- Oh my gosh where was this feature
when my father was alive.
There is a feature in Zoom
which I have to share with you today
which may be a game changer
for many in the sandwich generation.
Those of us who have kids but also have parents
who we're occasionally supporting in technology.
There is a feature built into Zoom
which goes well beyond the social connection benefits
that we get from Zoom.
It's called Zoom Remote Control
and it allows us to take remote control
over somebody else's computer.
Not for nefarious purposes
but for the purpose of support.
For the purpose of education.
For the purpose of helping
and its free and it's built into Zoom
and I'm gonna show it to you today on Dottotech.
(transitional music)
Steve Dotto here, how the heck are you doing this fine day?
Today we're gonna be taking a look at a feature
that's built into Zoom called Zoom Remote Control
If you go into your settings, you'll find a switch,
a toggle switch that will allow you to turn it on
and this is what it does.
During screen sharing, the person who is sharing
can allow others to control the shared content.
In other words, you can take over the screen
of the person who is sharing their screen.
So what does that mean practically speaking?
Well, there are a lot of purposes that this will work for.
But the one which just leaps to mind for me,
is technical support.
Is helping somebody out with something on their computer,
especially for those of us who have parents
that are maybe a little bit intimidated
by the settings on their computer
and afraid to go into the control panel and adjust things.
This will allow you to take over their computer
and remotely control it and remotely set things up.
It is pretty cool.
Now it's something that I haven't used before
but fortunately, a member of my team, April
has done it quite often.
So I asked her to take me on a tour.
Let's say you and I and April now explore
Remote Control in Zoom.
Hey April, how the heck you doing?
- I'm good, how are you?
- I am good.
So here's what we wanna look at today
is I wanna look at Zoom Remote Access
and I gotta tell you the truth.
I've never used it - Oh.
but it's something you told me that you've used before.
- I have I have, and it's been super helpful
for when I'm working with somebody doing a training session
and somebody who's having a hard time
kinda figuring out something.
A lot of times I take over their remote.
And I kind of lead them to where they need to be.
And what's nice is that as I'm doing,
when they're sharing their screen
and I use the remote then they take over the remote back.
It's not a back and forth
where there's this big notification.
So it's kind of cool.
Yeah, I like it a lot.
- Okay, so let's do it right now.
So the person whose computer needs to be controlled
shares the screen.
- Yep.
So you share your screen with me right now.
- Alright, so I'm gonna share my screen
and you're gonna see my desktop here but,
- And I see View Options at the top of my screen.
That's what I click on?
- [April] Yep and in the View Options
at the top of the screen,
in the drop down, you'll see request to
- Remote Control, I've got that right there
and I've sent you a request.
So now you've received a request
- [April] Now I just need to approve it.
So now you should have access to my screen.
- So I clicked to start the remote.
So now it says right here,
I'm controlling April with Cox screen.
- [April] Yes.
- So if I go here, and I okay,
let's What have you got?
You got Snagit, I'm gonna open your Snagit
I hope you don't have anything bad in Snagit.
So this is actually, do you see on your computer screen?
We'll get you to do this on my side in a moment.
But you see,
- [April] Snagit did open.
I have three screens though.
So I would go to my, would go to my Chrome
down on the bottom, and you should be able to,
Can you see my Chrome?
- Just a minute, I will find it.
- [April] Keep going keep going, right there.
- There it is.
Oh, you've got multiple monitors.
There it is.
- [April] Yeah, so that's,
- So I'm actually opening your browser window
and I'm readjusting it.
I can go in.
So this is our chat so I can actually chat to me.
- [April] Yup.
- I'm actually sending a text message to me.
You are the best boss.
There it is.
- [April] Oh, boy.
I just, Oh, that's so sweet.
April says, I'm the best boss.
Thank you, April.
- [April] You're welcome, you're welcome.
So this, so people, but the key here is
if you are supporting somebody, I can also do this,
which is I think, essential,
I can go into your system preferences at this point here.
- [April] Right.
- I can go in and I can say, okay,
you're having issues with your audio.
Let me take over, Mom, Dad or anybody else.
Let me take over and let me adjust your audio settings
and make it all work for you because so often
people have issues with their computer settings.
These are the issues that people have trouble with.
And being able to go in and adjust the computer settings,
the system preferences, is essential.
