Desktop sharing with Zoho Meeting

Desktop sharing is an incredibly useful approach for collaborating on ideas, holding presentations, or simply accessing remote computers. The concept is simple. A single computer acts as the presenter, allowing others to “see” the screen. From anywhere in the world, meeting participants can log in and view the presenters’ PC. Control can even be granted to any meeting participant, allowing them to interact with the presenters computer as if they were sitting right in front of it.

A number of services are available for conducting desktop presentations. Within a local network, both Windows and Mac OS X have native remote desktop software available. However, the true “bread and butter” of desktop sharing is being able to connect to a remote computer, without the use of VPN or other such protocols.

For a price, you can sign up with services like LogMeIn or GoToMeeting, but with such services the cost is high, and different product choices overwhelming. For example, LogMeIn has over a half-dozen products with different names, that may all essentially do the same thing.

Zoho Meeting

Zoho Meeting meets the needs of desktop sharing for small businesses and independent entrepreneurs. The product is straight-forward and practical. And did I mention it’s free?

I’ve tested Zoho Meeting using Windows XP as the presenter (Firefox 2.0), and Mac OS X as a participant (Firefox 2.0). Both computers were running on different networks.

System requirements

Meeting presenters must be on a Windows PC (2000/XP/Vista), but meeting participants can use any operating system with a modern web browser:

• Internet Explorer 5.5+
• Firefox 1.5+
• Safari

In order to view meetings, you need Java or Flash installed.

To host meetings, an additional plug-in is required.

This creates an icon in your toolbar which lets you manage the meeting.

The FAQ page has more information. Mac support (for presenters) is supposedly coming soon.

Creating a meeting

The meeting presenter needs a Zoho account to create a meeting. With just a few details, your meeting is quickly set up.

Joining a meeting

Meeting participants each receive an email inviting them to the meeting.

Once at the web page, participants can review the details of the meeting, and click Join to enter the meeting. Good news is participants do not need a Zoho account to enter a meeting.

Participants are prompted to choose which viewer they’d like to use, Java recommended as being faster.

That’s it! Participants should be logged into the meeting, and able to see the presenters’ screen.

Transferring control

At any time, meeting participants can request control of the presenters computer. The presenter then receives this message:

If control is granted, that participant will receive this message, and be able to interact with the presenters computer:

The presenter can revoke control at any time.

Closing thoughts

Zoho Meeting may not be as “fine-tuned” or feature-specific as paid services like GoToMeeting, but it gets the job done, and no one can argue with free.