Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Resource Kit Tool: Audio Extractor

  • Article

Audio Extractor is a supporting tool for the Collect Logs feature. It allows you to collect Microsoft Lync 2010 communications software logs so that Microsoft can investigate audio, video, or connectivity issues that you may encounter. During log collection, the user can choose to add audio recording. Audio Extractor enables the user to extract the audio from the collected logs to verify the audio content. The extracted audio is a .wav file, which can be listened to by using applications such as Windows Media Player. You can download this tool and other Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Resource Kit Tools from the Download Center.

Author : Hong Sodoma

Publication date: February 2011

Product version: Microsoft Lync 2010

Introduction

Audio Extractor is a supporting tool for the Collect Logs feature. This feature allows you to collect Lync 2010 logs so that Microsoft can investigate audio, video, or connectivity issues that you may encounter. During log collection, the user can choose to add audio recording. This tool enables the user to extract the audio from the collected logs to verify the audio content. The extracted audio is a .wav file, which can be listened to by using applications such as Windows Media Player. You can download this tool and other Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Resource Kit Tools from the Download Center.

Description

The Collect Logs feature allows you to collect Lync 2010 logs so that Microsoft can investigate audio, video, or connectivity issues that you may encounter.

Output

There are two output .wav files as follows:

  • The recording of the local talker: MEDIAMETRICS_mic.wav.
  • The recording of the remote speaker: MEDIAMETRICS_mic.wav. Note that to protect the privacy of the remote speaker, the remote speaker recording has been down-sampled so that the content is not intelligible.

Purpose

This tool extracts audio recording from logs that are collected by the Collect Logs feature so that users can verify the audio content in the recording.

The Collect Logs feature is not enabled by default. It can be enabled by using in-band provision. When the Collect Logs feature is enabled, the user will see the Collect Logs button in Lync 2010. By clicking Collect Logs and following the instructions, the user can collect Lync 2010 logs for diagnostics purposes. The logs are stored locally on your computer (under %USERPROFILE%\tracing\). You need to manually upload the logs according to your enterprise administrator's instructions.

When the user clicks Collect Logs, the following information will be collected:

  • Lync 2010 logs, containing your contact list and information about your previous conversation sessions. Lync 2010 logs do not include the content of your instant messaging conversation.
  • Audio parameters such as speech signal level and noise level.
  • Network conditions.
  • Device setup.
  • Operating system version and information.
  • Applications that run on your computer, such as Microsoft Office Outlook and Microsoft Internet Explorer.

If the user chooses, the following information is also collected:

  • A 30-second recording of their latest call
  • A screenshot of their desktop

The AudioExtractor.exe tool is provided for the user or administrator to extract the audio recording from the log files, and then verify their contents (if necessary) before submitting the information to Microsoft for diagnostic analysis.

Requirements

Run this script at the command prompt.

Examples

When a user clicks Collect Logs and follows the instructions, a compressed log file will be created under %UserProfile%\tracing that has a name in the following format:

MediaLog_GUID_yyyy-mm-dd_hh-mm-ss_4.0.xxxx.xxxx.cab .

This file may include 30 seconds of audio recording if this is provisioned and the user chooses to include the recording. The user or administrator can listen to the audio recording by using the following steps:

1.       Open a Command Prompt window.

2.       Create a working folder:

mkdir c:\tmp

3.       Paste the tool (AudioExtractor.exe) into this working folder.

4.       Double-click the *.cab file to open it.

5.       Paste the MEDIAMETRICS.MQDPCM file into the working folder. (Stop here if you don't see this file. It means that there is no audio recording in the .cab file.)

6.       Run the following at the command prompt to extract the audio recording:

AudioExtractor.exe MEDIAMETRICS.MQDPCM

Two *.wav files (MEDIAMETRICS_Mic.wav and MEDIAMETRICS_spk.wav) will be generated in the same working folder. The user or administrator can double-click these two .wav files to listen to their contents by using Windows Media or another audio player. MEDIAMETRICS_spk.wav is the recording of the far-end audio, which is down-sampled to protect privacy. The content should not be intelligible. MEDIAMETRICS_mic.wav is the recording of local speech of the near-end speaker.

Summary

The Audio Extractor tool was introduced to extract audio recordings from log files that are collected by the Collect Logs feature in Lync 2010. Collect Logs is a diagnostic feature that can be turned on by using in-band provision when a user encounters an audio quality, video quality, or connectivity issue. The logs help Microsoft to diagnose the issues that the users have experienced and help improve the product. Providing users a tool to extract audio recordings provides users with an opportunity to verify the audio content before submitting it to Microsoft for diagnostics purposes.

Keywords: Collect Logs, audio recording

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