And this would work the same in both Windows and Mac.
Now actually, if you think about it,
you can be on a Mac computer and you could service
and help your parents or somebody else
on their Windows computer this way as well, couldn't you?
- [April] Yes, you can.
Yeah and actually, most recently,
I do volunteer work for a veterans' Organization
and Zoom is one of the tools they've been using.
So I actually use this feature
to show them how to go in, set up a webinar,
how to go in and kind of walked them through Zoom
and launching from start to finish, the webinar
because they weren't sure and clearly,
sometimes when you're sharing it on your own screen,
they can't see all of those features.
So I took over the remote
and walk them through step by step and it was recorded,
so they actually got the recording to use
for other team members, which was perfect.
- That's excellent.
Now when you wanna take over the screen, what happens?
- [April] So I'm just gonna click on my mouse.
And when as soon as you click on your mouse,
you take back over the control of the mouse.
- [April] Yup.
- Now, can I take back control again
by clicking again on the screen?
And now I have control of your mouse once again.
- [April] Yes.
- So you can tag team back and forth.
I guess there's a certain protocol that
it can get a little bit frustrating if people
are constantly taking back control of their own mouse.
- [April] Right.
Now, do you want me to, do you wanna share your screen?
- I will but I'm gonna just point out
for everybody watching on YouTube
that you have more tabs open than even I have.
(April laughs)
- [April] Maybe, could be.
- Okay, so I'm gonna stop participant sharing.
And now I am going to share my screen
and I've got the browser window open with a blog post in it
that we might be having issues with, for example.
So I'm gonna share screen
and I'm just going to share that browser window.
I'm gonna share that actual browser window with you.
- [April] Okay.
- So now you've got that being shared.
- [April] Yup.
- So this is our last post.
- [April] Now I'm going to view options
I'm going to request Remote Control and there it is.
- I don't
- [April] You have, should have a pop up
- Oh your screen, there is, yeah, I got the pop up here.
- [April] So I couldn't see the pop up
just wanna let you know.
- Well, there's also a setting that has to happen
in your security settings in this particular case
that's built into Apple's systems settings
that it's requesting permission.
- [April] Okay.
- There we go, okay, so now you should have access.
- [April] Alright, so,
- Yes, you're moving the mouse.
This is awesome.
- [April] All right,
- You're going through it
and your highlighting and you're showing me how to do stuff
- [April] Right here.
- Yeah.
and if I choose to move the mouse at any point,
I can take back control. - Yes
And by clicking down on the bottom of the screen,
I can take over and stop the sharing from happening.
- You got it.
- Just like that.
- It's a great feature, I love it.
- It's very very cool.
- And well I think it's one of those
great teaching tools and like you said
helping mom and dad with those settings
and being able to show them
and I know a lot of people are much more of
a visual learner too so it's so easy for you to go in
and actually show them pretty much hands-on how to do it
so that's very cool.
- Thanks so much April.
This could be a real game changer
in so many different scenarios.
I just wished I had this tool when my dad was alive.
I can't tell you how many times I was
coaching him through using his computer
and eventually I would just say,
"You know what, Dad, I'm going to come over."
and it gave me a good excuse to go visit him.
But of course, in this day and age,
that might not be a practical thing to do.
So this is a terrific tool, this remote access.
Now I wanna share one thing with you before we leave
because I can guarantee there will be questions
in the comments of people asking for this
saying they can't find the feature
and it's not working in their Zoom
and asking if it's only available in the paid version
and not the free version.
No, this is available in the free version
and if you don't see it, this is what you do.
When you sign into your Zoom account,
you go into your settings.
This is where we turn on and off
all of the different extra features
that are built into Zoom,
some of which may be enabled on your installation,
some of which may not be enabled
but if I show you something in one of these videos
that you don't have access to,
chances are if you go in here,
you will find one of these little toggle switches
that will allow you to turn on or off those features.
And if we scroll down amongst so many features,
we will find Remote Control.
It is, there it is, right there.
Remote Control, during screen sharing
the person who is sharing can allow others
to remote, to control the shared content.
If that is gray, turn it on
and then you will have access to this feature.
Now if you have found today's video to be useful
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and I will see you next time for more DottoTech.
Till then, I'm Steve Dotto.
Have fun storming the castle.