Video Conferencing for Unix?

LordDavon asks: "I have been trying to find a good video conferencing solution for Linux. The main issue is that my family and many friends are subjects under the Microsoft tyranny and use Microsoft NetMeeting. Although it is a nicely featured application (Whiteboard, VNC, File Transfer, etc...), I am failing to find a comparable application for Linux. Is there a single, low cost, multi-platform application that can compete?" While I'm not so sure about the existence of a whole suite of Open Source applications that can compete with NetMeeting, are there apps that are usable solely for video conferencing? We touched on this exact question two years ago, we also talked about shared whiteboards as well, although a bit more recently. Are any of you out there using Linux (or any Unix clone for that matter) in Video Conferencing? If so, how?

Compete with Netmeeting?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's easy.

1) Make your program run as a device driver
2) Completely bring the system to its knees anytime someone launches the program

That's it!

At least, that's my experience with the steaming pile of crap Netmeeting.

GNOMEMeeting

[Anonymous Coward]

Might want to give GNOMEMeeting [gnomeeting.com] a try. Supposedly it works with NetMeeting but I've never had much success with it. Typical Linux software - half implemented and a mess.

Re:GNOMEMeeting

[Anonymous Coward]

Whoops, that should be GNOMEMeeting.org [gnomemeeting.org].

Re:GNOMEMeeting

[Anonymous Coward]

I do not agree with you. I'm successfully using GnomeMeeting since 2 months every day with some friends (I do not live where I'm born), and it works flawlessly and is from far better than Netmeeting. Guys like you should help to improve it instead of criticize and say stupid things.
When something doesn't work for somebody, there can be 2 reasons : the user is stupid or the software is bad. As I run it successfully, I think that you are stupid. Sorry, but your comment was stupid and I can say to everybody here that GnomeMeeting runs pretty good and has the most intuitive and clean UI I've never seen on Linux.

Thank you

[DavonZ]

This does look like an excellent package. I may try it tonight. This one looks like is may solve some of the problems I am having.

I haven't tried this:

[Peter H.S.]

http://cvw.sourceforge.net/ seems to fit your bill somewhat.

The Java client should run on Win, Posix (Linux?) and even Palm (no video I guess).

However, it does require a dedicated document server.

Projects like confman (java too) seems very slick, but is only for people having acces for Mbone (ip6?).

GnomeMeeting (http://www.gnomemeeting.org) is very slick too. It supports the H.323 protocol, so it should work with MS Netmeeting. However no chat, whiteboards etc, only video and voice. (those functions usually requires the T.120 protocol).

www.openh323.org

[carleton]

I haven't been tracking them for a quite a while, but they seem to have a start towards what you're looking for. One big problem they were having (which may or may not still be true) was that some of the other protocols being used by netmeeting and other videoconferencing over networks were patented.
Besides, who really wants to see their boss/coworkers? Wouldn't it be better to get cracking on some manner of better looking avatars?

Re:www.openh323.org

[kableh]

I have seen some of the Open H323 stuff in action, and it looks pretty good. Compatible with Netmeeting too. A developer at work contributes to it, and is developing a VoIP app for us. I've actually dialed a coworkers cell phone from an iPaq with a WiFi card, with good voice quality.

Anyhow, more on topic, the OpenH323 stuff is coming along, and is quite usuable in its current form. Not sure about the video support at the moment, but I'm sure a quick look at their website would help!

Re:www.openh323.org

[DavonZ]

This also look excellent. I am going to read more into it. It looks as though there is pleanty of information on this site. Thank you so much for this link.

I agree; what's the point anyways?

[eean]

I've done some video conferencing and it just seems silly. I do not know if I really like being able to see the person I'm talking to or visa versa. It makes it harder to multitask. I can't cook or read a website while videoconferencing, but I can while on the telephone or instant messenging.

Netmeeting works flawless

[Mustang Matt]

I can't believe they give it away for free.

I actually use it for remote desktop control more often than video conferencing.

If you're at all interested in remote desktop control, I'd check out VNC. It is cross platform and it's probably the next best thing to netmeeting.

As far as video conferencing... Until there are more drivers for all the cheapie usb webcams out there, I don't think video conferencing will be a realistic possibility under linux.

Re:Netmeeting works flawless

[DavonZ]

Actually, my camera only cost $50 and works in Linux. It is an Intel Delux. Has excellent picture quality too.

LD

Re:h.323 alternatives?

[bakes]

Equivalence (who host OpenH323) have a program called 'phonepatch' [equival.com] that sits on the firewall and proxies the connection for you. Don't know the current status, but I used it for a short while (demo) a couple of years ago, running NetMeeting inside the firewall complete with NAT, and it worked fine.

If you set it up properly with a directory (LDAP) it can even handle inbound connection requests by asking who you want to talk to and then forwarding the connection request to that users workstation.

If you have a Checkpoint FW-1 firewall, it supports H.323 with NAT, on outbound connections only of course. Don't know about other FW software.

It may not be linux but....

[squeegee-me]

Sun has a firewire camer for VC that they are selling for the Sun Blade workstations. It comes with Sun's version of netmeeting, which is compatable. I don't know if the app is freely downloadable or not, but the camera cost about $250 with the app on a CD. If it is freely avalable, they may have a x86 version as well in the works. It's been a while since I looked into it but you should be able to find the specs under the Blade 100 or 1000 pages. If I find a link to the kit, I'll post again as a resonce to this.

For Sun:

[larien]

.. there's SunForum [sun.com].

It uses "H.323, T.120 and T.127 standards for communicating multimedia and other data between conference participants"

From the FAQ, it looks like it should interoperate with Netmeeting etc if it talks the same language (H.323)

InPerson 2.0 on SGI's IRIX (on Indy)

[green pizza]

I use an old SiliconGraphics Indy (mine has a 200 MHz R4400 CPU) salvaged from a lab upgrade for my video conferencing. InPerson supports a whole bucket load of audio codec along with H.261, RGB8, and HDCC video codecs. When conversing with other InPerson users we can use a shared whiteboard and a 3D model space as well. The app is no longer sold, but it works fine on pretty much any SGI that can run IRIX 5.3, 6.2, or 6.5.X. It works great on most 150 MHz or faster Indys. Fair warning, the "IndyCam" is trash. It is what you would expect from any cheap montior-top cam from 1993. Indy has SVideo and Composite (RCA) NTSC/PAL input jacks, so use an old camcorder or small lab cam.

At any rate, this is what I use for my conferencing. It beats the heck outta a windows box. Some folks hate IRIX, but at least it's POSIX complaint and can run gcc, etc (http://freeware.sgi.com). And InPerson is much cooler than Sun's conferecing app anyway. :P

Yes, there is. But may be tough to buy.

[hatless]

NetMeeting can interoperate with any H.323 and T.120 compliant conferencing system. The H.323 part--the video and audio conferencing--is available under Linux, with apps like GnomeMeeting and the OpenH323 Project's foundational work.

But there's no free T.120 client for Linux. T.120 is the whiteboarding and application sharing part of the protocol.

DataConnection [dataconnection.com] is the company that did the core work for both NetMeeting and Sun's SunForum, which is a feature-for-feature NetMeeting-alike for Solaris. Their generic name for the product is DC-Share.

Last year they ported the product to Linux, and also have a Java version--with, yes, app sharing--but they don't do direct sales.. just OEM and licensing deals. Contact them and see if anyone is selling a Linux client based on their software.