The problem:

Ever find it annoying that if you’re screen-sharing or working on another working in a Google Meet call and have to click back into Meet to unmute, mute or exit call?

Call me lazy but, I found this quite annoying, especially in longer meetings. The shortcuts are great but again they only work when you’re focused on the Meet window. I wanted to be able to control the meeting from any window and maybe even from a wireless controller. It didn’t take me long to come across solutions online. There was plenty of examples of people making their own Arduino powered macro keyboards to control Meet. But, I didn’t really want to put much money into any hardware that I no doubt wouldn’t find time to put together.

The Solution:

GitHub came through with what I was looking for: (see the repo - by a guy called Chris Regado). This is a plugin for StreamDeck which can control Meet. Using the StreamDeck app (which means you don’t need to buy the hardware) you can control Meet wirelessly and from whatever window you’re in. It works by running a localhost-only Websocket server on port 2394 which connects to a Chrome extension that you have to install manually. So, when you hit a button on your StreamDeck device it sends a message to the Chrome extension via the StreamDeck app on Mac and clicks the button for you. There’s also info on the repo about creating your own extra controls if you wish.

I usually run this on my phone for meetings and sit it alongside my keyboard. If you’ve got 10 mins then it’s worth getting the Streamdeck free trial and trying it: