It Just Keeps Getting Better

Remember what life was like before apps, iPhones, Wi-Fi, laptops? Seriously. We’ve come far in a short amount of time, and not only does technology keep getting better, work itself keeps getting better. I can now take my first morning call from home to miss commuting traffic. And meet using video. I can take calls in the car. Without violating traffic laws. Biba makes meetings more efficient and communicating easier, and this month we have a packed release to make it even...better! The 2.11 release has over 90 reliability improvements as well as the following highlights:

• Single Sign On with Okta: You asked for it, you got it. We now have SSO integration with Okta! We introduced SSO with PingOne in our July release and asked what else you wanted - and here we are, two releases later with Okta. If you’d like the how-tos for the integration, just reach out to support@biba.com.
• Media quality: We’ve made several media performance improvements, including:
• Audio: We now have higher performance in low bandwidth environments, as well as suggestions when your connection is poor. For example, if VoIP has repeated connection problems, we’ll suggest that you switch to dial-in and give you the dial-in and PIN info. We’ve also improved Bluetooth capabilities on iOS and Android so that you can now use Bluetooth devices more reliably on Biba calls.
• Video: We’ve cut video CPU consumption by 20% to give you higher performance on desktops. We’ve also included suggestions for managing video in low bandwidth environments.
• Screen share: We’ve upped screen share performance by cutting bandwidth and CPU consumption. We’ve also improved the screen share web viewer with several bug fixes and expanded browser and platform support. 
• iOS 8 is ready to rock: The Biba mobile app is tested for iOS 8, so feel free to upgrade. 
• Biba Windows app auto-update = smarter: Windows users - we’ve fixed the Biba auto-updater - w00t! If a new Biba version is available when you launch the desktop app, we’ll begin the update after your call is done or when you quit the app. You also have the option to try the update later if you’re not ready. 
• Chat quality: We’ve heard some things about chat have been bugging you (no pun intended) - so we’ve fixed them: 
• Message drafts are now saved when you switch tabs
• You’re able to see group chat history when you start a chat with a group you’ve messaged before
• We’ve implemented Emoji smarts so you can paste code or enter a phone numbers without your co-worker thinking you’re flirting with them :)

To get the v2.11 release, update your Biba apps on your mobile devices and download to your laptop. As always, we’d like to hear from you on what would make your Biba experience even better. And check back in October for another update!  

Interested in Biba? Try it out for free and inquire now. 

More Biba!

We are committed to releasing a new version of Biba every 28 days, and our August release v2.10 sums up what we think is a good thing: you are using Biba and just want more of it! Our focus of this release has been to enable you to meet with more people - affordably, securely and reliably. Here are the highlights: 

More people with larger audio calls: 
Biba increased the meeting capacity from 50 to 100 people - a 100% increase! We’ve also optimized audio on large calls and improved screen share capabilities. (We anticipate another capacity bump from 100 to 200 in the next couple releases. Let us know at support@biba.com if you need it sooner.)

More affordable with low-cost international dial-ins: 
We’ve increased the list of international dial-ins (for those not using VoIP), with 15 new dial-ins, including support for China, India and Russia, upping the list to over 50 countries. And to keep your monthly dial-in costs down, we have more 1-2 cents-a-minute options than any other vendor! 

More secure with One-time PINs: 
We’ve added an extra layer of privacy by allowing hosts to issue an alternate One-time PIN for meetings where they don’t want to use their open Biba meeting PIN. One-time PINS come in handy for customer meetings, board meetings, or even back-to-back meetings that may overlap. One-time PINs can be used for ad hoc, scheduled, and recurring meetings. When scheduling with a one-time PIN, use the “Schedule” feature from the Biba desktop app and just select “One-time PIN” - the Google Calendar integration or Outlook plugin will automatically add the correct information to your invite. 

More reliable with bug fixes, quality improvements, and user experience enhancements: 
We’ve listened to your feedback about screen share and improved screen sharing capabilities in lower bandwidth environments. We’ve also made it easier to find screen share options by adding the Screen button to the launch pad. 

To get the v2.10 release, update your Biba apps on your mobile devices and download to your laptop. As always, we’d like to hear from you on what would make your Biba experience even better. And check back in September for another update! 

Interested in Biba? Try it out for free and inquire now.

Reliability, Usability, Security and SSO

A Riddle - When is 28 days actually 35 days?

Answer - When you are delivering the best possible product each and every release. 

A few months ago we started a concerted effort to release a new version of Biba once every 28 days. We want our customers to have the latest and greatest - and that means moving quickly to integrate the feedback from our users back into every release. This month we took 7 extra days to get even more specific requests and improvements into our July release. Biba v2.9 is laser focused on user feedback with an emphasis on Reliability, Usability, Security and Single Sign On. 

