Considerations for integrating Sametime with Connections

Starting with version 5, IBM® Connections supports an External Collaboration feature that allows users to invite people from outside the organization to participate in meetings and share files. Sametime® 9 does not fully support this feature and you should be aware of the following security and performance considerations when integrating IBM Sametime with Connections 5.

For more additional information on integrating Sametime with Connections, see the Sametime 9.0.1 Integration Guide in the Sametime wiki.

Chat

For a secure deployment, do not distribute the installed Sametime client (the Connect client or the Notes-embedded client) to external users. Instead, instruct those people to use the web client for chatting with your organization's users.

If you allow external users to chat with the installed client, the feature works with the following restrictions:

  • The Contacts list is drawn from the deployment's LDAP directory, so external users are not included in the Contacts list display.
    Attention: External users can use the Add Contact feature to view the organization's directory.
  • Business card information (including photos) might not be available for external users; however those users can see the photos and business cards for internal users.

Meetings

For a secure deployment, do not distribute the installed Sametime client (the Connect client or the Notes-embedded client) to external users. Instead, instruct those people to attend meetings in a web browser. In addition, use the following settings for your deployment:

  • Enable anonymous access to Sametime.
  • Set filters on the Community Server and the Meeting Server to prevent anonymous users from viewing the LDAP directory.

If you omit these settings, any external user who is a designated meeting room manager might be able to view the LDAP directory, and all external users in the meeting will see the full business card for internal users. Because external users will not be flagged, presenters might inadvertently share confidential information in the meeting or upload confidential materials to the meeting room library without realizing that external users can access the files.