Foreign Language Support | International Considerations of Unified Messaging

Unified Messaging provides language packs to satisfy international UM requirements. In multiple-language environments, you should install the applicable UM language packs because some UM users prefer their voice prompts in a different language or because they receive e-mail messages in multiple languages that they need to access using OVA. If you do not install the UM language pack for a particular language, e-mail messages in that language will be illogical and incoherent when relayed to the user. OVA uses the following language selection behavior in the release version of Exchange 2010:

1. Try to find an exact match from the OWA language setting.
2. If no match is found, look for a language with the same parent language name. If multiple languages with the same parent language name are installed, the language that is last installed on the UM server wins.
3. If still no match, pick the latest language installed on the UM server.

Exchange 2010 SP1 changes the language selection behavior as follows:

1. Try to find an exact match from the OWA language setting.
2. If no exact match is found, fall back to a matching fallback language (en = en-US, fr = fr-FR, es = es-ES, pt = pt-BR, and so on).
3. If no fallback language is installed, use the default language of the UM dial plan.

Several key components rely on UM language packs to enable users and callers to interact effectively with Exchange Server 2010 UM in multiple languages. Each language pack includes:

• A Text-to-Speech (TTS) engine to read and convert messages when OVA users access their inboxes.
• The prerecorded prompts used to configure UM dial plans and auto attendants.
• ASR support for speech-enabled UM dial plans and auto attendants.

To install a language pack, use Setup.com /AddUMLanguagePack found in the Exchsrvr\Bin directory of the Exchange Server installation. Once you install your language packs, you can change the default language configured for each dial plan.

Note

Users automatically use the default language if their configured language setting in Outlook Web App is not available as a language pack. For example, if you install only the English and German language packs, and the English language pack is the default on the dial plan, a user with the French language configuration in Outlook Web App will hear English prompts.

In Exchange Server 2007, each language pack included the TTS engine but only supported ASR for U.S. English. In Exchange Server 2010, all available language packs contain ASR support. However, not all language packs support Voicemail Preview.

Note

You can access and download all available UM language packs at http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd638119.aspx.