Best Practices

Make sure you are logged in to CarmenZoom. Many meetings will let you join just by clicking a link (in your Carmen course, your calendar, or an email), but logging in will improve your experience. You can log in at carmenzoom.osu.edu, or you can sign in with the Zoom desktop or mobile app on your device. Deliberately logging in will ensure:

• Your preferred name will be used as your display name.
• Your pronouns will be included as part of your display name.
• You will have access to a larger range of background images.
• Your profile picture will display if you turn off your camera.
• If you are the host or the alternative host, Zoom will “recognize” you and give you the right role in the meeting.
• If the meeting is set to require authentication, you will not be asked to log in again.
• If the host is using Zoom's reports to verify participation and attendance, your presence will be clearly identified by your lastname.#.

Keep your meetings as secure as possible. By requiring authentication for meetings that include only people associated with Ohio State, you can protect against outside troublemakers. It also ensures that if someone misbehaves in your meeting, their identity will be logged. 

If you need to invite specific individuals from outside Ohio State, you can create an exception for them while still requiring authentication.

Even if authentication isn’t feasible for your meeting, there are still other security practices you should follow.

Other Tips

Be careful when scheduling concurrent meetings. You cannot attend two Zoom meetings at the same time, using the same computer. If you use a separate computer or mobile device, you can be in more than one meeting. However, you can only be logged in to one of them.

Additionally, you can only have two meetings created under your account running at the same time, and you will need an alternative host running the second one. If you regularly need to schedule meetings on behalf of other people, have them give you scheduling privileges so you can create the meetings under their account.

If you need to leave a meeting that you created, assign the host role to someone else before you leave.  This ensures the meeting can continue without you and lets you join or start another meeting if needed.

Consider whether to use the Zoom integration for CarmenCanvas in your course. The Zoom integration with CarmenCanvas works best when you will be having synchronous (live) class sessions with all students. It creates the meeting, adds calendar events in Canvas, and automatically shares any recordings with the class. The Zoom link on the course navigation gives students a centralized location to find all of your Zoom resources.

Learn more about the CarmenCanvas Zoom integration.

If you will be meeting with smaller groups, on an inconsistent schedule, or you want to review the recording before making it available, you can set up your meeting in CarmenZoom web portal and then provide links as needed. A recurring meeting will always use the same link, so you can provide it in a module or page for use all semester.

Recurring meetings can be set up with or without a schedule. While the date and time have no bearing at all on whether the meeting can function, it is listed automatically in the invitation details.

For a one-time meeting or a recurring meeting with colleagues, schedule the meeting and set the date and time in at carmenzoom.osu.edu. Click the link to copy the invitation and paste it into your Outlook meeting invitation. Alternately, click the button to Add to Outlook Calendar (.ics). This will create a calendar invitation that you can modify as needed and send. There is also an Outlook Add-in that lets you schedule Zoom meetings from Outlook.

Learn more about scheduled meetings.

If you will be meeting regularly with the same group of people but the time and date will vary, you can schedule a recurring meeting that doesn’t have a schedule. When scheduling your meeting, check the box next to Recurring meeting, but then choose No Fixed Time from the Recurrence drop-down menu. This gives you a persistent, stable URL to use with that group of people.

Meeting owners can access their Zoom Cloud Recordings at carmenzoom.osu.edu. Under the Recordings section, each session is listed by Meeting Topic/Meeting ID, and then by Start Time and Date. If you made multiple recordings without stopping your meeting, all of them will be under the same Meeting Topic/Meeting ID. The Start Time helps identify different recordings made from the same recurring or personal meeting.

Click on the Meeting Topic link and then click Copy Shareable Link to get the URL. By default, recordings are available to anyone who has the link. There is a Share button in the upper right corner that will allow the meeting owner to manage access permissions for a recording. Note that students automatically have access to recordings of Zoom sessions created through the CarmenCanvas integration.

Learn more about CarmenZoom recordings.

Host Roles, Powers and Limitations

Meeting Owner

The person who creates or schedules the meeting and determines initial settings. Meetings can be created from the web portal at carmenzoom.osu.edu or the desktop app. The meeting owner is the default host for the meeting. Scheduled meetings only show up in the Zoom Upcoming Meetings list for the meeting owner. The meeting owner is the only person who has direct access to the cloud recording, to edit the transcript or download it for long-term storage.

Host

Usually the person who created the meeting. The host has the most power within the meeting itself; the host can designate someone else to be co-host or host during the meeting. A meeting must have a host. A meeting can have only one host.

Co-Host

A temporary role assigned within an active meeting to help manage that session. Anyone who is currently in the meeting can be designated as co-host. A co-host cannot do all the things within a meeting that the host can do.

Alt (Alternative) Host

Designated by the meeting owner when creating a meeting as someone who can start the meeting. The Alt Host will be Host until the actual Host or Meeting Owner joins the meeting. A person must have logged into CarmenZoom to create their account before they can be designated as Alt Host. The Alt Host will need a link to start the meeting via email or calendar invitation and will need to be logged in to Zoom from the web portal at carmenzoom.osu.eduor the desktop app in order to be recognized as the Alt Host.

Learn more about roles in a meeting.