Beta Features
These are experimental features - we are still working on these, but please try these in your boards and let us know your feedback!
Anonymous mode allows you to make all participants anonymous, and to stop Metro Retro tracking what they wrote or where they voted. When anonymous mode is on:
- you can’t tell who is who
- you can’t tell who wrote a sticky note, ever!
- voting is anonymous
Anonymous is a mode that you can turn on and off, to use whenever you need - whether for the whole session or just one activity.
Enable Anonymous mode from the Facilitator Menu when you have a meeting active:
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From then on, anything written or voted on during anonymous mode stays that way, forever. Nothing can ever be tied back to an individual.
When you’re done, turn anonymous mode off to go back to regular mode, where all new contributions and votes are tracked again.
Regular mode | In Anonymous mode |
---|---|
Everyone has an avatar | All avatar pictures replaced with a single question mark |
All sticky notes show the author | No authors |
Individual handwriting for each person | Everyone’s handwriting is the same font |
Can spotlight a person’s stickies and votes | Spotlight disabled in anon mode |
Can spotlight a person's votes | All votes are anonymous |
Can Follow other people | Following is disabled during anonymous mode |
Export contains who wrote and voted | Export does not contain who wrote and voted while in anon mode |
In short - we don’t believe anonymity should be default for team sessions, but we recognise that anonymity can be a useful tool in certain scenarios:
- helping newer teams raise awkward issues
- reducing bias like zombie groupthink, or the HIPPO effect
- is another useful tool in a facilitators toolbox
Place a draggable stopwatch anywhere on the board.
- 1.Open up the Command Palette with
Ctrl
+Space
- 2.Search for 'Create: Stopwatch' and select it
- 3.Set your time and start the clock. Wait for the countdown...!
- 4.BONUS - you can copy/paste the timer to create more.
Ctrl + Space to open the Command Palette

Paste the link to a video to embed it into your board. Copy either the Youtube link or the MP4 link and paste it directly onto the board with
Ctrl + V
.The video will appear on your board and can be played / stopped with a single click.
Ctrl + click selects the video so you can move, resize and delete it.
To slap someone, hold the space bar and fling your cursor through their avatar to send them flying (with bonus sound effects). If you find slaps annoying, disable them in the user settings.
We built Metro Retro so that all actions on a board can be programmatically executed with commands.
This means that in the future you could script an automated workshop. We're not quite there yet, but for now you can browse examples of the commands that will be available for keyboard ninjas.
Press the
Ctrl
+ Space
keys to bring up the Command Palette.
Ctrl + Space to bring up the command palette
From here you can scroll through the commands, or type to find a command.
This is in very early stages, so we don't recommend doing anything with it beyond browsing the commands. You'd need to know the correct parameters to type for most of the operations.

Sending all participants an alert.
The command palette is in very early stages, so we don't recommend doing much browsing the commands. You'd need to know the correct parameters to type for some of the operations.
Last modified 12d ago