Release notes

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• Enhanced communication devices selection feature to avoid unexpected combinations.

Improved device setup:

• We are introducing a redesigned, user-friendly and inclusive setup experience.
• Our new audio device selection feature for communication devices makes it easier to select your headset or a custom combination of a microphone and speaker/headphones.
• Get instant visual feedback from your camera and microphone to easily ensure that your devices work as expected.
• Intuitively choose whether you want to share your camera or microphone before joining a room.
• Conveniently access the settings sidebar from anywhere in the app, now also on mobile devices.
• We have optimized the setting of audio and video devices to your last preference.

• Resolved an issue where the user would receive a notification for old chat messages after temporarily losing connection to the room.
• Resolved an issue where it was not possible to pop-out a media share from the context menu in speaker view mode.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability of the application.

• The settings panel received a new option to enable debug logs and also a new button to download all available log files.

• Resolved a potential crash when using Siri while alfaview was running.

• Feature preview: Sharing of screens and screen regions with sound on macOS 13+.

• Improved performance, usability, and stability of the application.

• alfaview now requires at least Android 6. This was done in order to comply with Google Play Store requirements.

• alfaview will now warn if microphone access permissions have been denied.

• Improved performance, usability, and stability of the application.

• You can now secure your account with a second factor.
  • The two-factor authentication can be enabled in the advanced profile section of the administration web page.
  • You need the alfaview Client Version 9.2.0 or higher to login if two-factor authentication is enabled for your account.

• Improved performance, usability, and stability of the application.

• Resolved an issue where it was not possible to open the context dialog for scheduled meetings in the home screen.
• Resolved an issue in the home screen where meetings information was only partially visible mainly in narrow screens.
• Resolved an issue where chat notifications could erroneously be heard when leaving the room.
• Resolved an issue where HD camera resolution was not set correctly when it was selected for second camera sharing.

• Resolved an issue with Firefox 116+ where audio output would not be heard.
• Resolved an issue with Firefox where a very small window size would cause camera capturing to stop working.

• When sharing Windows Explorer, alfaview no longer automatically shares application sound to avoid sharing unwanted sounds from other applications.

With alfaview 9, we’re fully committed to accessibility, inclusion, and providing support for screen readers. We’ve introduced a host of new features and improvements in alfaview 9 with the aim of fulfilling our promise to you: a video conferencing platform that is accessible to everyone and fosters an inclusive environment for all. Our goal is to eliminate barriers and provide a comprehensive user experience.

• Support for screen readers: To ensure accessibility, we’ve incorporated robust support for screen reader applications into our desktop and mobile apps. If you rely on screen readers, you can now easily navigate through alfaview, participate in meetings, and receive voice notifications about events during the meeting.

• Keyboard navigation: We’ve made extensive provisions for keyboard navigation in alfaview. With keyboard navigation, you can swiftly move around in alfaview using just a keyboard, making alfaview even more accessible for those who cannot (or prefer not) to use a mouse.

• Improved contrast & universal design: We’ve made key optimizations to our light and dark display variants and introduced a high-contrast design to enhance text readability and control recognition. We’ve also adjusted the font size scaling, so you can resize the text according to your preference.

• Keyboard shortcuts: We’ve integrated user-friendly keyboard shortcuts to speed up your interactions with alfaview. These shortcuts speed-up navigation and give quick access to controls. Comprehensive documentation is also available right in the alfaview desktop application.

• Welcome screen: We’ve designed a new welcome screen to make onboarding easier for new users. You can now familiarize yourself with alfaview and configure accessibility settings even before entering an alfaview room.

• Performance improvements and bug fixes: We’ve implemented a series of improvements to reduce alfaview’s resource consumption. We’ve also fixed minor bugs and issues to ensure you have the best user experience.

• And more: We’ve revamped the design of the alfaview user interface, improved the screen content sharing menu and secondary camera support, added full support for tooltips, and optimized the design of the waiting room.

In addition to these updates, we are excited to offer a first look at some features that are currently in an early stage of development and can be tested through the feature preview.

• Screen sharing with sound for macOS: You can also broadcast the sound output of the selected application. (macOS 13+)

• Miniature representation of alfaview: When the alfaview window is minimized, the speaker, participants and some basic functions are displayed in a small window.

• Smart window management: alfaview will be automatically minimized during screen sharing if you are sharing the screen which alfaview is running on. This makes window management easier when working with only one screen.

