Microsoft Teams progressive web app now available on Linux
Published Nov 07 2022 08:00 AM 1.2M Views
Microsoft

We’re excited to announce the general availability of support for the Microsoft Teams progressive web app (PWA) as a feature of our current web client for Linux customers.

 

Linux customers who rely on Microsoft Teams for collaboration and communication needs told us they want the full richness of Teams features available for their users in a secure way. This can now be achieved using the Teams PWA.

 

Additionally, the PWA enables us to ship the latest Microsoft Teams features faster to our Linux customers and helps us bridge the gaps between the Teams desktop client on Linux and Windows. The PWA experience is available for both Edge and Chrome browsers running on Linux.

 

The PWA offers access to more capabilities, including custom backgrounds, gallery view, reactions, the raise-a-hand feature in meetings, as well as large gallery and Together mode views. The PWA also provides desktop-like app features, such as system notifications for chat and channel, a dock icon with respective controls, application auto-start, and easy access to system app permissions.

 

Microsoft Teams progressive web app now available on Linux.png

 

The Microsoft Teams PWA for Linux can be used with Conditional Access configuration, applied through Endpoint Manager, to enable Linux users to access the Teams web application while securely using Edge. This helps organizations use an industry-leading, unified endpoint management solution for Teams from Linux endpoints with security and quality built in.


We encourage our Teams Linux users to switch over to the PWA to get the latest Linux features and a desktop-like experience. Stay tuned for the latest news on the Microsoft Teams blog.

263 Comments

Nice to see an improved PWA experience for Linux users

Copper Contributor

did they fix the pwa phone notifications on linux or are they still bad?

Brass Contributor

I have questions and haven’t seen any solid information with answers.

  1. How will this work for chats if the app isn’t running in the foreground? (Can the PWA version park in the background reasonably well?)
  2. Can we have multiple Teams windows open in the PWA? 
    • Can we pop out individual chats in Teams so that there may be a half-dozen Teams windows open? This works on the desktop app now
    • Can meetings run in a dedicated window so that communication continues?
  3. How will phone calls work? We are shifting to Teams-based VOIP at work. Can I receive a call over Teams PWA while also still communicating with my team via Chats? This works on the existing app.
  4. Really, will the PWA version of Teams be as robust as the desktop versions for Windows and Mac, like the Linux client is now, or will it be a stripped down iPad-esque version that the current Teams website is, more or less?

 

Given that Linux users were provided with a mostly great desktop app for what is an Electron app, this feels like bait-and-switch. I suspect that this won’t affect too many users, but that the users it affects will be justifiably noisy about what I suspect will be a major feature regression.

 

With Teams on Linux, Microsoft essentially said “trust us, we get it, this is important.” Now that people are (sometimes reluctantly) shifting from Zoom or Slack, this feels to me like the rug is being pulled out from beneath us.

 

Iron Contributor

Works for Windows if you use a user agent switcher to tell it that you are running Linux.

 

Can we have multiple Teams windows open in the PWA? 

Doesn't look like it.

 

 

Really, will the PWA version of Teams be as robust as the desktop versions for Windows and Mac, like the Linux client is now, or will it be a stripped down iPad-esque version that the current Teams website is, more or less?

Seems to me like there isn't much of a difference between this and the current web app.

 

Once the user installs your PWA, it will:

 

Copper Contributor

Nice to see some progress made here. The native Linux app has not seen any meaningful updates since the preview was released back in 2019. The web version has been substantially more feature complete for quite a long time now and is what I've been using in preference to the native app. I'm not seeing a huge amount of difference between the web version and opening it as a PWA yet. It opens as a separate window, but you could already achieve that in chrome by using the "More Tools -> Create Shortcut..." option.

 

The PWA offers access to more capabilities, including custom backgrounds, gallery view, reactions,

Using a custom background is something that has worked in the web version for while - I can currently open teams in a browser tab and do have the option to enable a custom or blurred background. After installing as a PWA however I'm not seeing any options to enable this (toggle is missing when starting a meeting). This seems like a feature where the PWA is less functional than just opening the web version directly?

 

Can we have multiple Teams windows open in the PWA? 

I can right click on the launcher and select "New Window" which works as expected.

 

 

Brass Contributor

Is it possible to deploy MS Teams as a PWA on Linux desktops?

 

I would like to distribute MS Teams as a PWA directly to every user who sets up his Linux workstation (preferably via Ansible).

 

under /home/user/.local/share/applications I find a msedge-random-id.desktop file, but if I copy it to another user I can't find it.

 

Would be great if someone could help me with that!

