You can pipe your screen output into a dummy webcam device, and set Zoom to use that webcam, which results in the other party seeing your desktop.
It's a hack, but basically results in screen sharing.
If you're using swaywm
, you can use wf-recorder
to do this. On other desktops, find something that can do screen recording, and pipe it into /dev/video2
similar as below:
# Install the v4l2 loopback driver
sudo pacman -S v4l2loopback-dkms
# Load the kernel module
sudo modprobe v4l2loopback
# Finally, pipe the screen output into the virtual webcam:
wf-recorder --muxer=v4l2 --codec=rawvideo --pixel-format=yuv420p --file=/dev/video2
Now jump back to zoom, and change the video output to the "Dummy video device".
Extra tips:
- Remember to turn off video mirroring, or everything will be mirrored,
which you generally don't want when sharing the screen.
- In zoom, if you set the camera to Original Ratio, your full screen will be
shared, but the quality will be really crap (it's unlikely the other party
will be able to read anything).
- If you set it to 16:9, the sides of your screen will be cropped, but the
quality should be readable. Your pick. 😞
- Remember to kill
wf-recorder
once you're done or your screen will be shared
next time you join a call!
Original article