Citrix Go To Meeting

Organising meetings is one of the dreary bits of business. Citrix Go To Meeting intends to make life simpler by providing a service that lets you notify participants of meeting times, and share your screen with them, via a secure connection. There's the usual chat room, with the ability to send messages to everyone or just one other person, and you can automatically send meeting schedules via Outlook.

When someone receives a meeting invitation they just need to click on a short URL and if the software's not already installed on their PC it's downloaded - simple. There's no net-based audio or video though. Instead, Citrix sets up a teleconference on its server, and tells participants what number to dial and which code to enter when the call is answered. At the moment it's a US call, but a European-based service should be available soon.

So far, so good. With a personal account you can have meetings of up to 10 people as often as you like, and only the organiser needs to subscribe. Corporate accounts (for five or more organisers) allow up to 25 participants and add reporting options too.

Unfortunately, that's about it. Sure, there's integration with popular instant messaging applications to send invitations, but there's no file transfer facility, shared whiteboard, or videoconferencing. So, it's the scheduling features and the teleconferencing that you're really paying for. Only people who have lots of meetings where they demonstrate using a PC will find Go To Meeting worth the money.

Contact: Citrix
www.gotomeeting.com

System requirements:

• 300MHz Pentium
• Windows 95 or later
• 64MB memory
• Internet connection
• Java-enabled web browser

Price details:
£27 per month (personal); Corporate from £110 per month.