Hipchat: screen grab

[Roland]

Does HipChat enable screen captures (using a user selected window)  i.e. not screen sharing?  Can these screen captures send directly to the other IM contact(s) inline?

If so, how does it perform correctly at 4k res?

using Trillian now and it's gradually been let go by the Devs (over the lasts 5 years), so imminently abandoning it and looking for a good toolset as a replacement it.

Thanks

[David Maye · Accepted solution]

Hi Roland,

You're not being rude at all, we appreciate your response. I looked into Trillian's screen grab feature for comparison and for the HipChat Mac app and using the CMD+Shift+CTRL+4 shortcut, the time it takes to screen grab and paste into the chat window seems as efficient in my testing (three steps: shortcut command, then copy, then pasting) compared to Trillians (Select insert, then screen capture, then copy and the image is pasted in the chat window) The HipChat Windows app there are two extra steps involved (opening the snipping tool, then hitting the 'copy' button).

All in all, it appears that there should only be three main steps involved (not counting switching from/to the apps): shortcut key (or selecting screen capture option), copying and then pasting. I imagine if all you are doing is screen grabs, the two extra steps involved would consume more time in Windows environments. In my testing, the difference was a non-issue on Windows (a matter of a few seconds at most), however I'm not familiar with your use case and I can understand that this difference may add up over time. 

I'll file a feature request to see if we can implement a better method of screen capturing in the HipChat desktop clients. Thanks again for your post.

Cheers,
-David 

[Roland]

thanks for your response David..

Not meaning to come across rude, but Trillian's method is far more efficient than the methods you describe as alternatives.. I guess i need to keep looking!

Cheers

[Roland]

Hi David,

My team predominantly uses the window selection option, so we don't grab an entire screen normally but selected portions.  When I grab a windowed selection it automatically gets placed into the chat area and one would normally hit enter by default in Trillian (or in my case control enter) and it is sent to the recipient(s). We share a lot of images this way as part of out day to day graphics sharing in the work environment.

It's one reason I'm hoping this would be tweaked in Hipchat and I was hoping you support 4k as well as we are now using large 4k monitors, which Trillian has been promising to deliver for 3 years now and no ETA yet!

I am impressed by your statement "I'll file a feature request to see if we can implement a better method of screen capturing in the HipChat desktop clients".  I know this is not a promise to deliver a better method, but it's more support than I'm used to from the "other vendor".

thank you!

[David Maye]

Hi Roland,

We don't have this specific feature, mainly because the most modern OS's have a feature like this already built in. For the Mac OS, you can use CMD+Shift+CTRL+4  to capture the whole screen in the clipboard (CMD+Shift+4 to capture it to a file) or just a portion of the screen. For Windows, there is the Snipping tool (type snipping tool in the search box in the start menu). For Linux distro's, the Print Screen button usually works and most GNOME UI's have a screen capture functionality. 

For HipChat, you should be able to paste the image from the clipboard directly into the chat window, just focus the HipChat app and paste it using the shortcut (CMD+V for Mac or CTRL+V for Win). Alternatively, you can just upload the captured file directly.

As far as 4k performance, there may be some delay is generating the 4k thumbnail in the window (also depends on file size, speed of computer, internet connection, etc). My advise would be to create a new HIpChat group (it's free!) and try it out for yourself.

Hope this helps!

Cheers,
-David