IBM Sametime platform for unified communications and collaboration

The IBM Sametime® software communications and collaboration platform provides a unified user experience across a broad set of real-time collaboration capabilities.

You can extend these capabilities with offerings from IBM Business Partners or your own content and applications. You can also embed these Sametime capabilities through your desktop or web application.

This means that people switch context less often and can collaborate more efficiently and effectively—using the best methods for the task at hand.

Communications-enabled business processes (CEBP)

Sametime provides flexible, open-standards-based tools to help developers provide Sametime services into business processes. The robust software developer kit (SDK) features Web 2.0 and Eclipse-based rich-client APIs. See these solution catalogs:

• Solutions Catalog for IBM Sametime

• Global Solutions Directory (Search on "unified communications".)

Sametime integrates with many productivity and collaborative applications, including IBM WebSphere® Portal, IBM Lotus Notes®, IBM Lotus® Quickr™, IBM Connections, Microsoft® Office, Microsoft Outlook, and Microsoft SharePoint software. See the Sametime application integration page for more information.

Cost-effective, security-rich UC deployments

Sametime provides a first class, consistent user experience across many desktop operating systems and mobile devices. It supports multiple server, email platforms and directories, so you don't have to rip and replace.

Sametime is designed to minimize your costs and speed your time to value by leveraging your existing investment in hardware, software, and training. Sametime software provides:

• Scalability. Start small and grow cost effectively. Our clients support as many as 400,000 users with only a handful of servers.

• Security features. Sametime software offers robust security features for authentication and encryption of instant messaging and online meetings.

• Flexibility. Sametime software's componentized architecture delivers services that can be selectively combined, distributed, and clustered, as needed.

• Centralized management console. Plan, deploy, and manage the Sametime environment from a single dashboard.

• Rich policy-based controls. Policies allow administrators to control their user environment from the Sametime System Console. IBM Sametime software provides the ability to activate Sametime Unified Telephony features through policy to simply Sametime client deployment.

Support for a wide variety of environments

Sametime support for major server and client operating systems, directories, email and productivity applications, portals, and social networking platforms aligns with your IT strategy and helps protect your existing investments.

• IBM System z® support: Sametime software is available for Linux® on IBM System z for the following servers: community, meetings, proxy and system console. You can deploy Sametime capabilities that are not supported on System z, including advanced community services, audio/video, and unified telephony, on another platform and still provide a seamless end user experience.

• Sametime 8.5.2 software adds support for Microsoft Windows 2008 R2 and Novell SLES 11 servers.

• Zero-download-browser chat and meeting clients make it easier to support resource constrained environments.

• Desktop and mobile clients support major operating systems.

See Sametime system requirements for details.

Support for audio & video

• Conferencing Interoperability. Audio/video is based on the industry-standard Session Initiation Protocol (SIP), improving interoperability with third-party audio/video conferencing systems.

• Policies. Policy-based controls over the video experience (size, bitrate, and quality).

• Quality. High quality, low bandwidth codecs provide an optimal audio and video desktop experience.

• Bandwidth Manager. Administrators can set set bandwidth limits and call rate policies to control bandwidth based on classes of user and/or location. This makes rich media collaboration with audio and video feasible for mission-critical applications while helping preserve network integrity.

• Video security features. Native Secure Real-time Transport Protocol (SRTP) security support for multiperson video chats and meetings with Sametime 8.5.2 IFR 1 software.

Standards-based telephony integration

With IBM Sametime Unified Telephony software, Sametime also provides telephony integration through a middleware layer that by provides connectivity to multiple telephone systems.

The software connects trhough Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) to SIP-compliant PBXs from multiple vendors using SIP, and it connects to legacy TDM phone systems through SIP gateways.

Sametime server administration:

• New server-side administrative tools for managing preferences and policies.

• Improved capabilities for propagating updates to clients, including the ability to restart clients automatically.

• Simplified LDAP configuration and improved federation of LDAP nodes during installation.

• New administrator rights (in addition to room owners) for deleting meeting rooms.

• New Sametime System Console features, including installation of federated deployment managers for Sametime Meetings.

Related product: Tivoli Composite Application Manager for Applications

The IBM Tivoli® monitoring product, IBM Tivoli Composite Application Manager for Applications, can help ensure high performance and availability of IBM Sametime software. For information, visit the Tivoli Composite Application Manager for Applications page .