This winter, the Learning Technology Center staff looks forward to providing professional development opportunities for instructional and non-instructional staff on a wide variety of topics.
Multiple sessions on different topics related to Canvas, Webex, HyFlex/Video Enabled Classrooms, and general campus technologies will help you learn new skills, enhance your use of technology, and implement new strategies.
Webex Meetings now allows meeting hosts to setup meeting breakout sessions and pre-assign invitees to specific sessions while schedule the meetings. For full details on how to use pre-assignment for Webex Meetings, see Cisco’s article “Preassign Participants to Breakout Sessions.”
Breakout sessions can be assigned in advanced using the web scheduler one of two ways:
Instructors: If you schedule your class virtual meetings in Canvas, you can take advantage of this feature, but it will mean that students will not need to log in to Canvas to join the meeting, thus making the attendance feature less accurate.
By importing a CSV file of your students to the meeting in your account, you will effectively invite them through the web scheduler. This action will send them an invitation email with the meeting link.
Things for everyone to keep in mind:
If you currently have a meeting scheduled from your account, you can edit the meeting to include pre-assignment.
A meeting previously scheduled through Outlook can not be edited it to allow for pre-assignment.
When using a CSV file, download the template (see image below) and enter the names of the breakout sessions as well as the email addresses for your attendees, which will automatically invite these people to your meeting.
Screenshot of where to locate the template to import a list of attendees from a CSV.
Effective immediately, Webex Meetings, Events and Trainings will have a unique Host Key* generated for each occurrence of a recurring series. This means that if you previously made note of the Meeting Number and Host key for your recurring series, you will now need to check prior to each session for the new Host Key.
Why has this change been implemented? To prevent unauthorized use of the Host Key (or PIN), making your classes, meetings, and events even more secure.
What does this mean for you? It may not affect you at all, as most people do not need the Host Key to start and run Webex sessions. If you need to find your Host Key for a meeting, go to your account at uww.webex.com or to Host Information in the Outlook appointment.
Who will be impacted? Anyone who uses a Cisco Webex Control Panel to start Webex sessions in HyFlex Video-enabled classrooms or Video-enabled conference rooms will need to note the new Host Key for every recurrence. Anyone who uses or shares the Host Key for Meetings, Events, or Trainings will want to make note of this change.
When does this take effect? Immediately. It applies to previously scheduled sessions, so any Webex session moving forward will have a new Host Key after the scheduled time ends.
Does this only affect recurring meetings? No, the Host Key for any Webex session will renew when a session ends after its scheduled time.
*A Host Key (PIN) is a six-digit code generated when a Webex session is scheduled. The Host Key may be used to reclaim the host role within a live session, or it can be used to start a meeting from a video system.
Enter your Webex Host Key (PIN) when starting a meeting from a Cisco Touch Panel in our HyFlex Video-Enabled classrooms and conference rooms.
On Tuesday, September 15, Cisco will deploy additional updates to Webex Meetings. The highlights of these additional features are below. Full release notes are also available.
Video Breakout Sessions in Webex Meetings Breakout sessions allow you to place your meeting participants into smaller groups to collaborate and share ideas. Inside of the breakout session is like being in a smaller meeting, complete with audio and video where participants can collaborate and share content, or even ask the host for help from the main session. For more details, you can explore these capabilities in depth. UWW users may have up to 100 breakout sessions per meeting with a maximum of 1,000 meeting participants.
Be sure anyone participating in a Webex Meeting on a mobile phone or mobile device updates the app on their device. While they will be able to join the meeting, they will not be able to go into a breakout session until they update the app. UWW owned devices will automatically update, but student apps and devices may not.
View of Breakout session tool within Webex Meetings
In-Meeting Cohost Role As a meeting host, you can now assign other meeting participants as cohosts. Cohosts share your host-level privileges like muting and unmuting other participants, moving participants to or admitting participants from the lobby, and more!
You can assign cohosts on the fly, directly in-meeting, by right-clicking the participant and changing their role to Cohost. You may have as many cohosts in a meeting as you wish.
The following features aren’t currently supported in a breakout session and will be addressed in a future release:
Raise hand, People Insights profile, and the notes taker role
Closed captioning
Recording breakout sessions
“Optimize for motion and video” content sharing
Sharing web browser or multimedia
Annotation and Whiteboard
Live streaming
Polling
Saving chat
Users who join from the Webex Meeting web app can’t share content
Grid Layout for Cloud Recordings With the grid layout becoming the default experience in Webex Meetings, meeting recordings will default to the grid layout in this update for new and existing Webex hosts. This applies to both Webex Meetings and Webex Events. To return to previous settings or make changes to your recording preferences, sign in at uww.webex.com, navigate to Preferences and then select the Recordings tab. Be sure to hit SAVE!
Recording settings in your preferences
Participant Content Sharing Hosts can now allow the participants to share their screen during scheduled meetings or Personal Rooms meetings.
On Tuesday, September 8, Cisco deployed the Webex Meetings 40.9 update. The highlights of this release are listed below. Full release notes are also available. Please note, some of the updates outlined in the full release notes are not yet available. We expect these to launch next Tuesday, September 15.
Optimized Audio and Video Preview The larger, optimized Audio/Video Preview window makes it easier to look your best and find the settings you need before joining a meeting.
Webex preview window
Updated Controls in Meetings and Events The look of the controls in Meetings and Events has changed to make them more intuitive and easier to use. Meeting controls are now clearly labeled and located at the bottom of your meeting window, which means you’ll always have them in sight, but without them covering up shared content or video.
Clear and easy-to-find meeting controls
Contextual Option Menus Audio settings and camera settings can now be conveniently accessed in the menus at the right of their respective mute and camera buttons.
An easier way to adjust your setting
Consolidated Panel Controls Panel controls (like Participants, Chat, and Q&A) can be found towards the right, where the panel opens.
Panel controls
Additional Virtual Background Improvements and Support Cisco has added more virtual background images to choose from in your Meetings and Events. The virtual background feature is now supported on Macs with dual-core processors.
Virtual background preset images
Other Updates to Note: -Users of Amazon Echo Show or Google Home Hub Smart Display devices will now be able to use Webex Meetings on these devices. Amazon Echo Show devices will be able to display meeting and recording lists, as well as play back recordings. Google Nest Hub devices will be able to display meeting and recording lists, play back recordings, and schedule meetings. –Facebook Portal users will now be able to leverage their Webex Meetings app directly from all Facebook Portal devices! The experience will match what currently exists in the Android app. –Cisco is officially retiring Support for Internet Explorer 10 and Windows 7. While users on these platforms won’t be prevented from joining or starting meetings, Cisco will no longer provide bug fixes or updates for this operating system and browser going forward.
