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Unofficial Microsoft Teams client for Linux

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Re: Unofficial Microsoft Teams client for Linux

#151

Post by ryanjshaw »

andyjohnson0 wrote: post #108
jacquesm wrote: post #69

The official client is absolutely terrible. But, I've found a much better solution: I tell all my customers Microsoft Teams doesn't work for us and they'll have to pick something else. Kudos for at least trying to address this, MS should hang their head in shame, this is not the hardest problem to solve these days. If we could do it in 1995 they should be able to do it 30 years later.

I use Teams every day (for work, the company basically runs on it) for chat and meetings, and I'm one of those strange people who never really have much problem with it. I can think of one occasion in perhaps the last six months when it crashed and I had to kill and restart it. Otherwise it just sits there on my laptop and does its thing. Same with Outlook etc. So, what am I doing wrong? How do I get the authentic Te…

I’m also puzzled by the hate for Teams. I used Teams for years and developed on Power Platform. The integration between all the pieces of the MS stack is unrivaled.

I now use Slack, Zoom, Google Workspace etc. and don’t enjoy the experience at all. It feels low quality and messy compared to Teams.

Re: Unofficial Microsoft Teams client for Linux

#152

Post by dijit »

ryanjshaw wrote: post #151
andyjohnson0 wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I use Teams every day (for work, the company basically runs on it) for chat and meetings, and I'm one of those strange people who never really have much problem with it. I can think of one occasion in perhaps the last six months when it crashed and I had to kill and restart it. Otherwise it just sits there on my laptop and does its thing. Same with Outlook etc. So, what am I doing wrong? How do I get the authentic Te…

I’m also puzzled by the hate for Teams. I used Teams for years and developed on Power Platform. The integration between all the pieces of the MS stack is unrivaled. I now use Slack, Zoom, Google Workspace etc. and don’t enjoy the experience at all. It feels low quality and messy compared to Teams.

Wow.

I don't believe you.

Making App integrations for Slack to basically anything is pretty close to a joyful experience, the rest of it is comparable to other chat systems perhaps, but are you really telling me with a straight face that developing applications atop Teams (that do more than just plug other Microsoft things together) is actually a superior experience?

I get that opinions are subjective and all that, but so you understand: I'm having the same reaction as if someone said to you that contracting gangrene is preferable to a walk in the park.

Re: Unofficial Microsoft Teams client for Linux

#153

Post by freedomben »

ErroneousBosh wrote: post #89
jacquesm wrote: post #69

The official client is absolutely terrible. But, I've found a much better solution: I tell all my customers Microsoft Teams doesn't work for us and they'll have to pick something else. Kudos for at least trying to address this, MS should hang their head in shame, this is not the hardest problem to solve these days. If we could do it in 1995 they should be able to do it 30 years later.

The web-based one works perfectly on Linux. If anything it's better than the native Windows app. Office 365 actually works better in Firefox in Linux than any other browser in Windows. It's like they've kind of given up on the whole OS thing, and have just decided to go with Linux.

Exactly, I've been very pleasantly surprised at how well teams works in the browser on Linux. Much better than zoom!

Re: Unofficial Microsoft Teams client for Linux

#154

Post by Too »

ErroneousBosh wrote: post #115
Too wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If by perfect you mean that you can’t have two chats open next to each other and toggling between chats is slow as molasses then yes.

Are you running it on a particularly potatoey PC? On my fairly ancient Core i7-8700 I can have a video call open in one screen and be editing in Resolve on another.

No potato, quite the contrary, and it’s not that it hogs resources. It’s just slow within. I can also keep a video call open and do other things outside of teams. But doing any multitasking within teams is just a nightmare. Open a second chat while in a video call makes the video into a thumbnail. Searching through other chats to copy and forward into a third chat... Just not possible, because everything is modal and resetting the scroll location when toggling between. On top of that it’s just overall slow slow slow.

Re: Unofficial Microsoft Teams client for Linux

#155

Post by badsectoracula »

dijit wrote: post #118
cycomanic wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As bad as teams is, there is absolutely no comparison to the crap that is slack. Just a number of things I regularly encounter: 1. Slack selecting speakers instead of headphones for call, even though I've used the headphones just before. 2. Calls ringing on my mobile that has been quietly sitting on the desk, instead of on the desktop that I've been typing on. 3. Mobile and desktop client being completely out of sync…

Not a fan of slack. Teams is unjustifiably worse than slack. The only way you can hold this opinion is if you haven't been forced to use Teams.

At work for some reason we use both Slack and Teams because part of the company likes one and another part of the company likes the other, so i actually get to have simultaneous experience with both.

