1. How to define LDAP correctly in Onstream Webinars admin?

Solution: The account suffix should not be attached to the username but instead to be added to the account suffix field. 
For Eg: AD (Active Directory)

Incorrect way: 
AD USERNAME: [email protected] 
ACCOUNT SUFFIX: (empty)

Correct Way: 
AD USERNAME: johndoe 
ACCOUNT SUFFIX: @abc.org

In some instances where the username does not contain a suffix, the account suffix must also contain a reformatted base DN, for example:

AD USERNAME: johndoe 
BASE DN: dc=company,dc=local 
ACCOUNT SUFFIX: @company.local

 

2. Do you encrypt data transmission? Do you use RTMP or RTMPE? Do you use https?

We use RTMPE (encrypted RTMP) for streams and https for login and files.

 

3. Do you have a feature that keeps track of the attendance of participants?

Attendance can be checked via the "Usage Statistics" menu item in the Account Center.

Please click on "Usage Statistics" to find the graph depicting the number of users that attended all your sessions. The yellow line shows the "Number of connections per day". Click on the yellow dot showing connections for any particular day and it will provide you detailed data about all your users for that day.

 

4. Do you have any video tutorials?

Yes we do, please visit our YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.com/Onstream Webinars

 

5. Do you support application sharing and screen sharing on Linux? Do you have a linux version of the screen sharing driver?

Our linux application sharing driver is currently in experimental status. It requires configuration as outlined in the attached PDF "How to get Appshare running on linux + known issues.pdf" and has limitations such as not allowing selection of individual applications or individual windows such as our Windows and OS X versions. That said, sharng the entire desktop works well according to some of our linux customers and we are making this experimental version available due to popular demand.

DISCLAIMER: The linux appshare driver is to be considered experimental software. It is not officially supported by Onstream Webinars and not recommended for production environments. Downloading and installing this application is entirely at your own risk.

 

6. Does Onstream Webinars have any support for Mobile Devices or Tablets?

Yes, Onstream Webinars runs on mobile devices and tablets.

Please search for "Onstream Webinars" in the Apple App Store and Google Play Store to download and install the free app.

Supported iOS devices:

Requires iOS 5.0 or later. Compatible with iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, iPhone 4S, iPhone 5, iPod touch (3rd generation), iPod touch (4th generation), iPod touch (5th generation and iPad.

Minimum requirements for Android devices:

ARMv7 processor with vector FPU, minimum 550MHz, OpenGL ES 2.0, H.264 and AAC HW decoders Android 2.3 and above

If you are having trouble with getting Onstream Webinars running on your Android device, try installing another Adobe AIR based application to isolate the problem. If that app is also causing problems there is an issue with Adobe AIR support. Popular AIR-based apps can be found here:

http://www.appbrain.com/apps/popular/adobe-air/

 

7. Does Onstream Webinars support Polling functions and Surveys?

Yes, you can conduct polls and also set your own feedback (Survey) page.

Polls are useful during a meeting if you want instant feedback on what is being presented. Polls can also be used at the end of a meeting to find out if participants felt the meeting, content, and presenters were high quality.

An account holder or moderator can use the polling synclet to create questions, or polls, for participants and to view the results. Only session hosts and moderator control polling management and how polls appear to meeting participants. Hosts can also cast votes. You can conduct one poll at a time.

If your account has the branding feature enabled, you can set an exit URL. You can send users to a webpage where you have set up a survey with a third party tool.

Create a Poll:

• Login into the session as a session host or moderator, If the Poll synclet is not displayed, click the "WORKSPACE" menu and select Poll to show the Poll synclet.
• You can add multiple options for answers by checking the box "Allow multiple answers" below the question field.
• Once input is received from the users for a poll, you can then conduct another poll.
• The polling component allows participants to offer feedback or opinions.
• First, turn on the Polling component (see directions above for showing/hiding components).
• Click the Prepare button.
• To add a question, click and type the question in the input box that appears.
• To add choices, click in the Answer input box and type each answer choice in it’s own line.

 

Edit a Poll:

Note: If you edit an open poll, current results are lost.

