Last month I put up a post about new features that omNovia snuck into their web conferencing product. As I pointed out, they don’t put out formally numbered releases. They just let changes and enhancements trickle in over time. They recently announced another batch of features, leaving me with the question of whether to write another post so soon. I don’t want to give the impression that this is a promotional forum for any particular vendor… That would be far from true. But I suppose it’s similar to talking about a version upgrade from another vendor with enough items to justify splitting across two posts. With that in mind, here are the latest tweaks to omNovia.
Cosmetic changes:
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There are additional options for “skins” (color themes) for the conferencing room, selectable by an account administrator.
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Event registration looks a little different, but most importantly now supports languages that read right to left (such as Hebrew and Arabic).
- The audience chat area can now be configured to display to the side of your content if desired. It used to be fixed below the content area. This is an administrative setting and cannot be changed from within an active web meeting.
Functional changes:
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The Movie Player module can now show YouTube videos inside a web meeting. Previously you had to upload videos from your computer (which is still allowed). The new additional option gives you instant search and display availability for any video on the YouTube site.
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Full screen is now available for the Movie Player module. It was previously enabled only for application sharing and slides.
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Enterprises running LDAP or Microsoft Active Directory authentication can now access those security features within the room access API to allow better security and easier Single Sign On access to internal web meetings.
- And last but not least, my favorite… There is finally a functional difference between users identified as Presenters and those identified as Administrators in the named user setup. Previously, you could set up a user as a Presenter, but they had all the power of an Administrator. This drove me crazy when working with a one-time guest presenter on a webinar… I had to warn them not to accidentally close the meeting for all attendees. I had to tell them to ignore system messages that didn’t affect them. Now those are all hidden. I see the messages and controls as an Administrator, and my Presenters can concentrate purely on showing their materials without worrying about the mechanics of how the session is running. Yay!
As a reminder, I encourage all web conferencing vendors to let me know about enhancements so I can help spread the word. It can be hard for people to learn about new functionality when they only see your product at one point in time.
