Web Conferencing Blog

Along with other users we have been doing some beta testing of BeamYourScreen’s new version 4, which will be released tomorrow. You will find the software for download on BeamYourScreen’s then also new website.

Our tests have yielded results that will have an impact on our ranking of web conferencing solutions. As soon as the new version is out and running we will update the ranking accordingly.

The Japanese vendor LiveOn asked us to test their online meeting solution. At the risk of spoiling the suspense: The tool didn’t make it into our ranking.

But let us start at the beginning. The basic functionalities are all there and if we had to choose the scenario this solution is best suited for we’d say it definitely is online meetings planned in advance. Video is the central aspect of the solution, displaying the participant’s webcam streams in the main window. Functionalities such as whiteboard and screen sharing can be added in separate windows.

Now to the shortcomings… The tool runs on Windows only which really is a large restriction as we pointed out earlier – “Mac users are being neglected”. There are neither one-click meetings nor recurring meetings, and you can only enter a meeting room at the time the meeting is scheduled, no earlier. When we started our meeting it took us 8 minutes from clicking “enter room” to actually arriving in the room. Finally, there was no pricing information posted on the website.

User-friendliness and meeting-setup are the two major areas for improvement. The solution shows promise, but currently cannot be considered a serious alternative to the market leaders.

Google is going social. Now it is hard to come up with revolutionary concepts when others like Facebook have brought social networking to near perfection and solutions like Skype make you wonder how video chatting could be any easier. Google+ aims at providing all these services, manageable under one convenient location.

Since we focus on web conferencing we checked how easy it is to conduct meetings online with our Google+ test account. At the moment a Google+ participant can invite you to “hang out”. You will see this invitation posted on your Google+ account only, meaning there are no email invitations currently available.

So we hung out and checked which features Google+ provides. Video is easy and performs well. You also have a text chat option. The YouTube button is a nice touch, but it is still not working properly, i.e. not everyone can see the video – but that most likely has to do with Google still refining its service.

The bottom line for us is: Video, audio, and text chats are there which allow for rudimentary online collaboration. The fact that you need to be a member of the service and logged in to participate is a minus considering that for online meetings you want to have a barrier free experience rather than forcing every participant to open an account before joining a meeting. Screen sharing is what we definitely would expect to be added next. Throw in email notifications and the possibility to schedule meetings and we’re talking. But currently, Google+ really only is a place to hang out. And even with all those features added it just might not be the tool of choice for web conferencing.

There’s a new online meeting tool out there and we were asked to take a look at it. CrunchConnect is a brand new solution and has recently been launched by SalesCrunch. Yes, you guessed it, the focus is on improving the online pitch and sales process.

A first glance at the website – and the video you are greeted with – reveals nothing revolutionary. There are some nice features though, like tracking the attendees’ clicks in your follow-up messages along with the time they spend reading the documentation the presenter sends around. This should give a salesperson a good indication of how interested the participants really are in the product that was presented.

One feature that stands out is the Ice Breaker. CrunchConnect shows every attendant’s local weather, time, and sports news. So while you are waiting for everyone to arrive you can chat and talk away. Now this is naturally not an essential feature and some participants would probably enjoy a bit of silence to work on some emails until the meeting begins…

So, while the CrunchConnect website does make a good first impression this doesn’t mean their web conferencing solution will do the same. The site features easily accessible pricing information and you can test a free version with limited range of functionalities. Seeing that these prerequisites are given we will check out the tool’s performance and post the results in our comparison of online meeting solutions.

The name says it all: with join.me you can attend meetings on your iPad, that’s it. Which is no real surprise since our comprehensive test of web conferencing apps for mobile devices revealed that currently not more is possible or even sensible for touch devices.

When you attend a join.me online meeting with your iPad you get very clean interface and transfer of the presenters desktop or presentations is smooth. As attendee you have only one option of interacting with others and that is via the chat functionality.

join.me chat functionality on iPad

So basically, join.me fulfills the requirements of a touch device for web conferencing. To view the other vendors’ mobile apps check out our test results here.

There is a lot happening on the online meeting market, which is now noticeable in our ranking! There is quite some commotion among the top 5. With Netviewer removed and vacating rank 2, Adobe has launched a new version and itself to rank 2.

The keyword that summarizes Adobe Connect 8 best is complexity. Adobe masters this by providing a large amount of features which can be easily arranged on the user interface, which itself can be adapted for every meeting.

Other improvements are the handling of meetings directly from the desktop client (needs to be installed) and the enhancement of the invitation functionality. The invitation process can now easily be integrated into Outlook or Lotus Notes.

Before using the online meeting solution the meeting host needs to make a trade-off decision between two basic options:
1) Install a couple of plugins and handle everything from the desktop;
2) Handle meetings with the online portal, which is a bit more complicated.

Altogether Adobe Connect 8 offers many positive new features and has become a true allrounder that can be used in any web conferencing scenario. Read all the details on the solution here.

We usually don’t expect too much of a web conferencing solution when we run our initial tests, since most tools don’t live up to our standards. So finding a gem such as ClickMeeting is quite an exception.

The intuitive user interface and the overall user friendliness are a big plus. But ClickMeeting offers more than only good looks. Sharing content with attendees couldn’t be much easier, as this screenshot demonstrates:

ClickMeeting presentation options

ClickMeeting didn’t make it into the top 5, though, and that for a reason. You cannot switch mouse or keyboard control, so your options of truly collaborating are limited.

But still the whole package is very convincing, and ClickMeeting – previously not featured in our ranking – immediately jumps to number eight. Read our detailed evaluation of the tool here.

We were surprised at the range of functionalities TeamViewer offers users on an iPad.

On your iPad you can chat, alter the size of the screen you are viewing, and have full mouse and keyboard control. You can even decide on your own which screen you want to view if the host e.g. has a second, hidden screen. One member of our testing crew wasn’t too happy about that specific feature as it turned out…
This points towards the restrictions of the tool: You only have all these functionalities if you participate in a meeting with a Mac user. And you can only have meetings one-on-one as soon as an iPad user is participating. Also, we could find no way for the host to restrict the iPad user’s access.

TeamViewer advanced keyboard functionality on iPad

So really, it’s more of a remote access to a Mac – comparable with Citrix’ GoToMy PC –  than a meeting, since you can do everything from your iPad. You can even shut down the host’s Mac if he doesn’t watch the iPad user every second of the ‘meeting’.

On the iPad, FastViewer falls into the category ‘look, don’t touch’. According to the vendor, a meeting host should be able to transfer mouse and keyboard control to participants using an iPad, but in our tests we were not able to verify this.

FastViewer status bar on iPad

Apart from this FastViewer performs nicely. You can chat – not privately – and can check out the list of attendees any time. We liked the status bar at the bottom of the screen. If somebody sends a chat message during a presentation you can easily switch to the chat window and then back again.

In a nutshell, Saba allows participants of web conferences with an iPad to view another participants’ screens or content that has been uploaded by others. Unfortunately, with your iPad you cannot have a look at the list of participants, which we think would have been a nice feature.

Saba Centra's whiteboard viewed on an iPad

Saba Centra allows you to interact with other participants of an online meeting a little when you are on your iPad. You can chat and at the bottom of the screen you have icons that allow you to show your agreement or dislike of whatever is being presented. If a presentation is really good you can click on the “applause” icon. We are sure the presenter will appreciate it.