The first time I used Zoom…

Marjorie Willison on March 25, 2020

I am very excited that Spryfield Community Association (SCA) and civil servants from HRM are meeting online through Zoom Wednesday evening to chat about planning. Do let us know right away if you want to participate, so that we can include you in the invitation e-mail. 

Here’s what I did to use Zoom for the first time – a trial run with the help of SCA’s techno whiz the day before the meeting.

  1. Open your e-mail or click on this link – From the invitation e-mail I received, I wrote down the meeting i.d. number and the password, so they were handy when I needed them later. After that, I opened the link given in the e-mail. 
  2. Save the file – As soon as the link opened, there was a box that said to save the file. So I saved the file. Nothing seemed to happen, but there was an orangey-red, wide giant arrow pointing to the upper right-hand corner of the screen. I clicked on the giant arrow two or three times and again, nothing seemed to happen. 
  3. Find the file – It finally dawned on me that I was supposed to click on the tiny down-ward-pointing arrow (the downloads arrow) in the extreme upper right-hand corner of the screen that the giant arrow was pointing to. That’s where I found the saved file!
  4. Run the file – After clicking on the tiny download arrow, a little box dropped down with the Zoom name on the left and a tiny file icon on the right. I double-clicked on the file icon and then I’m not sure what happened next. (I’m writing this the morning after.) 
  5. Join the meeting – I think that’s when the boxes to enter the meeting i.d. and the password popped up. I filled in the boxes and Presto! There was SCA’s techno whiz smiling at me. I had successfully joined his trial-run meeting. If you run into problems, email [email protected]
  6. Mute – It is best with an on-line meeting to mute yourself unless you want to make a comment, so that the various little noises we all make won’t interfere. I found it easy to mute and un-mute myself by clicking Alt-A. 

I won’t have to go through all these steps the next time I use Zoom. When I join the meeting with HRM, the link in the invitation e-mail will take me to the Zoom sign-in page, where I will enter the meeting i.d. and password to join the meeting.

Marjorie Willison, Board Chair
Spryfield Community Association