I typically refrain from blogging product update news, but that’s really more of a guideline than a rule. Specifically, there have been some recent changes to the attendant console product line from Cisco (ARC OEM) that look to bridge the feature gap between it and the legacy attendant console as well as quell some concerns a number of other areas.

Most notable of these changes are:

1) Session based licensing – Better known as concurrent user licensing, this change brings the attendant console product line back in line with most other Cisco collaboration products. This has long been asked for and well most certainly ease budget concerns for customers who have a number of people who could be managing a call queue at any one time.

2) Forced Delivery – This feature will have the attendants phone actually ring in lieu of the previous behavior of the console ringing first and the call being delivered to the IP phone after accepting the call. When compared to the legacy attendant console package, this behavior generates most of the complaints regarding difference in functionality.

3) Personal Directory Groups – Yet another feature that has been sorely missed for users who grew up on the legacy attendant console.

To round out the list, some other enhancements included in this release are music in queue, wait time overflow, and some additional search functionality, UC on UCS certification.