Frequently Asked Questions
(FAQ)
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Document Number: faq.200000.01
Copyright (c) 2001-2024 1stWorks Corporation. All rights reserved. |
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) provides information that may help you work with hotComm. Please refer to the User Guide for information on how the products work.
Contents
Sales
These are questions about trying and purchasing hotComm.
How long are the demo periods?
To see how long your demo periods are, right-click the hotComm icon in the Windows tray, and click My Info. The standard demo periods are:
| Component | Demo period |
|---|---|
| hotComm (including ezPeer) | 14 days |
| IM-Live | 14 days |
| Call Manager | 14 days |
| Moderated Chat | 14 days |
The demo period starts when you install hotComm. At the end of the demo period, the feature or product is disabled until you purchase it.
If you need an extension of the demo period, contact sales@1stWorks.com.
How do I purchase?
You can order online at our Online store.
Do my customers need to buy IM-Live or ezPeer?
Your customers can contact you through IM-Live at no charge to themselves. You purchase hotComm and the IM-Live feature.
Similarly, your customers can access your ezPeer WebSite at no charge to themselves, provided that you purchase the ezPeer feature.
IM-Live
These are questions about IM-Live.
What are the IM-Live requirements?
Please see the IM-Live FAQ that we set up especially for your friends and customers who might have questions about using the IM-Live button.
Can I automatically generate an IM-Live button?
Yes, you can use our IM-Live HTML Link Toolkit to generate both a button and an email signature file. You can use one of our graphics or a custom button.
What IM-Live button do my users see when hotComm is offline?
The 1stWorks Corporation VNS server detects whether your hotComm is online or offline. If offline, it displays an alternate graphic on your IM-Live buttons to indicate that you are not available. This is part of the No-Live feature.
Problem: IM-Live button graphic shows as a missing graphic or an empty space
| A missing graphic may display as an empty space or as a symbol from your browser such as these: |  |
This means that your browser can not find the graphic used for your button. There are several possible causes for this:
- Is the location of the graphic correct? The correct location is in your hotComm/WEB/IM-Live folder.
- Is the HTML code for your button correct? Check that the filename in the code matches the graphic's filename.
- If this only happens when your hotComm is offline, then the graphic's filename may not be supported by our No-Live feature. This feature displays an alternate graphic when your hotComm is offline. The supported filenames are those used in the IM-Live HTML Link Toolkit.
- Is your computer behind a firewall, proxy server, or router? If so, you may need additional setup in order to run IM-Live or ezPeer. See Firewalls, proxy servers, routers and ports.
Closing IM-Live web page disconnects IM-Live peer
Yes. The IM-Live web page contains the IM-Live Java applet that opens the IM-Live login and session windows and runs IM-Live on your contact's computer. If your contact closes the web page, they stop the applet and the session is immediately discontinued.
Firewalls, proxy servers, routers and ports
Your hotComm connects to your peers' computers and the 1stWorks VNS Server to exchange messages. Additionally, visitors connecting to your ezPeer or IM-Live facilities need to connect to your computer.
See Firewalls, Routers and Ports if:
- Your computer is behind a firewall.
- Your computer accesses the Internet through a proxy server.
- Your computer accesses the Internet through a router, where several computers share one Internet IP address.
Some indications that you might have a firewall, proxy server or router are:
- Your IM-Live button graphic doesn't display outside your office.
- Your ezPeer site is inaccessible from outside your office.
- You are having difficulty registering hotComm.
See Firewalls, Routers and Ports.
How do I configure hotComm and a LinkSys router?
See Firewalls, Routers and Ports. For more detailed information on opening up ports in a LinkSys router, see hotComm and LinkSys router.
How do I configure hotComm and a Cayman router?
See Firewalls, Routers and Ports.
How do I configure hotComm and a D-Link router?
See Firewalls, Routers and Ports.
System Requirements
These are questions about system requirements:
What are your System Requirements?
