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Conferencing and Web Meetings

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PCQ Bureau
New Update

PCQLinux 2007 Appliance Edition (Collaboration) bundles a free (and open

source) product called WebHuddle.

WebHuddle allows you to have online, Web browser based presentations

(PowerPoint, OpenOffice Impress presentations), voice conferencing and even

application presentation by showing off your desktop to others. Using the

latter, you can share, to the meeting attendees, your computer's desktop. Note

that the other attendees cannot use your desktop, but only see it. Alongside,

during a Web meeting, one can chat, ask/answer to questions and host polls. All

these happen in almost real time and require only a Web browser (IE or Firefox)

with Java plugin (refer to the box Setting up Java Plugin on Windows and Linux).

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Let's jump right into the nitty-gritties of running this appliance with

WebHuddle on your network, for your customers/clients.

Set up a meeting



Start the Collaboration appliance as explained in the article Using WebHuddle
Appliance. Login as root. Change to the directory /opt/webhuddle/bin and start

the Webhuddle as:

cd /opt/webhuddle/bin



./run.sh

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Wait for a minute to let WebHuddle start. Set up the Java plugin on one or

more of the desktop machines running Windows/ Linux on your network and fire the

Web browser with the URL http:// 192.168.3.16:8080/. Substitute 192.168.3.17

with the IP address that you assigned to the appliance (refer to the article

Using WebHuddle Appliance). Click on Accept, OK or Continue for all pop-up

alerts (related to SSL certificate) you see while working on WebHuddle. You

should be greeted by the main page of WebHuddle. To set up a meeting, you will

first need to register and login to the system. Click on Login link on the top

right. Then click on 'Don't have an account? Register here!' to regiter for an

account. The password will be mailed to the e-mail address you specified during

registration. Alternatively, if the e-mail could not be sent, the password will

be shown to you along with an error saying that the password could not be

mailed.

Next, click on the login link and fill in the username (the e-mail address

which you specified during registration) and the password (sent to the e-mail

address or shown along with the error message). Upon login, you can click on

Profile link (at the top) and change the password to your preferred one. If you

want to present a PowerPoint presentation during the Web meet, click on Upload

link at the top. In the subsequent page, type in any name for the Content Name,

say Presentation1.

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Click on Browse and select the PowerPoint file to upload. Click on submit.

Type in a meeting room password, which will be used by the participants to join

the Web meeting.

Start the meeting



Click on the 'Begin Meeting' link at the top. Fill in any name and description
of the meeting. From the dropdown labeled 'Meeting Scripting', select

Presentation1 (the Content Name that you specified while uploading the

PowerPoint file). Click on Submit.

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Note: All the appliances that have been shipped with

PCQLinux 2007 have6y a standard password for the user root-pass@word

After a couple of seconds, you will see some Java pop ups. Click on Run or

Yes on these pop ups.

Subsequently, you will see the WebHuddle meeting space where you can flip

through the presentation slides, show your desktop and chat with the meeting

participants.

Invite others to join



You can send e-mails to the meeting participants with the URL to the WebHuddle
along with your e-mail  address (which you specified during registration)

and the meeting room password (specified on the 'Begin Meeting' page). A

standard e-mail could be as follows:



Dear xxx,


We have hosted a Web meet for today's presentation. Please access the meeting
room using the following URL:



https://192.168.3.16:8443/enterroom.do?action=setToken


Meeting Host's email address:


Meeting password:




When the participants click on the URL in the e-mail, they will be shown a

page with a form, which will prompt them to enter their name, their e-mail,

meeting host's e-mail address (given out in the e-mail) and meeting password

(given out in the e-mail). Once they fill up the form and click on the Submit,

the meeting place will also open in front of them. The second pane on the right

will show you the names of the participants in the meeting as they join in.

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