This article explains how Teams Hosts and KUDO Operators keep a live Microsoft Teams meeting running smoothly. It covers real-time monitoring, interpreter communication, troubleshooting, and multilingual accessibility during the event.
Audience: Hosts, Operators, AV technicians, Meeting Services teams, Producers, and meeting organizers supporting live KUDO interpretation in Microsoft Teams.
Meeting Components
The Teams Host
The Teams Host is responsible for setting up the meeting environment. This includes scheduling the meeting, adding the KUDO app, configuring languages, and managing Teams lobby permissions. The Host can also launch or restart the Bot, access recordings and transcripts, and adjust meeting and language settings as needed.
The KUDO Operator
The Operator is active in both the Teams meeting and the KUDO interface throughout the session and they login through the KUDO portal. They monitor interpretation channels, communicate with interpreters, validate audio and captions, restart services if something goes wrong, and help troubleshoot. The Operator serves as the bridge between Teams, KUDO, interpreters, and meeting organizers, ensuring multilingual services remain active throughout the event.
The KUDO Bot
The KUDO Bot is the bridge between a Microsoft Teams meeting and the KUDO platform. It joins the Teams meeting as a participant, listens to the meeting audio, captures video and screen sharing, and sends that content into KUDO so interpreters or AI translation services can process it in real time. If the Bot is not connected, KUDO cannot receive the meeting's audio or visual content, and multilingual interpretation and translation will not work as expected. The Bot typically joins automatically shortly before the meeting begins, although a Host or Operator can manually trigger it if necessary. It will automatically leave when the KUDO meeting ends or when it detects that there are no active participants remaining in the Teams meeting.
Conducting a Sound Check
A sound check confirms that everything is connected and working before the meeting begins. Start by joining the Teams meeting and confirming the Bot appears in the participant list. Then join KUDO as an Operator and go through each interpretation channel. Ask each interpreter to confirm they can hear the Teams meeting, see screen sharing, and that their microphone is active. Verify that captions are updating correctly and that Teams participants can hear interpretation. It's best to complete this before any participants join.
Restarting the Bot
If interpretation stops unexpectedly, or the Bot does not join automatically, the Teams Host can manually restart the Bot from the Teams calendar app. KUDO Operators can also restart translation services from the meeting portal. Restarting the Bot or translation services may temporarily interrupt interpretation, captions, and audio routing for all languages. Wait for services to fully reconnect before continuing troubleshooting.
Common Issues
| Participant Issue | Likely Cause | Recommended Action |
|---|---|---|
| “I can hear Teams but not the interpreter.” | The participant’s audio is routing to the wrong output device, or the interpreter microphone is muted. | Ask the participant to verify their audio output device settings in Windows or Mac. Confirm in the Operator console that the interpreter microphone is active and multilingual audio is functioning correctly. |
| “I don’t see the KUDO app.” | The participant joined from the Teams browser experience, which does not support the embedded KUDO app. | Ask the participant to rejoin the meeting using the Microsoft Teams desktop or mobile application. |
| “I selected French but I still hear English.” | The interpreter has not activated the outgoing language channel, or the interpreter microphone is muted. | Verify that the interpreter selected the correct outgoing language channel and confirm the interpreter microphone is enabled inside KUDO. |
When to Escalate
| Issue | First Action | Escalate When |
|---|---|---|
| Bot not joining | Restart Bot | Bot still fails after restart |
| Interpreter cannot hear audio | Check source feed and interpreter settings | Multiple interpreters affected |
| Participant cannot hear interpretation | Verify language selection and audio device | Multiple participants affected |
| Captions not updating | Restart translation service | Captions fail after restart |