• Click Prepare in the bottom-left corner of the Polling synclet.
• Edit the text.
• Click Open.

View Poll Results:

As a host or moderator, you can view poll results. These results are updated in real time as participants continue to cast or change their votes. All polling results are display in the format of percentages.

The overall responses appear in the Poll pod. To view responses from individual participants, click "View Votes".

To show results of the poll to all your session attendies you need to check the box "Show results to everyone" on the polling synclet.

You can also email yourself the results by clicking the menu in the Polling Synclet and selecting email results.

Opening an Existing Poll:

Polls that have already been created in a session can be quickly re-opened. When a synclet is minimized/hidden, Onstream Webinars stores all of its information for easy retrieval.

To open an existing poll:

• From the top menu bar, click the "WORKSPACE" menu and select(Checked) Poll.

You can also email polling results on your email id. 
To do this click on "POLL" button at the Left hand side top of the polling synclet then select "Email Poll". it wil enable a field to enter the email id. Default there will be your Onstream Webinars account holder's email id, you can change it as per your conveinience. Enter your valid email id and click on "Ok".

 

8. Does Onstream Webinars support origin/edge? How will an origin/edge server deployment help me manage bandwidth?

Onstream Webinars fully supports Adobe Flash Media Server's origin / edge capabilities. You can use these to optimise bandwidth usage in your deployment, scale your application, create a redundant set up and more. Adobe offers a lot of good information on their website which we recommend you read into.

This article will introduce you to some basics of bandwidth management and how an origin / edge deployment can help you adapt to bandwidth bottlenecks.

Since version 4.2.0 we support automatic IP detection for the customer to connect to the closest server. This is currently configured to work on a country level. We can help configure the origin edge setup once you know your exact requirements.

The attached a diagram illustrates 4 Flash media servers in an origin/edge setup - 1 origin and 3 edges called S1, S2, S3

It shows a single Onstream Webinars session. In this session, 6 users are broadcasting 256Kbps video each. 1 is broadcasting from S1, 2 from S2 and 3 from S3. All users are receiving each others streams.

The diagram illustrates how the network handles traffic distribution and allows you to make decisions about network design and bandwidth allocation.

Note, each individual user has the exact same bandwidth requirement of upload 256kbps and download 5*256 = 1280kbps.

You will immediately see how an origin edge architecture will help you save bandwidth. It could make sense to put edges into LANs where several users connect, then connect each edge to the origin via dedicated bandwidth over the internet or an intranet.

 

9. Does the meeting invite show the day/time of the meeting?

Yes, the meeting date and time will be mentioned in the email invite. If the user has a registered Onstream Webinars account, the date and time will reflect his local time-zone, as configured in his account.

 

