exercise around the grounds and huts, and a tour of the Museum. The modern content in the presentations was very interesting, but it was the history on display that was the star of the show. This is where many significant developments took place in the early days of computing, as well as work that has been credited with shortening the war and contributing greatly to Allied victory. The history is alive at Bletchley Park and there was a palpable energy in Hut 8, where Alan Turing and his team worked on the German naval Enigma codes.

The after dinner speaker at the end of day 1 was the Director of the National Museum of Computing, Dr David Hartley. He gave an excellent brief history of the pioneering computing done at Bletchley and across the UK, including Tommy Flowers' work and the Harwell Dekatron (aka WITCH); the oldest working stored-program computer in the world, which was recently restored to working order.

I have to say that visiting the National Museum of Computing with a group of people who were equally interested in computing history was a real pleasure. It's quite fantastic seeing the replica Colossus and Bombe machines, and the restored Dekatron, not only in the flesh, but in action! As well as these and many other large machines on display, the museum has an excellent selection of microcomputers (including a room of BBC Model B machines that can be used), peripherals, mobiles, software, books and magazines. I found some books that I used to own and some copies of the Let's Compute magazine that I had a subscription to as a boy. If you've been around computers for a long time, then you're going to find a bunch of things that bring back memories you'd forgotten you had. It's awesome. :-) 

If you're ever in the vicinity of Milton Keynes, I urge you to visit, enjoy and support this fascinating and important site. The Museum isn't fully open every day, so check the website when you plan your visit: www.tnmoc.org & www.bletchleypark.org.uk. You should take a guided tour of the museum and then browse in your own time - the staff are both knowledgeable and enthusiastic and really add to the experience.

If you're interested in finding out more about the wartime work carried out at Bletchley Park, I can highly recommend Sinclair McKay's "The Secret Life of Bletchley Park: The History of the Wartime Codebreaking Centre by the Men and Women Who Were There", which is available in paperback and on Kindle. I'm currently reading the follow-up to that book on my Kindle: "The Secret Listeners: How the Wartime Y Service Intercepted the Secret German Codes for Bletchley Park"

System Center 2012 SP1

When Microsoft first released Service Pack 1 for System Center 2012, there was a short period of pain when early adopters found that it was broken due to it shipping with a certificate that expired almost immediately. Thankfully that was quickly resolved and what is available now is an excellent update in terms of support for new versions of Windows and enhanced functionality.

I would recommend that people look at Microsoft Virtual Academy for details on the updates in SP1. They actually have two courses that cover it: System Center 2012 SP1 Updates and System Center 2012 SP1 Capabilities.

As usual, Microsoft has evaluation versions of the software available and you can grab System Center 2012 SP1 (handily with or without System Center 2012 in the same download bundle) from this link.

TheTekTonic Show

Last Sunday there was a seismic shift when my good friend Ben Lee and I recorded the zero-th episode of our new podcast, TheTekTonic Show. The idea is that it'll be a semi-regular dose of tech chat, not covering the news as such, but more to do with trends. Since both of us are IT Pros working largely in the Microsoft stack, you can expect a bias towards discussion of Microsoft products and corporate IT, but we're generally interested in all technology, and with all the BYOD, corporate IT and consumer tech are crossing over.

Our plan is to have guests on most episodes and we're putting together a diverse list of interesting people from across the industry for future recordings. We've also got to get an mp3 version and RSS feed sorted out, but for now, here's the recording of episode 0, where we discuss Microsoft's new update strategy and Blackberry's comeback. Please comment and give feedback, and if you think you'd like to be on the show in the future, let us know.

Microsoft's Certified Career Day

If you're an IT Pro and you aren't thinking about cloud technologies, then you probably aren't reading technology blogs either, so I'm assuming that you, dear reader, are conscious of the shift towards the cloud. You might also be thinking about getting skilled up and certified as a cloud expert for the benefit of your career.

On Tuesday 12th March (from 08:30 PDT), Microsoft is running a Certified Career Day to talk about the technologies, the direction and the certifications they have available. There's quite a line-up of experts on the schedule, so I expect the content is going to be pretty interesting.

The audience numbers for the free broadcast are limited, so you should sign up ASAP (and you might win an Acer tablet too). Head over to www.certifiedcareerday.com to register.

If you haven't done so already, you might want to start familiarising yourself with Windows Server 2012. It's been redesigned from the ground up with the cloud firmly in mind. There are two ways that you can do that easily. If you have a spare computer you can test on, grab the trial ISO image that will give you 180 days for evaluation, otherwise you can grab the Virtual Hard Disk and boot your PC into it without impacting your primary OS.

Downloads:

Windows Server 2012 ISO

Windows Server 2012 VHD