Microsoft seems to be to make Teams screen-sharing extra interactive with Live Share
The Live Share SDK, introduced at Microsoft’s Build occasion this week, lets builders flip any third-party software right into a “multiplayer” Teams app.
Microsoft
Looking to make screen-sharing extra interactive so colleagues can collaborate utilizing third-party apps straight in Teams video conferences, Microsoft this week unveiled Live Share, a Teams SDK extension that’s now in preview. It lets builders customise purposes so customers can co-edit and co-create whereas on a name collectively.
Announced Tuesday at Microsoft’s Build convention, Live Share makes use of Microsoft’s JavaScript-based Fluid Framework and is hosted on the Azure Fluid Relay cloud service and permits builders to construct apps with out writing back-end code.
Azure Fluid Relay can be accessible in mid-year, however Microsoft didn’t say when Live Share can be usually accessible.
Microsoft has added a wide range of methods to work together with third-party apps lately, together with the “share to stage” performance introduced final 12 months that lets Teams customers entry merchandise corresponding to Mural and Miro throughout a video name. But whereas earlier updates relied on bringing present “multi-player” parts in third-party apps into Teams, Live Share lets builders customise a wider vary of apps to be used inside Microsoft’s collaboration app, mentioned Nicole Herskowitz, vice chairman for Microsoft Teams.
“It basically makes every app a ‘multiplayer’ app in a live meeting,” mentioned Herskowitz in an interview forward of the Build occasion. “It’s a really hard problem to solve — a lot of apps are not built that way — but we’re making it very easy for developers to do that.”
Some of the companies that have already been building prototypes using the Live Share SDK include Frame.io, Hexagon, and SkillSoft (these are not currently available for users).
With Hexagon’s 3D design and visualization software, for example, it’s possible for users to zoom in and out, manipulate models, view data, and even make edits directly from Teams. Developers at learning and development software platform SkillSoft have created live share functionality that allows any Teams meeting participant to pause and annotate a video.
Microsoft said it will also start to bring more interactive experiences to its own first-party apps too.
“Releasing capabilities such as Live Share and the Azure Fluid Relay service at Build demonstrates Microsoft’s commitment to investing in Teams as a platform,” mentioned Kevin Kieller, co-founder of Microsoft consultancy EnableUC.
“Whether the Live Share capability is useful for end users relies on the interest, ingenuity, and creativity that Teams app developers employ using this new platform feature.”