Meeting Apps

A group can connect its Zoom or Google Meet account. The site then makes each event's meeting on that account, keeps it in step with the event, sends members in from the event page, and brings the recording back for the replay.

Meeting Apps comes with some plans, and each app has to be set up on the site.

Connecting an account

On Manage → Meeting Apps, a group's owners and admins connect the account the group's meetings are on. Connect Zoom or Connect Google Meet sends you there to sign in and allow the site's app. A group has one account per app; connecting again replaces it.

Once connected, the page shows the account and when it was connected. If Zoom or Google stops accepting the connection, the page says so and offers Connect Again. For Google Meet, allow everything Google asks for — the page lists anything the connection doesn't let the site do.

Disconnect removes the group's connection. Meetings already made stay in Zoom or Google, and their links stay on their events; saving one of those events afterwards says the group has no account connected.

Using it on an event

In the location section of the event form, turn on Use a Meeting App and choose the app. The meeting is made on the group's account when the event is saved, and its join link becomes the event's meeting link — the form shows the link once it's made.

The meeting gets the event's title, start, length and description, in the group's time zone. Everything else is the account's own defaults. Saving the event again updates the meeting. If Zoom or Google refused, or couldn't be reached, the form says why under the app, and saving again tries again.

• Turning it off deletes the meeting and takes its link off the event.
• Choosing the other app deletes the old meeting and makes a new one.
• A copied event, and each event of a recurring series, gets a meeting of its own.
• Deleting an event deletes its meeting.

With the built-in meeting on, the meeting app is a backup: the toggle reads Use a Meeting App for Backup. Built-In Meetings covers the built-in one.

Members joining

Members join with Join on Zoom or Join on Google Meet, on the event page and in the player. On the event page it opens 15 minutes before the event starts.

Members Register With Zoom (or Google Meet) lets members straight in:

• Zoom: reserving a place, or clicking Join, registers the member with Zoom and sends them in on their own link. Zoom sends them no email. It needs a paid Zoom account.
• Google Meet: reserving a place, or clicking Join, adds the member as a guest on the event in Google Calendar, so Meet lets them in without asking. Google sends them no email.

Giving a reservation back takes the member off again. A member needs an email address on their account to be registered.

Recording

Record Automatically When the Event Starts has the meeting record itself, so nobody has to remember:

• Zoom records to its cloud from the moment the meeting starts. Cloud recording needs a Pro or higher Zoom plan, with cloud recording turned on.
• Google Meet records once somebody allowed to record joins. It needs a Google Workspace edition that can record.

Without it, a host of a Zoom event is reminded when the first track is loaded if Zoom hasn't started recording, and they have to start it in Zoom. Google Meet tells the site nothing while a meeting is running, so Meet events have no reminder.

The recording and the replay

After the event has ended, the site copies the recording into its own storage:

• From Zoom, every video view, the transcript and the chat.
• From Google Meet, the video and the transcript, once every part of the meeting has finished and Google has made its files.

The organizers are told when it's ready, as they are for a built-in recording.

On the event's replay page, Use the recording offers it as the replay. For Zoom, the shared screen with speaker view is used when there is one. If the event used the built-in meeting too, the built-in recording is offered instead. Hosting a Session covers the replay.

The Recordings list on the same page shows every recording the event has. Owners and admins can delete one there: the site's copy is deleted for good, and the original stays in Zoom or Google Drive. The recording that is the replay can't be deleted until the replay is changed.