Early this morning we were surprised to find that UFIT Network Services began deploying CISCO VoIP handsets (the new phones) to Engineering Administration (EG-ADM). The work began with offices on the 2nd floor of Weil Hall (Safety, Facilities, Student Affairs, Processing, etc). Network Services intent was to deploy in select areas on the 3rd floor of Weil tomorrow (avoiding the Dean’s Office suite (Weil 300/310/312) and Development Office (Weil 330/339/350)) and finish the deployment to those remaining areas this Sunday.
We are requesting that Network Services push this back and deploy entirely during the Sunday maintenance window or later. We want Network Services to avoid deployments tomorrow because of the event planned for Thursday.
Deployment of the new handsets does not mean that we are migrating at this time. You will simply have an additional handset on your desk. The old phone system will continue to operate as it normally has.
New handsets are deployed so that you can familiarizing yourself with the features and operation of these devices before the actual migration. A training class will also be scheduled soon to teach you how to use them. At a later date, after the training, a migration date will be scheduled. After migration the VoIP handsets will take over and the old phones will be pulled from your desks. In other words, your old extensions will be gone and be replaced by the phone numbers associated with the VoIP handsets.
You can find some additional instructional and informational guides on Telecommunications website at https://it.ufl.edu/ict/documentation/telecommunications/instructional–informational-guides/.
If you have questions about this process please email mis@eng.ufl.edu or call 392-9217.
-MIS
PS: The VoIP handsets being deployed now still have some programming left to be completed. For instance, we know that auto-attendents are not recorded and voicemail is not configured. Additionally, placeholder phone numbers are on some handsets in order to leave your published phone numbers in the old phone system.