Add VoIP to CryptPad

jrd10

Hi the Cryptpad's team, thank you for Cryptpad.

A few years ago, we have had exchanges about the possible development of video conferencing in Cryptpad. After some tests, it was not installed as I understand.

But ** A voice over IP software would already be an interesting step**.
At the same time that a group is on the same pad, we could also exchange orally.
Video is not always necessary when the members know each other.

And this would certainly allow mass audio conferencing.

Thanks again for your work,
Sincerely, José.

For your info, see how I use Cryptpad in video conferencing. See slides at the end of the page.
https://www.oisux.org/index.php/support-des-ateliers-a-themes/gestion-dune-association-avec-garradin-adherents-et-compta

I just watched Ludovic's replay of the JDLL Lyon 2022, very good 🙂
https://www.videos-libr.es/search?tagsOneOf=JDLL2022

Thank you again 🙂, José

Mathilde

Hello José,

Thanks for your interest in CryptPad and welcome to our community forum!

I allowed myself to rename your topic to use plain English so it'll be easier for non-french readers to understand it. Anyway, thank you for your proposal! While I'm not sure it's feasible in a short future, it'll be interesting to discuss. 😊

Have a good day!

jrd10

Thank you for your interest in my post 🙂
I did not realize it was in French!
Congratulations for your translation 🙂.

Arnaud

Hello José,
I have a simple question : there are a lot of videoconferencing services and applications. Most can provide a way to access through a link. Even MS team allow that, or Zoom, or whatever. So you have it. Sharing a screen to show a presentation, using pads for collaborative minutes writing, are all common practices. Sharing the link to access the videconference through Cryptpad is not a problem. So finally, what would be the added value of integrating this application in Cryptpad ? It is really an opened question. How do you see that ?

Reading again your message, I understand that you think that a common audio conferencing would be enough. I suppose that you also wish to share a common display (for example in a presentation, or in a text). Is that the case ?

jrd10

Hello Arnaud, thank you for your time and interest.
Yes. (synchronized if possible) screen sharing + voice channel)

First, when you mention MS team or Zoom you are speaking about proprietary software. The idea is to use a "one-stop" FOSS stake 🙂. Mumble-web for exemple. https://github.com/johni0702/mumble-web.

Secondly, to use BBB, Jisti, others, needs some practices. A tool integrated in Cryptpad will make conferences easier (especially for non-geeks). And according to the server, you have some limitations for the attendee number.

Lastly, videoconferencing is not always required. Audio conferencing is enough. See various conferences where the video is switched off 🙂.

Example, if you have a large conference like a general assembly for your community (more than 50, 100 members), Cryptpad + Audio would be a complete solution.

I have already an experience with large online assemblies with pad (attendees are connected on the same document but without synchronization) + Mumble-web.

The innovation here would be about two services

To create a room where connected attendees will see the same "Cryptpad synchronyzed document",
To have a voice channel.

Note that (at the beginning), the "room" is not mandatory and can be replaced by a (Read or Edit) link to the same document 🙂.

Thank you again for your time.

José from Troyes (France 🙂.

mhep

Yes, it is a good idea !
Marc
oisux.org

ldubost

Hi,

I'm the one who had a discussion with jrd10 about video conferencing, because I did a prototype of audio/video over the CryptPad e2ee encrypting system using browser audio/video APIS (not using WebRTC which except on Chrome cannot do e2ee). The code of this prototype is in the conferencing branch of the repository on github: https://github.com/xwiki-labs/cryptpad/commits/conferencing

This experiment allowed to have a video conference audio/video working in CryptPad with e2ee with some nice interesting features mixing video conferencing and documents, it showed that it was very difficult to synchronize audio and video when captured separately (which the media API force unless you use webrtc). This meant that it would be a lot of work to make something work. It seems like a better bet to hope for WebRTC with e2ee capability in all major browsers and then integrate with existing systems (such as jitsi or bbb).

Now providing audio is something interesting as it does not have the issue of synchronization and the volume transferred are lower, so it could make a lot of sense to build in e2ee audio conferencing over the same channels as the documents use. It's still a lot of work though, so we did not discuss to add this compared to other priority work on the project.

It would be interesting work in any case. If some devs are interested to revive the work in the conferencing branch, do not hesitate to reach out.

Ludovic