Microsoft Teams Pilot#
Microsoft Teams Pilot: Next Steps
Following the pilot evaluation in December 2024, the IT department decided to support Microsoft Teams in a limited way (no integration with meeting rooms nor with Indico) and for specific use cases, namely:
- Collaboration with external organisations (when a CERN user is invited to collaborate on Teams by an external partner, or when a CERN user needs to organize a collaboration with an external partner that cannot use Zoom).
- User communities for which having audio/video, group chats and collaborative document editing all within a single application is a critical requirement.
The recommended platforms for all other use cases remain
- Zoom for audio/video calls and meetings
- Mattermost for chat
The pilot will evolve into a production service ready by the end of 2025.
Info
direct team creation by users is deactivated on the pilot (to avoid conflicts with e-groups/Grappa groups), if you need to create your own teams, don't hesitate to contact us!
Overview#
At its IT Steering Committee meeting of October 18th 2023, the IT management decided to run a pilot of Microsoft Teams for the communities that requested it (HR, FAP and IT). Microsoft Teams should be seen as a complement to the existing collaborative services (Mattermost, CERNBox, Zoom, etc). This site aims at providing information about this pilot to the users of the pilot service. In particular, have a look at the various sections of this site for more practical information.
Microsoft Teams is an integrated collaboration and meeting platform that can help you streamline your projects and daily team activities. Discover how in the onboarding section.
Dates of the pilot#
The pilot will run from January 2024 for a duration of 12 months.
Scope of the pilot#
Only users in the requesting communities (HR, FAP and IT) will have access to this pilot. The Microsoft Teams platform should be used during this pilot only for intra-community collaboration, or for collaboration with partners from outside CERN. In particular pilot users should not try to contact other CERN users outside of the pilot communities during the pilot, as these users will not have the license required to participate in this collaboration. The Microsoft Teams platform will be configured for a basic collaboration scenario during the pilot (no integration with CERN meeting room nor with telephony).
Objectives of the pilot#
- Evaluate the satisfaction of pilot users with regards to Microsoft Teams;
- Better identify the differentiating features compared to existing services (Mattermost and Zoom);
- Better define the scope of a possible production service
- Understand if the pilot limitations would be acceptable;
- Understand what is the appropriate configuration of the platform;
- Better assess the necessary support resources should a production service be offered.
Pilot users will be sent a survey to complete at the end of the pilot in order for the IT department to gain knowledge on the above objectives.
Limitations of the pilot#
Microsoft Teams is configured during this pilot for basic collaboration. In particular:
- It isn't possible to invite a CERN meeting room to a Microsoft Teams meeting
- Microsoft Teams is not compatible with the standard-based equipment installed in the CERN meeting rooms.
- The recommended tool for videoconferencing at CERN is Zoom
- It isn't possible to use Microsoft Teams for telephony (i.e. to call a phone number)
- The recommended tool for telephony at CERN is CERNPhone
- It isn't possible to run Live Events
- The recommended platforms for engaging with a large audience are Zoom and the webcast service
- A limited set of Apps is available by default
- They correspond to Microsoft tools which are already supported at CERN
- Teams cannot be directly created by pilot users. You have to send a mail to teams-support@cern.ch to request the creation of the team.
- This is to avoid conflicts with e-groups/Grappa
- Dynamic teams (that is teams which membership directly depends on some AD criteria like the unit of the user) are not supported
- Once the team is created, its membership can be managed by the team's owner (including using existing e-groups)
- Only pilot users are activated with a Microsoft Teams license
- Pilot users should only contact other pilot users or external partners through Microsoft Teams
- Microsoft Teams should not be used as a long term document repository
- The recommended solutions for document storage include CERNbox and CDS
- Lightweight accounts will not be able to participate in a Microsoft Teams interaction due to a conflict between CERN lightweight accounts and Microsoft guest management.
No data export at the end of the pilot
Please also note that there will be no automated data transfer out of Microsoft Teams at the end of the pilot should it conclude negatively. However users will be able to extract files shared through Microsoft Teams manually through OneDrive for Business or Sharepoint Online.