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BBB 2.2 Beta Released!

This is a *major* update to BigBlueButton.  It marks the point at which the HTML5 client moves to the foreground and becomes the default client for BigBlueButton.  
The HTML5 now implements all the main capabilities for the viewer, moderator, and presenter.  
The HTML5 client runs without plugins. There is no Flash, no Java, and no mobile app needed to run the HTML5 client.  The client takes advantage of the latest capabilities of FireFox and Chrome (the recommended browsers on the desktop) and mobile Safari (for iOS 11+ iPhones and iPads).  
The HTML5 client uses the browser’s support for web real-time communication (webRTC) to send and receive high-quality audio, video, and screen sharing.  You’ll find the shared video of higher quality than the Flash client.  We use FreeSWITCH for WebRTC audio and Kurento for WebRTC video/screen sharing.  
The HTML5 client implements the full capabilities for the presenter upload presentation, pan/zoom, and annotate using whiteboard tools (including multi-user whiteboard).
The HTML5 client offers more collaboration capabilities (compared with the Flash client) including built-in shared notes (using EtherPad) and ability to share YouTube video during the session (though the shared YouTube video does not appear yet in the recording).
The HTML5 client runs on desktop, laptop, chromebook, and mobile devices.  It implements a responsive interface (written in React) that automatically adapts to the screen size.  This means the *same* code and interface is now running across all these devices.  For mobile devices there is no app to install.
The HTML5 client runs with the mobile browser which on iOS is mobile Safari browser and on Android is Chrome.  These browsers support using WebRTC to send/receive audio and video.  The supported operating systems on mobile devices is iOS 11+ for Apple iPhones/iPads and Android 6.0+.  The device must support the h.264 codec (which is supported by iOS and most Android phones).
For a video overview of the capabilities of the new HTML5 client, see
https://bigbluebutton.org/html5

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HTML5 Update

Happy to announce that since we started the project this year that HTML5 is now integrated and tested. The developer is now on RC8 where most of the bugs have been worked out. Once version 2.2 is announced, we will migrate to that and do additional updates to be in the stable version.

There’s no going back now!

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BBB 2.0 and HTML5 are coming!

We’ve been working on updating BBB. Flash will be sun-setting in 2020 (yay) and we’re keeping ahead of the curve on this. On this test site we are running BBB version 2.0 and have applied the HTML5 architecture. Flash and HTML5 are able to run in parallel from version 2.0. We can toggle off the HTML5 architecture and in the meantime and have the 2.0 environment when we update folks sites. Future updates will move away from flash altogether and we can toggle back on HTML5 at that time.

2.0 is very nice and works smooth. They have added some new features, and cleaned up the skin. The HTML5 version looks different, its clean and simple and can run on tablets, I-phones, and android devices. The browsers supporting webRTC right now are Chrome, Firefox, and Safari os-X 11 or greater. Make sure any flash plugin is toggled off, as well as enabling your microphone and camera in the browsers settings. I found it easier to configure Firefox to use, but your going to have to experiment a bit. According to the developer, the HTML5 version isn’t in to beta yet and is very much in development. We’ve noted some bugs and will not roll out the HTML5 side until they have corrected a few of the issues with the audio and video, and added more of the presenters functions. But feel free to look at it , its really nice!