Apache OpenMeetingsĪlthough its look may remind you of an old-school Windows app, Apache OpenMeetings has many features found in commercial videoconferencing applications. The latest version, 5.0.1, was released in September 2020. There is no desktop or mobile app end users access the system via a web browser on their desktop or phone. We’ve included a features table so you can compare the options side by side.Īs part of the Apache open-source project, OpenMeetings provides users with videoconferencing among other groupware tools such as instant messaging, whiteboard sharing, and collaborative document editing. Platforms are listed in alphabetical order, with no preference or ranking to suggest that one is better than any other. With a variety of options to choose from, we hope you’ll find one that’s right for your organization. Indeed, as we found with our dives into free screen-sharing apps and enterprise-friendly remote desktop software offerings, the lines can get blurry between tools meant for videoconferencing, web conferencing, text chat, VoIP, and other features such as screen sharing, file sharing, and whiteboarding. Some of them are part of a larger collaboration offering, where videoconferencing is just one feature within the platform. With some, customers set up, host and maintain the software on-premises, while other platforms provide cloud-based hosting, and some offer both options. Some of these are free, and some of them have commercial upgrade options. Many of these projects utilize WebRTC, the open-source, real-time communications framework developed and maintained by Google and others that supports audio, video, and data communications.įor this roundup, we are focusing on open-source tools and platforms that offer videoconferencing as a main feature. The demand for videoconferencing due to the pandemic has ramped up the development of many open-source projects, with end users and companies able to benefit from more robust offerings than may have been available in recent years. In addition, videoconferencing vendors that offered their commercial platforms for free earlier in 2020 may end these freebies as we move into 2021.įortunately, there are many choices for companies looking to go beyond the mainstream commercial products. These include looking for a lower-cost option, searching for something more secure, or supporting the altruistic and transparent nature of open-source software. Now that a large majority of us are working from home with no immediate plans to return to the office full time, companies are exploring alternative videoconferencing platforms for a variety of reasons. Since many decisions regarding technology tools for remote workers at the start of the pandemic were made based on urgency, ease of use, availability, and cost, many companies turned to free or inexpensive videoconferencing tools such as Zoom or Google Meet for their immediate needs, with some larger organizations ponying up for enterprise versions of those applications. As the world’s knowledge workers continue to work from home due to the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, using a videoconferencing application is as common as checking your email or opening a spreadsheet.
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