Etherpad Lite plugs in video conferencing and more

Styled headings plugged into Etherpad Lite
Source: Etherpad Foundation Video conferencing and rich-text-styled headings are the latest features in the Etherpad Lite collaborative editor. Version 1.1 of the embeddable editor has a new plugin framework which allows the editor to be customised with new features such as the video conferencing and styled headers. The server backend of Etherpad Lite is a node.js-based server and is available for Windows, Linux or Mac OS X, while the frontend is an HTML/CSS/JavaScript application which runs in most modern browsers.

Plugins are installed as npm modules with Etherpad Lite itself being a plugin too. An admin page allows npm modules to be searched for and installed. The styled headings enable common styles to be quickly selected from a drop-down menu while the video conferencing uses Tokbox face-to-face video components to allow video to be shared while a document is worked on. Other plugins convert twitter names to links on the fly, allow Etherpad pads to be linked or ensure that authors don't change names.

An upgrade guide is available and a demo installation of Etherpad Lite can be accessed at beta.etherpad.org. Source code and instructions how to install Etherpad Lite are available from the project's github repository. Etherpad Lite is licensed under the Apache Licence 2.0.

(djwm)