Videoconferencing

Goal

• platform for 10-20 people at one time
• One person shares screen
  • Good to have other people share screens, too - one at a time
• Video Capture of development session
• Clear voice
• Chat window

Videoconferencing is a way to connect multiple distributed parties via global communication networks to allow for video and audio exchanges between multiple parties simultaneously. This article is to describe what cross-platform software is currently available for cheap or free and their capabilities.

Comparison of Web Conferencing Software

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_web_conferencing_software

WebRTC Open Source

WebRTC is a standard protocol for encrypted video communication whose API is implemented in many open source browsers, such as Mozilla Firefox. There's a few open source software products that utilize Web RTC without requiring the installation of software other than the web browser (no addons needed). Many WebRTC-backed websites utilize proprietary software. Here's some that don't:

Jitsi Meet

NodeJS powered scalable website whose sourcecode can be downloaded to run on your own apache webserver. Utilizes Jitsi Videobridge with WebRTC & SFU for scalability

A live version of jitsi meet hosted by Atlassian (the company that owns BlueJimp, the original developer of Jitsi software projects) can be accessed at https://meet.jit.si

For more info on our proof-of-concept of Jiti software, see Jitsi

Rocket Chat

Rocket Chat is a popular, free, open source chat system. It has instructions for installing on CentOS and has clients for windows, mac, linux, iOS, and android.

Its video chat utilizes Jitsi software, and you can configure it to use your own jitsi video bridge (by default it uses jitsi.org)

Jangouts

Jangouts is a self-hosted, open-source solution with a UI similar to Google Hangouts, backed by the Janus Gateway using WebRTC.

For more info on our proof-of-concept of Jangouts, see Janus

Hubl.in

Hubl.in is an open-source, NodeJS-backed, self-hosted video conferencing service based on Web RTC.

Spreed.me

Spreed.me is an open source NodeJS & Go self-hosted video conferencing solution using WebRTC with example configurations for nginx.

WebRTC Closed Source

Closed source software that use WebRTC follow

Hipchat

Atlassian, who acquired BlueJimp in 2015 (the company that built the most mature, open-source SFU, Jitsi Videobridge), produces many not-free, closed-source software products. Atlassian continues to develop the Jitsi open-source software.

Atlassian gives free licenses to nonprofits for their closed-source products, such as Hipchat.

Hipchat advertises that they can support up to 20 people in a vidoeconference.

Atlassian is also responsible for hosting the free Jitsi Meet site that OSE uses frequently at https://meet.jit.si

Open-Source Software

OpenMeetings

https://incubator.apache.org/openmeetings/

BigBlueButton

http://www.bigbluebutton.org/

has a test room

2 Short Tutorial Videos

Webhuddle

https://www.webhuddle.com

hosted version free to use while beta testing.

Ekiga

http://www.ekiga.org/

CUMeeting

http://www.cumeeting.com/

Homer-Conferencing

http://www.homer-conferencing.com/

Webhuddle

• No audio

https://www.webhuddle.com/

TokBox

• Incompatibility with Linux

http://www.tokbox.com/

Meetecho

• Free for 3 people, pay for more. Argh.

http://www.meetecho.com/

OpenMeetings

https://incubator.apache.org/openmeetings/

• Free and Open Source

• Audio and Video Conferencing

• Meeting Recording and Screen Sharing

• File Explorer and Moderating System

• Multi-Whiteboard and Chat

• User and Room Management

• Private Message Centre

• Integrated Calender

• Polls and Votes

• Backup

• Available as a Hosted Service OR Download and Install as Package on Server

• No Usage or User Limitations

MeetingBurner

http://www.meetingburner.com/

• Skype integrated
• Meeting analytics
• Mac & PC

Skype

http://skype.com

Available for:

• Mac
• Windows
• linux
• Android (audio only in group video chat)
• iOS (audio only in group video chat)

Pricing:

• One-to-one video conferencing: free
• Unlimited audio conferencing: free
• More than two simultaneous video conferencing parties: $4.95/mo

ooVoo

http://oovoo.com

Available for:

• Mac
• Windows
• Android
• iOS
• Web-based

Pricing:

• Up to 6 simultanuous video conferencing parties: Free (with ads)
• Up to 6 simultanuous video conferencing parties: $9.95/mo (no ads)
• Up to 12 simultaneous video conferencing parties: $29.95/mo

buzzumi.com

https://buzzumi.com

Available for:

• Web-based

Pricing:

• Up to 6 simultaneous video conferencing parties: Free

based on OpenTok API

Expressway Flexchat

http://videochatsoftware.ca/

Available for:

• Web-based (multiple rooms)

Pricing:

• Unlimited domain license: $300

Notes

Joe Justice promotes freeconferencecall.com, a web-based audio conferencing software, as used in Scrum project management of WIKISPEED.

See also

online conferencing