We use Zoom for external meetings with clients and Slack is used when meeting internally as a team.
1 upvote·23.4K views
Zoom
Business Tools / Collaboration / Web and Video Conferencing
I own an Escape Room. Since right now everyone is practicing social distancing, I would like to run my Escape Room games virtually. I would like to allow approx 4 users to log in to play. They can chitchat a few minutes before their game to get to know each other. Then once the game begins, I will introduce myself and give them the plot to their escape game. I will have a wide-angle camera mounted to the wall to show the room, and as the game master, carry a tablet or webcam around as players talk to me and direct me to show them certain items in the room, move in for closeups in certain areas, try lock combinations, etc. I will be their hands while they solve the puzzles. I am not sure if Google Hangouts Google Meet or Zoom is better for this. I did try it yesterday using google hangout meet and it was good, but I think there may have been a wifi issue where it was choppy. Just trying to figure out the best option. Thank you! Catherine
3 upvotes·651.2K views
Replies (4)
Google meet, as well as zoom are amazing platforms for online meetings. But I will try to explain the pros and cons of both according to your needs.
Network requirements: Google meet requires considerably more bandwidth than zoom, and it isn't a great choice if you have poor internet, or if there are more than 25 or 30 participants. While zoom is pretty lightweight and can support large groups (say about 80) with little to no internet instability.
UI: Zoom and google meet have decent UI, but assuming that participants will be using mobiles, they might have a hard time with chatting in zoom as it takes up a lot of space to view all contents.
Security: Even though both zoom and google meet provide 100% encrypted connections, I personally think google meet is somewhat better due to the flaws in the recent zoom security patches.
Battery consumption: Google meet hogs up your battery when uploading your video and also your video quality, unlike zoom will not be adjusted based on your network, meaning, even if you have poor internet, google meet will upload your video in high quality, sometimes leading to lag and hangs.
NOTE: If you are using the free version of zoom, your meeting will automatically end after 40 minutes. So either keep your games small, or buy the premium version.
In the end I think zoom will be a better choice according to your needs, but if you plan on buying zoom, I recommend you read other reviews about zoom. Enjoy and stay safe!
3 upvotes·139.5K views
I would suggest Zoom: - quality sound and audio is great - simple to set up and invite people + it doesn't matter if they have a microsoft, google, etc. email account or operating system - recently it added a couple of security options which could be handy in your situation = for example 'lock meeting' - once all your participants have logged in you can 'lock the meeting' to prevent others from entering. Another on is the enable waiting room, where participants can 'wait' before you allow them in the meeting.
3 upvotes·139.3K views
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Hi, I am building an enhanced web-conferencing app that will have a voice/video call, live chats, live notifications, live discussions, screen sharing, etc features. Ref: Zoom.
I need advise finalizing the tech stack for this app. I am considering below tech stack:
- Frontend: React
- Backend: Node.js
- Database: MongoDB
- IAAS: #AWS
- Containers & Orchestration: Docker / Kubernetes
- DevOps: GitLab, Terraform
- Brokers: Redis / RabbitMQ
I need advice at the platform level as to what could be considered to support concurrent video streaming seamlessly.
Also, please suggest what could be a better tech stack for my app?
#SAAS #VideoConferencing #WebAndVideoConferencing #zoom #stack
16 upvotes·471.6K views
Replies (8)
You're going to want to look hard at WebRTC. It's what almost every realtime video service uses. The appeal is that it establishes a direct connection between peers so that the massive video bandwidth doesn't need to go through your backend. That aside, actor clusters will be the other technology that handle that sort of traffic well. It was popularized by erlang for telecom backbone, akka is another choice for actor systems.
Infrastructure wise, kubernetes would be a fine choice. Just make sure to look up some benchmarks for Container Network Interface (CNI) implementations that support high bandwidth traffic.
14 upvotes·1 comment·8.7K views
Nikhil Gurnani
·
November 4th 2020 at 7:34AM
I absolutely second this recommendation! WebRTC is a must for apps that have high amount of audio / video streaming.
Kubernetes provides Auto-scaling whereas Docker Swarm doesn't support autoscaling. Kubernetes supports up to 5000 nodes whereas Docker Swarm supports more than 2000 nodes. Kubernetes is less extensive and customizable whereas Docker Swarm is more comprehensive and highly customizable. So if your main usecase is autoscaling go for kubernetes else Docker is always a good choice.
10 upvotes·8.5K views
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Hi! I am trying to decide between using Calendly or Meetingbird for my consultancy. I would like to connect 3/4 calendars (via Gmail / G Suite) and primarily use Zoom as my connection platform. I'd love to hear about what others use and your recommendations/points to consider. TIA!
3 upvotes·224K views
Replies (2)
There’s a new tool that’s currently In beta called Mightycal you may want to take a look at. https://mightycal.com/
I have used Calendly before and it works fine. It does it’s job but not much more.
2 upvotes·888 views
I've been using Meetingbird for quite some time, and it seamlessly integrates with Zoom and G Suite. That being said, I'd consider taking a look at zvite: https://zvite.co/
1 upvote·891 views
Server side
We decided to use Python for our backend because it is one of the industry standard languages for data analysis and machine learning. It also has a lot of support due to its large user base.
Web Server: We chose Flask because we want to keep our machine learning / data analysis and the web server in the same language. Flask is easy to use and we all have experience with it. Postman will be used for creating and testing APIs due to its convenience.
