Introducing Greenrooms - simple self-hosted video conferencing software

How it all started

Working in the area of IT development we used various ways of communication with our clients and employees. At different times we used different tools. Nowadays, collaboration with clients and team members is impossible without video conferencing services. 

It seems that we have tried all the existing solutions in our own working process as well as for our clients’ projects. Each solution has its own advantages. At the same time, some solutions miss important features, others are not too user-friendly. Working with financial companies we need the privacy of our conference and video call data which is impossible with SaaS platforms. On the other hand, self-hosted solutions are complicated in deployment and too expensive.

It was obvious that the market missed a solution that can be easily installed on a server or cloud instance for the private use by smaller companies and communities.

We started working on the project at the end of January 2020 before the spread of Covid-19. The goal was to create a high-speed, lightweight and full-featured software for videoconferencing. It had to be easily installed on a server or cloud without DevOps or server administrator’s help. So that anyone could have their own feature-packed self-hosted Zoom-like to control their data and manage users. And all that for no more than the price of a couple cups of coffee..

What we got 

There are few video conference solutions not because the market is oversaturated but because a video conference solution is technically complicated. Investing almost a year in research and development, we managed to release an MVP. Once we did, it was clear that the goals are achievable, the technical challenges are overcome and there is a relatively straightforward way in front of us to release a commercial product.

Currently the product allows users to create conference rooms and webinars and invite guests there. Users can chat and cast their desktop as well. User doesn’t need any client software, he connects to rooms through a browser. Installation of the server is straightforward. It can be done on a server with an external IP address or on a cloud instance.

We are using Greenrooms to interact with our clients and for all communications within our team since everyone is working from home nowadays. We also run early access program with some of our partners. Feedback from them will allow us to improve the product. We have already noticed that server requirements for the correct operation of Greenrooms are very modest. Real life use of the product showed that the chosen architecture allows it to scale up very easily and consume relatively few server resources.

Our early partners are research, consulting, investment, financial, and IT companies. Word of mouth is a best advertising strategy and our product is starting to spread widely.

What comes next

In the upcoming year we aim to achieve two main goals. Firstly, a webstore to manage subscriptions and to distribute custom-made software packages to be easily self-deployed by customers. The basic version of a license server is already available and is used in the early access program.

Also we are going to release a mobile app — Greenrooms client. We believe that mobile browsers are not fully reliable for such tasks as we can see . That is why we are going to release a mobile app that can be connected to various Greenroom instances so users might participate in Greenrooms conferences and webinars.

We also plan to add some features as whiteboard, conference and webinar recordings, temporary and permanent rooms, granular permissions, etc. The recordings of the meetings might be stored in your own cloud or server. Also we will offer some tools for branding and white label solutions.

This way we are going to achieve our main goal — anyone will be able to get a product with the maximum possible set of features, simply to deploy and easy to manage. All of that for a small subscription fee. Of course it will be a free evaluation period offered for new users.

Use Cases

A user will be offered the following options.

1. Based on the provided details about the subscription plan, domain name and administrator credentials, there will be an executable file created. A customer will be able to easily deploy it on their server or cloud and get their own preset video conference server with all the necessary features.

2. There is a different option for those who want to save money, a classic SaaS solution. Register and start using the service right away. You don’t need to deploy anything in this case.

Also we are going to offer an API to corporate customers to operate the server data, saved videos, employees, etc. AI background blurring and noise suppression are the next challenging tasks.

We are planning to offer the product to the general public in autumn 2021. Subscribe to our newsletter and stay tuned!

Follow us at https://www.dhirubhai.net/company/greenrooms

https://greenrooms.io