• Conferences
  • Connecting to a conference
  • Creating a сonference
    • Quick conference template
    • Call-to-conference escalation
  • Scheduling a conference
    • "General" tab
    • "Participants" tab
    • "Layout" tab
    • "Registration" tab
    • "Advanced" tab
  • Virtual room management
  • Call-to-conference escalation
  • Inviting users to the conference
  • Inviting a user group to the conference
  • User group actions
  • Disconnecting participants
  • Ending the conference
  • Conference analytics

Conferences

Any video conference provides the following participants' rights:

• Conference owner
• Moderator
• Operator
• Speaker.

Read more about user and guest rights in our knowledge base.

Connecting to a conference

You can join a video conference in the following ways:

• Call the conference owner

• Call the conference with its ID

• Choose a conference and click Connect to the conference in the conference scheduler

• Connect to the conference from its webpage

• Go to the conference page by entering its ID from the TrueConf Server guest page

• Go the conference webpage from the personal area. This option is available only to the conference owner.

• Enter the conference join URL in the search field of your client application.

Creating a сonference

Open the main application menu, go to the Conferences section or click on the button . On the left of the window choose Meet now, enter the meeting name and select the conferencing mode.

In Smart meeting and Moderated role-based conference modes, you can select the maximum number of participants and presenters on the podium. To do it, click on the drop-down menu which is in the right-hand side of the conference mode section:

When you join a meeting by calling its owner, the owner receives a corresponding request by default. You can change this settings by enabling the Automatically approve join requests checkbox. In this case, a user who wants to participate in the meeting will automatically connect to the meeting when calling its owner.

You can also enable this box after creating the conference. To this end, go to Conference options in the conference control panel by clicking on the corresponding button .

To turn off participants’ cameras and microphones at the moment when these users join the conference, mark the corresponding checkboxes in the Other options section:

If Smart meeting mode is selected, the box Mute participants on entry will be checked by default. To learn more about the mechanism of filling the vacant spots on the podium in a smart meeting, check the corresponding section.

The button can be used to clear the meeting settings and create it from scratch.

After that, click on the Add participants button in the Participants section to open your contact list. Select the participants you would like to invite to a conference and click Add.

Quick conference template

You can use templates to start conferences with pre-defined settings.

All conference templates are locally stored on the user's computer and are not synchronized with other devices.

Click on the Add to templates button if you want the template to be displayed in the Conferences → Conference templates section. Later you can use this template at any time.

When selecting a template, you can start and delete a conference, change its name, mode and number of participants. You can undo all unsaved edits by clicking on the corresponding button. Once you have made the changes, you can save your template.

You cannot restore the deleted template.

Call-to-conference escalation

To call all participants of a group chat, click on the in the upper right corner. The button will open the menu for [starting an instant meeting] (#create-conference). All chat participants will be automatically invited to the new conference.

Scheduling a conference

Clicking on the Scheduled conferences button in the Conferences section to go to the conference scheduler where you can:

• Schedule a conference on a specified date and select its settings

• Change the start mode to a virtual room (conference without a schedule) when creating a meeting or editing its settings

• Create a conference template.

You may not be able to create a conference in the conference scheduler due to the restrictions set by the server administrator on a group level.

To create a conference in the scheduler, follow the next steps:

1. Click the (Сreate a conference) button.

2. Select a conference type: private (by default) – only registered users can join the meeting, or public (webinar) – both registered and unregistered users can join.

The Public conference option may not be available if the server administrator didn't enable this feature.

3. Click Continue to proceed to the main settings.

"General" tab

In this section, you need to specify:

• Conference name

• Conference mode (All on screen is set by default)

• Number of presenters if you select a moderated role-based conference or a smart meeting

• The conference type: scheduled meeting or a virtual room.

• Date, time, duration, and, if necessary, recurrence for a scheduled conference.

If you need to create conferences with the same settings in a single click, check Save as a template box.

"Participants" tab

Proceed to the Participants tab and add participants in one of the following ways:

• From the address book

• By using a participant's TrueConf ID

• By entering a call string for an SIP/H.323 endpoint or RTSP device

• Via email (possible only for public conferences).

"Layout" tab

On the Layout tab, the default layout for all conference participants or for each individually and for SIP/H.323/WebRTC connections.

Editing layouts is unavailable in video lecture and smart meeting modes.

To configure the layout, complete the following steps:

1. Select a video layout

2. Choose the number of video windows

3. If necessary, you can add an additional window for content sharing

4. Select the participant for every video window or click Auto-fill layout (you will be able to re-arrange video windows with your mouse). You can also switch to full-screen mode

5. Select the location of a participant's display name in the layout (at the top or at the bottom of the video window)

6. If needed, you can check Do not allow users to change the layout box.

The location of users’ video windows in the layout (all participants in “all on screen” mode and presenters in a moderated role-based conference or a smart meeting) is determined in the following way: the windows are displayed in the order in which participants joined the conference. The layout is filled from left to right and from top to bottom starting from the upper left corner.

