carstenschwede/Zoom-HowToRecordMultipleBreakoutRoomsAtOnce.md

## Zoom-HowToRecordMultipleBreakoutRoomsAtOnce.md

      
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              Zoom-HowToRecordMultipleBreakoutRoomsAtOnce.md
            
          
    How to record multiple breakout rooms in Zoom at the same time:


Requirements

OS: Windows or Mac (Linux not tested, might work as well)
a Zoom account and Desktop installation (duh)


General idea

Host meeting under main account (main instance)
Open as many additional Zoom instances as there are breakout rooms (breakout instances)
For each breakout instance, join the meeting via meeting id + password and give each an easily identifiable name (e.g. "Breakout[1]", "Breakout[2]", ... )
From your main instance, give all "Breakout[...]" participants co-host permissions
From your main instance, start the breakout rooms, and assign exactly one Breakout[...] participant to each breakout room
From each breakout instance, start recording the breakout room individually


Opening additional Zoom instances is specific to your operating system:


Windows 10


Windows won't allow you to start multiple instances of Zoom without them being assigned to seperate users. Therefore, for each breakout room, we need to

(a) Create a dedicated user (Breakout1, to BreakoutX)
(b) Create a copy of the Zoom folder (Zoom(Breakout1) to Zoom(BreakoutX))
(c) Give user "BreakoutX" access to the Zoom folder "Zoom(BreakoutX)"
(d) Start Zoom(BreakoutX) under the user BreakoutX


In detail


(a) Create as many additional users as there are breakout rooms

Press "Windows" Key
Type "Add User"
Click "Add, edit, or remote other users"
Below "other users", click "Add someone else to this PC"

Click "I don't have this person's sign-in information"
Click "Add a user without a Microsoft account"
Enter "BreakoutX" as username (X = 1 to as many breakout recordings you need)
Enter password of your choice, supply security answers


(b) Create copies of the Zoom file folder located at C:\Users\YourUsername\AppData\Roaming\Zoom

Go to C:\Users\YourUsername\AppData\Roaming

Press "Windows" Key
Enter "Zoom"
Right-click on "Start Zoom" in Windows menu
Click "Open file location" (opens File explorer)
Right-click "Start Zoom" in File explorer
Click "Open file location"
You are now at C:\Users\YourUsername\AppData\Roaming\Zoom\bin
Move up two parent folders to C:\Users\YourUsername\AppData\Roaming


Create as many copies as there will be breakout rooms

Click on "Zoom"
Press (CTRL-C)
Press (CTRL-V) as often as there are breakout rooms
You now have the following folders

Zoom
Zoom - Copy
Zoom - Copy (2)
Zoom - Copy (3)
Zoom - Copy (4)
...
Zoom - Copy (X)


Rename "Zoom - Copy" to "Zoom - Copy (1)" for consistency


(c) Give user "BreakoutX" access to the Zoom folder "Zoom - Copy (X)"

For each Zoom - Copy (X) folder

Right click on the folder
Click "Properties"

Click "Security"

Click "Edit"

Click "Add"

Enter username BreakoutX (e.g. Breakout3 for "Zoom - Copy (3)" folder)
Click "Check Names" to check
Click "OK"


Click "OK"


Click "OK"


(d) Start Zoom(BreakoutX) under the user BreakoutX

For each Zoom - Copy (X) folder

Enter the folder

Enter "bin" folder

Find "Zoom.exe"
Shift Right-click "Zoom.exe"
Click "Run as different user"
Enter "BreakoutX" as Username (e.g. Breakout5 for "Zoom - Copy (5)" folder)
Enter password you chose

if you receive error message "Windows cannot access the specified device, path, or file" then that folder is not accessable by that user, you need to redo (c)


Mac OS


Fortunately Mac OS allows multiple instances of Zoom under the same user account once you duplicate the Application:

Go to /Applications
Create as many duplicates as there will be breakout rooms:

Right click on "Zoom.us"
Click "Duplicate"


Start each duplicate by double-click


Notice


Zoom uses their own video format to record conversions. The application will convert them once you left the meeting. However, under Mac, parallel conversions are not supported: If user "Breakout2" leaves the meeting while the conversion for the recording by user "Breakout1" is still in progress, you will get a corresponding error message telling you that another conversion is in progress and that you can convert it a later time by opening Zoom and selecting your meeting. However, since the BreakoutX users joined anonymously those meetings are not accessible via the app. This is why the BreakoutX users should only exit a meeting when the conversion of other BreakoutX users are complete. In particular, the host should not terminate the meeting for all until all BreakoutX have left as Zoom will attempt to start all remaining BreakoutX video conversions at the same time, triggering the error. If you still happen to encounter this error, you need to start the conversion of the raw Zoom video files manually using either of three options:


(1) Using Zoom's own Transcode App

Open Application -> Utilities -> Terminal
Open Finder and navigate to /Applications
Right click on "Zoom.us"
Select "Show Package Contents"
Dbl-click "Contents"
Dbl-click "Frameworks"
Drag "Transcode.app" to Terminal window
Find the folder corresponding to the breakout session that failed the conversion under Document -> Zoom -> [Date of Breakout session], containing the "double_click_convert...zoom" files.
Drag the "double_click_convert...zoom" to Terminal window
In the Temrinal Window, press Enter


(2) by tricking Zoom into thinking that the older video recording belong to the current session:

Wait until currently ongoing conversions are finished
Close all Zoom instances
Open your Zoom main instance
Create new meeting
Click Record and select "Record on this Computer" (don't select on "Record to the Cloud")
After a few seconds click the Stop Icon to stop the recording
Important: Don't end your meeting
Find the folder corresponding to your ongoing meeting under Documents -> Zoom -> [Current Date] and delete the .zoom files there
Find the folder corresponding to the breakout session that failed the conversion under Document -> Zoom -> [Date of Breakout session], containing the "double_click_convert...zoom" files.
Copy the "double_click_convert...zoom" files from the [Actual Meeting Date] folder to the [Current Date] folder
Wait until copying is finished
Only now, end the meeting in Zoom
Zoom should now start converting and you will find the results under Documents -> Zoom -> [Current Date]
Copy the converted video files to Document -> Zoom -> [Date of Breakout session]
Repeat for other session that failed conversion


(3) If this fails, you can use Zoom's own zTsCoder.exe tool, though it is Windows only:

move the "double_click_convert.zoom" files to Windows (a virtual machine running Windows 10 can be found here)
right click on the first of them
select "Open with"
select "More apps"
select "Look for another app on this PC"
Browse to C:\Users\YourUsername\AppData\Roaming\Zoom\bin.
Select "zTsCoder.exe"
Click "open"