Presence can be defined as “the ability and willingness of a user to communicate across a set of devices”, as specified in the Unified Communications SRND version 7.0. Put into plain English, presence is the indication, based on user-provided information, regarding whether coworkers are available and how they prefer to be reached.

In this white paper, we will discuss an option that will allow our users to see availability status information of other users in the network via the Cisco Unified Presence Solution (CUPS) version 7.0. Using this solution, if the person you're trying to reach is unavailable, the CUPS will relay that 'busy' status back to your initiating device. As a result, you will see the busy status on your phone and will allow you to avoid wasting time even making the call.