Keep floating meeting controls and video panel from hiding part of a shared screen for participants.

[N5JJR-a]

When I am sharing a screen, If I can see the floating meeting controls and the video panel, those items block part of the screen I am trying to share, like part of a powerpoint slide.  Is there a way I can share a screen with the floating meeting controls and the video panel visible on my screen but not have them block part of the shared screen the participants see?

[RickC]

I have the same question. When I use PPT I share; stop sharing to be on screen w/o PPT and then go back to the PPT.  I know I can click on More each time to hide the controls. BUT is there a way to hide them to the viewer all the time? Thanks!

[BitWrangler]

Hi RickC,

I have the very same problem.  I want ALL the toolbars/popups/etc. to away when I screen-share, and I don't want to have to hide them again each time.  Have you gotten any feedback?

[DTroyNC]

There is an option to Hide Floating Meeting Controls.   You can activate it using the shortcut [Ctrl+Alt+Shft+H].  Or by clicking the three horizontal dots on the right side of the floating meeting control bar.  That option should appear in the dropdown menu.  To unhide the control bar, press the [ESC] key.

I hope that solves your problem.

[dm50]

I just discovered this topic and there's a big problem with the answer; the shortcut does indeed hide the controls but only until someone enters or leaves the meeting – the toolbar then appears and has to be hidden again with the shortcut. In meetings where people are always entering or leaving this renders the shortcut useless. Isn't there a way to permanently hide the meeting toolbar?

[bgrose]

This problem just started happening for me as well, particularly when I check the "Optimize Video" box. The workaround was that the host of the meeting disabled the meeting room. But that no longer prevents the floating meeting toolbar from appearing everytime a new person enters the meeting. Only way I've discovered to prevent it is to NOT disable the meeting room--participants will NOT see your meeting controls, but YOU WILL. However, your video resolution is no longer optimized as a result.

[Vadderung]

This is a new problem since the last patch. I have been using the ctrl-alt-shift-h to hide the meeting controls for over a year, and it would stay hidden all day. I use zoom for education, 8-hr long calls, hide it once and done for the rest of the day. Now it reappears when folks log in. 

[Doug_M]

There is a workaround using a second monitor.  Configure it in Windows as Extended Screen.  Do not use the Dual Monitor feature in Zoom.  Move the Zoom window to the extended screen.  Pop out the Participants window, the Chat window and any other windows needed for administration such as breakout rooms, and move them to the primary screen.  Open the window to be shared, move it to the extended screen and minimize it.  When you share this screen, click and hold the Floating Meeting Controls menu which will appear over the shared screen.  Drag it to the main screen so the shared screen on the extended monitor has no other windows over it or behind it.  When someone enters the waiting room, or when they are admitted to the zoom meeting, they will appear in the participants list on the main monitor but nothing will appear or cause grey boxes on the shared screen.  This workaround allows clicking the Optimize For Video button which improves the quality of video being shared, especially on low-end user devices such as cell phones.

It is annoying to me that Zoom made such a significant change in an update in mid January without any warning.  We run meetings with people in a physical meeting room who can see the Zoom participants via a projector to a screen at the front of the room.  The new update in mid January causes grey boxes to appear during screen sharing for all zoom participants.  You can get rid of the grey boxes by unclicking Optimize For Video, but every time a someone arrives in the waiting room everyone's shared video freezes for several seconds, and then when you admit them to the meeting their video screen freezes again for several seconds.  Worse, the people in the physical room now have the floating meeting controls appearing over the shared video on the projector screen, and when you press Ctrl-Shift-Alt-H to get rid of it, a box appears saying to press Esc to get the floating meeting controls back.  This happens for the people in the physical room every time a person enters the waiting room and every time someone is admitted to the meeting.

Prior to the update in mid-January, pressing Ctrl-Alt-Shift-H caused the pop-up Floating Meeting Controls to permanently disappear.  We used a separate computer to do administration so screen sharing was relatively fuss-free.  Now we are having to order second monitors for all computers doing screen sharing, and find space for them on audio/visual desks with somewhat limited real estate.  Ugh.

