replacing close/min/max buttons when screen sharing on macos?

Dear Steve Whitley1,

Good day! Thank you for posting to Microsoft Community. We are happy to help you.

I understand how frustrating it can be when software changes disrupt your workflow. The behavior you’re describing, where Microsoft Teams replaces the standard close, minimize, and maximize buttons with screen sharing controls, is indeed unique to Teams.

This design choice is likely intended to provide quick access to screen sharing controls, making it easier to manage your sharing session without needing to navigate away from the shared content. However, I can see how this could be annoying, especially if you’re used to the standard window controls.

Unfortunately, as an end-user, there’s no direct way to revert this change. Here are a few steps you can take to provide feedback and potentially find a workaround:

1. Provide Feedback to Microsoft:
   • Open Teams and click on your profile picture.
   • Select Help > Give feedback.
   • Describe the issue and how it impacts your workflow. User feedback is crucial for Microsoft to understand and address such concerns.
2. If the desktop version’s behavior is too disruptive, consider using the web version of Teams, which might not have the same issue.

In addition, I recommend you submit your concern to the Microsoft Admin Center under feedback or create a UserVoice request for the feature on our Microsoft Teams · Community. Microsoft appreciates your feedback. Your opinion will be delivered directly to our engineers, helping us determine the direction of Microsoft products and services for all of our customers. It may be considered for future releases.

Thanks for your cooperation. If you need further assistance or have any other questions, feel free to ask!

I understand how frustrating it can be...

any time we're forced to use software made by microsoft contracted by some nameless company with a microsoft ™️ on it, we all just understand that it'll never work, and just assume there should be a high level of frustration in attempting to, what most humans call "using" the product.

that said...

I appreciate the words posted. they have no relevance in the matter in which I posted, but I'm grateful for your time in responding.

macOS puts these icons in the notification bar any time any application uses any system resources such as the mic , camera or attempts to share their desktop this way you don't end up having some entity (as you may see if you ever watch the film about edward snoden) where some entity accesses one of these resources without the knowledge of the user. at least its visible to the person using the computer when it happens i guess...

so what's happening, when teams shares the desktop, is that the teams client is replacing macOS's window chrome (close, minimize, maximize buttons) with the "sharing the desktop" privacy indicator that is already up in the notification window.

and is replacing the normal window buttons:

with an icon that is already in the notification bar, but making it more difficult to access the normal OS functionality of the window.

as you can see, this has nothing to do with the screen sharing controls that are *also* on the screen that zoom in and out at annoying pace:

so this button replacement is redundant and makes window management when sharing screens overly difficult. Does the same thing happen in windows (its been forever since being forced to use that operating system but I wouldnt think so, firstly because it doesn't have any similar "safety" features (showing when applications are accessing privacy constrained resources) but I can't see microsoft removing their close / min / max buttons...

is there a way to disable this functionality, if not... there should be.

How is it possible to make such a frustraiting UI feature enabled by default and then not even have any option of turning it off? Don't dare to touch another OS design and think you know better :P

But, seriously.. disable it by default. And if ju MUST have it then it should be a feature you must turn on. Personally I think most people did not wish for this to ever have existed..

How is it possible to make such a frustraiting UI feature enabled by default and then not even have any option of turning it off? Don't dare to touch another OS design and think you know better :P

But, seriously.. disable it by default. And if ju MUST have it then it should be a feature you must turn on. Personally I think most people did not wish for this to ever have existed..

we and our parent company work with MS. from my experience, very few ppl are actually "employed (as in proper non-contractor employees)" with for the company, most people are contractors of some sort, and projects are some sort of contract. My guess is how the state of mediocrity happens: projects and features get proposed; approvals get issued all in a vacuum outside of necessity, user experience (or in things like crowdstrike), or safety nets... contracts get assigned, software gets end of life'd and replaced by identical apps or platforms (skype/teams/xamarin-maui) and things get changed without anyone ever stopping to think whether it should or how it impacts the quality of life of any user... all for the sake of the a few more months of a contract for people working for microsoft. another release is kicked out the door, and more buzz is published out the microsoft PR engine, and life continues on. unless enough people complain about it, in which case.... another contract is issued, more people get to work longer changing whatever anybody didn't like, and (original scenario continues).

I have to agree with everything is said here.

Why in the name of God should I use some Microsfot Teams feature when Mac is perfectly suitable for me?

I/We need a setting to disable it and this feature should be disabled by default

And, the give feedback doesn't exists in Teams for Mac, BTW.