What?

In essence, it’s a doorbell. But one that can reach you wherever you are. If a picture’s worth a thousand words, hopefully this GIF makes up for the lack of a proper written introduction.

Why?

I wanted to build a simple push button for our student helpdesk so that if we ever had to step away students could page us. I decided on Google Hangouts for the message delivery platform since I use it every day and the app is already installed on all of my devices.

How?

All you need to get started is:

• A G Suite account with Hangouts Chat enabled.
• A device that’s kiosk mode capable to act as the push button.
  • I opted for an Android tablet stuffed inside a retired Chromebook running Fully Kiosk Browser & App Lockdown.
• The Hangouts Chat app installed on all of your devices.

That’s it! If you’ve got those things, and a few minutes to spare, click through to get this setup!