[bgrose]

Really appreciate this detailed information. But for those of us without the ability to utilize a secondary monitor (primarily because of real estate on our desks), it’s a horrible workaround. I’m hoping Zoom has gotten enough complaints about this situation to correct it on the next upgrade. 

In the meantime, I’m left to uncheck the optimize video when I share the screen for my powerpoints with embedded videos. And based on the responses of people participating in my zoom, this has NOT impacted video quality (and I”m often in zooms with dozens of participants). Yes, my screen looks a mess with the floating meeting controls always visible as well as the views of the participants (which of course can be minimized).

I am frankly surprised that NOT using optimized video has seemingly not affected video quality. Has this been anyone else’s experience?

Again, many thanks for your instructions. Now if only I had room for a biggest desk!!

[dm51]

Doug: Yes, thanks so much! Can't remember if I mentioned this before but I've been emailing and calling with Zoom tech for a month, more than 60 emails, and the conclusion was that it was intentional (what?!) and my venue, UCLA, could institute a Feature Request (shouldn't it be a Feature Repair Request?) but there were very few other people with this problem and they probably wouldn't do anything about it. I'm going to forward your reply as well as bgrose's to them and see if that helps.

Meanwhile, though, I've been experimenting with your workaround and it doesn't work for me, but I may not be doing it right.

First, a small thing: you say "Open the window to be shared, move ito the extended screen and minimize" – by "minimize" do you mean make it smaller or make it go Windows toolbar? I'm assuming the former.

Then "When you share this screen, click and hold the Floating Meeting Controls menu which will appear over the shared screen (etc.)." For that there's good new and bad news; the good news is that the menu/toolbar isn't there! Which would solve the problem except that the app in the shared screen doesn't work.

It's PowerPoint, and it's on the Main screen; I open it there, drag it to the Extended Screen, start the Slide Show, but the Slide Show opens on the Main screen where it works just fine... which is of no use, because the open PowerPoint on the Extended Screen doesn't do anything; it doesn't expand to full screen and it won't play.

I'd be really grateful if you could address this but I also wonder if this is something we could discuss in a Meeting. Either way, I appreciate what you've already done.

[Doug_M]

By "minimize" I am making it go to the Windows toolbar.  It can still be shared from that condition, and it makes certain that there are no windows open behind the one being shared.  I honestly don't know if that makes a difference, I spent hours troubleshooting this already and decided to take the route I perceived as safer.

Regarding the second issue, I believe the Floating Meeting Controls will disappear with a timeout unless you have clicked "leave meeting controls on all the time" or a box with something like that, which I seem to recall is in General settings.

Regarding the next issue, Powerpoint detects that you are using an extended screen and therefore changes its behavior compared to a single screen.  I think you can configure Powerpoint to tell it which is the main screen that holds your speaker notes etc, and which is the extended screen.  I set my computers so the screen which goes to the projector or is being shared is on the extended screen.  I move Powerpoint to the extended screen and share it using Zoom.  I then click the Full Screen button in Powerpoint.  The Powerpoint slide then takes up the entire extended screen, and the speakers screen appears on the main screen, but behind the Zoom administration windows, which are always brought to the front.  I don't know if these comments help, but that is how we are doing it and it works OK.

[Doug_M]

Also, thanks for the background information regarding Zoom deliberating causing this new behavior.  I thought that was probably the case, but didn't know.  I elected to do some experimentation on my own rather than trying to get Zoom tech support involved.  It takes a long time just to explain the issues.  They usually assume a very simple meeting configuration rather than the more complex arrangements of computers we use in our meetings.  We have a mid-size Zoom account (I think 1,000 licenses but I would need to check with my wife to confirm).  If you want my support regarding the "feature request" I will happily support it.  It would be interesting to know how you would like the "new feature" to be configured.

[bgrose]

Why would Zoom want to “enable” this configuration? How does it benefit them—or any user? I’m hoping this is just a coding glitch that will somehow be corrected in the next update

[dm51]

bgrose: As near as I can understand what I got from the Supervisor at Zoom Support, it was instituted for some reason unconnected with Optimize Video or Meeting Toolbar but they consider that problem to be small and affecting only a few people.

