Wednesday Webinars Info
A Webinar is a "Web Seminar" where the seminar is conducted over the internet and the physical location of the attendees is not important as long as they have an internet connection. The presenters computer screen is shown on your screen, and you hear them, either over your computer speakers, or on a parallel telephone call. We are using GoToWebinar software from Citrix.
Joining a webinar
 Register | Select the webinar you wish to attend on the webinars page, click on the session you wish to attend and fill in the registration form. You will be emailed a link to the webinar session with instructions. You will also be sent a reminder shortly before the webinar starts. |
 Join in |
About ten minutes before the webinar is due to start, click the link in the registration email you received in step 1.
You will be joined to the webinar automatically. Webinars provide the audio using VoIP. If this doesn't work for you, you can dial in to the parallel telephone feed - details are provided in the webinar panel once you have logged in. |
Notes
- Webinars are recorded and are usually made available for download from this web site.
- To ask a question or to get help during the webinar, please use the "Question" section in the GoToWebinar panel. See the FAQ below for more details.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
| General FAQs | |
| ? | What is a "webinar"? |
| A webinar is a "Web Seminar" - a seminar conducted over the internet where the participants don't have to be physically present but can see and hear the seminar on their computer. Each webinar may be repeated more than once, in which case we refer to these as different "sessions" of a webinar.
FAQ ID = 146
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| ? | What software do I need? |
| Currently we are using Citrix GoToWebinar products (more information on the Citrix GoToMeeting web site).
When you register for a webinar on the GoToWebinar site you get a link in the registration email that, when clicked, will connect you via your browser, to the Citrix GoToWebinar website where the connection to the session is automated. This works for both PC and Mac. iOS and Android devices are also supported via apps. Please see the GoToWebinar FAQ page for more information.
There is currently no Linux support :-( FAQ ID = 147
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| ? | How much does it cost? |
| The actual webinar costs nothing. The only costs you may incur are for you internet/phone connection.
FAQ ID = 148
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| ? | Do I need to register? |
| Yes. The webinar sessions each have a unique session ID and you will need to register in order for us to let you know the session ID by email. Usually this email will be sent immediately and you will have the session details in a link within seconds.
Please note that each webinar can have more than one "session" at different dates or times and the session link and number is not necessarily the same for each, therefore you need to register for the session that you want to attend, not just the webinar. FAQ ID = 149
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| ? | Where do I get the session number? |
| Every webinar session uses a specific session number which links you to the right webinar. You get a link to this webinar session by filling in the registration form on the "GoToWebinar" site for the session you want to attend - the link will be emailed to you directly.
In the event that the session number you are using doesn't work, please check first that you are not attempting to sign in at the wrong time (you should be able to sign in from about 10 minutes before the webinar begins). If you still can't sign in, then check back on the specific webinar page for updates. It is possible that we are experiencing technical difficulties or have had to change the session number. FAQ ID = 151
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| ? | What are the phone details for the conference call service? |
| All webinars use VoIP audio via your computer sound card. There may also be a backup telephone connection which you can use which carries the same audio as the webinar. This will be charged as a standard long distance phone call. Details are in the webinar panel once you join the webinar. We suggest you join first and check whether the VoIP feed is sufficient, and only change to the phone backup if necessary.
FAQ ID = 153
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| ? | What are the internet bandwidth requirements? |
| This is very hard to quantify as a high bandwidth connection with a lot of traffic will be worse than a low bandwidth connection with low traffic. You will need a "broadband" internet connection. A 1Mbit/s connection is unlikely to have sufficient bandwidth for the VoIP (audio), but may be sufficient for the video which typically doesn't need to run in real time (there may be some delay in updating the screen).
Essentially, if the bandwidth is insufficient or the network is congested, you will see delays in the pictures updating and the audio may break up and you may get a network connection notification. If the picture is workable, you could try the parallel telephone conference for the audio which won't suffer these problems. Details are in a separate FAQ above. The best way to find out is to visit the Citrix Online test page at http://support.citrixonline.com/en_us/gotomeeting/help_files/gtm140010 and run a test. Although this is a different package (GoToMeeting instead of GoToWebinar), it uses the same technology and should tell you if you are likely to encounter any issues. FAQ ID = 154
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| ? | The phone instructions refer to the "hash"/"pound" key. What's that? |
| Depending on which system you log into for the telephone conferencing service, the instructions may ask you to press the "hash" key or the "pound" key. Both of these refer to the "#" button on your telephone keypad.
FAQ ID = 157
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| ? | How do I ask a question during a webinar? |
| To ask a question, please use the "question" section within the GoToWebinar panel. To do this, within the panel on the right of GoToWebinar, click on the "Questions" tab. This will open a panel with a small area where you can see what other people are sending to you, and below that, a small area to type your question.
When you join the webinar, your PC microphone (and phone if used) is initially set to allow you to hear, but not contribute. You will therefore not be heard by others on the conference unless the moderator enables this featuer. We are only likely to do this if there are only a very few people on the webinar. FAQ ID = 158
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| ? | Are the webinars available for download afterwards? |
| The intention is that they all will be available, but there is usually a bit of a delay between the webinar session and it being made available for download. If you sign up for the webinars RSS feed you will be able to be informed when the webinar download is available and when new webinars are announced.
