Cisco Cisco Customer Voice Portal 8.0(1) User Guide

call starts and ends. An administrator experiencing some sessions timing out may choose to
increase this attribute to see if it resolves the issue and if not, should look into network issues.
The administrator should be careful not to set this value too small a number because there is a
risk that a normal call could time out due to the caller visiting a particularly large VoiceXML
page or taking their time entering a long DTMF input. Too large a number will mean that sessions
that are no longer valid will remain in memory longer and the administrator would not be able
to see which sessions are timed out until the timeout period elapsed.

An administrator may choose to change the suspended audio file at runtime if the application
needed to be suspended due to a specific reason. For example, if a weather event required an
application to be suspended, the administrator could point the suspended audio message to a
recording explaining why the application is suspended rather then just pointing to a generic
message. The administrator is taking advantage of the fact that this change is not persisted since
it is expected that the event that caused the application’s suspension is temporary.

Administration Functions

VXML Server exposes several functions that allow an administrator to make both small and
large changes to the applications and VXML Server at runtime. They are divided into two
categories: those that affect a specific application and those that affect all applications running
on VXML Server. An administrator can use the JMX interface as well as administration scripts
to execute these functions.

Each administrator function, when activated, prompts VXML Server to send a logger event
reporting the function and its result so that any loggers listening to these events can log the
information. The logs will then maintain a history of administration activity that can be analyzed
later.

Administrator functions include the ability to add, update, and remove applications as well as
suspend both an application and VXML Server itself. This section describes all functions
available.

Graceful Administration Activity

Administration functions are used primarily to alter an application, whether it be to update its
contents or suspend its activity. Whenever changes are made to a live system handling callers,
a concern is how these changes affect live callers. A robust, reliable system should strive for
maximum uptime and minimal disruptions of live calls, and VXML Server does this by
implementing a graceful process for managing changes.

In the graceful process, existing callers continue to experience the application as it existed before
the change, while new callers experience the change. Only after all existing callers have naturally
ended their calls will the change apply to all live callers. At this time, VXML Server will perform
any necessary cleanup required to remove the old application configuration. In this manner,
changes can be made to applications at any time, the administrator need not worry about the
impact of the change on live callers as the transition will be handled gracefully.

Due to the interactive nature, when using administration scripts to perform graceful functions,
the script will display a count down of callers that are actively visiting the application as they

User Guide for Cisco Unified CVP VXML Server and Cisco Unified Call Studio Release 8.0(1)