OpenHuddle
well…me and my educational aspirations were thoroughly annoyed at the application that promises to support great collaboration.
OpenHUddle is not ready. Far from it. Better splitting your screen between a Skype webcam session and a Google doc and you’ve got yourself something that OpenHuddle does not offer. Anything you open with OpenHuddle, opens outside your room’s screen, and is not manipulable by anyone. So frankly, I don’t care much going through all the technical trouble to get this thing going (no tutorials either or glossed icons) and create more internet junk (archives that you can’t delete or organize) if the webpage, the document, the picture or the ppt I open to share shows up static. At least the link you share on Twitter are hot, not pictures of the webpage you want to show.
So I might keep an eye on the application, but it is not ready at all for educational applications.
September 18th, 2008 at 11:16 am
Hey,
First off, thanks for beta testing OpenHuddle!!
We really appreciate people like you giving it a shot and giving us feedback – both positive and negative. OpenHuddle strives to support great collaboration. We are trying to provide the web conferencing tools you need at no cost – there are bound to be bumps along the way. Thanks for your patience!
To briefly address your issues:
Which is why we love the feedback. Ideally, send a bug report (link at bottom of home page) and we’ll get looking into it!
1. Using Skype and Google Docs: this can be effective, although you’ll be missing some key features. Being that this is v1 of OpenHuddle, we already have an extensive roadmap of features (soon to be published in our blog), and the functionality you seek is surely included.
2. Sharing docs, etc: true, they does appear outside of the Huddle, for now. Webpages should not be static – what browser are you using? What Huddle were you in? We plan to have the collaboration on documents, spreadsheets, etc. appear in the whiteboard area in v2. You can get a feel for what that is like by sharing your desktop or uploading PPT, which does function in that way.
3. Working through technical issues is what beta’s are all about!
4. Tutorials are coming very soon. We already started a few step-by-steps in the blog. A video demo is coming out shortly.
5. PPT: try uploading them (at the bottom of the Huddle) instead of sharing. The uploads appear in the whiteboard area for all to see.
So again, thanks for testing it out. Definitely keep your eye out for regular feature additions and enhancements. And feel free to drop me an email…
Best regards,
Jeremy and the entire OpenHuddle Team
September 18th, 2008 at 10:32 pm
Thank you for addressing my concerns, Jeremy! Deeply appreciated.
My problems started while trying to get back in my room “Willow’s World”: I could not enter or find any button, ‘join’, whatever button that would allow me to get in for a new session. The Huddle icon would only offer a hot link on ‘Archives”.
Regarding my archives, I try to locate keys that would allow me to manage my archives -essentially delete, since those archives were solo doodling– Will you offer “rename” “delete”, “create folders” ?
When my colleague and I could not enter the room I had created, she created a new one “instructional muse”. We were able to enter (’join’). Although my colleague was able to see and hear me right away, i was not able to hear her at all despite a run through the Huddle camera icon, and a checkrun on my own computer settings. 40minutes after logging, my audio kicked in. Honestly, I do not know what made it work.
Once in the Huddle, we tried the different tools, but were sorry not to be able to manipulate the content of the documents we were opening for each other to see. My browser is Mozilla Firefox. Does this make a difference for the webpages?
Another problem was my inability to scroll down the page (no scrolling option). So the Huddle window was cut at the bottom (i have a tablet PC, would that make a difference in viewing window space?). IF there were other options located there, I would not know. I suspect that this might be the case because I could not access the chat bar and join my colleague in a text exchange. So I typed my comments in the drawing pad space.
You are definitely right about Beta version.
In fact, what isn’t in beta version these days!
Again, I appreciate your comments, and will certainly stay informed about OpenHuddle… and don’t mind me if I take you up on your email offer with more comments, concerns and/or questions.
September 18th, 2008 at 10:42 pm
Ah! Thanks to Jeremy’s link (http://www.openhuddle.com/blog/), I discovered something that answers one of my questions (or at least, that addresses one of my expectations about the app):
“Oh, one quick note, OpenHuddle was designed to provide single-use rooms.” yes, indeed, it is a big deal. Because I certainly expected to be able to go back to my room at any time and use it at anytime. So as an instructor, I can’t set up the Huddle ahead of time. All my documents can be uploaded only at the time of the Huddle creation, hopefully, when the students have all entered.
Which leads to another question: can a huddle be closed to public? Maybe the instructor wishes to limit viewers to the archive? and limit the “join” to the students only.