System Requirements
The minimum system requirements are:
Windows clients: hotComm,
hotComm
Lite, and hotComm CL
- Windows XP. Vista or Windows 7/8 on a PC. You may need to be logged in with Administrator Privileges to install and start the software if you're downloading to a PC on a corporate network.
- Minimum RAM: 512K RAM for text chat only, (bare minimum)
- BEST by Microsoft is recommended 1 gigabyte of RAM for multi-media (i.e. VoIP, 1.0 Second updating visual graphics programs/trading platforms AND text/typing "chat") presentations, (Typical Setup: Windows Vista, 7 or 8 64 bit machine - 32 bit machines can have less RAM)
- 10 MB of hard disk space for installation.
- An high-speed (preferably wired) Internet connection.
- Microsoft DirectX 9.0 or higher. See Microsoft for DirectX downloads.
- For audio, the Truespeech audio codec must be installed. See Truespeech in "I can't hear anyone".
- For speaking, a noise-cancelling microphone is recommended.
- For Webcam, your camera must support Windows Imaging Acquisition (WIA).
NOTE: more RAM may be needed for presenting, recording and/or running multiple programs at the same time.
Firewall, Privacy and Security requirements: Be sure to allow hotComm to access the Internet through your firewall, privacy and security software, and grant it all possible rights. For more information, see "Firewalls" at Firewalls FAQ.
Super Java client
Minimum requirements for chat (typing):
- Sun Java (most recent version) installed on your computer. If your computer does
not already have Java support, you can get it from Sun
Microsystems, Inc..
- Internet Explorer 8.0 (or higher). Google Chrome Browser, Firefox or Safari also supported with most recent Java V: 7.17 or higer
- Browser and/or MAC & PC enabled for Java and Javascript. Specifically set to allow for Java Applets to run with full permissions granted
Presentations including audio and/or charts also require:
- Windows XP, Vista, or Windows 7/8 on a PC.
- MAC OS users should still download hotComm (CL, Lite or STD/PRO) onto WINDOWS if installed on MAC (available through programs like VMWare, Bootcamp or Parallels) if this is possible
- High-speed Internet connection, not dial-up*, ISDN* or satellite*.
- Sound card in your computer, with updated sound drivers.
- Pop-ups must be allowed. You must disable any pop-up blocking software.
- Best performance requires multiple VoIP programs (i.e. SKYPE, AIM, Yahoo Messenger as examples) closed
Do you support Windows 98 and Windows ME?
1stWorks Corporation development support for its Windows products (hotComm, hotComm Lite, hotComm CL) under Windows 98 and ME will end as of January 2004.Windows 98 and ME are built on the Microsoft Windows 9.x architecture, which has significant system restrictions compared to later Operating Systems. As we release future versions of our products after this date, they may not operate in conformity to these earlier constraints and, although we will continue to provide information about using our products, we cannot guarantee that our products will continue to work successfully on these platforms in future releases.
Known issues include:
- The Windows 9.x architecture, which 98 and ME use, has a fixed amount of system resources. You can't increase them. Buying more memory doesn't help. hotComm uses these system resources, as do other products, such as the Microsoft Office products. When system resources are exhausted, hotComm does not work correctly, with symptoms such as these: windows may turn white, icons may no longer display, the computer may freeze or crash.
- Many Windows 98 and ME computers are outfitted with older audio technology equipment. New hotComm users may need to upgrade their computer/audio systems, and may not be completely happy with the end result.
Do you support Windows NT 4.0?
1stWorks Corporation no longer supports its Windows products (hotComm, hotComm Lite, hotComm CL) on Windows NT 4.0.
hotComm supported Windows NT 4.0 through June 2003, with these known issues:
-
Windows NT 4.0 does not support the level of DirectX that hotComm requires. The latest release of DirectX supported by Windows NT 4.0 is DirectX 3.0a, which was supplied in Service Pack 3.
Because of this, Windows NT 4.0 users can expect to hear what others say through hotComm VoIP, but are unable to speak themselves.