Reliability was truly a driving force in this release - with over 60% of the engineering efforts devoted to quality. In fact the entire extra week for v2.9 was focused on bug fixing and in the end we fixed over 800 bugs! As our customer base continues to grow it’s clear how important reliability is and we are proud to release the highest quality version of the product to date.

Usability was our second area of focus. Highlights include allowing users with multiple webcams to select which camera to use for video calls, the addition of keyboard shortcuts to quickly navigate within Biba and significant scheduling improvements on the desktop versions. 

Users were already able to easily schedule meetings from their work calendar application, but in this release we also added a quick way to schedule from the Biba app. For those who use Google Calendar, clicking the “Schedule” icon in the Biba Launchpad and then choosing to “Schedule in Google” will automatically create a new calendar invite that includes all of the needed information for a Biba hosted meeting. Likewise, Outlook users on Windows can also pull-up a pre-populated Outlook invite.

Security was the final bucket of updates for this release. The efforts here were focused in two areas, meeting lock/unlock and additional security during account creation. Meeting organizers can now choose to lock a meeting in which case participants that are already on the call remain, but no one else can join. Both scheduled and ad hoc calls can be locked and unlocked multiple times as needed. We also added an email verification step to our account creation process to ensure proper ownership of email addresses.

Single Sign On (SSO) More and more customers have started to request SSO integration. In v2.9 we partnered with Ping Identity to provide SSO access with PingOne. We plan to offer additional SSO integrations in the future, so let us know what SSO options you would like to see.

Check back in August for another update - see you then!

28 Days Later in June

28 days later, and summer is here! This month we are highlighting 5 awesome new features, and then giving you just a taste of some of the reliability and user experience improvements that we have made recently. There are a TON of great improvements coming for July so be sure and check back in with us next month.

Screen Record

Last month we announced the availability of audio recording for all calls. This month we built on that capability and now include screen share recording along with audio. You can now fully record any meeting-audio and screen-for easy replay later. Just like audio record, anyone can initiate a recording and everyone knows that it is happening.

Outlook Plugin

One of the most requested features from our Windows desktop users was for an Outlook plugin to make it easier for them to schedule a meeting directly from their Outlook calendar. We have always made it super easy to schedule a meeting with Biba, just add meet@biba.com as an attendee to any meeting that you are scheduling. Now on Windows once you have installed the Outlook plugin Biba will add meet@biba.com for you as well as include your dial-in, passcode, and screen share information in the invite description.

Local International Dial-ins

Another frequent request from our customers is for additional local dial-in numbers for specific countries or regions. This month we made it much easier for our engineering team to accommodate those requests. This month we added Germany to the list of countries that has a local dial-in option. Look for additional countries to be added to the list later this summer, including India.

Join Meeting Using Pin

Once users get a taste of Biba they want to share the magic with their colleagues. One request from users has been to allow people they are meeting with to join a meeting using the Biba app, but not have to register for an account. This month we added that functionality and meeting attendees can now choose to attend a meeting with audio, screen share and video on the Biba app just by entering their meeting PIN.


Manual Presence


Last month we made some improvements to Presence so that it was visible from more parts of the product. This month we have added the ability to manually change your Presence. If you have an all day event on your calendar that would normally indicate you were busy, you many want to change your status to "Available". If you are working on a project and don't want to be interrupted, you can change your Presence to "Busy". You still have the option to keep Presence set to "Automatic" and Biba will update your status based on your calendar and if you have recently been using your computer or mobile device.



Reliability and User Experience

We are constantly working to improve our reliability and user experience - here are some of those updates from the past month.



PowerPoint Slide Show supported with Windows Share as well as Desktop Share.

Message retry if a message is not sent due to poor network connectivity. 





Ongoing improvement for audio quality including better echo cancellation on Windows. Auto un-mute when answering a call on desktop.





Better support for hot plugging devices like USB headsets.

Send a message to everyone on a call from the incoming call screen. Biba always starts all meetings on time and lets users choose to Answer, Decline, Snooze or now Message All.

Roster notifications to let users know when there are changes to the call roster.

So that's it for June and v2.8 - see you next month!

28 Days Later: 9 New Things to Get Excited About

It’s hard to believe that it’s only been 28 days since we were telling you about all of the amazing updates and changes there were in Biba v2.6. But, it’s true, less than one month later we once again have exciting new updates to tell you about. This month we are highlighting nine new features and improvements!

Call Recording - As our customers are expanding the ways that they are using Biba throughout their workday - the feature requests keep coming in. This month we’ve added instant call recording. Anyone on a call can start an audio recording. The person who starts the recording will get an MP3 file of the recording after the meeting has ended. Look for additional recording features including screen recording over the summer.