Doug: I'll go back and try again with this new information, but maybe not right away. (My brain's starting to fry from all the things I've experimented with.) A couple things, though, which I think may mean it's unlikely to work for me...

1: Yep, I know about the Meeting Controls disappearing after five seconds – that's what happens if you click Optimize Video. But having that toolbar appear then disappear every time someone enters or leaves the meeting isn't viable.

2: Yep, PowerPoint has a setting under Set Up Slide Show where you can designate the monitor you want the Show to appear on; the only choices are Primary and Automatic, and I've designated Primary. So I'll try Automatic.

Meanwhile, I've forwarded all these recent responses to my Supervisor contact, who's been responsive though hasn't been able to get any action taken so far.

[Doug_M]

Sounds like you know more than me about some of the software behaviour.  And thanks for forwarding this information.  Regarding which monitor does what with Powerpoint, it may make more sense to leave Powerpoint set to Primary.  It is probably telling which monitor does what from the designation made in Windows.  To check this, make sure both monitors are active.  Right click on the desktop and select Display Settings in Windows.  There should be a graphical representation of both monitors.  Select the one you want to be Primary in Powerpoint, then click "Make this my main display".  I think that determines which monitor in Powerpoint has the speaker view and which shows the Powerpoint slide to be shared within Zoom.

Again, I am certainly not an expert, hope I am not wasting more of you're time.  🙂

[SteveS2]

Presenters at the organization I work at are furious about this. I hear complaints about the fact that the meeting controls keep popping up during their presentations.
"It's distracting." "This is absurd. Why do these keep coming up when you click on hide them?" etc.
I tell them the truth. Zoom has made changes and every time I have tried to contact them about issues, I have had no luck. They do not listen. This is not the first issue I have had with contacting Zoom about issues. 
One person told me about 15 minutes ago that he is going to recommend dropping Zoom and using teams or Webex. I have spoken to various people in Event support throughout the Boston area and they have all told me the same thing. I will relay to them that Zoom does not consider it worth fixing this issue. 
Seems like making these "updates" without letting anyone know, is not a good business model. The people who use this software are reporting they are not happy and customer service doesn't seem concerned about poor customer experiences. This seems like a good way to lose your customers. 

[bgrose]

As I’ve mentioned previously on this topic, the ONLY workaround I’ve discovered is to NOT optimize video when you’re screen sharing. 95% of the time this has not presented any degrading of my embedded video—and I’ve been on screen share events with over 300 participants. But there’s that pesky 5% that this configuration presents significant video problems. My question to everyone on this board—is this an issue for Windows users only? Or is this appearing with Macs as well?  Praying that someday Zoom will address this issue—and FIX IT!

[dm51]

Just to note that, as also mentioned above, many of us have found another workaround – using two monitors. (See above) It's also been my particular experience that checking or not checking Optimize Video has no discernible effect.

As far as I know, it's Windows only. As for Zoom fixing it, in my extensive emails and phone calls with them, they appear convinced that the problem affects so few people that they're not going to fix it.

[bgrose]

So do you feel Zoom is unwilling to do anything because there are so few Zoom Windows users? Or because so few people complaining about it?

Can’t believe after holding out for decades I’m going to now be forced to buy a Mac just to solve this stupid issue which the Zoom overlords could solve with a few lines of code!

[dm51]

My impression from Zoom Support was that it didn't affect enough users to be of great concern (even though, as I mentioned in this thread, I sent them a link to this discussion). But if more people complained that might push them into action.

Still, wouldn't it be easier to buy a cheap 2nd screen rather than switch to Mac? My 10" monitor cost $80.

[bgrose]

Sadly, my desktop, hard as it may be to believe, simply has no room for another monitor! Otherwise I certainly would take advantage of your very well-explained workaround.

[dm51]

No, I get it – real estate is an issue. I have a little room but even with a 10" it gets crowded. Though only for the length of the Zoom.

