Zoom: March 21 update brings waiting and breakout room changes, new and enhanced features

Zoom: March 21 update brings waiting and breakout room changes, new and enhanced features

• March 25th, 2022
• in Announcements

The March 21 Zoom release brings many new and enhanced features, a complete list of which is available here: Release notes for March 21, 2022

CIT staffer Karen Burns points out that several improvements to waiting and breakout rooms have been requested by UA instructors. From Zoom:

Meeting features

• Rename participants in Waiting Room – Windows, macOS, Linux, Android, iOS
  Hosts and co-hosts can rename meeting participants in the waiting room before they enter the meeting. After locating a participant’s name in the waiting room section of the participant list, an option appears in the … menu to rename that participant. The participant is notified of this change.
• Save Breakout Room assignments for future use – Windows, macOS
  When breakout rooms are created, the host can save that current configuration and participant assignments, which can be used in future sessions. This is only available for recurring meetings and limited to 10 saved configurations per user.
• Share audio with content to all breakout rooms – Windows, macOS
  Hosts are able to share computer audio, along with shared content, to all breakout rooms. This can be enabled when beginning the share, or while sharing is in progress. This also supports the Share Video option as well for Breakout Rooms.
• Optional include co-host when automatically assigning breakout rooms – Windows, macOS, Linux
  When creating breakout rooms and choosing to assign participants automatically, any co-hosts will now not automatically be included in the assignments, but the host can choose to include them.

Zoom provides video conferencing, simple online meetings, and group messaging. Real-time information about Zoom status, as well as updates about scheduled maintenance and past incidents, is available on the Zoom status page.