• Confetti effects: Confetti effects can be used by moderators to give gamified reactions during the meeting. To see and control reactions, this feature must be enabled.

• Highlight microphone when speaking: The microphone icon pulses when the microphone detects noise or speech, providing cues about any background noise.

• Color coding of users: When using the search function, participants in alfaview are randomly color-coded for easier recognition.

• Show me first in the speaker view: In the speaker view, you see your own video image in the first position of the participant videos.

• Fixed a memory leak when toggling “Blur surroundings” on Firefox.
• Fixed an issue where “Blur surroundings” would not work on Chromium 114 and above.

• Some windows were not available for application sharing.

• Improved performance, usability, and stability of the application.

• The web client is now able to share its own tab in Chrome, Edge and other Chromium-based browsers.
• Granting permissions to use the microphone in Chrome, Edge and other Chromium-based browsers does not deactivate the microphone anymore.
• Switching rooms frequently could cause the camera to stop working. This is now fixed.

• Some windows were not available for application sharing.

• We fixed an issue with bad audio quality on Linux systems using PipeWire.

• Improved performance, usability, and stability of the application.

• A new stronger blur value (“Full”) is now available in the blur surroundings list.
• We fixed a potential memory leak in Chrome, Edge and other Chromium-based browsers when using the blur function.

• We fixed an issue with sharing the tooltips of some applications.

• Improved performance, usability, and stability of the application.

• We fixed an issue which sometimes caused media shares from browser app users to fail to start.
• The transcription settings for moderators are no longer shown in breakout groups.
• We fixed an issue where the participants count indicator was not visible to users coming from the waiting room.

• The Ukrainian language is now available for live transcription and translation.
• Your last used e-mail address is now saved and pre-filled in the login view when your authentication has expired.
• We’ve also improved the performance, usability, and stability of the application.

• “Blur surroundings” is now also available on the browser app.

• We fixed an issue with sharing Microsoft Office documents through application share when using the “Read Aloud” feature.

• New feature: Waiting Room. Moderators and administrators of a room can now enable the Waiting Room to approve regular participants and spectators individually or as a group before they join the room. The Waiting Room can be managed from the participant list in the sidebar.

• You can now share a specific application window by selecting the option ‘Application’ in the media share menu.
• alfaview is now available as a native ARM64 app and thus runs faster and requires less resources on Apple M1 and M2 processors.

• For external package maintainers: there is now a RPM package for Fedora/Red Hat https://assets.alfaview.com/stable/linux/rpm/alfaview_VERSION.rpm

• We’ve improved both the video and screen capture quality for alfaview in supported browsers (Chrome and Edge). It also runs smoother on slower machines.

• For external package maintainers: the path to our Debian package has changed, it is now https://assets.alfaview.com/stable/linux/deb/alfaview_VERSION.deb

An Outlook add-in is now available to easily add alfaview meetings to your calendar events.
The add-in can be installed directly via Microsoft AppSource.
More information about installation and usage can be found here.

• Shared screens and second cameras are now supported in the speaker view layout without the need to fall back to the gallery view.
• You can now customize the size of both the participant row and speaker video to suit your preferences by dragging the splitter bars on the desktop version.
• We’ve made the layout more user-friendly for those using small screens or a narrow alfaview window. You now have the option to choose between viewing the active speaker or shared content.
• To make the layout switch button more intuitive, we’ve reversed the icon of the speaker and gallery selection.

• We’ve made it easier to pop out shared content with multiple access points: double-click, right-click context menu, or the pop-out icon on the top right of the active media share. You can also now pop out individual media shares by using the right-click context menu on the video thumbnail or selection button.
• When you were previously the only participant sharing your screen or a second camera, any new content shared by another participant will now be automatically selected for you.
• We have resolved an issue where overlapping windows from Universal Windows Platform (UWP) apps on top of a shared UWP app were shared too.

• We’ve improved the legibility of usernames on videos by increasing the contrast.
• Web client users can now maximize shared content within their browser window.

• We’ve greatly improved the stability and usability of the mobile client, optimizing the user interface, bandwidth usage, and battery consumption for a smoother and more reliable meeting experience.
• We’ve optimized the use of screen real estate on mobile devices.

• Improved system font management on macOS 13.2, now displaying font weights correctly and more legibly on low-DPI screens.

• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Fixed microphone not recording when everyone in the room is muted and while Acoustic Echo Cancellation is active.
• Windows 10 / 11 mouse cursor scaling is now reflected in shared screen content.
• alfaview for Linux no longer depends on libtiff5.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• We fixed an issue where users would mistakenly get an error message about their account not being activated.
• Media sharing with audio was erroneously available on older Windows 10 versions, potentionally causing a crash.
• The OBS Virtual Camera now works with alfaview.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Support for Android 6 and older has been restored.
• Fix an accessibility issue when navigating through direct messages.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Fixed a problem that prevented the application from starting on Windows 7.
• Fixed an audio quality issue when sharing media with audio.
• Fixed a problem that prevented applications on UWP from being captured by application media sharing.

• Media sharing with audio: a new feature on Windows which allows you to additionally share audio from your computer.
• Pop out windows for media shares will not stay on top of other applications anymore.
• Direct messages you replied to now stay in your list and do not disappear automatically.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• To make it easier to add new rooms, we have added a button on the home screen that allows you to open the room and department management directly from the alfaview client.

• Fixed a crash on macOS Ventura when the Continuity Camera feature is used.

• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Individual media shares can now be popped out in separate windows by double clicking on the thumbnails and via right click.
• Secondary menu panels (e.g. participant list) can now be popped out in separate windows by right clicking on the respective icon.
• Fixed application sharing issues while using Windows 10 in tablet mode (e.g. Microsoft Surface).
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• The microphone is now turned off completely when the microphone button is inactive. For technical reasons, the microphone indicator will still show as active on iOS.
• On Android and iOS, alfaview will now report if microphone permissions are missing.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• The shape of the blur area on face video streams was updated.
• Acoustic Echo Cancellation performance was improved in particular on Android devices.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• The shape of the blur area on face video streams was updated. We also fixed an issue where the blur would be applied incorrectly in some device orientations.
• We fixed an issue where sometimes a small noise could be heard by other participants in the room when returning from a break or when switching microphones.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Speaker View: A new video layout is now available. Using this view, the active speaker is shown in a larger area than the others. All the other participants are presented as thumbnails under the speaker video. When VIP attendees are present, the speaker view switches among them only. Toggle between gallery and speaker view via the status menu at the bottom left.
• “Blur surroundings” is now also available on mobile devices. The visual quality has been improved and an option to control the focus area was added.
• Users can now pop out their own face video to a new window.
• Fixed a potential issue with delayed camera image on Android.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Blurring of the background is temporarily disabled on mobile devices.

• It is now possible to blur the background of your face video stream.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• We have fixed a visual glitch with scrolling the participant list with a touchpad on macOS Monterey.
• We have fixed a problem which caused spectators to be unable to see participants' videos.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• There’s now a red badge next to the settings button to indicate when a new update is available (for desktop devices except MSI package).
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Fixed a problem where sometimes user’s desktop would be visible while sharing a full screen application.
• Fixed a problem where application sharing would be disabled.
• Application sharing is now correctly disabled on Windows 8.0. The lowest supported version is Windows 8.1.
• Fixed a problem which caused the camera menu to be enabled even when there were no cameras attached.

• You can now share a specific application window by selecting the option ‘Application’ in the media share menu. For now, this feature is only available on Windows 8.1 or later.
• You can now control your camera while you are in a meeting by turning the camera off or showing your video only to VIPs. You can find the options under the newly added camera button in the main menu.
• On Linux, alfaview now no longer has a dependency on a system-provided OpenSSL library.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• The raise hand feature is available by default in all rooms. See Room features for more details on the feature.
• We have added a new option in the settings menu with a link to the alfaview release notes.
• We have fixed a crash on iOS 12.
• Acoustic Echo Cancellation is now less aggressive on Windows and macOS, when using a USB or Bluetooth headset.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• We have improved our Acoustic Echo Cancelation.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• You can now leave a room easier via a button in the secondary menu.
• We have added a search button to the status menu.
• We have fixed a potential crash when switching audio devices.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Users with multiple accounts are now asked to select the desired account after logging in.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Screensharing is now also available on Linux with Wayland using Sway.
• The second camera media share now picks better resolutions for some camera models.
• We have fixed an issue with screen sharing on macOS which prevented the mouse cursor from being captured under certain circumstances.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Screensharing on Mac now uses less system resources.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• We fixed an issue where bluetooth headsets could not be used with some iPads since alfaview 8.33.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Acoustic Echo Cancellation is now less sensitive, allowing you to be heard better when another person talks at the same time.
• We have fixed an issue where the group name would occasionally appear incorrectly in the title bar. We also fixed an issue where renaming a group would not immediately change the group name in the participant list.
• We have fixed a crash with screensharing and camera capturing.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• We have fixed a potential crash on Android when copying the attendance report.
• You can now select the default device for the microphone in alfaview also on Windows and Mac. The default device will follow the operating system default.
• Sound effects from alfaview now get filtered out while Acoustic Echo Cancellation is activated.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Users with appropriate permissions can now copy the attendance report from the main room context dialog.
• The join and leave notification sounds can now also be heard on the discreet setting.
• We have fixed an issue where an incorrect resolution was selected on the second camera.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Users can now delete all expired group links for a room with one action.

• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• You can now launch multiple instances of alfaview by using the command line option --allowmultiple.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Rooms can now be further customized with the new “Features” tab in room settings. Note that these features only work for client version 8.25 or later.
  • Feature to use 16:9 video aspect ratio for participant videos
  • Feature to center participant videos on the stage
  • Feature to disable minimum bandwidth usage setting

• You can now pop out VIPs' videos on the stage. Available on all desktop platforms.
• Acoustic Echo Cancellation is now enabled by default on all supported platforms.
• Noise Cancellation is now enabled by default on all platforms.
• When Noise Cancellation is enabled, a separate voice activation level is used that can be changed in the audio settings.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Users with “Administrate Rooms” permissions can now select a room type and number of subrooms when creating a new room.
• Companies with rooms that do not match a room type in their quotas will see a warning on the “Room Management” page

• We have added tooltips to the primary and secondary controls.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Guest users can now toggle “Remember me” before joining. The system will remember their settings (name and consent to our terms), which will allow them to join faster on subsequent joins. The same settings are used for all links from the same company. The settings are only “remembered” for 48 hours.

• Company owners and users with related permissions can now set a custom privacy policy, which will be displayed to all guest users before they join.
• Number of subgroups per room are now displayed in room management.

• Screensharing is now also available on Linux with Wayland using Gnome or KDE (version 5.22 or newer).
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Users can now duplicate a room. Room name, user access, room mode, participant and spectator limits are duplicated. Guest and group links will not be duplicated. Only users with room management permissions can duplicate a room. The new button can be found in the room settings page.
• Users can now rename group links. The option can be found under Room settings in Group links tab, in the context menu of each link. Note, this has no impact on links or the users using them, just how they are named on the admin web app.
• In the advanced room structure, multiple or all rooms can be selected with one click.

• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• We have fixed an issue on Windows where automatic run at startup did not work for some users.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.
• Admins can now rename room groups in the room settings.

• Admins and moderators can now copy the chat history from the new group chat context dialog. You can open this dialog by right-clicking inside the group chat on desktop devices or double-tapping on mobile devices.
• Admins can now open various room settings from the main room context dialog which can be found in the participant list.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Screensharing is now available on Android devices.
• We have fixed an issue on macOS where alfaview occasionally showed an empty window when launched.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• We have fixed issues where launching alfaview 8.18.1 on a Windows 7 or 8 computer would fail (d3d12.dll or api-ms-win-core-winrt-l1-1-0.dll missing).
• Further improved audio quality (macOS).

• You can now send direct messages to other users in the same room. Moderators can also send direct messages to a group or the whole room.
• Fixes a dependency issue on Debian 10 (libxcb-util1)
• Improved audio quality when Acoustic Echo Cancelation is activated (Windows and Linux).
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• When using Speaker View (Android / iOS), the names of guest users are now displayed correctly.
• An audio quality issue on some macOS machines (“sizzling” sound) was fixed.
• The Compose key and numpad keys can now be used for writing chat messages on Linux.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Acoustic Echo Cancelation has been improved. It is now also enabled by default on the Windows version of alfaview. MacOS and Linux users can manually enable it in the audio settings if needed.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Noise reduction is now available on all desktop platforms and Android: This new feature can help removing distracting background noises picked up by your microphone, such as keyboard typing.
• macOS Sierra 10.12 is no longer supported.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Transcription and translation now supports Hindi.
• Improved performance and quality of Acoustic Echo Cancellation.

• Acoustic Echo Cancellation (AEC) is now available on all desktop platforms.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• The device setup screen is now showing up on all platforms.
• Experimental Acoustic Echo Cancellation (AEC) for desktops: if you have experimental settings enabled, a switch for “Echo cancellation” will appear in the settings sidebar. It allows you to join alfaview meetings without a headset.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability.