Copper Contributor

@Anupam_Pattnaik wrote:

The PWA also provides desktop-like app features, such as system notifications for chat and channel, a dock icon with respective controls, application auto-start, and easy access to system app permissions.

Tried in both Edge & Chrome, notifications non-functional in both. Also, no dock icon.

 

Notifications from other sites (Including Outlook.office.com) work correctly.

Copper Contributor

I love the PWA support! For any updates on the PWA please make available on this Blog for all users. Thanks!

Copper Contributor

@Anupam_Pattnaikvery good work and a wise strategical/architectural decision to move from electron to a native web app, thank you! Question: does the web app also work in chromium and firefox? (I did not test it there yet).

Brass Contributor

I'm getting notifications fine with edge and the PWA. Dock icon is also there.

 

It also seems like this finally fixes wayland screen sharing.

 

What's broken with this is:

- Tray icon (not that important)

- Meeting links don't open up in the PWA

Copper Contributor
Using a custom background is something that has worked in the web version for while - I can currently open teams in a browser tab and do have the option to enable a custom or blurred background. After installing as a PWA however I'm not seeing any options to enable this (toggle is missing when starting a meeting). This seems like a feature where the PWA is less functional than just opening the web version directly?

I am experiencing the same issue, the option to enable background blurring is missing in the PWA. Using Chrome and Ubuntu 20.04 / 22.04.

Brass Contributor

Hi all,

 

I tested the PWA client on Kubuntu 20.04 using chrome (Version 107.0.5304.68 (Offizieller Build) (64-Bit) / nvidia gpu - hardware acceleration enabled).

Looks good as long as I can tell after a few hours, but there are some critical points which prevents using the pwa app as default.

 

What I'm missing:

- critical: Notification "join meeting" is missing, when someone is starting a meeting and also there is no notification reminder, if a meeting is starting - this is not usable because I'm working with multiple desktops and have no reminder at all.

- critical: Notifications is missing with "take call" when I'm getting a call (shows only up in pwa app) - this is not usable because I'm working with multiple desktops. So I have to search all desktops to find the app?

- critical: take control over shared desktop of other user during desktop sharing not working

- major: device setting (audio, camera) only during call - missing under settings?

- major: sometimes more laggy than linux client

 

Since the critical points are very important to us, I would like you to ask is this a problem of my configuration, or it's still not supported?

 

Thank you in advance,

Roland

 

Copper Contributor

Also would be nice to have the 3x3 gallery view that was added to the desktop version back in 2020 - seems we're still stuck with 2x2 which is quite restrictive. Yes, I know there's "Large Gallery (Preview)" but it seems as though the video quality is really poor when enabling this option (presumably because it's intended for very large meetings.

Copper Contributor

Hi there! I tested both web client and PWA and I have no notification sounds. All the notifications options are enabled, cookies for Edge seems to be correct and sound works on calls, but no in notifications. Any solutions? I have the same behaviour in two linux laptops and I've used Chrome, Edge and Brave with the same results.

 

I don't have background effects on calls either. I thought this feature was enabled in the web client.

 

Help please

Copper Contributor

Another issue: Once in a call, screen shares that other people are doing so you can follow along just shows a black screen. Running Fedora 36 with Wayland on Gnome in Chrome based PWA.

Copper Contributor

Tested it on Ubuntu 20.04 (Gnome classic desktop) with Chrome 107.0.5304.110. Found the following problems compared to the app:

 

  • No tray icon
  • delayed notifications
  • no secondary ringing tone (important, if You have a head-set connected, but not always on ears)

 

 

Copper Contributor

As of now the PWA is totally unusable compared to the Linux native app. Tried it in Chrome on Ubuntu 20.04 with Gnome Flashback/Compiz.

 

These are the most critical issues I see in the PWA:

- the sound is  a disaster, speaker/headphone volume fluctuates between barely any sound at all to almost normal (same issue with microphone)

- meeting started notifications are missing

- have not found any way to autostart the PWA

 

Also the  input/output sound device selections does not match what the OS displays and does not follow what is selected in OS. This goes also for the Linux native app where sometimes you have to change it when the app seems to forget last setting.

 

Then there are some other promised "capabilities" for the PWA that does not exist like custom backgrounds which is nice to have but not vital.

And the "make a test call" function is missing which is very useful when testing that sound and video works.

 

All in all, this is not a GA release, only some sort of BETA release. Until the most vital things are fixed, the PWA can not be used in a corporate environment and we have to stick to the native app where at least sound/video and notifications actually works even if some other neat features are missing.