FAQ ID = 159
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| ? | Will the webinar work through my firewall/proxy etc.? |
| The only way to be sure is to try it, but seeing as you are reading this online, the most likely answer is "yes". This is because GoToWebinar uses very similar technology to web page access and tends to pass through firewalls and proxies without difficulty, although there have been some instances where company network administrators have applied policies which block the webinars. Unfortunately there is little we can do about this.
There is a connection test page at http://support.citrixonline.com/en_us/gotomeeting/help_files/gtm140010 which you can use to test if your firewall is likely to be a problem. Although this is for a different product (GoToMeeting and not GoToWebinar) it's the same technology and the test should give meaningful information. FAQ ID = 160
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| ? | How do I work out what time the webinar is? |
| This can be a tricky one. We set all the webinar times in UTC/GMT (Universal Co-ordinated Time / Greenwich Mean Time, which, for our purposes are the same thing). Working out what time it will be in your time zone becomes a two part problem: what time zone are you in, and will you be in Daylight Saving Time (DST) at the time of the webinar? If you know this information, you can usually work out your Time Zone Offset and work out when the webinar will be in your local time.
To attempt to make it easier for you, we have implemented a little bit of code on the webinar registration page that attempts to find out what time zone you are in by looking at your computer's time zone settings. If the time is right on your computer AND there is no change to daylight saving time in your time zone between now and the webinar, the time shown there should be correct. This same calculation is applied and displayed in the registration email. Should you be unsure on the day, the easiest way to check is to come back to the webinar page and it will say how long until each webinar session starts in hours and minutes. This updates only when you open or refresh the web page and is not a real time display. FAQ ID = 188
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| Software FAQs | |
| ? | What are the computer requirements? |
| Currently we are using Citrix GoToWebinar. This works for both PC and Mac. Please see the GoToWebinar FAQ page for more information and current computer requirements.
FAQ ID = 155
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| ? | Can I view the webinars using a Mac? |
| Currently we are using Citrix GoToWebinar. This works for both PC and Mac. Please see the GoToWebinar FAQ page for more information and current computer requirements.
FAQ ID = 156
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| ? | Can I view the webinar using a web browser / iPhone / Android / Linux? |
| Although there is a web viewer available for Citrix GoToMeeting, it does not currently (Dec 2013) work with GoToWebinar although it might be worth checking with the FAQ linked to below to see if this has now changed.
For the iOS and Android devices free apps are available Please see the GoToWebinar FAQ page for more information. Linux is currently not supported :-( FAQ ID = 161
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| ? | Some of the Webinar downloads are a Windows format (WMV). How do I view them on a Mac or with Linux? |
| The earlier downloads for our Webinars were only available in Windows Media Video (WMV format), but this is supported on both Mac and Linux. (All our downloads are now MP4).
Mac Users: There are several options:
Linux Users: Most Linux distros have at least one media player that can cope with WMV files, but you will most likely need to install the Win32 codecs to enable them to do so. Your best source for information on this is likely to be the help site or wiki for the distro you are using. For a powerful media player with support for many Linux distros, have a look at VLC. Web site: http://www.videolan.org/vlc/ FAQ ID = 163
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| ? | Will I be able to watch the webinar with my computer/connection? |
| There is a connection test page at http://support.citrixonline.com/en_us/gotomeeting/help_files/gtm140010 which you can use to test if your system is likely to work. Although this is for a different product (GoToMeeting and not GoToWebinar) it's the same technology and the test should give meaningful information.
FAQ ID = 200
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| Trouble Shooting FAQs | |
| ? | Why can't I hear any audio through my PC? |
There are several reasons why this could happen:
FAQ ID = 150
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| ? | The GoToWebinar screen has black areas. Is this normal? |
| GoToWebinar transmits the computer screen of the person selected by the moderator. In a webinar, this is usually the moderator's computer and he can select which applications can be seen on the webinar. Any applications that are blocked appear as black areas on the GoToWebinar session. A black area along the bottom of screen is usually the Windows Taskbar which is not usually transmitted. New windows that are opened on the moderators computer can appear black for a second or two while the network updates your display.
If the presenter appears to be referring to something that is only a black blob on your screen, it may be that the application he is using is not enabled. The presenter may not be aware that you can't see it. If this happens, please use the GoToWebinar question facility to let us know that you can't see the screen. We usually have additional staff monitoring the questions section and the webinars themselves and we usually pick these things up in a few seconds and rectify them. FAQ ID = 152
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| ? | The webinar video stops and starts or plays jerkily. What's wrong? |
| When trying to view the recorded webinars from the web site, the video may stop and start or play erratically.
The basic problem here is that the computer is unable to play the video back fast enough. If you are viewing the file directly from the internet, it may be that the internet connection is not fast enough to play back the video in real time: the computer is playing the data faster than it is receiving it and runs out of images to display. If this happens, you can just wait for the video to finish downloading and try again. Alternatively you can download the video to your computer and play it from there. On old computer hardware, if playing the video from your computer results in erratic playback (jerky images etc.) the computer simply may not be fast enough. You can try closing other applications and adding memory but if this doesn't resolve it you may need to try it on another computer. FAQ ID = 164
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