An engineer has a problem. So he says to himself, "I'll use a remote-enabled auto-capturing whiteboard." Now he has two problems.
Now his team has a problem :)
Ask HN: What collaborative whiteboard are you using?
81–90 of 170 posts
Re: Ask HN: What collaborative whiteboard are you using?
#82[deleted]
Re: Ask HN: What collaborative whiteboard are you using?
#83I love excalidraw.com A quick shoutout to our service, we embedded excalidraw in our pair programming solution that helps you do system design interviews effectively: https://www.hackerrank.com/products/codepair/
I heard about it from the React community on Twitter and I've been using it exclusively for system design interviews. I love the look of 'whoa cool' when candidates see my cursor moving around the screen :)
Re: Ask HN: What collaborative whiteboard are you using?
#84Its still very much in development, but we're building https://whiteboard.systems/
Its based on the idea that for most system diagrams, you just need boxes, text and arrows. everything else is superfluous. Its collaborative by default so you can invite someone to join you with the URL. The tools aren't discoverable yet, so to use it:
- option(⌥) + click to create a box
- option(⌥) + drag to create a grouping box
- select a box and option(⌥) + click another to draw an arrow
- select a box and type to edit text
would very much appreciate feedback! (email in profile)
Re: Ask HN: What collaborative whiteboard are you using?
#85I started building my own with a friend because nothing else had what I wanted (great freehand drawing and text tools) and was cheap. We've only just finished the MVP, so feedback would be very helpful!
I have no idea if it'll hold up under load, I guess let's see. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ You can share the URL to collaborate with someone else.
Re: Ask HN: What collaborative whiteboard are you using?
#86Google Slides and share desktop on Zoom. No need to complicate it with yet another piece of software.
Powerpoint and Slides are perfectly capable for drawing diagrams, or whiteboarding. Zoom screen share is low enough latency and you're already using it for voice comm.
Re: Ask HN: What collaborative whiteboard are you using?
#87Google Jamboard + Wacom Intuos tablet with stylus [1] [1] https://www.wacom.com/en-us/products/pen-tablets/wacom-intuo...
Years ago, a team I was on decided to get wacom tablets to try to do some remote brainstorming. We quickly found that nobody liked it enough to actually continue, because none of us found it natural at all to cope with writing motions on a blank desk surface with results appearing dislocated on a screen. Those devices all found their way into dusty drawers, never to see electrons in their USB cables again.
I suppose somebody must find this interface satisfactory, since the product category has existed so long. But for the most part, we found the human factors part to be too awkward. I realized then that I would not try this again unless I had a stylus+touchscreen device so I could have a more natural writing experience. Even then, I have experienced enough terrible stylus interfaces on point-of-sale equipment to realize that I need quite low latency before it feels natural rather than tortured to write on a screen.
But, for us to buy such a thing for many team members, knowing it will probably only see infrequent use, it would have to be at an entry-level Android phone price level, not at iPad price levels. However, I'd be concerned that something like a phone will not provide an appliance/peripheral-like experience. I want something that works consistently with any software over a matter of years/decades, not something tied heavily to a specific app and platform which may evaporate long before the hardware wears out.
Re: Ask HN: What collaborative whiteboard are you using?
#88Freehand by InVision is great! Very simple and intuitive. http://freehand.new
Seconding Freehand.
Re: Ask HN: What collaborative whiteboard are you using?
#89Earlier quoted context omitted.
huh, i didn't realize i was missing this and now i miss it. that said, it's usually not too bad to underline and then click "undo" (which is what i have been doing since i didn't know what i was missing)
If you're on a collaborative whiteboard does undo undo the last collective edit or just your own edits?
The way we handle it in Browserboard is to only undo your own edits. We version each individual shape, and filter events out of the undo stack for shapes that have been touched by other users.
Re: Ask HN: What collaborative whiteboard are you using?
#90I love https://excalidraw.com Christopher Chedeau did a recent talk on nice challenges they had building it in the open https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fix2-SynPGE I want to build a plugin for Figma to embed Excalidraw inside Figma as I use Figma for all my design work already.
Excalidraw looks great. Sadly the Firefox support for Tablets is very poor. However, after switching to Chrome, everything worked as expected.