Re: WebEx reservations for Working Group and Task Force calls

Hi Michael
Was I also meant to get an email directly from webex?

All the best

Lisa Seeman

Athena ICT Accessibility Projects 
LinkedIn, Twitter





---- On Fri, 08 May 2015 21:20:13 +0300 Michael Cooper<cooper@w3.org> wrote ---- 

  As you know, the W3C Zakim teleconference bridge will soon be decommissioned. As a supposedly interim solution, W3C will use WebEx for teleconferences. I am about to schedule WebEx reservations for the groups in my area of responsibility. For each reservation, I will have the system send the chair / facilitator of that call information about the reservation, for you to include in your agenda. This message is to let you know to look out for those messages and explain why you'll be seeing them.
 
 A number of notes about this:
  Please keep the mail you receive from WebEx. I do not know of a lookup service to find information about a given call if you forget it. As the scheduler of these calls I can look it up if needed, but it would involve a loop without guaranteed fast response. It will be best for you to save the email in some place you know to look.
 
 I am scheduling calls that I can remember. I don't attend all calls so may forget about some I need to schedule. Please ping me if you don't get a WebEx reservation within an hour of this message for a call you need to keep running.
 I am not at the moment scheduling WebEx reservations for joint task forces, because I don't want to cross wires with the staff contact of the other group. If you would like me to be the one to set up the reservation for a joint task force, let me know. I will also try to check with the staff contacts of joint task forces to work it out with them directly, but it's best if facilitators work directly with whichever staff contact they want managing the call. This matters because only the person who originally scheduled the call can make changes to it, so you should work with whichever staff contact is closer to that particular group (sometimes me, sometimes not).
 WebEx does not allow us to choose the meeting code, so we can't get mnemonic codes. Each meeting will have a different 9 digit code, but recurring meetings will have the same code week to week. So while each different meeting will have a different code, the connection information for a given meeting is the same week to week and you can copy forwards from your agenda messages. Because we will not have mnemonic codes and there will be different codes for each of the several W3C meetings some people attend each week, it will be important to provide the full connection information in each week's agenda. Note there is also a URI to join the meeting which some people will be able to use without needing the code, you should include this in your agenda also.
 
 WebEx uses a meeting "password" in addition to the code. The password is something I can choose and will try to make obvious choices for our meetings, and it will be in the automated mail you receive. Let me know if you prefer a different password.
 
 I strongly recommend you test the WebEx system with your group within the next couple weeks, if you have not already done so. There will be some startup pains as people figure out what connection method works for them, get their devices working with the WebEx tools, get out of the habit of using Zakim, etc. Scheduling time in an upcoming agenda where you can test the WebEx system, while also having the Zakim bridge open so people can fall back to it and say "help" will help smooth the transition.
 My understanding is Zakim will be decommissioned at the end of June. You can switch to WebEx at any time before then if you like, once you have tested it out with the group. If you do not test it out before the end of June, you will be forced to switch anyways and should expect some bumps at that time.
 WebEx has features beyond audio teleconferencing, such as screen sharing, whiteboard, chat, video, closed captioning, file transfer, etc. In my initial experiments with WebEx I have found that these features can be very distracting if not well managed, and as far as I can tell it's not possible to do things like only allow one person to share their screen - anybody else can just take over at any time which really interrupts a presentation. So for the moment I am setting up meetings with most of these features turned off. If you would like your meeting to support one of these features, let me know and I can turn it on.
 
 WebEx defines a "host" that has some extra call management abilities. There can only be one host at a time, which I believe is either the first person to join the meeting, or somebody with a code that allows them to take over the host role. Initially I plan to be the "host" while we work out kinks, but will give chairs / facilitators the host code so you can manage your call. *Please do not share the host code for your meeting with participants, as chaos could ensue.*
 Although the Zakim teleconference bridge will disappear, the zakim IRC bot will not. It will not longer be able to identify callers, but its agenda and queue management features will still work. The current expectation is that groups will continue to use the usual IRC meeting minutes tools etc. 
 General information about WebEx is available from https://mit.webex.com/. This is also where to go to to join a meeting if choosing to do it via the web client or request a dialout.
 It is possible to dial into WebEx using a local or nearby number in many areas. These numbers are listed at http://www.cisco.com/web/about/doing_business/conferencing/index.html. You can point people to this page in your agendas if you want, or you can include specific local numbers for your participants if you think it would be helpful. 
 
 Some suggestions for using WebEx for W3C calls are available at https://www.w3.org/2006/tools/wiki/WebExBestPractices. This resource may evolve. Let me know if you think of something that should be added to it.
 Keeping track of attendees in the meeting will be a challenge. Users of the web client will be able to see a participants list, but some of the participants may be just a phone number or something, and we don't have a way to tell the system which connection belongs to whom. You will need to use the "present: " or "present+ " commands in IRC to get participants listed.
 Muting noisy lines will be a challenge. The web client does indicate who is speaking / making noise. However, only the "host" can force mute someone if that person doesn't mute themselves. As far as I know, there isn't a feature for people to unmute themselves with the phone keypad, so keep in mind that if you mute someone they may be unable to speak up unless they are in the web client.
 
 The WebEx web client isn't fully accessible to all users, so some people may not be able to use WebEx that way. There are smartphone apps for the major phone systems that are reportedly more accessible. It's also possible to dial in using the plain old telephone network. Some people have been exploring the accessibility gotchas and workarounds, and hopefully there will be some documentation about that you can share with your groups.
  Good luck! I expect there will be startup challenges so let me know when you need help.
 
 Michael