Cisco CCNP Collaboration

Voice and video break when the network under them is wrong. You check DNS, time, DHCP and certificates, review the firewall and security pieces in the path, and plan and carry out cluster upgrades safely.

• DNS and NTP requirements
• DHCP options for phones
• Certificates and trust between components
• Firewall and edge security considerations
• Cluster upgrade planning and order
• Troubleshooting a failed upgrade

You build A readiness checklist for a collaboration deployment, with an upgrade runbook.

SIP is how nearly every call is set up. You read call flows message by message, understand offer and answer for media, and diagnose failures from a trace.

• SIP request and response messages
• A basic call flow from INVITE to BYE
• Session description and media negotiation
• Early offer and delayed offer
• Reading a SIP trace
• Common SIP failure patterns

You build An annotated SIP trace that explains a successful call and a failed one.

Users judge the system by their phone. You deploy hardware endpoints and soft clients, register them to call control, and troubleshoot why a device will not register.

• Hardware phones and video endpoints
• Soft clients and what they need
• Device pools and registration settings
• Provisioning and firmware for endpoints
• Troubleshooting registration to call control
• Registration of trunks to gateways and border controllers

You build A working set of endpoints registered to call control, with a troubleshooting record.

Call routing is a set of rules that decide where a dialed number goes. You build it from partitions, calling search spaces, route patterns and route groups, and trace how a call is matched.

• Directory numbers, partitions and calling search spaces
• Route patterns, route lists and route groups
• Translation patterns
• Calling and called party transformations
• How a dialed string is matched
• Tracing a call through the routing logic

You build A routing design for a two-site company, proven by traced test calls.

A dial plan that grows by exception becomes impossible to maintain. You globalize numbers in E.164 form, use local route groups, find and fix a broken plan with monitoring tools, and block routes toll fraud depends on.

• Normalizing numbers to E.164
• Local route groups and site-based routing
• Emergency calling considerations
• Using analysis tools to find a dial plan fault
• Fixing a misconfigured plan without breaking another
• Toll fraud: how it happens and how to prevent it

You build A globalized dial plan for three sites, with a repaired fault and toll fraud controls.

Voicemail is still a core service. You integrate Unity Connection with call control, configure users and call handling, and troubleshoot the routing between a call, a mailbox and its notifications.

• Integrating Unity Connection with call control
• Users, mailboxes and templates
• Call handlers and routing rules
• Message notification and access
• Securing voicemail access
• Troubleshooting a call that misses the mailbox

You build A configured voicemail system with users, a call handler and a working integration.

Gateways and border controllers connect your calls to the outside. You configure dial peers, translation rules and SIP profiles on IOS XE, and troubleshoot calls that fail at the edge.

• Dial peers and how they match
• Voice translation rules and profiles
• SIP profiles and header manipulation
• Session border controller functions
• Codecs and DTMF relay
• Troubleshooting gateway call failures

You build A gateway configuration that routes inbound and outbound calls with number translation.

Some calls need help beyond two endpoints. You provide conferencing, transcoding and media termination, and choose codecs and resource placement so calls work without wasting capacity.

• Conference bridges and ad hoc conferences
• Transcoders and when they are needed
• Media termination points
• Music on hold
• Media resource groups and lists
• Codec choice and bandwidth

You build A media resource design that supports conferences and mixed-codec calls across sites.

Cloud calling moves call control off site but not the need to design it. You describe the Webex Suite, configure locations and call routing in Webex Calling, choose PSTN options and guard against toll fraud.

• The Webex Suite and its parts
• Locations, numbers and users in Webex Calling
• Call routing features in the cloud
• PSTN connectivity options
• Toll fraud controls in the cloud
• Connecting cloud calling to on-premises systems

You build A Webex Calling setup for two locations with routing and PSTN access.

People use collaboration through meetings and chat, and administrators manage it through the cloud. You configure meetings and messaging, then manage users and roles through Control Hub, SCIM and role-based access.

• Configuring Webex meetings
• Messaging spaces and policies
• Control Hub for users and services
• Synchronizing users with SCIM
• Role-based administration
• Using the cloud APIs

You build A cloud tenant with synchronized users, admin roles and a working meetings policy.

Bad audio is the problem users notice most. You trace one-way audio and choppy calls to their causes, set trust boundaries, and configure low-latency queuing for media and signaling.

• Causes of one-way audio
• Jitter, loss and delay
• Where to place QoS trust boundaries
• Marking signaling and media
• Low-latency queuing for voice and video
• Measuring call quality

You build A QoS policy for a campus and WAN, with a method for diagnosing poor call quality.

Put one deployment together from design to support. You plan the architecture, build the dial plan, connect the edge, add cloud services and quality controls, and test it with real call scenarios.

• Designing the architecture and numbering
• Building routing, voicemail and the edge
• Adding cloud calling and meetings
• Applying QoS and security
• Running acceptance tests and handing over

You build A complete multi-site collaboration deployment, with test calls and a handover pack.