"Registration" tab

This tab will be available only when scheduling a public conference.

In the Registration tab, you will be able to configure mandatory registration for guest participants. To do it, take the following steps:

1. Check the Enable conference registration box.

2. Set the registration parameters: availability period, automatic closing when the maximum number of participants is reached, and ability of authenticated users to join the webinar.

3. Create a custom registration form. To do it, click on the Settings button which is at the very bottom of the Registration form settings section. There you will be able to select input fields for your form or add custom fields.

The registration form can be customised only when a conference is created. This feature will be unavailable when the conference is edited.

"Advanced" tab

In the Advanced tab, you can:

• Set up conference ID

• PIN for joining a conference (an optional security safeguard which may be helpful when holding a webinar)

• Enable uninvited users to join the conference without asking for permission (available only for private conferences)

• Settings for automatically turning off participants’ cameras and microphones when they join the conference

This checkbox will work only for this particular conference. It will not affect users’ devices in other conferences or point-to-point calls.

• Specify guest permissions (available only for private conferences)

Learn more about public conferences in our article about webinar security.

• Record a conference (this parameter can be changed only if recording is allowed on the server side by the owner)

• Send email invitations to conference participants.

You may not be able to enable conference recording and send invitations if your TrueConf Server administrator has not set up these features.

• Conference control widget.

Virtual room management

In the Virtual rooms section, you will see the list of unscheduled conferences (virtual rooms) where you are either the owner or a participant. Here, you will be able to manage your events or add new ones. When editing the conference, you can also change the start mode of this meeting (either a scheduled conference or a virtual room). To add a conference, click (Сreate a conference).

Call-to-conference escalation

Sometimes, it may be necessary to involve additional participants into a discussion. TrueConf for Windows client application allows you to quickly transform your video call into a group conference in "all on screen" mode and connect new participants. There is no need to interrupt a call and start a new video conference.

To add a new participant to a conversation:

1. Go to Contacts in the left-side menu.

2. Choose a participant you would like to invite and call this user in one of the ways described in the previous section of this guide.

You can also connect an IP camera or other devices using call strings.

You can invite users to an ongoing call in a different way:

1. Click on the in the upper right corner of the video call window.

2. Add participants from the list of contacts or search for them by entering their names (here you can also connect a device by entering a call string).

When a video call is escalated into a conference, a group chat will be automatically created for this conference. This chat will be available to all conference participants. However, it will not include the messages from the private chat with the user participating in the initial video call.

Inviting users to the conference

You can add participants from your address book when creating a conference as shown above.

Moreover, if you are the moderator of an ongoing conference, you can invite participants to join it. There are three options to do so.

1. Go to the list of participants using the button and click Add participants.

2. If you call any user during a conference, this user will be invited to join your current conference.

3. Third, if you are the conference owner or have operator rights, you can go to the participants list in the real-time meeting manager and invite users by clicking the button to the right of the search bar.

The users, who did not join the meeting, will be displayed as a separate Unconnected group in the conference participant list. You can remove any of these participants (right-click on a participant to open the context menu and remove) or clear the entire list by clicking on the button.

Inviting a user group to the conference

To add a user group to a conference, go to the group list display mode and click Invite to conference in the group context menu. You will enter the conference creation menu.

In the same way, you can invite the group to an active video meeting if you are the meeting moderator.

To add a new participant or group without leaving the conference window, you need to go to the list of conference participants and click Add participants.

User group actions

Click on the button to select the required action over conference participants.

The same button is available for the list of users who did not join the conference. It will allow you to re-invite all them to the meeting.

Disconnecting participants

The moderator can disconnect a participant or another moderator during a meeting (removing the conference owner is unavailable). To this end, right click on the user name and select Disconnect participant in the list of conference participants (don't forget to go to the list of participants rather than the address book).

You will need to confirm the removal of a participant by clicking on the corresponding button. Please note that if you have marked the Do not allow to rejoin box, the user will be unable to join this meeting later.

Ending the conference

If you are the conference moderator, when you leave the conference (by pressing ) you will be asked whether you want to leave the conference or end the conference for all participants.

If you choose Leave (without ending it for everyone), you can re-join it in the following ways:

• Call its ID or join URL

• If you are the owner, you will only need to create a new conference. The application will automatically redirect you to the conference where you are the owner (if at least one participant still remains in the meeting).

Conference analytics

The conference owner can check detailed information about participants and their activity during the event. To do it, you will need to:

1. Click on the button in the application menu to access the Conferences section.

2. Select the list of conferences depending their start mode: Scheduled conferences or Virtual rooms.

3. Click on the conference for which you want to check the analytics.

4. Click on the Analytics button in the conference card.

   

5. In the analytics section, you will be able to check the following data:

   • Information about participants

   • Connection history

   • Messages sent to the common chat.

It is also possible to search within these data and apply filters. If necessary, any list can be saved to a csv file. To do it, click on the button.