Microsoft Lync 2013 Presence not showing in Outlook when using Exchange 2010

Finally I have found some time to write this up, I have not seen much information about this particular problem which you may come across if you deploy Lync Server 2013 in a scenario where by you do not have an Exchange 2013 Environment. If you are using a Previous Version such as Exchange 2010 then you may find that your users do not see any user presence displayed within the Outlook 2007 / Outlook 2010 or Outlook 2013 client.

This is because by Default Lync Server 2013 is configured to store this information in a Unified Contact Store, The unified contact store was introduced in Microsoft Lync Server 2013 which gives administrators the option of storing a user's contacts in Microsoft Exchange Server 2013 instead of in Lync Server and such feature only works with Exchange 2013.  So if you are using Exchange Server 2010 of Previous Versions then it is important that before you enable any users for Lync that you disable this setting by using the following powershell command:

Set-CsUserServicesPolicy -Identity global -UcsAllowed $False

This will disable the Unified Contact Store Feature globally, and so by doing this Lync 2013 will store such information in the RTCDyn Database.

If you are deploying Lync 2013 in a deployment where by you have users who reside on Exchange 2010 & Exchange 2013 then you need to ensure that all users whom have Exchange 2010 mailboxes store there presence information in the Lync Server Database. This would mean you could turn off  Unified Contact Store Globally, but if you have users who reside on Exchange 2013 then you can go ahead and enable them for UCS on a per user basis. You can do this by using the following Powershell Command.

New-CsUserServicesPolicy -Identity "<UCSAllowPolicy>" -UcsAllowed $True
Grant-CsUserServicesPolicy -Identity "<James Evans>" -PolicyName <"UcsAllowed">

or if you have your users split across multiple sites, and this is reflected in the way you are migrating from a previous version of Exchange to Exchange 2013 then you could do it at site level.

New-CsUserServicesPolicy -Identity site:Birmingham -UcsAllowed $True

If you were not to know about this information, you may have already enabled some users for testing and so if you need to disable UCs for these particular users then you to rollback the change from UCS to Lync Server Database Store. You can do this by running the following powershell command.

Invoke-CsUcsRollback -Identity "James Evans"

You can add -Force to this command but it is not recommend as the user may loose contact list information.

You may have enabled quite a few users already and if so then don't worry if all of your users are on Exchange 2010 then issue the command for the entire pool

Get-CsUser -Filter {RegistrarPool -eq "pool1.domain.co.uk"} | Invoke-CsUcsRollback -Confirm:$False

Note: If you do not change the user services policy then, after a 7-day waiting period, the user's contacts will automatically be moved back into the unified contact store.

Now If you at a later date decide to implement Exchange 2013 or move users to Exchange 2013 then you can re-enable the Unified Contact Store by ensuring that the User Services Policy is updated and assigned to that user. This will then use the UCS as oppose to Lync Server 2010.

If you have problems with the rollback then i would recommend, Remove the user from Lync Server 2013 and then after around 15 minutes Re-Enabling this user. If you Re-Enable this user ensure that they have the correct User Services Policy Assigned, Or if it is turned off completely then you won't have any problems and the user account will store the information on Lync Server.

If you are troubleshooting this issue from a client, view the configuration information of the client. (Right Click on Lync Client Icon in Task Bar > Select Configuration Information)

User with Unified Contact Store Enabled:  

 

User with Unified Contact Store Disabled:  

 

 

I hope this helps,

Cheers,

James.