Introduction
This document describes the General System Requirements and TCP Ports required to fully operate an instance of the Variphy Cloud Collector VM.
Due to the API’s from Cisco, the features of Variphy Insight rely on different connectivity and authentication requirements when supporting Cisco Communications Manager (CUCM), Cisco Unity Connection (CUC), and Cisco Unified Contact Center Express (UCCX).
Further information about the installation and configuration of Variphy Insight can be found online in our User Guides Section.
This version of Variphy Insight is designed to integrate with the following Cisco Unified Communications/Collaboration products and versions:
Cisco Unified Communications Manager (CUCM) : Versions 10.x through 14
Cisco Unity Connection (CUC): Version 8.6.1 through 14
Cisco Unified Contact Center Express (UCCX): Versions 8.5 through 12.5.x
This document assumes that Variphy will be installed in a “stand-alone” function, i.e. it will reside on an operating system and be the primary application running.
While Variphy can coexist with other applications running simultaneously in the same operating system, there may be port conflicts from previously installed applications that are running. Variphy’s default ports can be easily changed during the installation. However, for best performance, we strongly recommend that Variphy be installed on a standalone system.
CUCM Billing Application Server
Access to the CDR files and their data can be made possible by configuring what’s referred to as a ‘Billing Server’ in Cisco UCM. A Billing Server is simply a remote computer or server running a (S)FTP server. Once a Billing Server (consisting of host name/IP address, file transfer protocol, login credentials, and directory path location) has been successfully added in UCM, CDR files can be automatically sent, via (S)FTP, to the Billing Server(s).
Once the (S)FTP communication has been established from the CUCM Billing Server to the Variphy server, CDR files will be uploaded regularly as set by the Enterprise Parameter, CDR File Time Interval. By default, this is set to 1 minute, which means a new CDR file is created every minute for all calls ending within that minute and is subject to the automatic (S)FTP transfer to the Billing Server(s).
(S)FTP Application
Linux OVA: Variphy embeds the open source platform, OpenSSH, into the distributed OVA.
Windows: For the use of Call Analytics a (S)FTP server will be required to collect CDR files from CUCM. It is the customers responsibility to obtain a suitable FTP/(S)FTP server application to be installed co-resident with the Variphy application. Popular zero-cost (S)FTP server options include FileZilla Server, WinSCP, or SolarWinds.
Database Application (Hybrid Processing Only)
A database application, MySQL or Microsoft SQL, will only be needed if you choose to use the Variphy Collector in hybrid mode. Hybrid Mode entails the processing of data both to your dedicated Google namespace and simultaneously processing data to a local database instance.
Linux OVA: Variphy utilizes a pre-installed/configured instance of an open source database platform within the distributed OVA. An external database application will not be needed unless desired.
Windows: For the use of Call Analytics a database will be built in your preferred MySQL or Microsoft SQL instance. These application will need to be downloaded and configured manually. Variphy does not
MySQL – https://dev.mysql.com/downloads/windows/installer/
Microsoft SQL Express – https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=55994
Variphy is currently supported on the following platforms
Hardware Platform: Physical or Virtual Machine. A VM is strongly preferred for ease of scalability. We currently support either Windows or Linux for Variphy Enterprise server builds. Linux, Windows, or Mac OS are supported for Variphy Professional license builds.
Supported Operating Systems and VM Platforms
Windows Server Enterprise Edition version 2008 R2 and later: This can be installed on standalone hardware, VMware, Azure, Hyper-V, or AWS. The Variphy application is host agnostic – as long as the windows server VM is compatible with a given host, the Variphy software will be also.
Variphy Linux OVA: We currently provide an Ubuntu 18.04 OVA appliance package that is easily deployed in your VSphere environment (supported on VSphere 5.0 – 7.0). It comes with Variphy, SFTP, and open source database platform pre-installed, ensuring significantly faster deployment time than on a Windows server.
If you will be using Call Analytics (CDR) reporting, then Insight, FTP server, and SQL server components are required. Installation to a dedicated server is highly recommended. If only using features other than CDR Analytics reporting, only the Insight application is required, and can be installed to any supported platform with significantly less system resources.
