Google’s group video chat feature in Google +, Hangouts has been made more convenient for those who use the sign language. Not only have there been improvements in the video stability but a new feature ‘Take the Floor’ has taken the utility of the service to a new level for the hearing-impaired users.
The most remarkable feature of Google+ Hangouts is the automatic switching between speakers, where whoever is talking the most or the loudest is shown in the main video area, and all others are seen in smaller video thumbnails. The system does this by listening to the microphones of all users and trying to determine who is speaking at any given point. This makes sure that whoever is doing the talking also gets featured in the larger center video, rather than in the thumbnail videos below.
However, this was not advantageous for a group chat where all the users were using the sign language. As Chee Chew, Google engineering director says in his blog post, “ I noticed that most people were trying to watch others sign from the thumbnail video. Our voice activated video switching for the main video usually just stayed on whoever had the most background noise.”
To fix this, the search engine giant has introduced the ‘Take the Floor’ feature, which Chew explains as follows:
- have everyone mute their audio
- when you want to sign something, hit Shift+s
- when you see yourself as the main video, it is your cue that you have got the floor, everyone’s main video has switched to you. Sign away.
Once, a user has ‘taken the floor’, no one else can take the floor for a few seconds. Chew explains, “We did this to arbitrate if multiple users do it at the same time.”
You can view a video of this feature below:
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Chew added that Google has also been aggressively improving the video quality and stability. He says that it is still a huge challenge to transmit 10 video feeds to 10 end points, potentially all around the world. He said that there is still a lot of ground to be covered in the video quality and stability department which will be a ‘never-ending’ effort. He was of the opinion that without video quality and stability no other features can make an impact.
Group video conferencing, Google+ Hangouts is being employed by Google+ users in a number of creative and fun ways. Intimate concerts and cooking lessons are a few ways in which users are making most of the function.
Last week, Google told some of its ‘trusted developers’ that it would make available access to Google+ APIs for developing apps. It will be interesting to see what developers will be able to do with the social network, in general, and Hangouts in particular.