Lync Server Best Practices

Best Practices for Lync Server 2013 Standard Edition Front End on Windows 2012.

Below are the step by step instructions to install/Configure Lync Server 2013 Standard Edition Front End on Windows Server 2012.

Here is an outline of what we will do:

  1. Prepare Servers
  2. Install Lync Server 2013
  3. Prepare Active Directory
  4. Prepare First Server
  5. Configure DNS
  6. Build Topology
  7. Install Lync Server System
  8. Add & Enable AD Users
  9. Login to Lync 2013

Some prerequisites for you Lync system:

We will require 1 AD Server O/S and 1 Lync Server O/S
Lync requires 64bit O/S
We are using Windows Server 2012 64bit

But Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 should work fine as well.
Make Sure we have the below roles running on our AD Server

AD-DS (Directory Services)
DNS
AD-CS (Certificate Authority)

Server Requirements
Front End server must be joined to domain
FE must have UI installed
Install Silverlight (will save time later)
Front End Must have these Features

Roles
Web Server (IIS)

Features
Message Queuing | Message Queuing Services
Remote Server Administration Tools | Role Administration Tools | AD DS and AD LDS Tools
User Interfaces and Infrastructure | Desktop Experience

  • Windows Identity Foundation 3.5
  • .NET Framework 3.5 Features
  • .NET Framework 3.5
  • HTTP Activation (Important!)
  • Non-HTTP Activation
  • .NET Framework 4.5 (all options)

Roles

  • Web Server (IIS)

Role Services
Common Http Features Installed

  • Static
  • Default doc
  • Https errors

Health and Diagnostics

  • Http logging
  • Logging Tools
  • Tracing

Performance

  • Static Content Compression
  • Dynamics Content Compression

Security

  • Request Filtering
  • Client Cert Mapping Authentication
  • Windows Authentication

Management Tools

  • IIS Mgt Console
  • IIS mgt Scripts and Tools

Application Development

  • ASP.NET 3.5
  • ASP.NET 4.5
  • .NET extensibility 3.5
  • .NET extensibility 4.5
  • ISAPI extensions
  • ISAPI Filters

Steps:

Run the setup for Lync server 2013 and it will ask you to install Visual C++ once done open Lync Server Deployment Wizard-

Prepare Active Directory (As noted in prerequisites, you will need AD DS and AD LDS Tools Feature installed on your Front End to complete this step):

  1. Prepare Schema
  2. Prepare Forest
  3. Prepare Domain

And add the Administrator to CSAdministrator group.

Prepare first Standard Edition server:

  1. SQL Server 2008 Express Edition will be installed
  2. RTC databases will be created and populated
  3. Lync Server installation files will be put in place

Configure DNS Records for your Lync Front End Server (From AD DNS Manager).
Open Lync Server Topology Builder and start build new topology for Lync Server, Setup the FQDN for Front End tool.

  1. Conferencing
  2. Enterprise Voice
  3. CAC (Call Admission Control)

Create the Lync file store share and assign the permission for following groups and follow the instructions during setup

  1. RTCHS Universal Services
  2. RTC Component Universal Services
  3. RTC Universal Server Admins
  4. RTC Universal Config Replicator

Once topology configuration done open the properties “Administrative access URL” and define the Admin URL.

Now we will install some Lync Server System components, put Certs in place and Start Services: Install RtcLocal database
Install Speechfiles, etc.
Setup Certs
Start Lync Services and After services are started you can open the Services to verify all the Lync Services are running properly.

Open the Lync Server Control (you will be asked to type in Administrator credentials. If this is new server you will also be asked to install Silverlight.)

Add and Enable AD Users

Next, we will move to our AD server and add several users to Active Directory (I suggest for your first test users to NOT use the Administrator, but 3 other users). In our case I added:

Test1@domain.local
test2@domain.local
test3@domain.local

Now back to Lync Server Control Panel. Click on User | Enable Users. Now click the “Add” button and Add the 3 users.

Click “Enable” and if you get no errors, you should have 3 Lync users ready to login. Let’s open Lync 2013 and login!

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