Re: [111attendees] [Tools-discuss] Positive observations and proposals for improvements to Meetecho (was: Re: Re: So, what are jabber scribes actually doing, these days?)

[Jonathan Morton <[e-mail]>]

On Sun, 1 Aug 2021 at 23:37, Michael Richardson <[e-mail]> wrote:

>     > *information about who is speaking in the same place as video feeds*
>
> The video image does do the yellow square when they are speaking.
>
>     > See my previous email :)  Basically the "participant list" should just
>     > be an ordered list of participants and only needs to be switched to
>     > when seeing who is in the call or opening an individual message to them
>     > (and people don't get moved out of order when they're sending
>     > something).  The "who is sending something" list should be all together
>     > with the video, and chairs pinned even if they're sending nothing right
>     > now.
>
> I think that I need a picture.

So, currently we have the Chairs and any "active" participants (hand
up, mic and/or camera open, presenting slides or screen) moving
dynamically to the top of the Participants list on the left.  This
makes it easy to find the Chairs, but if looking for a particular
person in the list, you have to check both the top of the list and
their alphabetical position, since their dynamic status could place
them either way.  By default the Participants list is also hidden when
you're reading the chat, and vice versa.  And currently the list of
video thumbnails on the right is *strictly* those people with a camera
open, whether or not they have the mic open or are active in some
other way.

The proposal here is to include *anyone* who would normally be moved
to the top of the Participants list in the list of video thumbnails,
and make the Participants list mostly static (only Chairs at the top).
The thumbnail for people without a camera on would be the profile pic
if they have one, supplemented by the appropriate participation icons
(hand, microphone, screen, slides).  This gives a natural place to
show speaking cues, so you can see at a glance who is actually
speaking.

> As my meetecho windows are more vertical than horizontal, I'd also like to be
> able to move the video boxes to be under the slides.

This also seems like a valid optimisation of screen real estate.  The
thumbnail list should lie along the edge of the window that is least
pressured by the presentation area.

 - Jonathan Morton