Microsoft Teams on Linux woes

At work we use Microsoft Teams to communicate. Of course I try to use this natively on Linux, since that is my platform of choice. Today I looked into an issue, that causes me to get an empty pop-up when receiving a call. Which effectively means that I can not answer incoming calls. (TL;DR: was not able to fix it)

Obligatory stats: Ubuntu 21.10 with awesome wm, running Microsoft Teams version 1.4.00.26453 using snaps.

Updates

I looked for an update, but the snap has been updated 7 October 2021 and I’m running that latest version. I’m glad there is a Linux version at all, to be honest.

Cache

Although it’s a Windows tip, I still tried to clear my cache data of the snap. It resulted in my having to reset my preferences, but that is it.

Web version

Then I remembered that there was a web-version of Teams, so I tried to use that with Mozilla Firefox. When trying to initiate a call I get this lovely message:

Try a different browser
This feature isn't available yet for your browser. Try the web app with Microsoft Edge or Google Chrome, or switch to the desktop app.

So I installed User-Agent switcher and manager and pretended to use Chrome on Linux. That worked, so I can now can initiate and receive calls and get a notification thereof, which I can accept.

Then I tried to share my screen and receive a screenshare, but no such luck. Receiving screenshares did work in the snap version, but not sharing screens.

Screen sharing

Looking at the Share content in a meeting in Teams page it states:

  1. If you’re using Teams on the web, you’ll be able to share your screen only if you’re using Google Chrome or the latest version of Microsoft Edge.
  2. Window sharing isn’t available for Linux users.

So I am basically still SOL and so I switch back to the snap.

Known issues

Looking around a bit, I also found this gem with ‘known issues’ on Linux. The discovery date of the issues are “12/05/19” and the resolution is that Microsoft is looking at it. Looking at the date, the issues have probably zero priority and will receive no love.

Where is the love?

That made me think of “Microsoft ♥ Linux” from years ago. A quick DuckDuckGo search gave me this blogpost at Microsoft. Apparently it’s server love. Would be great if this would still be a thing… (also for desktop apps / web apps / desktops)