[UK_Dave]

I'm having the same issues on linux, the developers have clearly moved on to messing around with AI and left no one behind to fix bugs in the meeting code. 

I just want the meeting controls to stay on my laptop monitor and be able to display the gallery and presentations on the hdmi TV output.

[Doug_M]

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@bgrose wrote:

Why would Zoom want to “enable” this configuration? How does it benefit them—or any user? I’m hoping this is just a coding glitch that will somehow be corrected in the next update

---

bgrose:  I thought they may have introduced this new behaviour on purpose because they probably have users who use a single computer for both screen sharing and administration.  When the window being shared is set to full screen mode, then you cannot see any administration windows to know that someone has entered the waiting room and wants into the meeting.  So Zoom made the floating menu and a message pop up over the shared full-screen window to alert the user that people were in the waiting room.  I am guessing that some users complained about these being visible on the projector screen for people in the room, and causing grey boxes for people in Zoom, so they introduced a new feature of Ctrl-Alt-Shift-H to hide the pop-up messages, and then when you execute those keystrokes, another window pops up in the middle of the screen for about 5 seconds saying to press ESC to get the Floating Meeting Controls back again.  I am guessing that some users still didn't understand that you can't do administration with a computer that is also doing full-screen window sharing, so they complained again to Zoom, so now they made the menu and messages pop up on all computers for every person entering the waiting room.  Then for good measure, they pop up again when you admit them to the Zoom meeting.

I don't know for sure that was the Zoom developer's thinking, it is just my own guesswork.  My frustration with it is that we use separate computers to do administration, and we don't even make the computer doing the video sharing a host or a co-host.  So basically, Zoom is causing administrative messages to pop up on a computer which can't do administration anyways because it doesn't have the rights to do so.  I cannot understand why they think that is a desirable behaviour.

Obviously, my second-monitor workaround is pretty ugly.  I am willing to invest the money into the extra monitors because my original solution of sharing video from a computer without co-host or host rights means I have to allow all participants in the Zoom meeting to be able so share their screens.  We have been Zoom-bombed once in which the intruders posted very pornographic images using this loophole.  The advantage of adding a second screen to the computers sharing video is that I can do both full-screen sharing and meeting administration from the same computer, which in turn means I can make it host and limit screen sharing to only that computer, which improves security for the next time we get Zoom-bombed.

Of course, that raises another problem because only the host can do Breakout Rooms, and right now we have a different person doing that compared to the person doing the screen sharing.  There are always compromises.

The worst part of my workaround is that if Zoom doesn't recognize it as a solution to a real problem, then at some point in the future they will make another decision and new software release, and suddenly we will find our meetings have huge problems again.  Hence I am very interested in the dialog that dm51 has going with Zoom so that the meeting configurations of the people in this thread become officially supported and not just an ad-hoc workaround.

Anyway, I am not at all surprised by dm51's discovery that they caused this software behaviour deliberately.

[dm51]

Doug: A couple things...

As far as this disruptive behavior being caused deliberately, I definitely have that in writing from a Zoom engineer. But we should keep in mind that that doesn't necessarily mean it's true – it could just be that engineer's assumption. But your explanation of why rings true to me.

Second, a small thing before I get back to testing your workaround: why do you un-check Zoom's setting of "Dual Monitors"?

[dm51]

I know a bit but so do you! And yep, I know about checking monitor identities – I do it constantly 'cause I constantly forget which is which. (The one I consider my primary inevitably ends up as "2".)

As for wasting my time, it may be time down the drain but it may not be, so you're doing me (and others reading these as well) a huge favor; given that you've beaten the problem, it's worth some effort to try to replicate your result.

The main thing to me about what you've passed on is something that may seem small to you – the idea that you can drag the menu toolbar off the Zoom window. I had no idea that was possible and if I can do that, it could well solve the problem.

Here's hoping. And in any case, thanks!

