NICE Uptivity Screen Recording

NICE Uptivity Screen Recording gives you the ability to record agent workstation activity and to view agent desktops in near-real time. It is part of the base Uptivity installation, but is enabled only if your organization has purchased the NICE Uptivity Screen Recording feature.

NICE Uptivity Screen Recording uses client/server architecture. The Screen Capture Client application must be installed and configured on every workstation to be recorded. On the server side, NICE Uptivity Screen Recording consists of a number of services. This topic contains information and other considerations for the implementation of NICE Uptivity Screen Recording.

Services

All Uptivity screen recording implementations use the following services:

Service

Details

CTI Core
CTI CoreClosed The software component that provides the PBX/ACD integration and makes call recording decisions based on customer-defined recording schedules. communicates recording start and stop commands based on customer-defined recording schedules. Recording start and stop commands are sent to RabbitMQ and routed to the appropriate Screen Capture Client.
RabbitMQ
RabbitMQ routes recording commands from CTI Core to the appropriate Screen Capture Client.
Screen Capture Client Screen Capture Client receives screen recording commands from CTI Core via RabbitMQ. During a screen recording session, Screen Capture Client captures and sends segments of video to the Screen Capture Server.
Screen Capture Server Screen Capture Server keeps track of client connections and facilitates the live monitor of agents' screens.
Screen Capture API (SCAPI) During a screen recording session, SCAPI receives screen capture video segments from Screen Capture Client, collects all segments from a session, and when the session is finished, SCAPI sends the collection of video segments to the final location to be transcoded.
Transcoder
Transcoder converts the audio media from a recording into a WAV file.
Transcoder 2
Transcoder 2 transcodes the video media and then combines the transcoded audio and video files to create a WEBM file.

Screen Capture Client

The Uptivity Screen Capture Client captures WEBM video in 1-minute segments. At the end of recording, the segments are sent to the server and are then transcoded into a complete WEBM video file. This is different from past versions of the Screen Capture Client, which captured JPG frames that were sent to the Screen Capture Server to be transcoded. The result is that the new WEBM screen capture uses fewer server resources than the previous JPG screen capture method.

With WEBM screen capture, the Screen Capture Client can record up to 4 videos simultaneously. For example: 

  • An agent begins an interaction and the Screen Capture Client begins recording (1 video in progress).
  • The agent puts the first call on hold and calls a supervisor, and that call is also recorded (2 videos in progress).
  • The agent puts the supervisor on hold and makes a call to a third person (3 videos in progress).
  • The agent puts the third call on hold and begins a fourth interaction that is also recorded (4 videos in progress).

If the agent started a 5th interaction, it would not be recorded until one of the 4 in-progress recordings was ended, because the client can only record 4 videos at a time. This feature allows for redundant recording, where every interaction is recorded twice to reduce the likelihood of errors that could result in loss of data.

The new Screen Capture Client can be installed with previous versions of Uptivity. It automatically determines the screen capture method to use based on the Uptivity environment. There are new SCAPI settings that correspond to this change. When the Screen Capture Client starts, it retrieves the settings from SCAPI to determine the screen capture method to use.

If there are environmental considerations that make WEBM screen capture a poor fit for your organization, contact your Uptivity representative.

Screen Capture Client High Availability

Screen Capture Client supports connections to multiple RabbitMQ or SCAPI endpoints for high availability and redundancy. If the primary RabbitMQ or SCAPI node becomes unavailable, Screen Capture Client automatically connects to a secondary node in the cluster and continues normal service. All call data for an in-progress interaction is lost if the connection between Screen Capture Client and RabbitMQ is interrupted.

Screen Capture Client can connect to instances of RabbitMQ and SCAPI located in more than one physical location. During installation of the client, you can configure up to 3 instances each of RabbitMQ, SCAPI, and Screen Capture Server, at up to 4 different locations.

To reconnect to the primary RabbitMQ or SCAPI node, you can restart the Screen Capture Client service, or you can log out of the Screen Capture Client workstation and then log in to the workstation.

Design Considerations

During the sales process, an Uptivity sales engineer works with your organization to determine the best way to implement NICE Uptivity Screen Recording. The number of users or agents is a key issue. Growth in the number of agents affects performance and may necessitate changes to the system design.

Interactions between Uptivity components (servers, web portals, and so forth), file servers, and archive devices can be secured.

Schedule Considerations

When you configure schedules for screen recording, they must include the following settings:

  • Screen Capture — Set to Yes.
  • Screen Capture Wrap Length — Configure to business requirements.
  • Stop screen capture wrap on call start — Configure to business requirements.

To fully support screen recording, you may need two schedules: one for audio recording only, and one for both audio and screen recording. For example, an organization wants to record 50 percent of all calls and ten percent of all calls must have both audio and screen. In this scenario, the organization needs an audio-only schedule to capture 40 percent of the calls and another schedule to capture audio and screen for 10 percent of calls.

Workstation Considerations

The Screen Capture Client can be installed manually or silently. Silent installations require no user intervention.

In most cases, you do not need to take special steps to ensure Uptivity records the correct workstation for each user. By default, Uptivity looks at the System Username (Windows login) and the System Domain (if the domain is required) in a user's profile, compares it to logged-in usernames reported by Screen Capture Client, and matches the workstation to the user accordingly.

Upgrade Considerations

Starting with Uptivity version 20.1, all patches for the Screen Capture Client will be for the new 20.1 version. This version is backwards-compatible with previous versions of Uptivity.

Ensure that you have installed all of the prerequisite software on servers and PCs before installing a new version of Uptivity.

The new Screen Capture Client that became available with Uptivity version 20.1 changes how agent screen activity is captured. If there are environmental considerations that make WEBM screen capture a poor fit for your organization, contact your Uptivity representative.

Upgrading to Versions of Uptivity Prior to 20.1

Versions of the Screen Capture Client prior to 20.1 are not backward-compatible when you upgrade from a previous version of Uptivity. Screen recording is not backward-compatible when you upgrade from a previous person of Uptivity. When upgrading to a version of Uptivity prior to 20.1, you must uninstall all earlier versions of the Screen Capture Client before installing the version for the release you are upgrading to. You can do this using Windows Programs & Features functionality in the Control Panel.

Ensure that you have installed all of the prerequisite software on servers and PCs before installing a new version of Uptivity.

WEBM is the only file format that Uptivity version 18.1 and 18.1.1 can process, but in Uptivity version 18.1.2, WAV was re-introduced as a screen recording export option.

In Uptivity version 18.1 and 18.1.1, historical recording media (WAV and VID) from Uptivity versions 17.3 and earlier must be retranscoded to the WEBM format so that this media is compatible with version 18.1.