Variphy Data Types Requiring Storage/Memory
CDR Records : For each on-net (internal extension to extension) and off-net/PSTN call, 1 CDR record will exist in the system (and 1 CMR record if Call Diagnostics is also enabled). Calls that are forwarded, transferred, diverted, or joined to a conference bridge will create additional call records. While these records can all be linked by the call’s Global Call ID number, single call flow can produce several CDR records, one for each leg of the call.
For a data retention policy (e.g. 1, 3, or 6 months), it’s important to calculate the total number of CDR records that will exist in the system, for all on-net and off-net/PSTN calls. For example, For a 3 month CDR data retention policy and a total of 150,000 calls (both on-net and off-net/PSTN) per month, the system must be capable of storing a minimum of 450,000 CDRs.
Snapshot: Each historical CUCM, Unity Connection, UCCX, or Unity Cluster snapshot stored in the system. The actual size of each snapshot will vary, depending on the size of the Cluster, but they typically do not exceed 200MB.
For example, in an installation containing 1 CUCM, 1 Unity Connection, and 1 UCCX Cluster, if snapshots are scheduled to be generated daily (7 days/week) and 1 week of snapshots should be retained, then a total capacity of at least 21 snapshots will need to be stored on the Variphy Collector’s file system.
Please Note: These “snapshots” are merely informational and are pulled from Cisco clusters as read-only data for reporting purposes only. They can not be used to restore or revert a Cisco cluster configuration, as with a VM snapshot.
Audit Log Files: Each CUCM, Unity Connection, or UCCX Audit Log file from Cisco’s Real Time Monitoring Tool (RTMT) can be stored on the Variphy Server for easier access and searching. These files can be downloaded from RTMT and imported into Variphy either “on demand” or on an FTP download schedule within RTMT. Once the logs are imported, they can be searched by keyword, user id, user IP address, or event type.
By default in CUCM/Unity Connection/UCCX, each Audit Log File is 2MB in size. The time period covered by each Audit Log File will largely depend on the number of administrative moves, adds, changes, and deletes in CUCM/Unity Connection. The more administrative events, the smaller time frame each Audit Log File will span.
Server Requirements
The following “System Profiles” represent common system configurations showing the recommended data capacities for Variphy Insight. Please note that these guidelines are estimates, as your precise data sizes and storage requirements will vary depending on the number and size of your clusters, devices, call volume, and which features of Variphy you are actively using.
Please note that while the recommended memory allocation for Variphy Insight is 16G, it should be able to run on a minimum of 8GB in Standard deployments. However, you should expect to upscale system resources should your call volume or data retention needs increase.
System Profile Type: Standard
| Available System RAM | 8+ GB | CDR Publishing ONLY | |
| Available Hard Disk Space | 60 GB | ||
| Variphy Data Type | Capacity | Est. Total Size | Est. RAM Use |
| CDR Records | 5,000,000 | 10 GB | 5.5 GB |
| Available System RAM | 16+ GB for CDR Publishing and other features | ||
| Available Hard Disk Space | 100 GB | ||
| Variphy Data Type | Capacity | Est. Total Size | Est. RAM Use |
| Snapshots | 90 | 36 GB | – |
| CDR Records | 5,000,000 | 10 GB | 5.5 GB |
| Audit Log Files | 250 | 500 MB | – |
Network Port Requirements
| TCP Port | Description | Destination | Variphy Feature |
|---|---|---|---|
| 21 | FTP | Variphy Collector | Variphy Cloud, Log-Analysis |
| 22 | SFTP | Variphy Collector | Variphy Cloud, Log-Analysis |
| 1433 | Default Microsoft SQL Server TCP Port (Only if Hybrid Processing is enabled) | Server Running Microsoft SQL | Variphy On-Prem Call Usage |
| 3306 | Default MySQL TCP Port (Only if Hybrid Processing is enabled) | Server Running MySQL | Variphy On-Prem Call Usage |
| TCP Port | Description | Destination | Variphy Feature |
|---|---|---|---|
| 8005 | Service Shutdown/Startup Port | Variphy Collector | Variphy Collector |
| 9001 | Service Shutdown/Startup Port | Variphy Collector | HSQLDB |
| 8080 | Default HTTP Port | Variphy Collector | Variphy Collector |
| 8443 | Default HTTPS Port | Variphy Collector | Variphy Collector |
