Federation Tab

Note: Federation is not supported for MiCollab deployments in MiCloud Flex on GCP (Google Cloud Platform) environment.

The Federation tab allows you to configure IM and presence federation. IM and Presence Federation provides a communication path between a single MiCollab Client Service and one or more IM servers for the purpose of providing extended IM capabilities to MiCollab Client users. The communication path between the servers uses the Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol (XMPP).

The customer must install the IM server and deploy the XMPP gateway provided with the server to federate with MiCollab Client Service. Refer to the IM server documentation for instructions about configuring federation.

Note: You can also configure federation for an external IM server from the Peer Server Details page. After adding the server and performing a synchronization with the server's AD/LDAP database, the IM server contacts are imported to the MiCollab Client Service database (visible from the Corporate Directory tab) and federation is automatically enabled.

When a MiCollab Client Service and IM server are configured for federation, MiCollab Client users are provided with IM presence information and the ability to chat with IM contacts using the Desktop Client's Chat window.

When you configure federation from the Federation tab, instruct users to manually add federated contacts to the Desktop Client. Users should create a new personal contact, and then add the IM login information (for example, john_smith@ocs.com) for the contact using the MiCollab Client Login option.

Note: For MiCollab Client v4.0, IM server support is limited to Microsoft Office Communicator Server (OCS) and IBM Lotus Sametime Server. For MiCollab Client v6.0, NextPlane Federation is supported.

In addition, for MiCollab Client v6.0, federation with MBG in the network path between MiCollab Client Service and the federated server (Skype for Business, IBM Sametime) is supported. This is accomplished by adding MBG connector for TCP port 5269 in MBG v8.0.

To configure federation with an external IM server:
  1. Configure the external IM server for federation. Refer to the IM server documentation for instructions.
  2. On the Federation tab, click Enable Federation. This configures the embedded XMPP MiCollab Client Service for federation.
  3. Add the external IM server to the Federated Servers table.
    1. Click Add Server. A server entry is added to the Federated Servers table.

    2. Double-click Enter domain. An editable text box appears.

    3. Type the domain for the IM server (for example, ocs.com).

    Perform these additional steps if adding a NextPlane server:
    1. Select checkbox NextPlane.

    2. Double-click Enter server. An editable text box appears.

    3. Double-click Port. An editable text box appears.

  4. Click Apply to save the information, or click Reset to clear your changes.
You can also complete the following tasks from the Federation tab:
  • Click the Disable Federation button to disable federation on the MiCollab Client Service .

  • Click the Delete Server link to delete an IM server from the Federated Servers table.