10. Error Codes

common.errorCodes.error0=Unknown error. 
common.errorCodes.error1001=Token was not specified. 
common.errorCodes.error1002=DirectoryVO or directoryId is empty. 
common.errorCodes.error1003=DirectoryVO or parentId is empty. 
common.errorCodes.error1004=This directory contains files and can therefore not be deleted. Please delete the files first. 
common.errorCodes.error1005=This directory contains other directories and can therefore not be deleted. Please delete the directories first. 
common.errorCodes.error1006=Could not delete from database. 
common.errorCodes.error1007=Cannot delete the home directory. 
common.errorCodes.error1008=Directory ID does not exist. 
common.errorCodes.error1009=Could not insert into database. 
common.errorCodes.error1010=Cannot rename directory. Name missing. 
common.errorCodes.error1011=Could not update database. 
common.errorCodes.error1012=FileVO or fileId is empty. 
common.errorCodes.error1013=Cannot rename file. Name missing. 
common.errorCodes.error1014=Could not select from database. 
common.errorCodes.error1015=The connection was disallowed because you are already logged into another session. 
common.errorCodes.error1016=The connection was disallowed because the connection limit for this account has already been reached. 
common.errorCodes.error1022=This email address is already registered. 
common.errorCodes.error1023=This login is already registered. 
common.errorCodes.error5000=The connection was disallowed because the communication server rejected your session ticket. 
common.errorCodes.error5001=The connection was disallowed because you are already logged into this session. 
common.errorCodes.error5002=The connection was disallowed because the verification process timed out. 
common.errorCodes.error5003=The connection was disallowed because the connection process timed out. 
common.errorCodes.error5004=A network error occurred during the connection. 
common.errorCodes.error5005=The communication server is not responding to the connection request. 
common.errorCodes.error5006=Initial application variables are missing. 
common.errorCodes.error5007=The user profile could not be retrieved from the server. 
common.errorCodes.error5008=The user role could not be retrieved from the server. 
common.errorCodes.error5009=The user data could not be retrieved from the server. 
common.errorCodes.error5010=The connection was disallowed because the web server rejected your session ticket. 
common.errorCodes.error5011=A network error occurred during the ticket verification process. 
common.errorCodes.error5012=You have been disconnected because you have connected from another location. 
common.errorCodes.error5013=The remote server call failed. This is most likely the result of a temporary disruption in your connection. Please make sure that you are still connected. If you are connected via WiFi, please ensure that the connection is strong or switch to a cabled connection. 
common.errorCodes.error5014=The communication server rejected the connection but did not specify a reason. It is likely the server license limit has been exceeded, which could mean that the server is running the development edition. 
common.errorCodes.error5015=The connection attempt has been terminated because you have chosen to remain connected in the other location.

 

11. How can I disable the Pepper Flash plugin in Google Chrome?

The Google Chrome browser uses a version of the Flash Player called Pepper Flash. Pepper Flash is built into Chrome and is used by default.

There are known issues with Pepper Flash such as audio distortion (robotic sounding, or choppy audio) and problems with the synchronization between audio and video, perceivable on the receiving end of the stream.

If the people receiving your stream are complaining of these problems, then it is likely that you may be having problems with Pepper Flash.

We recommend that you either:

• use another browser, such as Firefox, Safari or Internet Explorer, or
• disable Pepper Flash in Chrome and install the publicly available Flash Player.

To disable Pepper Flash, you can follow the instructions in the following article (courtesy of Newtriks LTD).

http://newtriks.com/2012/12/01/how-to-disable-the-chrome-pepper-flash-player/

As the bottom of the article indicates, if you are having troubles disabling the Pepper Flash plugin, you may need to rename the Pepper Flash directory so that Chrome cannot find it. Onstream Webinars will not show you the warning after you successfully disable Pepper Flash.

Note: it may not be immediately obvious, but the article mentions that the very first thing you should do is to download and install the latest Flash Player version from Adobe in Chrome.

 

12. How can I load YouTube videos in an Onstream Webinars session?

• Open your media library.
• Click the plus icon and select "Add from URL", then select "Add YouTube video".
• A pop-up window will open where you can copy/paste the YouTube URL. The Video will then appear in your Media Library.
• Double-click the link from your Media Library or drag and drop it to you content viewer to open it for all users in the meeting. Click play to play the video. You’ll have to be an Account Holder or Moderator to be able to do this.

 

13. How can I show the "Registered Users" tab on session login page by default?

To load the "Registered users" tab by default on session links, just append "/registered" to the URL

You might want to do this when hosting an event and making it easier for your registered users to log in. Showing the tab by default will greatly increase the number of users that log in using their accounts vs using a guest access.

 

14. How can I upload a video which size is over 300 MB?

300MB is a very big file size for web conferences, we lead the field in terms of file sizes we allow. Most competitors allow 100MB or less.

We strongly recommend working with smaller file sizes to avoid causing your audiences bandwidth issues. If however you abosolutely need to share a very big file, like for example a longer video file, you have two options:

• Upload the video to your own FTP and link it through the “Add File from URL” option.
• Upload the video to YouTube and link the video to your Onstream Webinars room, through the “Add Video from YouTube” option that you will find on the Media Library:

http://www.screencast.com/t/qhtQS5A7IN06

 

15. How do I delete past sessions from your schedule?

Login into your Onstream Webinars account and click "Schedule".

