O.k., you must have figured it out by now, I’m a huge BigBlueButton fan. So while that is certainly true, there are a number of things I have noticed over the past few weeks that are not so nice (yet) and actually get in the way of getting some things done in an efficient way.
One major thing that really should be improved is auto-rejoin when connectivity is lost for a few seconds for various reasons. When this happens, the user needs to go through the microphone test again, his microphone might be muted depending on the default settings for the room and the video camera must be switched on again manually. And the most inconvenient thing in this category: If joining has to be confirmed by the moderator, connectivity interruption results in frequent confirmation requests on the moderator’s side.
While I do see the reason for some of these things for privacy reasons, this does get in the way as participants always have to interact with the browser instead of just sitting it out for a few moments and then just going on when reconnection is complete. I guess all of this can be fixed on BBB’s side.
Another shortcoming I have noticed is when I use BBB on a mobile device when I am out and about and just want to listen to the audio. Even when allowing ‘background’ activities for the browser, connectivity is interrupted a few minutes after I have switched-off the display. Rather inconvenient outside. I’m not sure if that can be fixed on BBB’s side as that is an operating system functionality to conserve battery and data volume. A bit of a pity.
There we go, the list is not overly long, but definitely there are quite a few things that could be improved 🙂