Microsoft Lync 2010 Custom Presence States

There are times when simply telling others that you are Busy, Away, or Do Not Disturb are not enough to convey your actual presence state. For most, the use of custom presence states other than the defaults provided by Lync 2010 was forgotten after Office Communications Server 2007. Although it is true that tighter security behavior doom fated the four additional presence states that were customizable, there is still a method for making additional, customizable presence states available in Lync 2010.

The process is broken down into 3 steps: (1) Create a new configuration XML on the local workstation, (2) disable SIP security mode on the local Lync client, and (3) enable the custom presence state on the local Lync client.

Create the Configuration File

The configuration file does not exist yet and will need to be created with some basic guidelines to adhere. There should be a maximum of 4 entries with a limit of 64 characters of text for the descriptions. This file may be created using Windows Notepad and saved as the file type XML. The following sample could be used as a guide:

Name this file anything (e.g. Presence.xml) and save it to the system directory (I.e. c:\windows\Presence.XML). The availability strings are limited to: Online, Busy, and Do Not Disturb.

Disable Local SIP Security

To complete the setup of the custom presence states, the following registry keys will require modification on the local workstation where Lync client is installed.

• Create a new Key with the name Communicator in the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoftpath if it does not already exist.
• Create a new REG_DWORD value named EnableSIPHighSecurityMode in the Communicator Software Policies key shown below. Enter the value of ‘0’ to disable this security mode.

Path: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Communicator
Name: EnableSIPHighSecurityMode
Value: 0

Enable Custom Presence States

The configuration process is complete once the following registry is added to point to the configuration file created earlier.

• Create a new REG_SZ value named CustomStateURL in the same key as shown below. Enter the path to the presence.xml.

Path: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Communicator
Name: CustomStateURL
Value: C:/Windows/Presence.xml

Finally, restart the Lync client and the newly available custom presence states will be available. It is worth noting that these custom presence states are only available locally.

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