In Exchange 2010, the Unified Messaging server role allows UM-enabled users to create and customize personal auto attendants to enhance the call answering experience of their callers. When a user is UM-enabled, no personal auto attendant is created. Instead, the existing Exchange 2010 voice mail remains the default call answering behavior. However, users can create up to nine personal auto attendants.

A personal auto attendant is similar to the Exchange Server 2007 UM auto attendant (AA) feature. There is usually a greeting, menu prompt, and a list of options to choose from. The key difference is in the context of the call. When the personal auto attendant answers the incoming call, Unified Messaging already knows who the call is for. This shows that the feature set required for personal auto attendants is different from that of the auto attendants.

Using a personal auto attendant, a caller can:

• Leave a voice message for the UM-enabled user.
  
• Transfer to an alternate contact of the UM-enabled user.
  
• Transfer to an alternate contact's voice mail of the UM-enabled user.
  
• Transfer to other phone numbers that the UM-enabled user has configured.
  
• Use the Find-Me feature or locate the UM-enabled user via a supervised transfer.
  

In Exchange 2007, each UM language pack included a Text-to-Speech (TTS) engine and the prerecorded prompts for a specified language. UM language packs for Exchange 2007 are offered in 16 different languages, and all 16 language packs are included on the Exchange 2007 DVD. However, not all the UM language packs contain support for Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR). For ASR, there was only one language—US English.

For Exchange 2010, all available language packs contain ASR support. Currently, there are plans to have 16 language packs available with the RTM version and each of them will contain support for ASR. For this release of the product, however, the German, Mexican Spanish, Japanese and Canadian French language packs are included along with US-English. 

In Exchange 2007 Unified Messaging, a voice message is created after answering a call that was diverted to a Unified Messaging server because of a ring-no-answer or busy condition. After the call is answered, Exchange 2007 Unified Messaging tries to resolve the caller ID. It does this so that it can insert a name, rather than a number, into the sender information.

In Exchange 2007, name lookups for voice mail messages are done using information about the caller that is in the same dial plan as the user being called, using an Exchange Unified Messaging proxy address (EUM proxy address), from the personal contacts of the user receiving the call, or using the msRTCSIP-Line attribute in Active Directory if Service Pack 1 (SP1) for Exchange 2007 is installed and Exchange 2007 is integrated with Office Communications Server 2007.

In Exchange 2010, the name lookup methods are different from what was used in Exchange 2007. You can use the following steps to look up a name from the calling party's information:

1. Use the callers' name if they are logged on to their mailbox from Outlook Voice Access or if they use a Unified Communications client such as Office Communicator 2007 or Office Communicator Phone Edition to place the call. The callers' identity is known because they have been authenticated when they use Outlook Voice Access, Office Communicator 2007 or Office Communicator Phone Edition.
   
2. Use the EUM proxy addresses in Active Directory. If the proxy address contains an at sign (@), it is considered to be a Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) Uniform Resource Identifier (URI). If the proxy address begins with a plus sign (+), it is assumed to be an E.164 number. If neither of these is present, it is considered to be an extension within the same dial plan as the called party or an equivalent dial plan.
   
3. If the caller ID is a valid SIP URI, use Active Directory to resolve the SIP URI using the EUM proxy addresses.
   
4. If the caller ID is a valid E.164 number, use Active Directory to resolve the number to the calling party's name. For this to work correctly, you must manually configure the UMCallingLineIds parameter on the UM-enabled mailbox for a user. This is useful in situations when you do not want to publish a telephone number such as a personal cell phone number in Active Directory, but still want to resolve the calling party's name by using this phone number.
   
5. Use Active Directory heuristic matching, if it is enabled, to resolve the number to the calling party's name. Active Directory heuristic matching must be enabled on the dial plan, and the user's account in Active Directory must contain information such as telephone numbers, including home number or mobile number for this to work properly.
   
6. Use the personal Contacts of the called party to resolve the number to the calling party's name.
   
7. If the calling party's name is not resolved using one the methods described previously, the phone is used in the voice mail message.
   

In Exchange 2010, the Unified Messaging role uses ASR on newly created voice messages. When users receive a voice mail, they receive a message that contains not just a recording, but also text that has been created from the voice recording. Users see the voice mail text displayed in the e-mail message from within Outlook Web App, Outlook 2007, or the next version of Outlook.

Message Waiting Indicator is a feature found in most legacy voice mail systems and can refer to any mechanism that indicates the existence of a new message. However, in Exchange 2007, this functionality was provided by a third-party application, which indicated receipt of a new voice mail by lighting the lamp on the desk phone. This feature has been added to Exchange 2010, and third-party software is not needed. Enabling or disabling Message Waiting Indicator is done on the user's mailbox or on a UM mailbox policy.

When users are members of a hosted or consumer dial plan, and they configure their voice mail settings with their cell phone number and configure call forwarding, both missed call and new voice mail notifications can be configured to be sent to the users' cell phones using Short Messaging Service (SMS) or text messaging. However, for missed call and voice mail notifications to be sent to users, users must configure text messaging and also enable the missed call and voice messages setting on their account.

Protected voice mail is a function of Unified Messaging so that users can send private mail. This mail is protected by Microsoft Rights Management Services (RMS), and is restricted to forwarding, copying, or extracting the voice file from mail. It increases the confidentiality of Unified Messaging, and users can rely on Unified Messaging if they want to limit the audience. This functionality is similar to handling private e-mail messages, but in Exchange 2010, this also applies to voice mail messages.

A set of built-in roles to manage Unified Messaging and voice mail features has been defined within Exchange 2010. There were administrative roles that were included in Exchange 2007 but in addition to these, there are UM specific administrative roles that were added:

• On-Premise Administrator UM Roles:
  
  • Unified Messaging Management
    
  • Unified Messaging Prompt Management
    
  • Unified Messaging Recipient Management
    
• Tenant Administrator UM Roles:
  
  • Unified Messaging Management - Tenant
    
  • Unified Messaging Prompt Management - Tenant
    
  • Recipient Management - Tenant