JISCMail Newsletter - 31/03/11

The JISCMail Newsletter for March has now been distributed. Please see href="https://jiscmail.ac.uk/cgi-bin/webadmin?A2=JISCMAIL-NEWSLETTER;6d27252.1103p If you would like to subscribe to the JISCMAIL-NEWSLETTER list, send an email to listserv@jiscmail.ac.uk with SUBSCRIBE JISCMAIL-NEWSLETTER in the body of the email.

BigBlueButton live testing - 03/03/11

JISCMail would like to invite you to try our online video and audio conferencing service powered by BigBlueButton. All of BigBlueButton’s multimedia collaboration features are available in your own private meeting. Other users can access the meeting only if you choose to share your links with them.

This service is ideal for web seminars and distance learning. We’ve found that presenter-led sessions work best.

How do I take part?

To book a private meeting please e-mail helpline@jiscmail.ac.uk with the following information:

• Time and Date of the Meeting.
• Approximate Number of Participants.

We’ll e-mail back with a link to create the meeting (valid on the day of the meeting only!). Please give us 24 hours notice for bookings. We’ll provide meeting links on a best effort basis for late bookings.

Right now we’re offering this service to UK academia. To confirm this please send your bookings using a .ac.uk e-mail address.

Getting Help

BigBlueButton provides tutorial videos for both viewers and presenters. To get the best from the service we advise that presenters watch these videos prior to using the service.

http://www.bigbluebutton.org/content/videos

You may also find it useful to send this link to your meeting participants before the meeting starts.

If you need help with this service we’re happy to do what we can. Just send an e-mail to helpline@jiscmail.ac.uk.

Warning: Please don’t hold mission critical meetings here just yet! This service is still in its testing phase. While the platform has been stable and fully functional in our tests there may be issues we’re unaware of. We’re keen for this to be a high quality service so please let us know if you have problems.

JISCMail is still our top priority so we’ll provide as much support for meetings as we can without affecting our production services.

Known Issues

We’ve come across a few issues that you should be aware of before holding a meeting:

• A small but noticeable audio delay which may be worse with lower quality internet connection. The delay is not a problem in presenter-led sessions.
• Presentations in Microsoft Office formats (.ppt, .pptx) may have graphical artefacts. Please save as PDF and upload the PDF file instead.
• Unreliable desktop sharing on Apple’s OSX platform.
• Long usernames are chopped off in the chat window. As a temporary fix hover your cursor over the name.
• Latest versions of Flash Player and Java are required - ava is only necessary for sharing your desktop.

BigBlueButton Features

 

• Audio Conferencing.
• Presentation Sharing.
• Webcam Sharing.
• Desktop Sharing.
• Whiteboard.
• Text Chat.

Network at Risk - 01/03/11

Site maintenance will be carried out during the Tuesday 'At Risk' period on 15/03/2011 and the JISCMail service may be unavailable for short periods between 07:00 and 09:00. Apologies for any inconvenience this may cause.