For the technician

The technician functions as a host for the defence, and is responsible for managing all participants during the entire defence.

Responsibilities as host

Conduct a practice defence session in Zoom, together with the candidate and the chair of the defence and the opponents (provided they are available) two days before the defence. During this practice session, make sure to inform the candidate and the chair of the defence about how the digital defence will be conducted, and point out functions such as the chat, "Raise hand", "Go slower" and break-out sessions.
As host, you must schedule the disputation in Zoom, and ensure that all necessary participants are invited. Those who have to be present, in addition to yourself, are the candidate, the chair of the defence, the chair of the committee, the first and second opponents.
Others may choose to attend, but will most likely not play an active part in the defence.
You will be the host, but you must make the chair of the defence, the candidate and the first and second opponent co-hosts. Everyone else will be participants. This ensures that if you as a host mute them and do not allow them to unmute themselves, they will not accidentally disturb the defence by forgetting to turn off their microphones.
Remind the chair of the defence, the candidate and the opponents to mute themselves when they are not speaking.
Only hosts and co-hosts should be allowed to share their screen. This prevents unwanted sharing from other participants.
Even though Zoom allows for more than one person to share a screen at the same time, we advice against using this option as it does not work optimally. Instead, we recommend one person sharing at a time, and changing between candidate and opponents sharing whenever necessary.
When the chair of the defence invites the audience to ask questions ex auditorio, you must monitor the participants to see if anyone "raises a hand", signalling that they wish to ask a question. Some may choose to signify this also by writing directly in the chat to get your attention. At this point you must either invite them to ask the question in writing in the chat or to ask it directly, by unmuting them.
When it is time for the opponents, the chair of the defence and the chair of the committee to "leave" in order to decide if the candidate has been found worth of the degree of PhD, it is your responsibility to send them out in a break-out session. Once they are satisfied, they will return to the main session and the chair of the defence will announce their decision, after which the formal defence is over. You can choose to join them in the break-out session, if you wish, as they may need technical assistance.
If technical issues occur that simply cannot be resolved right away, the chair of the defence will pause the defence until the issues can be solved. If it still cannot be solved, the defence may need to be called off and rescheduled.

Prior to the start of the general defence

The digital defence session should start 30 minutes before the official public defence, to allow for participants to connect, test microphones and camera, and figure out how to work with Zoom.
As soon as the chair of the defence, the candidate and the opponents join the session, make them co-hosts.
As soon as all three members of the committee are present in addition to the chair of the defence, create the breakout room where the committee and the chair will confer after the defence is over.
Rename the opponents, so that their names start with 1. opponent, 2. opponent and 3. opponent followed by their actual name. Rename the candidate, by writing Candidate before their name.
Under "Advanced sharing options", check that only hosts can share a screen.
During this start-up period, you as a host, should cover a few ground rules before starting out. This should cover:
- The candidate and the members of the committee should not leave the meeting until the chair of the defence officially declares that the defence is finished.
- How microphones should be muted whenever you are not supposed to speak.
- If there are issues with poor Internet connection, and either the opponents or the candidate miss something said by anyone else, they should signify this, preferably by clicking on "Participants" and select "Go slower" in the menu on the right hand side. Other members of the audience should not ask for this, as it will only cause unnecessary disturbances.
- When the chair of the defence opens up for questions from the audience, participants should click "Raise hand" under "Participants" to indicate that they wish to ask a question.

The general procedure during a defence

(If the candidate decides to perform their trial lecture live, with opponents and chair of the defence, you must function as technician for this session as well. The trial lecture is prior to the rest of the defence)
The chair of the defence will start the defence by introducing the candidate
The candidate will take over and present their work. This will most likely involve screen sharing to present slides or a "blackboard" from an iPad.
The first opponent takes over and puts the candidate's work into a larger context. This is also likely to involve screen sharing, but only the first opponent needs to speak.
After placing the candidate's work in a larger context, the first opponent will ask questions for the candidate. They may also want to jump back and forth between the opponents screen sharing and the candidate's screen sharing.
When the first opponent is finished, there may be a short break, but that will be decided by the chair of the defence.
The second opponent takes over.
When the second opponent is finished asking questions, the chair of the defence will usually say a few words before inviting the audience to ask questions ex auditorio. Anyone who wishes to ask a question can signal by raising their hand. The host can see this by clicking on "Participants", and look for a red hand next to a participant's name.
When the potential questions from the audience have been answered, the chair of the defence will invite the candidate to say a few words, typically thank the committee, supervisors, etc.
Finally, the two opponents, the chair of the defence and the chair of the committee will leave in a break-out session to confer and reach a decision about the candidates work. Everyone else may stay in the main session.
They then need to return to the main session and the chair of the defence will announce their decision.
You may close the session.

Settings when scheduling the defence

Click "Schedule" in Zoom, and name the session after the name of the candidate.
Choose the date and time corresponding to 30 minutes before the defence should start.
Set Meeting ID to "Generate Automatically".
There is no need to require a password.
Under video you can select either "On" or "Off" for the host, but set "Participants" to "Off".
Under "Audio" select "Telephone and Computer Audio".
Under "Calendar" select "Outlook".

Under "Advance Options" select "Enable waiting rooms", "Mute participants on entry" and set up an "Alternative Host". The alternative host will be another technician who will work as a back-up in case you get disconnected.