[Doug_M]

It depends on what you want to show to your meeting participants and where they are located. Zoom's Dual Monitor setting puts people on the main screen and shared content on the extended screen. As long as all participants are viewing the meeting via Zoom, especially with each of them having a dual-monitor setup themselves, it works great. But the first issue for us is that we have some participants in a physical meeting viewing one of the screens via a projector. The projector has to be wired to show a duplicat copy of either a) the shared content, or b) the people on Zoom. It cannot be switched between them easily. In addition, for Zoom participants with only a single screen, such as a cell phone, they will only see the shared content, never the meeting participants again.

Our meetings use a projector, and we want the people in the room to see the people on Zoom, unless there is video being shared in which case we want all participants (physical and Zoom) to see the video. That can only be achieved with Dual Monitors unchecked. I move the Zoom window to the extended screen and use a Y cable to create a second HDMI copy of that screen which is sent to the projector. The primary screen only contains administration windows from Zoom such as Participants, Chat etc, and none of the meeting participants can see the information on that screen which is OK because they don't need to. When not sharing video, people in the room and on Zoom all see the other meeting participants. When sharing video, all participants are automatically switched by Zoom to view the shared video - true even for users with a single screen such as a cell phone. When the video is done and the administrator stops sharing, all participants are again switched by Zoom to show the meeting participants, even those with a single screen.

This is why I said a few posts back if the problem behaviour in the update is fixed with a "new feature", I am interested in exactly how the new feature is designed to behave. There are important subtleties.

I don't know how unique our meeting configuration is. We want the participants in the room to be able to talk with the participants on Zoom. They can do this by walking up to the podium - we have a camera at the back with a telephoto lens which is input to Zoom so the Zoom participants can see and talk to the person at the podium. The big projected screen is behind the podium which is hard for the speaker to see, so we put a laptop at the podium with audio and camera shut off, set up as a "dumb" meeting participant, so the speaker can see and converse with the Zoom participants by glancing down at the laptop.

We recently made a change because some participants in the room feel shy or intimidated about walking up to the podium to talk to everyone in the meeting. So we put another camera at the front of the room facing the audience, and we have a roving microphone available for people in the building. If they want to interact with the people on Zoom, they speak into the microphone from their chair in the audience, and I switch the video feed in Zoom to the camera at the front which shows the person in the audience to everyone in the room as well as to the participants on Zoom.

It might sound too complicated, but everyone got used to it pretty quickly, even non-technical people. It lets us hold a meeting in a physical building but invite participants via Zoom from anywhere in the world, and everyone can talk and interact with everyone else. Non-technical users can fully participate in the meeting and interact with all participants even with just a cell phone, even while driving a car. We love Zoom! Except when they do a new release that suddenly starts showing menus and grey boxes on all the screens during the shared video...

[dm51]

It does indeed sound complicated but it also sounds like every step of it was well thought-out and works, which is great.

About your answer to my smaller question: you say "As long as all participants are viewing the meeting via Zoom, especially with each of them having a dual-monitor setup themselves, it works great." I know the last part of that applies to your situation but it doesn't at all to mine. So if none of the participants has a dual-monitor setup, do you know what effect the Host's disabling the duel-monitor setup have? It sounds like maybe it's not necessary to disable it.

[Doug_M]

If none of the participants have a dual monitor setup, disabling Dual Monitor in Zoom on the leader's computer means the participants will see the people on Zoom, until the leader shares something.  Then they will see the shared material, until the leader stops sharing.  Then their screens will revert back to seeing the people on Zoom.  Almost none of our participants have dual screens, only the leaders do, so that is how we run our meetings.

[dm51]

Ah, got it – thanks!

[Doug_M]

Sorry, dm51, that lengthy reply was to a posting that I saw from yourself that seems to have disappeared now.  Not sure what happened.

[N5JJR-a]

Thanks Doug_M 

If the reply you are not seeing any more starts with: "It depends on what you want to show..."  I can still see it in this thread. 

Anyway, we have come up with something that is working for us.

Thanks +++ 🙂

Mike

[dm51]

Doug: I think I deleted it but only 'cause it appeared to be a draft and the one I'd uploaded was already there. Who knows.