 

Copper Contributor

It's not very well integrated into the rest of the Linux desktop, it does not feel like it's an actual desktop app at all.

 

Microsoft please understand that PWAs sucks, don't go down that road.

Copper Contributor

Where are technical issues discussed about implementing this software? I have a fedora 36 machine running gnome/wayland and have tried this PWA on chromium and cannot get video (neither incoming or outgoing) or screen sharing to work.

 

This is presumably not the right place?

Iron Contributor
Nice to see an improved PWA experience for Linux users

But it's not.  It's the same PWA experience that's already been available in Chrome for a while now as far as I can tell.  I even uninstalled and re-installed the PWA, because I couldn't believe that it's improved absolutely zero since I last tried it a month or so back.  Where are all the new features MS mentioned as a reason to go full PWA, background settings et al.?  At this point, it seems like It's exactly the same as running the web client.

 

And, as others have pointed out, a major step back from the Electron app.  There's no longer any way to set it to the specific cameras and microphones I used for Teams, turn on echo cancellation, make a test call...  There's not even a tray icon to facilitate quick changes to status!  The Linux Electron client was lagging behind the Windows client, but at least it had these basic features.

 

This really feels like MS just dropped support for the Linux client after using it to get Teams accepted into many companies as a crossplatform solution these past few years.

Microsoft

Thanks for the feedback, please keep it coming-- we're really glad to see people using the PWA scenarios, and we would just like to provide some additional details on a few items that we are addressing from your comments:

  • In progress: Fixing System notifications for Incoming Calls and Meeting Starts so you will see that you have an incoming call or a meeting has started even when you don't have the Teams PWA in the foreground.
  • In progress: Meeting links open in the PWA, so when you have the PWA installed, the PWA is opened.

A few other notes:

  • The PWA is a currently a single window experience (the same as the Teams desktop app on Linux was).
  • In meetings, you do have the ability to minimise the call to a call monitor and work in Teams in channels or chats during the call. 
  • The PWA and web app offer a number of features that weren't feasible on the desktop app, including custom backgrounds, in-meeting reactions, and CA policies for device management in conjunction with Edge and Microsoft Endpoint Manager.

We will continue to iterate on the PWA experience on Linux, while also looking to expand its functionality to other platforms. We will continue to listen here to our Tech Community and hope that you enjoy the PWA experience. 

Brass Contributor

It's also annoying, that it's opening links in the same browser, the PWA is installed in. I would like them to open in my main browser, firefox.

Copper Contributor

Thanks for the feedback, please keep it coming-- we're really glad to see people using the PWA scenarios

Great to see that someone is reading this feedback!

 

The PWA and web app offer a number of features that weren't feasible on the desktop app, including custom backgrounds

It was mentioned in the original post that custom backgrounds were a feature of the PWA and it's also been mentioned in the feedback that they don't actually seem to be available. To clarify

The clientType=pwa seems to be the flag that the PWA appends to the URL.

 

I'm sure I'm not the only one but having a audible sound along with a notification is very useful. It seems all the PWA notifications are all currently silent?

 

We will continue to iterate on the PWA experience on Linux, while also looking to expand its functionality to other platforms.

Enabling the PWA on chromeOS would certainly be useful - the web app has always been the only option there.

 

Copper Contributor

@BillWWIn response to: "We will continue to listen here to our Tech Community"

 

So you want to track all issues from the linux community with respect to the Team PWA in this chat? Doesn't really sound sustainable but here goes:

 

I have a fedora 36 machine running gnome/wayland and have tried this PWA on chromium and cannot get video (neither incoming or outgoing) or screen sharing to work. Should this software work on chromium and wayland or to I need to install Chrome or Edge? Also have you confirmed that it works on wayland or is it only tested on Xorg?

 

Thanks!

Brass Contributor

Using fedora 36 with the flathub edge, video/audio + screenshare work fine with wayland. I've only tested video/audio with X, so I have no idea if screenshare works there.

 

One thing about installing a pwa with flathub edge is, that you need to allow it to write to two folders on your disk, if you don't manage that before you will need to uninstall the PWA and reinstall it, in order to get the desktop entries.

Copper Contributor

@razzeeThanks for recommending the flatpak version of Edge. I tried to install Edge through microsoft's own yum repo and it installed but it just crashed. That's why I went with chromium, which is a pleasant dnf install experience not to mention open source. Unfortunately that didn't result in MSteams working with camera and screensharing. I have steered clear of flathub previously since now a third party is redistributing MS's product right? So I have to trust yet another party? Anyway, I suppose if I must use MSTeams then I guess I have put all my trust in the propriety code anyway.... Result is that for the first time I can use video, see video and screenshare with MSTeams on Fedora Gnome/Wayland. Nice to see MS is catching up to Zoom and others since my company is using MS products. How did you give Edge(flatpak) the right file system permissions to be able to install this as a PWA? I currently have to open edge first to start it up.

