Guiding Attention: Follow Me, Show Everyone & Focus

Point the whole room at the same thing. Walk people across the canvas with you, show everyone a tool at the size you're seeing it, or clear your own screen so one tool gets all your attention.

Quick links: Follow me | Show everyone my view | Focus mode | Your own view

At a Glance

Everyone Follows Me

Walk the room around the canvas with you. While it's on, everyone else gathers in a ring around your avatar each time you move, and their view follows yours, so nobody gets lost on a big board.

Turn it on

1. Open More settings (the ⋮ button in the bottom-left bar)
2. Under Space Settings, switch on Everyone follows me

Result: A pill at the top of your screen shows how many people are following you, such as "4 people are following you". Participants see "[Your name] is moving everyone" with "Your view follows theirs" so they know why their screen is moving. Their pill stays up for as long as follow is on.

Who gets moved

• Everyone else in your room follows, including other facilitators.
• People in a different breakout room stay put, because they're on a different board. The count in your pill only includes the people actually following you.
• If you're alone, your pill reads "Nobody to follow you yet". Anyone who joins mid-session, or reconnects, starts following straight away.

Turn it off

Any of these ends it:

• Click Stop on your pill at the top of the screen.
• Switch off the toggle in More settings.
• Leave the space. Follow ends automatically when the person leading it leaves.

Note: Any facilitator can stop it, not just the one who started it. That's handy if the leader has stepped away. If another facilitator already has it running, the toggle reads Everyone follows [their name]. Turning it on yourself takes over, and the room follows you instead.

Tip: Follow me is for this session only. It isn't saved as a space setting, so the next session starts with it off.

Show Everyone My View

When a tool is open, you choose how big it is on your own screen: the normal panel, maximized, or focus. Show everyone my view sends your choice to the whole room. It works with interactives, embeds, card decks, and videos.

Start showing your view

1. Open a tool for the room.
2. Click the broadcast-tower button in the tool's top-right controls. Its tooltip reads Show everyone my view.

Result: Everyone else switches to the view you're in right now. From then on, each time you switch between panel, maximized, and focus, everyone switches with you. They see a short notice such as "Sam enlarged this for everyone. You can still resize it for yourself."

It sets their view but doesn't lock it

Participants can still resize the tool for themselves, and their choice sticks until you change your view again. When you change it, everyone switches to match.

• Minimize is personal. If you minimize the tool, nobody else's view changes, and anyone can minimize their own copy.
• Maximize depends on the space mode. Maximize only exists in Interactive and Sidebar modes. In Conference mode, tools already open large, so a maximized view isn't applied there.
• Late joiners and anyone who reconnects land straight in the view you're showing.

Stop, or take over

• Click the button again. Its tooltip reads Stop showing everyone my view.
• Closing the tool for everyone also ends it.
• If another facilitator is showing their view, your button reads Show everyone my view instead of [name]'s. Clicking it makes your view the one everyone follows.

Note: Show everyone my view only works in the main room. Inside a breakout room, you won't see the button.

Focus Mode

Focus mode fills your whole browser window with the tool, covering the canvas and the top bars. It works with interactives, embeds, card decks, and videos, and anyone can use it. Only your screen changes.

Enter focus

Click the expand button in the tool's top-right controls. Its tooltip reads Focus — fill my browser. A facilitator using Show everyone my view can also put you in focus mode.

Faces are hidden by default

Focus opens with everyone's video hidden, so the tool gets the whole screen. A floating control bar at the bottom holds:

While faces are hidden and someone else is talking, the people button shows a speaker icon and their first name in place of the headcount, with a ring in their color. Your own voice doesn't trigger it.

The control bar fades when nothing is happening and comes back as soon as you move your mouse or press a key.

Choose how much room faces get

Once people are showing, you have three settings:

• Hidden: No faces. The tool uses the whole window.
• Avatar rail: A slim strip of avatars beside the tool. Click it to expand to video tiles.
• Tiles: Larger video tiles. Use the chevron to collapse back to the rail, or the × to hide everyone again.

The strip only shows people in your room, and faces stay in place instead of jumping around each time someone speaks.

Tip: Kolab remembers your last choice (hidden, rail, or tiles) on this browser, and uses it the next time you enter focus in any session.

Exit focus

Click Exit focus in the control bar, or press Esc.

Adjusting Your Own View

These controls only change your screen. Your avatar, position, and audio stay where they are.

Maximize a tool for yourself

In Interactive and Sidebar modes, tools open as a small panel. Click Maximize for me in the tool's top-right controls to enlarge it to fill the space between the top and bottom bars. Click it again (Back to the room) or press Esc to shrink it back.

Conference mode doesn't show this button, because tools already open large there.

Minimize a tool

Click Minimize (the − button) to shrink the tool to a small pill. Click the pill to bring it back. The tool stays open for everyone else.

About Esc

Each press of Esc undoes one step. If you're in focus mode, the first press exits focus. If you're maximized, the next press shrinks the tool back to its panel.

Note: Esc doesn't work while you're typing in a field or clicking around inside the tool itself. Click outside the tool first, or use the on-screen button, which always works.

Minimize the video column

In Sidebar mode, or in Conference mode while a tool is open, the video column can take up a lot of room. Click Minimize videos for me on the column's controls to collapse it to a slim rail at the right edge. The tool then widens into the space it frees up.

• The rail keeps playing live video for as many people as fit, so you can still see who's there.
• Click the rail (Show all videos) to bring the full column back.
• You still hear everyone. Minimizing only hides the video.
• Reloading the page brings the videos back.

Troubleshooting

My screen keeps moving on its own. A facilitator has turned on Everyone follows me. The pill at the top of your screen shows who's leading. Only a facilitator can turn it off.

The tool changed size by itself. A facilitator is showing everyone their view. You can resize it again for yourself, and it'll stay that way until they change their view.

I can't find Show everyone my view. Only hosts and facilitators see it, and only in the main room, not inside a breakout room.

Related Guides

• Space Modes Explained - How Conference, Sidebar, and Interactive modes lay out tools and video
• Interactives - Build the live mini-apps you'll often want everyone focused on
• Embeds & iFrames - Put slides, docs, and videos in front of the room
• Card Decks - Run card-based activities
• Using Breakout Rooms - How follow and show-everyone behave across rooms
• Screen Sharing - Another way to put something in front of everyone