Microsoft NetMeeting

Microsoft NetMeeting

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Email this to a friend Microsoft NetMeeting

Microsoft NetMeeting

Screenshot of NetMeeting for Windows XP

Microsoft NetMeeting is a VoIP and multi-point videoconferencing client included in many versions of Microsoft Windows (from Windows 95 OSR2 to Windows XP). It uses the H.323 protocol for video and audio conferencing, and is interoperable with OpenH323-based clients such as Ekiga, and Internet Locator Service (ILS) as reflector. It also uses a slightly modified version of the ITU T.120 Protocol for whiteboarding, application sharing, desktop sharing, remote desktop sharing (RDS) and file transfers. The secondary Whiteboard in NetMeeting 2.1 and later utilizes the H.324 protocol.

Before video service became common on free IM clients, such as Yahoo! Messenger and MSN Messenger, NetMeeting was a popular way to perform video conferences and chatting over the Internet (with the help of public ILS servers, or "direct-dialing" to an IP address). The defunct TechTV channel even used NetMeeting as a means of getting viewers onto their call-in shows via webcam, although viewers had to call on their telephones as a matter of redundancy because broadband Internet connections were only starting to proliferate.

Since the release of Windows XP, Microsoft has deprecated it in favour of Windows Messenger and Microsoft Office Live Meeting http://office.microsoft.com/livemeeting/, although it is still installed by default (Start : Run... : C:\Program Files\NetMeeting\conf.exe). Note that Windows Messenger, MSN Messenger and Windows Live Messenger hooks directly into NetMeeting for the application sharing, desktop sharing, and Whiteboard features exposed by each application.

NetMeeting is no longer included with Windows Vista, and has been replaced by Windows Meeting Space and Microsoft Office Live Meeting. Windows Meeting Space only has collaboration features and lacks NetMeeting's conferencing features. Live Meeting http://office.microsoft.com/livemeeting/ includes the conferencing features that Windows Meeting Space doesn't offer. For internet collaboration, Microsoft has also released SharedView.

However, NetMeeting can still be installed and run on Windows Vista. A hotfix for Vista was published by Microsoft on March 22, 2007 http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx/kb/927853. Users can obtain this hotfix by contacting Microsoft Support. The hotfix contains an installer package to install NetMeeting 3.02 on Windows Vista Business, Enterprise or Ultimate editions. Version 3.02 is essentially a port of 3.01 to Windows Vista. http://kurtsh.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!DA410C7F7E038D!1392.entry NetMeeting does not work with Windows Vista Home Basic and Home Premium editions.

NetMeeting was originally bundled with later versions of Internet Explorer 3, and the launch version of Internet Explorer 4.0.