- Your ability to send hotCam screenshots may be limited because Windows NT 4.0 does not support a Microsoft Windows function, MonitorFromWindow, that hotComm uses. See Hot Issues.
Do you support Windows 95?
1stWorks Corporation no longer supports its Windows products (hotComm, hotComm Lite, hotComm CL) on Windows 95.
hotComm worked on Windows 95 in some early releases of hotComm 1.x, with these notes:
- For Windows 95, Winsock2 and Riched20.dll are required. You can get Riched20.dll by downloading and installing Microsoft Word 97/2000 Viewer (Word 2000) or Word 97/2000 (Word 97).
- Windows 95 Riched20.dll requirement
As of revision 1.00.012, hotComm supports active links in text chat. This feature requires that you have Microsoft Rich Edit version 2.0 or higher installed on your computer. The name of the DLL for Rich Edit versions 2.0 and 3.0 is riched20.dll.
Riched20.dll is included in Microsoft Windows 98, 2000, ME, and NT version 4.0.
Riched20.dll is not included in Microsoft Windows 95, but is compatible with Windows 95. If you are running Windows 95 and have installed an application that uses Rich Edit 2.0, Riched20.dll may be installed on your system.
You can search for riched20.dll in your Windows/System directory. Note: if you find riched32.dll, that is the DLL for Rich Edit 1.0, it is included in Windows 95, and it will not work for hotComm.
If necessary, you can get Riched20.dll by downloading and installing Microsoft Word 97/2000 Viewer (Word 2000) or Word 97/2000 Viewer (Word 97). Microsoft Word Viewer is an application that lets users who do not have Word view Word 97 or Word 2000 files.
Troubleshooting
These may help you when troubleshooting:
Login error when connecting to server
You see this message when you start hotComm: "Login error when connecting to server. Click OK to exit."
The most common reasons for this message are:
- The 1stWorks VNS server may be down temporarily. Try again later.
- There may be a problem with your hotComm registration. If the message reoccurs after you try later, then contact Support.
Others see me as OFF when I'm really online
| When this occurs | What to do |
| On login | The 1stWorks DNS server updates addresses regularly. It may take a few minutes for you and other peers to all see each other as being online. Check again in 5-10 minutes. |
| After login | Some ISPs (Internet Service Providers) terminate a session when there has been no activity for a certain number of minutes. When this happens, you think you're online, but other peers see you as offline. To prevent this from happening, use the hotComm Keep Alive option.
Keep Alive causes activity to occur regularly, so that your Internet connection is not perceived as idle. To use Keep Alive, add -kn to your hotComm startup command, where n is number of minutes. For example, -k30 causes activity every 30 minutes. For more information on adding the -k parameter to your hotComm startup command, see hotComm Command Line Parameters (Switches). |
Launching Microsoft Word inside a hotWeb window
The hotComm collaboration feature requires that your Internet Explorer is configured for in-place activation of document servers. If Word documents sent through hotComm instant file transfers display in a Word shell instead of in a hotWeb window, your Internet Explorer is not configured correctly. For more information, see Tips for Techies on this website.
Sound Quality
See Sound Quality in the online User's Guide. Also see "I can't hear anyone" on our Support page.
Hot Issues
See Hot Issues for more troubleshooting information..
Security
These are questions about security.
How secure is hotComm?
Please see About Us: Security.
Development
These are questions about development issues.
What coding languages do you use?
The hotComm Windows desktop client code is C++. The 1stWorks VNS Server (location server) is primarily ANSI C.
What protocols do you use?
Communication protocols are UDP where possible, TCP as the default.
The streaming cipher encyrption is proprietary.
Support
For answers to questions about your specific situation or for other technical assistance, please see our Support page.
Where is the User Guide?
You can find it in the sidebar on the Support page. Or, click here: User Guide.
Are there more FAQs and Troubleshooting?
Yes. Many are listed on our Support page. For an FAQ Table of Contents, select FAQ from the sidebar on the Support page, or click here: FAQ Table of Contents.
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