

Show HN: Faster access to Google hangouts - pyotrgalois
http://hang0ut.com/

======
bentoner
[http://plus.google.com/hangouts/_](http://plus.google.com/hangouts/_)

~~~
thinkmassive
Exactly. And for those of us with multiple accounts:

First Id: [https://plus.google.com](https://plus.google.com) Second Id:
[https://plus.google.com/u/1/](https://plus.google.com/u/1/) Third Id:
[https://plus.google.com/u/2/](https://plus.google.com/u/2/) ...etc

------
mmahemoff
If you want a permanent, unique, hangout URL, set up a Google+ event which
finishes in 100 years and make Hangout the location. Voila - the hangout URL
persists even if no-one's in it.

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methehack
I think this works better for me:

[http://hangouts.google.com/start](http://hangouts.google.com/start)

It is better for me because, now that I've visited the URL, if I start typing
'hangout' in the address bar, this comes up first for me and I just hit enter
(and it's easy to remember). It's the little things.

------
dvorak42
[https://plus.google.com/hangouts/_/meet/](https://plus.google.com/hangouts/_/meet/)

~~~
pyotrgalois
It does not work: That links let's you open the google hangouts application,
however it does not work when you want to invite people. Check that after
opening the application, the link to invite other people is set to
[https://plus.google.com/hangouts/_/meet/](https://plus.google.com/hangouts/_/meet/).
If you send the link to somebody else it will try to create a new hangout
(that will have the exact same issue).

~~~
jc4p
Just go to
[https://plus.google.com/hangouts/_](https://plus.google.com/hangouts/_) \--
It'll generate a new one and take you to it. I have this bookmarked on my
address book too so it's just one click to make a new hangout.

~~~
pyotrgalois
Thanks! This link works fine. I was not aware of it existence. I has a too
long URI but it is way better than having to go to google plus and go to the
the bottom right corner so that start a hangout button appears.

I am going to replace my Start button created by hangouts js library with a
link to this URI.

EDIT: I just replaced the google hangout button created via js with google's
framework by a direct link :).

------
jasoncrawford
Nice, it amazes me how difficult it is to start a Hangout.

~~~
hamburglar
I, too, am constantly amazed at the fact that there are so many different
paths through the G+ UI for creating hangouts, and that they all seem to
produce different, weirdly incompatible results that affect whether or not
your intended recipient is actually going to be able to see/use the
invitation. It is utterly bizarre that my company uses hangouts every single
day, but we are reduced to: 1) hitting "refresh" on the browser in hopes of
updating things so we see the invitation, and 2) saying "i sent it...do you
see it? I'll try sending it again" ad infinitum. It's the 2014 version of "can
you hear me now?" and google should be really, _really_ embarrassed about it.

~~~
lnanek2
Same experience here. It is always a nightmare using it with everyone having
to do weird things like go to every else's G+ page and click hi and weird
stuff...

------
spuz
I don't understand, how is this faster? There is nothing on the page but a
button that says Start. When I click it, it takes me to
[https://plus.google.com/hangouts/_](https://plus.google.com/hangouts/_) which
then redirects to a page that says "Please wait" for about 5 seconds. After
than I get another redirect to a google page asking me to install a plugin.
Why do I need a plugin to use Hangouts? At the moment I just open my Gmail
tab. What problem exactly are you trying to solve here?

~~~
K-Wall
What I don't understand is why this got voted up. It is webpage with a link.

~~~
pyotrgalois
Probably because many of us had the same issue: no easy way to create google
hangout with a link to share where anybody can join. After creating the page
with the google hangout api somebody mentioned a link to resolve the issue
I/we had. Since it is very likely that many do not know about the link or do
not want to learn it, I think the webpage is useful. It is something very
simple and stupid, but it is useful enought, at least for me.

------
keehun
It works really well on Chrome. Sadly, it does not work on Firefox.

~~~
nilgradisnik
Not working for me either. All I can see is the image and some text but
nothing happens. Firefox 30 on Ubuntu 14.04

~~~
pyotrgalois
Strange. It is working fine on my linux, mac and windows pcs with Firefox 30.
I don't think it is my code since it is really simple (10 lines of html and
some css). It might be an issue google platform.js.

------
robk
The Hangouts UI is a disgrace to Google. I can't count the # of times I've
tried to get even technical people to join a Hangout and it took an extra 5-10
minutes to sort out. Finding the initiation button is horribly hard, the UI is
clumsy and unintuitive for those used to Skype or other video calling tools,
and even inviting a new person to a hangout is maddeningly hard, particularly
if they've got multiple Google IDs.

~~~
vertex-four
Luckily, Hangouts is no longer the only usable vidchat system out there.
There's also things like vLine[0] which I use to chat with loved ones, and
numerous other services. It doesn't even require a login. WebRTC is awesome.

Apparently it's possible to do screen-sharing over WebRTC with a Chrome
extension as well (and I assume a Firefox extension is possible), although I
don't know of any services which provide that yet.

[0] [https://vline.com/](https://vline.com/)

~~~
nnnnni
vLine looks like it's really cool, but I don't see a way to "lock" a chat.
That's a dealbreaker for me. =-(

~~~
vertex-four
By locking a chat, do you mean keep it open for the future? I think, but I'm
not sure, that simply keeping the link around would work.