Here you will get all your sessions which were created with your admin account. 
In this section you will get options to sort the session list as per your convenience i.e. "Current", "History", "By anyone", "By me" and "By others". 
Once you have sorted this list, you can view all your previous sessions here.

You need to check the boxes in front of the sessions, so that the session gets selected. Now, click on the "Actions" dropdown box above the check boxes, you will get two options 'Edit' and 'Delete'. 
As you want to delete the session, click on 'Delete', it will delete the selected session from your account.

To delete only a particular session, place the cursor on the specific session. You will see a small 'x' icon besides the "pencil icon", please click on it to delete the session. You will be prompted to confirm the deletion.

 

16. How do I delete past sessions from your schedule?

To edit a meeting you should place the cursor on the specific meeting. Once you place the cursor there you will see a small "pencil icon", please click on it to edit the meeting.

 

17. How do I improve the video and audio quality?

You can bump up the quality of the video feed you are sending by going into "Options" -> "Preferences" and selecting the "Camera & Video" tab. If you look in the section "Broadcast Shape & Quality" there are a number of quality adjustments you can make there, up to HD video standards.

By default we set the medium setting to ensure that most customers can participate without running into bandwidth issues at an acceptable quality.

In the "Mic & Speakers" tab you can additionally configure and increase the audio quality.

 

18. How do I invite participants inserted in a group? How do I invite all members of a group I created?

You can create groups of people in your Address Book section of your Account Center.If you do this, you can later add that group to a meeting by opening the "Address Book" on the invite participants screen.

When you are creating any new meeting from our "Schedule" section, you will get an option "Invite participants". 
Check this box to make the field to add participants appears. 
Click onto the user icon in the email field, you can then show groups and select multiple users in that list and add to the invitation. 
Then add all participants or group that you wish to invite to attend the meeting and click on save meeting. 
Once your meeting is saved successfully all the participants will automatically receive an email invitation.

Alternatively you can invite participants in live session also by clicking the "Invite Users" icon inside the Onstream Webinars room, but this will not allow you to invite groups.

 

19. How do I use the fields 'Moderator Redirect URL' and 'Guest Redirect URL' in Branding section of Account Center?

These fields are used so that you can choose where your attendees and moderators are redirected to when the menu item Options > End Session or Options > Leave Session is selected.

 

20. How do I use the fields 'Moderator Redirect URL' and 'Guest Redirect URL' in Branding section of Account Center?

As a moderator:

First you need to activate the "Question and Answer" feature by going to WORKSPACE >> Q & A. 
This will open a new window of the "Question and Answer" feature. 
You can adjust the position of this window by dragging it by it’s title bar. You can create space by closing any unwanted window within the Onstream Webinars interface and by clicking and dragging the edges of the windows to reshape their size and position. 
You can also save this view of your Onstream Webinars interface for future sessions via the WORKSPACE menu. 
Once activated, any attendee can send you a question. Questions will appear in the Q&A window. To answer a question you must first click on the question and then type the answer in the field below and click the answer button. The questions will be visible only to you and other moderators. The answer will be visible to all attendees. 
If you want to ask a question yourself, Click on the menu “Q & A” in the title of the window and set moderator to “off”, this will put you in the attendee mode.

As an attendee

Type your question into the text field at the bottom of the windo and click “Ask”. The question will be submitted and moderators will answer when they choose. 
Your question will be visible to moderators as soon as it is submitted, if it is answered it will be visible to all attendees.

 

21. How do we create a different login and password for each student to avoid proxy attendance?

If you want to force students to log in, make sure you invite them using the Onstream Webinars invitation feature in your Account Center when creating your meetings. 
These students will then show up in your statistics.

 

22. How many attendees can use their camera at the same time? Are there any limitations?

Onstream Meetings limits the amount of running webcams to 3. Onstream Webinars can allow up to 10 running simultaneously  
The only other limitations are the users own bandwidth. Onstream Webinars will allow you to start up to 10 video streams as you like but performance may suffer if bandwidth isn't available.