I use both on Linux via Firefox (their tabs are pinned side by side). I prefer Teams because:

a) Slack constantly forgets my credentials and i need to go through a whole dance of logging in, proving i'm human by clicking bicycles, having it email some code. Pretty much every day.

b) Slack, for some reason i cannot fathom, randomly switches me to "do not disturb" mode (or something like that) even though i'm right there. Not even away: it switches to a mode where i do not receive notifications when someone messages me. Fortunately it still does the beepy sound and i do keep the tabs visible on my screen all the time so i actually do notice messages, but i had at least a couple of questions from others why i am in that mode.

c) Slack does not support audio calls. Not sure why, but it doesn't work in Firefox. Teams does work just fine. Fortunately all work meetings are done via Teams and all people on Stack are also on Teams so if someone wants an audio call we use Teams, but still, a negative for Slack.

The only issue i had with Teams is that its text input can get confused when typing `backticks` and it seems to dislike using emojis at any place except the end of the text. Also Slack has some (old) meme emojis, though if that is a good thing or not depends on your taste :-P.

Re: Unofficial Microsoft Teams client for Linux

#156

Post by Aaargh20318 »

jonathanlydall wrote: post #75
hosteur wrote: post #68

Please make an unofficial client for windows too. The official one sucks so much it is hard to even describe.

I use Teams on Windows extensively at work (for chats, calls, meetings, screen sharing). And I have zero issues with it. It’s been really solid for me since that major overhaul they did a couple of years back. Not sure what issues you have, but I wonder if perhaps that us NOT running 3rd party security products is a factor (we only run Windows Defender).

Apart from it being slow, a memory hog and having a shitty web-based UI that feels out of place regardless of what OS you’re using. It’s missing basic features.

One example is the inability to share only part of your screen. This is essential if you’re working on a large, ultra-wide monitor. There’s been a feature request for this on Microsofts feedback site for years.

Also, how embarrassing is it that the biggest software company in the world is not able to make a decent native app and has to resort to this html-app nonsense.

Re: Unofficial Microsoft Teams client for Linux

#157

Post by snickerer »

aorth wrote: post #94
ErroneousBosh wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The web-based one works perfectly on Linux. If anything it's better than the native Windows app. Office 365 actually works better in Firefox in Linux than any other browser in Windows. It's like they've kind of given up on the whole OS thing, and have just decided to go with Linux.

True! I've been doing this for years on Linux. I use a dedicated Chromium instance in app mode: /usr/bin/chromium --ozone-platform=wayland --enable-features=UseOzonePlatform,WaylandWindowDecorations,WebRTCPipeWireCapturer --user-data-dir=/home/myuser/.config/chromium-ilri --app=https://teams.microsoft.com Works incredibly well (put this in a `.desktop` file with `Exec=` and you can launch it via your desktop's launch…

The only thing that does not work for me with Teams as chromium 'app' is the screen sharing (on Wayland). Does your --enable-features fix this?

Re: Unofficial Microsoft Teams client for Linux

#158

Post by Levitating »

ErroneousBosh wrote: post #115
Too wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If by perfect you mean that you can’t have two chats open next to each other and toggling between chats is slow as molasses then yes.

Are you running it on a particularly potatoey PC? On my fairly ancient Core i7-8700 I can have a video call open in one screen and be editing in Resolve on another.

It's not that it hogs resources. The app is just slow. So so so so terribly slow.

And half of the time it crashes. Or the video/audio doesn't work.

Re: Unofficial Microsoft Teams client for Linux

#159

Post by jon-wood »

andyjohnson0 wrote: post #108
jacquesm wrote: post #69

The official client is absolutely terrible. But, I've found a much better solution: I tell all my customers Microsoft Teams doesn't work for us and they'll have to pick something else. Kudos for at least trying to address this, MS should hang their head in shame, this is not the hardest problem to solve these days. If we could do it in 1995 they should be able to do it 30 years later.

I use Teams every day (for work, the company basically runs on it) for chat and meetings, and I'm one of those strange people who never really have much problem with it. I can think of one occasion in perhaps the last six months when it crashed and I had to kill and restart it. Otherwise it just sits there on my laptop and does its thing. Same with Outlook etc. So, what am I doing wrong? How do I get the authentic Te…

In the strictest form Teams "works". You can chat with people, you can do video calls, you can share files. Outside of the core "calling a person" experience though it's a mess, starting with the way the word Team is so overloaded, it has several different meanings within the Teams application. There's very few other places where its so apparent that a piece of software is bunch of other products all mashed together and shipped as fast as possible - you've got Sharepoint in there, Office, Skype for Business, and very little consideration seems to have gone into how to make all of those work together seamlessly.

Re: Unofficial Microsoft Teams client for Linux

#160

Post by jll29 »

Why would I want to use Teams on Linux? One reason to use Linux is to avoid such bloatware with unbearably poor UX.

Rumor has it that a usability consultant died from a heart attack when he saw the first alpha build, but I may misremember the story (or confuse it with the deadly joke by Monty Python).

I'm totally fine with text-based chat, and it had better be implementing an open standard (e.g. USENET news or Jabber).

And it's by no means restricted to Microsoft: many companies use unclear interfaces with non-existant discoverability, sluggish response times, and cryptic menu names like "..." or "+"; and nobody neads multi-row menus at the top to compete for attention with left-side column menus, each of which featuring symbols that lack clarity - since when is one pane of icons not enough?

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