SlideControll

A remote on the web to control your presentations

Overview

Slide control is a tool for controlling your presentations from your phone, tablet, or computer.

How to use Guide/Demo is available here.

Tech Stack

This uses websockets as a main communication channel between the web and the desktop application.

• Backend uses Node.js, TypeScript, and Docker for easier deployment.

• The Web client is built with React using Vite, styled with TailwindCSS and Shadcn UI components.

• The desktop client is powered by the ElectronJs framework.

Thought process

In the RnD, I experemented controlling the computer using a chrome extension, but I failed at it due to sandbox restrictions. One drawback was that we cant access anything outside the browser. I got to know that I have to use a desktop app to have more freedom to do things and Electron was the obvious choice considering the timing and tech stack.

So, In the current implementation, I send commands from the web app via websocket to the desktop app (routed via server). According to the command, the NodeJS mimics the behaviour of keyboard arrow keys. I use a fork of nut-js for this purpose as nutjs is no longer free. The authors have given permission for creating and distributing forks read more.

Issues / limitations in current implementation

• Socket routing causing little bit of latency

• Sessions are stored in-memory at server which is not a good idea if this scales or users have longer sessions. Need to shift to something like Redis.

• The window needs to be an active window.

⚠️ Current versions of desktop apps is not code signed and hence might create some issue while installing them on your computers. (I will create a detailed guide on how to deal with this)

Future scope of this project

• Add support for local networks such as Bluetooth or Wifi

• Controll with gestures and volume buttons of mobile

• Switch to Redis for storing sessions

• Explore more sophisticated technologies such as webRTC to reduce the latency

I see this project going in the direction of solving multiple small use cases, such as media control, presentation control, etc. I will see how this goes and accordingly make it better. If you have any suggestions or feedback, please let me know.

Contributing

I am open to any suggestions and contributions. Please feel free to open an issue or a PR and get started. You can find the Installation guide. I have already added a few issues which you can pick up and get started.