 

23. How many guests can attend the webinar other than the host?

The amount of guests that can attend depends entirely on the contracted model. 
The free version will support up to 2 people other than the host. 
You can get further details here:http://www.onstreammedia.com/landing/lead_nurturing/webinar_free_trial/

 

24. How many meetings can I hold daily? Can I hold simultaneous meetings?

You can do unlimited meetings and the people you invite can be different every time too but you cannot do two simultaneous meetings from one account. 
If you want to run two simultaneous meetings, you must purchase two accounts.

 

25. How many people can speak at a time?

There is no limit as to how many people can speak at any one time. Only your bandwidth will limit the amount of video streams you can reasonably receive.

 

26. How much bandwidth do we need for the application to work correctly? What are some other system requirements for the application to work correctly?

Our system requirements page contains recommended system requirements and also includes a section on bandwidth requirements:http://support.onstreammedia.com/onsm_webinars_system_requirements.html

 

27. How to change password?

Navigate to "Account Settings" via the drop down menu in the top right corner of your account center (where it reads "Welcome, Your Name"). 
Then enter your new password in the password field and click Update.

You can also change your password in the "Welcome" menu by going to "Account Settings".

 

28. How does the "Ban User" feature work?

Moderators can ban a user by selecting the user in the participants module and selecting the ban option from the cogwheel menu. A ban can be time limited or for life.

When a banned user attempts to join a session, the moderator will receive a discreet notification. The notification provides the moderator with an option to unban the user.

 

29. How to create folders in the Media Library?

• Click the + button you use to add files.
• Select "Add directory".

A folder will be created in your Media Library and you'll be able to sort your files.

 

30. How to export the list of users that joined the webinar?

Go to your account center and click Usage statistics in the left menu. At the bottom of that page you will see the "Export to CSV" link. Click on this link to export and save the statistics of users to your desktop.

 

31. How to install Onstream Webinars?

Installing Onstream Webinars is only required if you are purchasing an ESL (Enterprise Server Licence).

Otherwise, Onstream Webinars is available as a SaaS. 
You don't need to install anything on your computer to use; simply login to your account from our website and start conferencing.

 

32. How to invite users to conference without creating a login for them?

If you do not want to create logins for your guests then you should not invite users with Onstream Webinars’s email invitation feature and instead use the link directly to the room. 
You can do this by clicking the Invite Users icon inside the Onstream Webinars room. Note: Even if you do use the invite feature of Onstream Webinars, your invitees will get a simple link they can click and join the room directly, without having to log in manually.

 

33. How to target Registered Users tab on session login page?

Yes, it is possible to remote control a users screen. Please refer to page 20 in the user manual http://support.onstreammedia.com/pdf/account_holders.pdf

 

34. How to remote control a participant's screen?

To load the "Registered users" tab by default on session links, just append "/registered" to the URL

 

35. How To: Import from CSV

Available with the 4.1.9 release.

The file must have a .csv extension.

In Address Book

To mass-import contacts to your Address Book, just press the "Import from CSV" button in the top bar of the Address Book.

The first line in the CSV must contain the names of the parameters such as:

required:

first_name;last_name;emails (comma-seperate multiple emails and finish with a semi-colon)

you can append optional Address Book parameters: gender;company;phones (comma-seperate multiples);address;city;postcode;country;facebook;twitter;groups (comma-seperate multiples, if group name is not found a new group is created)

In Admin

To mass-import user accounts, you can choose the "Import from CSV" in the Users section.

The first line in the CSV file must contain the names of the parameters such as this:

user_name;password;first_name;last_name;email;service_plan_id

Then just add subsequent line entries and make sure the data is in the same order, and delimited with a semi-colon.

 

36. I am not able to access a webinar from outside our network. The progress is stuck on the error: "looking for the best connection path". Please suggest a solution.

Most likely this is a firewall issue.

 

37. I can't find the Branding option link in the Admin section

You can find the branding options in the "Welcome" menu in the top right of your Account Center.

