ooVoo:Jamie thanks for the questions (and the blog post!).
You're welcome. I don't have a lot of delusions about how many people might read it, but I do hope that it steers a few new users your way.
ooVoo: In answer to your questions:
- Initial/default resolution and frame rate (320x240? 15/30 FPS?)
- Resolution: 352x288. If the camera can’t produce this resolution, ooVoo takes the next closet and resizes it to 352x288.
- Frame rate - 15fps or up to the cameras full capability. In the next version of ooVoo users will be able to determine the fps (from 5 to 30 fps).
I don't mean to split hairs here, but does that statement mean it is currently a maximum of 15 fps, but less if the camera can't do 15, or does it mean ooVoo will currently go higher than 15 fps if the camera can do it?
ooVoo: - Dynamic adjustment of frame rate and/or resolution - if so, based on what factors, and over what minimum/maximum range of each?
- While ooVoo does dynamically adjust frame rates we are not divulging this information.
Fair enough. Thanks for just saying so straight out, rather than beating around the bush.
ooVoo: - Display of technical/debugging info during a call?
- ooVoo currently provides an alert in the conversation window when technical challenges arise. In the next version we will a incorporate quality meter that will appear in the video conversation window.
This is a bit of a touchy area for me. The current "alert" doesn't really provide much useful information, and if anything it seems to be triggered in some odd or unexpected situations. For example, when I was testing ooVoo for the blog post, with two laptops on my desk connected to the same 100MB ethernet hub, and nothing else running on either laptop or the network, I would sometimes get an alert about bandwidth fluctutations possibly having an impact on call quality or some such?
A quality meter is an interesting idea, are you going to make it only an indicator, or would it be possible for the user to "set" it somehow? I'm asking this because it is an issue that came up in conjunction with Skype's over-hyped "High Quality Video" - what if someone is in a situation where they actually want to limit the video quality for some reason, most likely to limit upload/download data quantity? It's not difficult to imagine several such situations - someone who has a volume-based payment for their internet connection, or people inside a company network that doesn't want to be flooded with video call data, for example. Having a simple way for a user to "throttle" their video quality, and thus data, could be very good.
But I still would like to see some more technical detail made available, at least something like video resolution and frame rate, overall bandwidth use and perhaps some indication of when/where ooVoo thinks it is running into a limit (cpu load, comm bandwidth, camera capability, etc). I'm just one sort of technical guy who could use this kind of information to optimize ooVoo installation, but I'm sure there are others.
ooVoo: I have searched the ooVoo help, features, tutorials and forums, and can't find this. Could someone please point me to it, if it exists, or perhaps just give a quick rundown if it isn't already written somewhere?ooVoo help: § From ooVoo application’s ‘Help’ menu click ‘Help topics’ § Click on the ‘Help’ menu on www.oovoo.com web site and then click on ‘Online help’, ‘ooVoo tutorials’ or ‘FAQ’, on the side menu.ooVoo support: § From ooVoo application’s ‘Help’ menu select ‘Get support’.§ Click on the ‘Help’ menu on www.oovoo.com web site and then click on ‘Support Center’ on the side menu.§ http://support.oovoo.com Hope this helps. ooVoo
Sorry, I wasn't clear about this. I didn't meant that I couldn't find the help, tutorials and such, I found them with no problem - and I'm pleased with both the quantity and quality of them. What I meant was that I couldn't find much information in any of them about the video resolution/frame rate and such that I was looking for.
Thanks again for the prompt answers, and for providing a good program.
jw