Brass Contributor

@Thomas Rosendalthere should have been a popup reporting which paths to allow writing to, when you added the PWA. Grab flatseal, from flathub and use it to change the folder permissions for edge (add the two folders). Then restart edge, remove the PWA Teams (search online for how to), then reinstall Teams PWA.

Brass Contributor

Oh and you can check how the flatpak is build here. https://github.com/flathub/com.microsoft.Edge/blob/beta/com.microsoft.Edge.yaml#L88

It's reusing the .deb for e.g.

Copper Contributor

None of the new/announced features currently work for me using the PWA.

 

Even features like "background blur" work in the browser but NOT in the PWA (which appends "clientType=pwa" request parameter).

 

- Using Edge stable (Version 107.0.1418.42 (Official build) (64-bit))

- Fedora 36

Copper Contributor

I have the same problem like @SaschaAppel.

 

Any Solution or Workaround for this?

Copper Contributor

@SaschaAppelMe too (No blur, no together mode). I have the same setup as you but using Edge from flathub. I never use those extra features so it doesn't bother me but I'm very happy that screensharing works on wayland. That has been a long time coming and really the only important feature missing from the electron app.

 

@razzeecurious... does the icon show up for you in the task view? I find the teams icons in

".local/share/icons/hicolor/128x128" and in 48x48 and 256x256 but the icon in the task bar is just the generic turned square with cog wheels thing not the 'teams' icon found there.

Copper Contributor

Looks better than a desktop app, but it takes more than 700MB of RAM right after startup. This is so incredible, that Microsoft cannot create an ordinal usable application for chat and video. I need more than 700MB RAM for chat and video calls. Unbelievable.

 
 

 

 

Microsoft

For anyone who doesn't have the Custom Backgrounds feature available, please accept our apologies for the inconvenience. A feature flag was erroneously set recently that disabled the feature, and it has been removed. The change that will enable the feature for the general public should reach all users this week. 

Brass Contributor

@Thomas Rosendalyes, my icon is the correct teams icon. I also have it in the 512x512 and 32x32 folder.

 

And together mode works for me.

Copper Contributor

Just opened teams.microsoft.com in google-chrome on rhel8 (work/school office365 account), and chrome isn't giving me the option to install as a pwa. 

 

???

 

 

Brass Contributor

Edge does need some time on the page to offer the PWA install option. Collagues said to me chrome was instant.

Copper Contributor

hrm... maybe doesn't work for schools where the url looks like... https://teams.microsoft.com/_#/school/teams-grid/General?ctx=teamsGrid ? (that's what teams.microsoft.com goes to after I login)

Copper Contributor

No option to install the PWA if the teams url is different then the normal 'teams.microsoft.com'. My companies use of it provides a different url.

Copper Contributor

I'm running Ubuntu 22.04 and have installed the PWA using Chrome without issue. I think I used Tweaks to add it as a startup item which has been working well.

 

The one only thing that I have noticed so far is that I can't find in-meeting reactions that BillWW mentioned. Though I also didn't have them in Teams for Linux (desktop app) or when I join from Chrome.

I think I do have meeting reactions for any scheduled meeting. For a call from the chat I don't get the reactions but I think that might be standard behaviour.

 

One thing I miss is the "join from this device" ribbon that shows up when I'm already in a teams call on my phone. If I want to be in on a call from more than 1 device I have to join from Teams PWA first and then join from my mobile app.

 

Someone else also mentioned audio settings, I got pulse audio to utilize my headset instead of my speakers for teams but I think I had to configure that during a call once, but now it is set and stays that way. I haven't tried out Ubuntu 22.10 with pipewire yet as I'm happy with my current audio setup and don't want to troubleshoot getting everything working again.

 

Copper Contributor

well, as you can see, it is teams.microsoft.com ... just has stuff afterwards. Question is, does that break pwa availability?

Copper Contributor

Good news! Looking forward to the "Meeting links open in the PWA" feature

Copper Contributor

Hmm, just tried it out (with chrome 108), and meetings seem completely broken.

 

The first hint that something is different is that when I join a meeting on teams.microsoft.com I get the option to blur by background,

but on the PWA I just get camera off or on.