Scheduled Meetings
Using Biba for a scheduled meeting is super easy, but we realized that we weren’t doing a good job of showing people how to schedule. In this release we have added a “Schedule” button in the Launchpad to show you how you can schedule with your existing calendar application just by adding meet@biba.com to your invite.

Meeting Chat  - Business Messaging has been part of Biba from the beginning. This month we made it easier to chat with people while in a meeting. Instantly start a Group Chat from a Meeting and message All Invited Callers or All Present Callers. Because Messaging is all integrated with Biba, your chat will still be available, even after the meeting ends. Also all of the Biba chat features, including attachments, are available for Meeting Chat.

Even Better Echo Cancellation - Echo on a call can be super annoying (really, does anyone ever want to hear themselves talk). This month we spent a lot of time testing to support a wider number of headsets. We also improved our mic and and speaker detection for Windows, Android, iPhone 5 and Mac to reduce echo and provide even better audio quality.

Easier to Invite - As more and more people have started using Biba, it’s not surprising that uses want a quick and easy way to invite others to join them on Biba. We’ve improved the suggested contacts to make it easier to invite the people that you meet with most. You can invite multiple people or dismiss suggestions for people you don’t want to add as Biba contacts.   Getting Started - In v2.7 we’ve made it easier to getting started with BIba. We’ve updated the registration flow so that  new users just download the app on Mac, Windows, iOS or Android and complete a quick in app registration - that’s it! You will also see more in app help screens as well as tooltips to make it easier to navigate in Biba.

Better Mute - “Muted” notifications display and show until dismissed. Easily switch windows and be reminded you are on mute while on a call. An audio cue also plays when a person is remote muted along with the visual reminder.

Presence Everywhere
Presence was actually part of our 1.0 release that we launched in June of last year. With v2.7 you will see Presence updates sprinkled in even more places both in the mobile and desktop applications. We are making it quicker and easier for you to see if someone is available, and if they are not, when they will be free to talk.

All Company Room
Some of the most helpful (and yes, fun too) chats at Biba have taken place in our “Biba All Company” Room. When a domain is claimed we will automatically create an All Company Room and add all of the users from that domain to the room. Any future new users to the domain will also automatically be added as they join Biba.

Even Better Messaging - Attachments & Emoji

We’ve said it before, and we are saying it again.  “We are building a product that people want to use.” Often times that means adding features like Open Pin or Remote Control that customers request in order to use Biba to have better meetings.

But this month in addition to ongoing enhancements, bug fixes and a better user experience with our new launchpad we bring you attachments and emoji!

Attachments:

You can add files, photos, documents, or share whatever else you need in any 1:1 chat, group chat, or chat room. The attachments are saved along with your message history so you can easily retrieve whatever you share. Thumbnail previews of your attachments appear inline right within your chat room or message. You can easily save any attachment directly to your laptop or other device just by clicking on the preview and selecting “Save to Downloads”.

Emoji:

Are 100’s of different smiley faces and images mandatory for business messaging? Probably not, but after a couple of weeks of having them in our internal test builds I admit my Biba chats are more fun.  Besides what brings a team together faster than emoji wars in the All Company room with each person trying to outdo the other? The full list of emoji characters is available at http://www.emoji-cheat-sheet.com/.

Business Messaging is Still Free:
Because Business Messaging is part of Biba Basic - both attachments and emoji are available in the free version of the product. So whether it’s infusing a little fun into a team chat room or sharing a photo or document, Biba is building Business Messaging you want to use everyday. Enjoy!

Biba Launchpad

We released Biba Desktop in December and since then the product team has added a ton of great features (screen share, remote control, video conferencing, video calling and more). With all of this new functionality in the product we took a step back and realized that our desktop  was not as intuitive as it was back when Biba was simply business chat and audio conferencing.

Today we’ve released a set of icons called launchpad for our Windows and Mac apps. Launchpad gives easy access to all your key points of collaboration at the top of your Biba window.

In addition we’ve included some new features along with the release of the launchpad.


Screen Share without Biba audio

Sales and support teams often are on a traditional telephone line (think dialing into a toll free customer support number) with a customer or prospect and need to share their screen.  We have always allowed external guests to view a screen share simply with an html browser link and dial in audio. Now you can simply click the screen button in launchpad and share your screen without having to start a meeting with Biba audio first.




Instant Meetings with Conference Bridge

Last month we added a traditional open conference bridge for those who want to schedule a meeting with people not on the Biba app. Now with the new launchpad, you have the ability to start ad-hoc calls using your conference number and pin.