 

38. I have version 11.8.800.94 of the Flash Player. How do I install a different version?

Onstream Webinars is based on the Adobe Flash Player, which is a great platform because it is already installed on almost every computer on the planet. This means you can get up and running quickly without having to install anything. However, on certain occasions, Adobe releases a version of the Flash Player that does not play nice with Onstream Webinars. They usually respond quickly and provide a fix for these issues, but the fix is not immediately made public.

On this particular occasion, version 11.8.800.94 of the player can cause crashes, especially on Windows. The Adobe bug report can be found here:

https://bugbase.adobe.com/index.cfm?event=bug&id=3594351

We recommend all users- regardless of browser type or operating system- to visit the following link and install the latest version of the Flash Player:

http://get2.adobe.com/flashplayer/

Unfortunately, we have no control over Adobe's release schedule, but we hope that this article helps you get the best out of Onstream Webinars, and we sincerely apologize for any inconvenience caused! If you need any assistance, please submit a ticket to our support team and we will do what we can to help.

 

39. I'm having trouble getting my file to convert, it seems the conversion fails, what can I do?

For PowerPoint files:

• Make sure you do not include macros on your slides. For safety reasons we have to disable all macros and that should work fine, but there can be cases where the presence of macros will cause the conversion to cancel.
• Make sure you do not embed ActiveX components in your slides (such as external video). This causes stability issues with the converter.
• Make sure you do not rely on external resources, such as CSS. Whilst this should usually not cause any issues with the conversion, we have seen cases which made the file unconvertable.

 

40. If I terminate my plan and maybe few months later I need Onstream Webinars again, do I need to redo everything all over again? Will my data be stored on your server during my inactive period?

If a customer cancels his account his data may be deleted, we cannot promise to keep data for months of non-payment. A customer should keep his account open in this period, if he does not exceed the storage limits he can downgrade to a smaller account throughout this period. There is no minimum subscription period.

 

41. In Linux, every time I try to launch the video or audio, I get a window where I am supposed to allow your server to use my camera and microphone but the session hangs and I am unable to click to grant permission. Please help.

This problem is most probably occurring due to a conflict between the general audio input on the motherboard and the audio input on your webcam. Onstream Webinars will, by default, use the Webcam audio and video settings. In your “Sound Settings” you must cancel the audio input from the webcam and allow it from your motherboard, where your microphone is connected. This should solve the conflict.

 

42. Is it possible to have a different screen from the one that the participants see? In particular, I would like to be able to see the list of participants myself but I don't want other participants to see it.

Being able to hide the participants’ list from participants and observers is available through our EVENTS plan. You can access this feature by clicking Advanced Scheduling when scheduling a session.

 

43. Is it possible to kick a participant out of a meeting room?

Yes, the account holder (green user) and moderators (blue users) can kick another user by hovering over that user's element in the PARTICIPANTS list and clicking the X that appears. Note: moderators cannot kick account holders as account holders are higher in the user hierarchy.

 

44. Is it possible to limit the broadcast of cameras and microphones to broadcast to moderators only?

No, a stream is broadcasted to all the people in the session. We have added this request to our roadmap. You will be able to put users “on hold” in a call, meaning they will temporarily be excluded from any video stream or file activity.

 

45. Is it possible to personalize the email sent to the customer to invite them to the meeting?

Personalizing an invitation email is possible in the "EVENTS" plan, using advanced scheduling features, to customize reminder emails. You can also add agenda items and additional information as well as event registration pages.

 

46. Is it possible to remove all participants except moderators from a room with a single click?

No. The closest thing that fits your request is the "Close session" feature (accessible from the OPTIONS menu), which kicks all users except the one who performed the close action. To achieve what you want, you would need to kick all non-moderators manually.

However, we have added this request to our roadmap. We imagine you would see an additional pop-up asking you if you want to "End session for all users", "End session for everyone except Moderators".

 

47. Is it possible to send a meeting invitation to a whole group?

You can create groups of people in your Address Book section of your Account Center. If you do this, you can later add that group to a meeting by opening the "Address Book" on the Invite Participants screen.

When you are creating any new meeting from the "Schedule" section, you will get an option "Invite participants". Check this box to make the field to add participants appear. Click onto the user icon in the email field, it will give you list of all your participants that you have added in your address book. You will see this list in alphabetical order.