Then after I joined the meeting with PWA I can't hear my colleagues, see their camera, or see their screenshare. They can't hear or see me either.

The only indication I get of the meeting being active is the mute/unmute icon appearing on peoples names in the participant list.

 

If I join the same meeting on teams.microsoft.com in the same browser that I installed the PWA with everything seems to work and I get the "blur my background" option before joining.

 

Also one-to-one calls work fine and my colleague can hear and see me, and me them.

The issue also persist with meeting recordings. If I start a meeting with myself and try to record it (using PWA) it's a "blank" video, with camera, voice and screenshare missing.

 

**Edit**: After some investigating i realize this only occurs on my office network. On a mobile hotspot meetings seem to work fine.

Still, I wonder why meetings in teams web work on this network, but not meetings in teams PWA.

 

**Edit 2**: I opened a feedback ticket here: https://feedbackportal.microsoft.com/feedback/idea/ac85bc0b-8f65-ed11-a81b-000d3a045ff7

 

**Edit 3**: Meetings seem to work again today 21 nov on the office network. I also got the background effects back, so it seems like these

fixes might have been deployed together.

Copper Contributor

Is there a chance to get working own backgrounds e.g. a company based background?

Copper Contributor

Something went wrong with the release of the PWA. For me it's worse than the web app which existed already. Here's hope MS can sort this out quickly. I'm on PopOS!_22.04 and Edge.
top prios on my list:
- notifications (works in Outlook PWA)
- Icon for task bar (currently I get a 2nd MS Edge instance while it works for the Outlook PWA)
- settings for background

Copper Contributor

Did they disable PWA?  Elementary OS 5.1 and see no options for PWA right now.  Outlook has worked great for years.  I checked with Chrome and Edge.  Nothing.

Copper Contributor

I'm using the PWA in Ubuntu. Why is the large gallery only enabled with 10 or more participants? Without it, I can only see a 2x2 grid.

Copper Contributor

Hello,

First i would like to thank you about this app. It is far far better than the native one.

I have been using it for the last 2-3 days and would like to provide a feedback and to ask if someone observes the same things. I am using fedora 36 with gnome and i installed the teams pwa with edge, but i tried with chrome as well.

 

- For me there is no sound for the notifications, so i cannot hear when someone send me a message.

- The notification for the messages disappear after 3-5 seconds from the notification area next to the clock on the top bar, so if you are busy and don't pay attention you will not even understand that you have received a new message .

- Currently i am using also outlook pwa and when i have a meeting and click join to the meeting from outlook - > nothing happens. I need to check my meeting from outlook, then i need to open teams, click on calendar and then to find the exact meeting and to join from there. Is it possible to make to join directly from outlook pwa ?

 

These are my observations so far. I haven't tested everything but spent these 2-3 days trying to fix the notification sound and to make notification to not disappear so fast but with not success.

 

Any recommendations and advises are welcome.

 

Thank you in advance.

Copper Contributor

chrome-stable on fedora 35 did give me the option to install the PWA.

Would love to work with the Teams, er, Team on why I'm not getting the install option for installation on chrome-stable on RHEL8 (maybe there's a mis-detection in the os version where it's not looking at RHEL8??)

 

One huge missing thing from the desktop app is no desktop status icon. Which was great for the desktop version as that would have a red dot over it if I had been mentioned in a channel or had a chat message waiting. A notification pop up that I may not see if looking the other way, getting a cup of coffee, etc, is not nearly as useful.

 

thanks.

Copper Contributor

Generally works in flatpak Chromium on Fedora 36 with Plasma desktop including audio, video, screen sharing and chat desktop notifications. I may have granted Chromium some additional permissions in Flatseal in the past.

 

Nothing about the dock icon stands out as specific for Teams however, so maybe that isn't quite working right.

Or perhaps they're talking about the icon in chrome://apps that you can right click and change settings like autorun on login.

 

Meeting started and call notifications need to be added/improved. Pop-out of chats is missing compared to the old client.

Copper Contributor

Is there any issue with the PWA and the latest ubuntu v22.04 LTS version? For any notification, it gives me the notification tile but without making any notification sound. But the same teams account when I use it with the old official Teams preview desktop application, It does sound when a notification comes. And that also works with the unofficial Teams desktop application(teams-for-Linux).

It's very strange for me, even though all required permission is given to teams web application in chrome, edge, etc. still the issue is there and the same when I install it as a PWA.

 

System: Ubuntu 22.04.1

Windowing System: Wayland

GNOME version: 42.5

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Last update:
‎Nov 04 2022 02:55 PM
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