• Experimental Acoustic Echo Cancellation (AEC) for desktops: if you’re on the beta channel and have experimental settings enabled, a switch for “Echo cancellation” will appear in the settings sidebar. It allows you to join alfaview meetings without a headset.

• In order to keep alfaview meetings calm and relaxed — even the big ones — the videos in the grid are now being sorted by the time people join the room or group. New arrivals are slotted in at the back. The participant list in the sidebar remains sorted alphabetically.
• If you’re a moderator, you can now edit and delete toolbox entries individually via a More Options button.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability

• We’ve added a new feature that we call the Toolbox! It’s a collection of productivity tools and you can access them via a new button in the secondary menu (3 squares and a circle). For starters, you can manage and share web links on a per-room basis. More tools are already in the making.
• We’ve made it possible to access the room details on the mobile versions while you are in a meeting room.
• We’ve added a full screen share dialog urging the user to be aware about potentially sharing sensitive data.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability

• Moderators can now toggle chat permissions of individual participants in the moderator context menu.
• We’ve tweaked the scaling of VIPs in the grid. The new behavior is as follows:
  • small meetings (up to 12 participants): VIPs use up a single grid slot
  • medium-sized meetings (13 - 40 participants): VIPs use up 4 grid slots (2x2)
  • big meetings (41+ participants): VIPs use up 9 grid slots (3x3)
• [IOS] Users on mobile devices can now double-tap on shared media to toggle between a full-screen and windowed view.

• Improved performance, usability, and stability

• alfaview will draw a red outline around the screen you are currently sharing.
• alfaview will display a warning and a notification sound when spectators are in the room.
• We added initial support for accessibility with improvements to the screen reader support and the ability to increase the interface font size.
• the Second camera support is no longer experimental and is now available for all.
• Improved performance, usability and stability.

• We have fixed an issue with virtual cameras (like OBS) on macOS.
• On Linux and iOS, we have reworked our audio code. If you experience any audio issues please contact our support or downgrade to 8.7.0.

• Improved performance, usability, and stability

• alfaview’s layout has been cleaned-up for very narrow window sizes.
• We have tweaked the new media share UI: it’s sleeker and index numbers on all screens help in selecting the screen you want share.
• License files were added on all supported platforms.
• [IOS] You can choose whether your own video appears mirrored for yourself. For others, you will never appear mirrored.

• Pressing the screen share button will present you with a selection of region share and fullscreen sharing options.
• Improved performance, usability, and stability

• Locking your system will now correctly put you into break mode in alfaview on Linux.
• If you face audio issues during a meeting, you can now try switching to TCP audio in the network settings. This used to be an experimental feature only.
• Improved performance and stability

• Linux support (deb package for Ubuntu)
• Browse all your rooms in the new roomlist panel
• Easy access to live translation settings
• Improved performance and stability

• Newly developed user interface with focus on usability and accessibility
• Sign-in and room list are now within the alfaview application
• Comfortable search for rooms and users
• Direct access to breakout groups
• The web-based administration interface was revised
• Rooms can now be structured in several levels
• Transcription and translation now available for a fee
• Improved performance and stability

• Maintenance Release

• Maintenance Release

• We’ve prepared alfaview for the upcoming macOS 10.15 Catalina release.
• On rare occasions, toggling the break mode would crash alfaview. This is fixed now.
• If the current room has spectators mode enabled, the eye icon will always be displayed in the top-right corner. Before, it would only appear if there was at least one spectator present.
• User interface, performance and stability improvements and bug fixes.

• Maintenance release

• Maintenance release

• Hotfix release

• Introducing notification sounds. As a starter we added a notification sound for incoming chat messages. Note that notification sounds are disabled by default and have to be activated in the Audio section of the Settings dialog.
• It is now possible to use the same camera for both your face video stream and the second camera video stream. For those who missed the release note on the second camera feature, here is a quick recap: There is a new experimental feature: the second camera. With this, you can stream a second camera’s video in high resolution instead of your screen share. This is useful when you want to share detailed impressions of objects or documents. You can enable the feature and select the desired quality in the video settings. When enabled, you can select a video source in the settings sidebar and start the second camera with the new button in the top menu. (Announced May 3rd, 2019)
• The screen sharing annotation feature has been improved.
• User interface, performance and stability improvements and bug fixes.
• The required network settings for alfaview have been updated. The address range 18.196.85.128/25 has been dropped and is no longer necessary. The updated System Requirements & Network Settings can be found in our Support Center.

• Maintenance release