In this section you will get options to sort the participants list as per your convenience i.e "All", "Company", "By group" and "By list". Here you have to sort this list "By group" so that you can view all your participants sorted in your various groups. You need to check the box infront of the name of the group, so that the whole group can be selected and invited to the session.

 

48. Is it possible to work from more than one PC using the same login/account?

Yes, you can use your same account at home, at work and when you travel anywhere in the world. Please note you can only log in from one location at a time, we do not allow simultaneous connections from different locations using the same account.

 

49. Is there a solution to broadcast two audio streams and selecting one of them for the user? For example, I’d like to make a multi-lingual broadcast and use live translation services in my webcast.

Onstream Webinars is not designed for this particular purpose but you could broadcast via two different audio streams simultaneously and your audience would then be able to mute the one they don’t want to listen to. You can invite the secondspeaker as a moderator. It is possible to have multiple moderators in a meeting. Alternatively you could open separate accounts, one for each language, and then send your customers to the particular language room they are interested in. Whichever method you choose, you would have to use a separate computer for each mic and of course this does not have to be limited to two streams, it can be as many as you want.

 

50. Is there any option to stop auto chat scrolling?

Currently, we don't have such a feature. If your chats are very busy, we suggest you to switch to "Discussion View" which offers a much larger chat area and is easier to read.

 

51. Is there any training manual for the Onstream Webinars application?

For all user manuals and support, please refer to http://support.onstreammedia.com

 

52. Once the invitation has been sent, is it possible to prevent the participants from logging in before a certain time? I would like to be able to prepare the presentation etc without having participants joining in before I'm ready to start.

Currently this is not possible but we are working on such a feature for an upcoming release.

 

53. Onstream Webinars does not load my webcam at all even though I choose the correct camera from the Preferences menu.

There might be a chance that you are running another software that may be accessing the camera driver. If yes then you should exit this other software and refresh your browser to reload Onstream Webinars and try again.

 

54. Please suggest the step-by-step methods to integrate the API in moodle.

We have many customers that have already integrated our API with LMS's such as Moodle, Blackboard or their own custom systems. 
API documentation with instructions is available here:

yea

55. Reducing quality of screen share to save bandwidth - Experimental

NOTE: Suggestions in this article require advanced level of computer usage and are to be regarded as experimental and not officially supported by Onstream Webinars and the Onstream Webinars staff.

In some cases, when sharing your screen to users that have very low download bandwidth, or if your own upload bandwidth is very limited (below 500kbit) you can take the following steps to reduce the color depth of the image you share. Typical reasons for trying these changes are poor audio performance (chops, or delays) as soon as you start your screen share. Please be aware that changing these settings can have unexpected effects on the amount of bandwidth you are sending and will greatly decrease the quality of your image.

Please test the various settings by sharing your screen to yourself so you know what to expect before using this with customers or in a real-life setting.

To change the color depth you will need to open the file "Application_Sharing.cfg" in an ASCII text editor and change the parameter "RGBCountOfBits" to a value 1 - 4. You can see a technical description below of what all of these settings mean but it is best to test them with trial and error. Note that value 1 results in very poor, monochromatic color.

Locating the file On Mac

• Find the Application_Sharing application in your Applications folder
• Right click the application and "Show package contents" http://cl.ly/image/1S0j1a11062x
• Navigate to Contents > MacOS and open the file Application_Sharing.cfg

Locating the file on PC

• You can navigate to the file directly by entering the path in your Windows Explorer or manually click through the folders.
• Open the file Application_Sharing.cfg

Editing the file

• IMPORTANT: Before you start, make sure that the Application Sharing application is not running.
• Make sure to use an ASCII text editor such as notepad++ on PC or TextWrangler on Mac.
• Locate the parameter "RGBCountOfBits" http://cl.ly/image/0y3P1i1J2h01
• Change the number "4" to number "3" and save the file.
• Now you can share your screen from Onstream Webinars as you do usually and you will see a reduced image quality. If you want to reduce further, repeat steps 1 through 4 and try a lower setting.
• Once again: We recommend you test this before trying it in a production environment and do not officially support any of these changes. Try the settings and measure the bandwidth you send until you arrive at a value you are happy with.

