What is a Hangout?
UCSC staff, faculty, and students are quickly discovering the enormous benefits of using Google+ Hangouts to communicate with each other, either for those short 30 minute conversations to those 2-3 hour meetings. Instead of driving to and from campus for meetings, try a Hangout instead!
Hangouts is a free video conferencing tool that is part of Google+ and the suite of UCSC Google Consumer Apps services. You can use Hangouts in Google+ or as part of the Video Call feature in Google Calendar and in Gmail Chat. More information about Hangouts
Creating Calendar Events with Hangouts
If you have never started a Hangout, you first need to install the video plugin on your computer. It's free and downloads in seconds. Download Video Plugin. You also need to have an active Google+ profile. Learn more about Google+
When creating a new event in your Google Calendar, you will see the link to Add video call under the "Where" section on the event detail page, and clicking on it will add a Hangout to the event. Guests you invite will have the option to Join the video call to participate in the Hangout. If you don’t want a Hangout for a particular event, click Remove next to the video call link.
Joining a Calendar Event Hangout
Guests who have been invited to an event can participate in a Hangout by clicking on the Join video call link in the event bubble or event page. Guests must be a Google+ user to join a Hangout. If a guest is not currently a Google+ user, they'll see a suggestion to sign up for Google+ and then be able to join the Hangout.
Google Hangouts is a self-supported service and a Google Consumer App. The best resource for support is the Google Hangout Help Center which contains official Google support documentation.
Posted by: Lisa Bono