But now I have something else to say...

Oh. My. God. I think it works. I THINK IT WORKS! Five weeks and 60 emails with Zoom support but it took you to get My Zoom back. I owe you big. You're in England, right? Well, I'm in California – maybe I could use my influence to send you some good weather.

But seriously, I can't thank you enough. Although, for others listening in, the key to the whole thing – once you've set up (meaning, in many of our cases, buying) a second monitor – is that the Zoom meeting toolbar/menu is draggable. So I take the steps you suggested, the shared window opens on the Primary monitor, I drag the toolbar to the Extended, and the gray-bar problem is over! Not only that but it appears that in subsequent meetings the toolbar continues to open in the Extended without having to be dragged.

So, fingers crossed, I and other people are now set. I'm going to try to get this info to my Zoom Support contact and strongly urge them to disseminate it to the masses, and preferably not on a case-to-case basis but maybe with an extended note on one of the client updates? Anyway, that's up to them, obviously, but it sure isn't good when this fix has to be discovered by a hard-working fellow (bloke?) such as yourself.

I hope I'm not back here in a couple days saying I was wrong but I've checked it by joining the meeting through my cell-phone and it seems to work. I'll be testing it in a couple real-life situations in the next few days but for the moment, at least, I'm as ecstatic as a person can be when something that's supposed to work... well, works.

Thanks again...

[Doug_M]

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@dm51 wrote:

You're in England, right?

Not only that but it appears that in subsequent meetings the toolbar continues to open in the Extended without having to be dragged.

I'm in Calgary, Alberta, Canada.  But I like people from California.  And England.  😊

Regarding second quote, that is my observation as well.  I also agree with your observation that the key is that the Floating Meeting Controls are draggable and they even stay put once dragged.  I only learned that from someone else in these forums.

Thank you for your efforts to get Zoom to acknowledge this as a real issue for some meeting configurations.  That is really important so they don't break it again.  Let me know if I can help on that front.

[bgrose]

I just wanted to add that I thought I might be able to solve the problem by installing an earlier version of Zoom, prior to this horrible upgrade. I went back to December 2022 for version 12.9. Things worked fine, but I discovered that, strangely, certain of my embedded videos in PowerPoint no longer shared audio. I then tried a somewhat later version…and same problem reappeared. No idea why this happened, but it does seem to indicate that older versions of zoom are simply not viable.

I’m glad your two-monitor workaround WORKED—but alas there are those of us who simply don’t have the desk real estate to add an extra screen. And from what you’ve indicated about Zoom, somehow this “problem” seems to have been intentional.

I’m just keeping my fingers crossed that my video so far has not been compromised when I screen share without optimizing. Makes me wonder what purpose screen optimization actually serves in the first place.

[dm51]

Earlier Zoom: Boy, that's weird. Presumably the audio in those videos worked when you were originally using that earlier Zoom? But downgrading can certainly cause issues.

Real estate: Don't have much myself but I got a 10-inch monitor and was able to squeeze it in. And I believe there's at least one smaller size available.

Video quality: I think you said before that your videos seemed to play fine even after Zoom's botched upgrade and that your main problem was the gray box. For me, at least, the difference in video quality may not be large but it seems clearly better, mostly that it's less choppy.

[bgrose]

Yes, audio worked fine in the past. And since the upgrade, I’ve done zooms with over 200 participants and they’ve all reported virtually no video issues with video optimization unchecked. Go figure. 

[dm51]

Wow -- that's impressive. Anyway, I'm still testing and could well be wrong. Although if it's true that optimizing video is unnecessary, that eliminates the problem too!

[Doug_M]

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@dm51 wrote:

Wow -- that's impressive. Anyway, I'm still testing and could well be wrong. Although if it's true that optimizing video is unnecessary, that eliminates the problem too!

---

Probably not important for you two, but it only eliminates the problem for Zoom participants, not for physical meeting participants viewing the meeting via a projector.

[bgrose]

I had an IT person monitoring my unoptimized video zoom and he reported that it actually looked better unoptimized, with direct comparisons to optimized.