~~~
nnnnni
You'll probably never see this, but no -- I meant "keep other people out".

------
sciurus
Pretty minimal page!

    
    
        <!DOCTYPE html>
    
        <html>
        <head>
          <meta name="generator" content=
          "HTML Tidy for Linux/x86 (vers 25 March 2009), see www.w3.org">
          <meta charset="UTF-8">
    
          <title>Hang0ut - Faster access to Google Hangouts</title>
          <link rel="stylesheet" href="/main.css" type="text/css">
          <link href="http://fonts.googleapis.com/css?family=Lato" rel="stylesheet" type=
          "text/css">
        </head>
    
        <body>
          <div id="content">
            <h1>hangout</h1><a href="https://plus.google.com/hangouts/_"></a>
    
            <div id="button">
              <span id="btn-txt">Start</span>
            </div>
          </div>
    
          <div id="name">
            <h2><a href="http://federicocarrone.com/">Federico Carrone</a></h2>
          </div>
    
          <div id="why">
            <p>Faster access to google hangouts</p>
          </div>
        </body>
        </html>

------
joshmn
I like that the background image is almost 3 megs.

~~~
pyotrgalois
Copied from [http://unsplash.com/](http://unsplash.com/). I just resized it.
It has not yet been updated on amazon cloudfront. Check:
[http://hang0ut.s3-website-us-
west-2.amazonaws.com/](http://hang0ut.s3-website-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/)

~~~
joshmn
Here's 62kb for you:
[http://i.imgur.com/cuL7uX1.jpg](http://i.imgur.com/cuL7uX1.jpg) :)

------
dpearce
If you have Alfred, this is a great workflow for this problem:
[https://github.com/wallace/google_hangout_workflow](https://github.com/wallace/google_hangout_workflow)

~~~
clews
Here is a link to another Alfred workflow that I wrote. It opens a hangout
session in a new window of your default browser and supports Safari, Chrome,
and Firefox. [https://github.com/codykimberling/alfred-workflow-google-
han...](https://github.com/codykimberling/alfred-workflow-google-
hangout/releases/latest)

------
jmgrosen
Not working for me on Chrome 37 OS X, interestingly enough. Error in console
is 'Uncaught ReferenceError: gapi is not defined'. My bet is on an HTTP/HTTPS
discrepancy, but I'm not sure.

~~~
pyotrgalois
I changed the google hangout button by a normal link. Check it out:
[http://hang0ut.s3-website-us-
west-2.amazonaws.com/](http://hang0ut.s3-website-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/). It
should work now.

------
dy
Is there a way to do a minimal-click start to Google Hangouts on Air. I really
like it for screencasting when I'm giving a lecture but it takes a few minutes
to set up and get going.

~~~
silverlight
[https://plus.google.com/hangouts/_?hso=0](https://plus.google.com/hangouts/_?hso=0)

------
RoryH
[http://g.co/hangout](http://g.co/hangout)

------
pit
I don't use Google hangouts because I don't want a Google+ profile.

------
patrickocoffeyo
There is no problem, and this is no solution.

~~~
pyotrgalois
As I said in other comments sometimes on hipchat I need to have a call with
teammates that I do not have on gmail/hangouts. So I need to create a hangout
with a link to share so that I can copy it into hipchat and anybody can join
it. There is no way to do that on gmail. You need to open google plus that
takes a while to load, then you need to go to the bottom right corner and wait
for the Start video chat button to appear and finally click it.

I was not aware that there was a link
([https://plus.google.com/hangouts/_](https://plus.google.com/hangouts/_))
that lets you create a hangout with a link to share so that other people can
join it. So I created a simple landing page with a button created with google
hangouts api. After learning about the link I mentioned before, I changed the
google hangout button by a normal link.

------
elwell
This works better for me:

1\. Close laptop

2\. Hangout with friends in person

~~~
ithkuil
I'm sure you don't find the idea of a group video chat so useless, so I guess
that's what happens when you choose a "fancy" name for a product. I found it a
ridiculous name when I first heard of it, and I still didn't change my mind;
even if the product itself works very well for me.

A funny thing about its audio codec: my dogs don't recognize my wife's voice
over skype, but they do over hangouts :-)

~~~
philbarr
It's better than "facetime". I mean you can't really say, "I'm just going to
facetime the wife" without a little chortle. Call me immature ('cos I sort of
am).

