Flickering window in the screen capture of Zoom Mac desktop client when NSWindowSharingNone is set | Community
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Newcomer
March 30, 2023
Question

Flickering window in the screen capture of Zoom Mac desktop client when NSWindowSharingNone is set

  • March 30, 2023
  • 3 replies
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Hi there,

I develop a Mac desktop application and its window is expected to be ignored (i.e. being transparent) by the screen capture. However, Zoom Mac desktop client does such filtering in a broken way. The screen capture shows my window sometimes and hides it other times. Here is the result with my test application. It looks like Zoom brings back the window whenever any update is made on the window and then hides it a few seconds later.

Repro video is here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1-itVSIb9FdoXTTtDbmQaXj53uJK9sK4p/view?usp=sharing

 

I found a workaround. Go to Share Screen > Advanced, and set Screen capture mode as one of “Capture with window filtering”, “Advanced capture with window filtering”, and “Previous Operating Systems”. “Advanced capture without window filtering” shows my window all the time, and it sounds expected from its name.

In other words, the problem happens only when I set this config as “auto”.

It looks like the logic of “auto” mode is broken and it flips filtering on and off unacceptably.

 

Note that my application calls [NSWindow setSharingType:NSWindowSharingNone] to flag the desire.

I expect that screen capture software, like Zoom desktop client, honors it.

As an example, Microsoft Teams desktop client successfully makes my window hidden (transparent) when capturing the entire screen all the time without flickering.

 

I searched past forum posts, but I was not able to find this one. Is Zoom team aware of this issue and will they fix it?

    3 replies

    Community Manager
    April 5, 2023

    Hey @hiroshi_45 thank you for the detailed discussion here! I am curious, do you mind sharing the current Zoom version you're currently running? 

    Newcomer
    April 6, 2023

    Hi @RN52_2, thank you for the response.
    As of today, I still see this problem with Zoom desktop version 5.14.0 (16775) + macOS 13.3.

    My hardware is MacBook Pro 14-inch, 2021.

    Newcomer
    May 25, 2023

    FYI, I tested this scenario today with the latest version 5.14.7 and the flickering problem is gone.