Polycom 3725-76302-001LI manual Administrator Responsibilities, Administrative Best Practices

DMA Operations Guide Management and Maintenance Overview

Administrator Responsibilities

As a Polycom DMA system administrator, you’re responsible for the installation and ongoing maintenance of the system. You should be familiar with the following configurations, tasks, and operations:

•Installing licenses when the system is first installed and when additional call capacity is added. See “Licenses” on page 70.

•Monitoring system health and performing the recommended regular maintenance. See “Recommended Regular Maintenance” on page 349.

•Using the system tools provided to aid with system and network diagnostics, monitoring, and troubleshooting. See “Troubleshooting Utilities” on page 380. Should the need arise, Polycom Global Services personnel may ask you to run these tools.

•Upgrading the system when upgrades/patches are made available. See “Upgrading the Software” on page 388.

Administrative Best Practices

The following are some of our recommendations for administrative best practices:

•Perform the recommended regular maintenance.

•Except in emergencies or when instructed to by Polycom Global Services personnel, don’t reconfigure, install an upgrade, or restore a backup when there are active calls and conferences on the system. Many of these operations will require a system restart to complete, which will result in these calls and conferences being dropped. Before performing these operations, busy out all MCUs and wait for all conferencing activity to cease.

•Before you reconfigure, install an upgrade, or restore a backup, manually create a new backup. Then download and archive this backup in the event that something unforeseen occurs and it becomes necessary to restore the system to a known good state.

•For proper name resolution and smooth network operations, configure two or more DNS servers in your network configuration (see “Network Settings” on page 64). This allows the Polycom DMA system to function properly in the event of a single external DNS failure.

•Configure at least one NTP server in your time configuration (see “Time Settings” on page 69) and preferably three. Proper time management helps ensure that your cluster operates efficiently and helps in diagnosing any issues that may arise in the future. Proper system time is also essential for accurate audit and CDR data.

•Unless otherwise instructed by Polycom Global Services, always use the High Security setting. See “Security Settings” on page 48.

348 Polycom, Inc.