More detailed information:

You will find several parameters in this file. We do not recommend changing any of them as they will result in unexpected results and can break your Onstream Webinars experience. We include the following information purely for academic purposes.

FRAMEFREQ

• framerate value in milliseconds, default = 500
• determines how often a frame is sent
• can be set with a CHANGE call from the code
• currently a property in SettingsVO (not sure if can be set after START)
• setting available in PHP

KEY_FRAMEFREQ

• key frame interval value, default = 20
• as opposed to the actionscript equiv, this value represents seconds
• the lowest value (ie. highest kf interval) is 3 (keyframe every 3 seconds)
• can be set with CHANGE call from the code (see FlashAppshareTest.mxml)
• currently NOT set dynamically from any VO (we rely on default value)
• setting NOT available in PHP

RGB_COUNTOFBITS

• number representing the leading 1's in the binary form of the mask
• mask to apply to each of the R, G & B components
• accepts values 1-8. eg 5 represents 0xf8 (= 11111000, 5 leading 1's)
• the complete mask ends up being a hex value, eg 0xf8f8f8 for a value of 5
• can be set with a CHANGE call from the code- currently a property in OnTheFlyVO
• currently availiable in local appshare config file
• complete map of values below (you can see decimal value applied to each RGB):
• 1 > 0x80 (binary 10000000, decimal 128)
• 2 > 0xc0 (binary 11000000, decimal 192)
• 3 > 0xe0 (binary 11100000, decimal 224)
• 4 > 0xf0 (binary 11110000, decimal 240)
• 5 > 0xf8 (binary 11111000, decimal 248)
• 6 > 0xfc (binary 11111100, decimal 252)
• 7 > 0xfe (binary 11111110, decimal 254)
• 8 > 0xff (binary 11111111, decimal 255)

RGB_MASK

• value in HEX format, eg. 0xffffff
• allows the RGB mask to be set independently for each RGB component
• eg. 0xf1f2f3 means: mask 0xf1 for red, 0xf2 for green, 0xf3 for blue
• this basically sets a number from 0-255 on each channel of RGB

 

56. Should we use a separate meeting room for our post interview discussions?

Yes, this is currently the best option. Looking towards the future, we are working on a break-out session feature that would allow you to do this from the main session.

 

57. Suggestions to have a seamless session even with bandwidth problems.

• Reduce your video quality by using the Camera Preferences
• If problems persist, turn off video and use audio only.
• Avoid using ScreenShare and use file presentations via the Media Library instead. If you have to use screensharing, share only selected windows or single programs and make the windows smaller if you have a very big screen. This will reduce bandwidth usage.
• Try running a system check on system check to analyze your bandwidth; your students may want to do the same.

 

58. The URLs in my powerpoint presentation are not clickable, I need my viewers to be able to click on links, what can I do?

When creating your powerpoint, right click onto the text you want to link and manually reassign the hyperlink using the "hyperlink" menu item. If this does not work, make sure to remove any Word Art. Applying Word Art will result in this text being rendered as a bitmap image rather than a clickable link. Remove Word Art styles by right clicking, then selecting Format > Word Art styles > Clear Word Art.

 

59. The webcam image is mirrored when switching in full screen mode.

The mirror image is only seen locally. Remote viewers always see you unmirrored.

If you wish to flip the image locally you can do that by following these instructions:

• Once you start the broadcast, click on the "Video Conference" option and go to "Camera Settings".
• From the "Camera Settings" click on "Camera & Video" and check the "Flip My Image Locally" checkbox and apply to make the necessary changes.

If there is anything we could help you with, please do not hesitate to ask.

 

60. There seems to be a problem with the time zones. When I select GMT+1, it thinks as if we were in GMT+2.

It seems that in your Profile, the DST (Day light saving) option is checked; you should uncheck it and see if it shows you the correct local time