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Yugma Review
Written by JakeDahn - January 4, 2007
As I was surfin' around the net yesterday, I stumbled across a cool web app called Yugma. Yugma is a web app that brings together desktop sharing, and web conferencing, You can call together a few people that you work with, and you can show them your desktop, and demo software, or other things. It's really cool. It is built off of java and will run on Windows and Macintosh. After I did a little digging, I found that Yugma is a venture backed company, which has offices in Minnesota, and India.
I actually found this to be one of, if not the most useful apps I've 'played' with to date. I can open it up, tell a friend, or a co-worker to hop on, and we can have a conference. The thing that I really like about this app is that it is all live, fast, and quick. Instead of having to upload or email a file to the other people, I can just pull it up on my own desktop and show it to them.
A cool thing with this, is that you can use annotation tools which is extremely useful for presenting ideas. I took a few screenshots of how this works, they're down at the bottom of the page. With the annotation tools, you can use a freehand tool, which allows you to draw any shape you want. You can use the circle shape as well as the oval shape. Then there is the rectangle tool, along with the rounded corner rectangle tool. All of these can be used to highlight certain areas, and such.
The annotation tools are the first thing that helps out while presenting to other conference members. Another thing that helps, of course, is audio! This is a feature that I think needs some work, for Yugma, but it is cool, never the less. Currently you can call a number, with a Duluth, Minnesota area code, and dial into a conference call.
When you call in, you can talk to whoever else called in. To me, it seems like it may be a better idea, to allow people to talk right through the client. It would be really awesome to setup a VoIP run service. Where you could talk through the client, as well as allowing someone who doesn't have a computer, to call in to a specific number, and be part of the conversation
Overall I think that this is an extremely useful app. It takes desktop sharing, and conferencing to the next level, at least from what I've seen. It allows me to demo things for people, that I normally couldn't demo. The only downside is the communication for voice, but that is easily solved with something like Skype.
COMMENTS - Add New Comment
Hi Jake,
Thanks for reviewing the new Yugma service. I'm really pleased that you like what we have done with Yugma. Our vision of a very easy, ubiquitous (cross platform), and low cost collaboration service (completely free-forever for most users) led us to create the Yugma FREE web conferencing service.
We launched just before the holidays and have received great response and feedback from small and mid-sized businesses, educators and students, and web communities around the globe. The feedback is helping us fine tune our priorities for the next releases.
You suggested that we should include a VoIP feature. Fortunately, a VoIP feature is already in the works and is not far away from being launched. I'll drop you another line when we have rolled it out. It's just one of the many exciting new features that you will see rolled out in the coming months. Stay tuned.... and Happy New Years!!!
Best Regards,
Karel
--
Karel Lukas
Yugma, Inc.
https://www.yugma.com
Of interest to the Yugma community:
At Yugma, we believe good ideas deserve to be shared, regardless of the
resources of their creators. That's why we are using our software to turn our booth at the Web 2.0 conference into a virtual stage. We're calling the project Stage 2, and are currently seeking individuals and companies who wouldn't otherwise have a presence to share their ideas and products.
If you have content to share (best practices, innovative idea, new
invention, product or service), please visit
http://www.yugma.com/stage2 to read more information about participating. Slot are limited, so please enter your submission as soon as possible.
Sincerely,
Karel Lukas
COO, Yugma
www.yugma.com