Machine Learning: We decided to go with PyTorch for machine learning since it is one of the most popular libraries. It is also known to have an easier learning curve than other popular libraries such as Tensorflow. This is important because our team lacks ML experience and learning the tool as fast as possible would increase productivity.
Data Analysis: Some common Python libraries will be used to analyze our data. These include NumPy, Pandas , and matplotlib. These tools combined will help us learn the properties and characteristics of our data. Jupyter notebook will be used to help organize the data analysis process, and improve the code readability.
Client side
UI: We decided to use React for the UI because it helps organize the data and variables of the application into components, making it very convenient to maintain our dashboard. Since React is one of the most popular front end frameworks right now, there will be a lot of support for it as well as a lot of potential new hires that are familiar with the framework. CSS 3 and HTML5 will be used for the basic styling and structure of the web app, as they are the most widely used front end languages.
State Management: We decided to use Redux to manage the state of the application since it works naturally to React. Our team also already has experience working with Redux which gave it a slight edge over the other state management libraries.
Data Visualization: We decided to use the React-based library Victory to visualize the data. They have very user friendly documentation on their official website which we find easy to learn from.
Cache
- Caching: We decided between Redis and memcached because they are two of the most popular open-source cache engines. We ultimately decided to use Redis to improve our web app performance mainly due to the extra functionalities it provides such as fine-tuning cache contents and durability.
Database
- Database: We decided to use a NoSQL database over a relational database because of its flexibility from not having a predefined schema. The user behavior analytics has to be flexible since the data we plan to store may change frequently. We decided on MongoDB because it is lightweight and we can easily host the database with MongoDB Atlas . Everyone on our team also has experience working with MongoDB.
Infrastructure
- Deployment: We decided to use Heroku over AWS, Azure, Google Cloud because it is free. Although there are advantages to the other cloud services, Heroku makes the most sense to our team because our primary goal is to build an MVP.
Other Tools
Communication Slack will be used as the primary source of communication. It provides all the features needed for basic discussions. In terms of more interactive meetings, Zoom will be used for its video calls and screen sharing capabilities.
Source Control The project will be stored on GitHub and all code changes will be done though pull requests. This will help us keep the codebase clean and make it easy to revert changes when we need to.
13 upvotes·1.6M views
We've used Zoom for a year or two. They offer 1 Gb online storage that is convenient for sending out links to team members who miss a meeting. But some of their meetings run to 850 Mb each, which means I'm always overflowing the limit even though I don't leave a meeting up for more than a week.
So I asked about buying additional storage. The answer was that the first additional step was all the way to 100 Gb at $40/month when the basic video package was only $15/month. That's ridiculous!
5 upvotes·88.1K views
Replies (3)
Jitsi is open source. One can easily implement at their own premises. It offers live streaming thru which one can stream to you tube live. No hassles of storage. Another option is to deliver the lecture and store at local device cloud (open cloud) and share the link to the end users who requires to use the resources
6 upvotes·65.4K views
You can automate uploading the files to whatever file storage platform you're already using like Dropbox, Google drive or better yet Firebase or AWS. Then delete the files from Zoom after they are uploaded. You might be able to accomplish this with Zapier. If not, we develop these kinds of custom automations at TinyApp.io
4 upvotes·21.9K views
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I want to host an online Jeopardy game with less than 30 participants. During each round of the game, I'll stream some videos. The point is to gather friends together to play the Jeopardy game and watch random stuff. Please let me know if there's a more suitable platform other than Discord and Zoom. Thanks, everyone!
5 upvotes·891.9K views
Replies (1)
Personally, I think that Discord works much better than anything else, even if you don't have Nitro (which is what they call their premium plan). You could seriously do this Jeopardy thing with just Discord (and maybe a bot to make it easier)
Zoom would only let you have a crappy meeting that hackers could easily join. Discord actually has DDoS protection, Zoom just has things that can easily be bypassed.
And if you do want Nitro, it's only $9/mo or $99/yr
2 upvotes·193.9K views
Hi,
A client is asking me to make a website to sell courses on it. I decided to make it with WordPress, but I don't have enough experience in WordPress. How can I make this website with free themes and plugins? How can I put live streaming from Zoom on course pages?
Thanks.
3 upvotes·19.3K views
Replies (2)
Hi Andrew
Wordpress and WooCommerce can get you almost all the way, free. But it depends how your client wants to organize and sell the content. For membership and subscription, Woocommerce has some paid plugins.
2 upvotes·2 comments·682 views
LearnDash (https://www.learndash.com/) would be the first place I would look
1 upvote·1 comment·444 views
A common issue with Zoom is the "half-duplex" operation, where only one person can speak at a time, and another person speaking will cause an interrupt and take control. Hence the infernal mute button is so needed. Does Jitsi allow for a "full-duplex" communication to occur? An example scenario is two people singing a duet, which is impossible on a Zoom call.
Many Thanks, Garry
4 upvotes·69.7K views
I am looking for a video meeting/conferencing tool. Zoom free version only allows a meeting length of 40 minutes. I need a free alternative to Zoom that has most of the same features but allows for longer meetings.
3 upvotes·372 views
Replies (2)
Hello! I recommend the installation of Jitsi—meet, through docker on a server, it is free and works perfectly. There is a lot of information on the Internet that allows you to install it correctly. Especially about opening the ports.
All the best,
3 upvotes·157 views
Google meet is a really good alternative to zoom because of its unlimited call time, and its a very good conecction as long as you have good internet and can all be done online, no downloading required!
2 upvotes·89 views