🚀 go-pugleaf

cd@lios.apana.org.au (Craig Dewick) writes:

>>I've been trying to find a decent videoconferencing
>>app for our Suns for years.  I finally found 
>>SunForum awhile ago, but when we got it I found
>>that it didn't handle video.

>>Now I see that it does
>>	http://www.sun.com/desktop/products/software/sunforum/
>>but it appears to only work with the new SunVideo
>>*Plus* (PCI) card.

>>Does this mean that Sun is dropping SunVideo (SBus)
>>card support?

>I don't think it's dropped in Solaris [2.]8 (aka SunOS 5.8), but it might be
>in Solaris [2.]9 (tentatively known as SunOS 5.8.1 I believe).

Regardless, they apparently don't care to support
it to the extent of making their software work
with it.

>Sun also have
>a PCI version called the SunVideo+ which works in the Ultrasparc machines..

As soon as I find someone to trade us 1:1 SunVideo
for SunVideo Plus cards, I'll be all set (except on
my home machines, which are SBus).

>>(I'm already moving to Linux after frustration over
>>hardware support under Solaris.  Maybe this will
>>help convince others at work to do the same.)

>Sun doesn't provide much software for the SunVideo cards, but there are
>shareware and freeware 3rd-party applications which use it. One of the best
>is 'vic', a videoconferencing package originally put together by LBL, but
>it's now maintained by UCL in the UK.

I've done a lot with vic - even hacked it up to
continue to use my old VideoPix cards.  It's not
in the same class as what SunForum appears to be.

>UCL also maintain other related applications which can be all used together
>to create a complete video/audio conferencing environment (assuming you have
>a fast [read 'ISDN' or similar] network connection).

Unfortunately, NetMeeting compatibility is a big
deal around here.

It appears that DC-Share
	http://www.datcon.co.uk/conf/DCshare.htm
was used to make SunForum.  I'm going to hope
that they make a Linux version or that the
Open H.323 project
	http://www.openh323.org/
comes up with some video apps soon.

--kyler