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Managing Conversations and Conferences

Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 and Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 R2 will reach end of support on January 9, 2018. To stay supported, you will need to upgrade. For more information, see Resources to help you upgrade your Office 2007 servers and clients.

A conversation is a peer-to-peer instant message session between two (only) participants. A conference is a multiparty, SIP-signaling conversation centrally controlled by a multipoint control unit (MCU). Usually, an instant message session with more than two participants is a conference.

You can start a conversation or conference and you can manage existing conversations from the Conversation window using two menus. From the Invite menu, accessible from the Invite button, you can:

  • Invite Someone

  • Lock this conversation

The Participant menu options, available by right-clicking the participant's name in the Conversation window, depend upon the following:

  • Your role in the conversation/conference

  • The role of the participant, which you right-clicked to get the menu

  • Your level of access

  • The participants level of access

  • The number of participants

Depending on the previous items, you can use this menu to perform the following actions on the participant that you right-clicked:

  • Invite to New Conversation

  • Remove from Conversation

  • Invite to Conference

  • Make Leader

  • Remove from Conference

The next figures show these two menus.

Figure 7: Invite menu

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Figure 8: Participant menu

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While you are participating in a peer-to-peer instant message conversation, you can invite one or more people to join. Three or more participants are classified as a conference. You can invite up to 32 people to the same instant message conference.

A conference distinguishes between a conference leader and the two or more conference participants. The leader has additional functionality in addition to the functionality that participants have. Any participant in a conference, including the leader, can invite one of the other participants or leader to a separate conversation.

The person who initially adds the third person is the leader. If a participant leaves a three-party conference, conversation functionality is restored. If the leader leaves a four-party conference, the leader must promote a participant to a leader, or there will be no leader among the remaining participants.

The leader, of which there can be more than one in a conference, has the following additional functionality:

  • Lock a conference to other participants

  • Remove a participant

  • Promote a participant as the leader

To add participants to an existing conversation or conference

  1. In the Conversation window, click Invite to display the Invite Someone page.

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  2. On the Invite Someone page, do one of the following:

    • Click the name of the contact that you want to add to the conversation, and then click OK.

    • In the Search box, type the person's display name or sign-in name, and then press the ENTER key. In the results list, click the person's name, and then click OK.

      Note

      When there are many participants, it can take time for everyone to be added to the conversation, because each person on the list must accept, decline, or ignore the invitation before the next invitation can be delivered. After a short period of time, if someone has not responded, the invitation will be automatically accepted.

To lock a conversation or conference

  1. At the top of the Conversation window, click the arrow next to Invite.

  2. Click Lock this conversation.

To remove a participant

  1. Right-click the participant that you want to remove.

  2. Click Remove from conversation.

    The participant can join the meeting again, unless the conference is locked.

To promote a participant

  1. Right-click the participant that you want to promote.

  2. Click Make Leader.