| 9002 | Service Shutdown/Startup Port | Variphy Collector | Variphy Collector |
| TCP Port | Description | Destination | Variphy Feature |
|---|---|---|---|
| 80 | HTTP | Cisco IP Phones | Remote Phone Control, As-Built Reporting, Snapshots, Compare |
| 443 | HTTPS | IP Phones | Remote Phone Control, As-Built Reporting, Snapshots, Compare |
| 8443 | CUCM AXL | CUCM Servers | Call Analytics, Remote Phone Control, Macro, As-Built Reporting, Snapshots, Compare |
| TCP Port | Description | Destination | Variphy Feature |
|---|---|---|---|
| 8443 | Cisco Unity Connection | Cisco Unity Connection Server(s) | As-Built Reporting, Snapshots, Compare |
| TCP Port | Description | Destination | Variphy Feature |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1504 | Cisco UCCX Historical Reporting | Cisco UCCX Server(s) | As-Built Reporting, Snapshots, Compare |
| 5223 | Cisco UCCX XMPP Subscription | Cisco UCCX Finesse Server | UCCX Call Analytics/ Wallboard |
| TCP Port | Description | Destination | Variphy Feature |
|---|---|---|---|
| 443 | TLS – Schema Registry | GCP | Call Analytics |
| 9092 | SSL – CDR, CMR, Sync Data Publishing | Confluent/Kafka | Call Analytics |
Architecture
Orange boxes indicate outbound connections from the Variphy On-Prem Collector, an on-premise, lightweight, VM that collects raw data from CUCM clusters. It also performs AXL queries to local CUCM clusters and publishes all of its contents up to Variphy Cloud.
- Variphy On-Prem Collector pushes collected data (CDR, CMR, and AXL info) to Confluent Cloud via port 9092 to 35.247.67.244.
- Confluent Cloud utilizes Apache Kafka, a distributed streaming system used to stream and process large amounts of data at scale.
- Nginx Reverse Proxy is responsible for handling request headers and fined-tuned buffering of responses. It acts as a schema registry to Confluent Cloud and ensures that the data being presented is tied to the namespace configured. This is all managed through the provided license key and ensures that the data coming from that instance of the Variphy On-Prem Collector is going to the correct destination.
- Data exits the Confluent Cloud cluster (dedicated to each customer) and enters GKE where we have numerous pods set up on each namespace.
- The CDR Processing Agent pod handles the parsing and publishing of CDR, CMR, and AXL data to the Percona database.
- Percona CDR Database is where all the call data, qos data, and CUCM AXL info is stored for the query.
- Percona Config Database is where all the configurations made within the app are stored and read from.
- This is all accessed by a dedicated Variphy App service that reads contents from both Percona databases (CDR and Config)
- The Variphy Application is accessed over the web on HTTPS 443 via https://customer.variphy.cloud. This is the front end to all the subservices mentioned above on the backend.
- The Variphy Application is built with a SendGrid SMTP default SMTP server. This is used to deliver call reports to your user base via email. Reports will be sent with a cloud-no-reply@variphy.com sender address.
Installation Packages
All of our current software builds can be downloaded from http://variphy.com/support/download. There are currently installation/upgrade packages for all of the supported OS platforms, as well as a complete Linux OVA appliance using Ubuntu server that can be deployed in your VSphere environment.
If you are planning on deploying Variphy Insight on Linux, use of our OVA is highly recommended, as it is already optimized for use with Variphy, and requires significantly less deployment configuration than a manual install. If you have special requirements which dictate that you use your own Linux server build, please consult with our support team prior to attempting installation.
A current registration with our website is required to access the downloads section. If you don’t yet have an account, you can contact us for your account number and register your account at https://www.variphy.com/support/register. This will require a customer account number, which your account manager or support team can provide.
If you have additional questions or would like assistance with the installation, please submit a request to support@variphy.com. Please note that our normal support hours are Monday through Friday, 7:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. Pacific Time, excluding US holidays. After-hours support may be arranged with advanced notice.
