Revision as of 11:46, 31 January 2012

Hardware

Logitech 700e and 700i IP cameras

• e = external = 249$
• i = internal = 229$

Logitech cameras have a 'free' service associated with them that allows on to route the cameras to their web proxy so you can view them online or through an app. Technically no server required but do you want Logitech to have access to the cameras?

• https://shop.micasaverde.com/index.php
  • System has IP camera support but also has home automation included in its offerings.
• Internal Cams @ 170$
• External Cams @ ?
  • Vera 3 and Vera 2 look like the 'servers' for the vera devices. No software offered.
    • Vera 2 = 238
    • Vera 3 = 299

Y-cam

• http://www.amazon.com/mn/search/?_encoding=UTF8&node=172282&tag=ycamip-20&linkCode=ur2&field-brandtextbin=Y-cam&camp=1789&creative=390957

Camera solutions, bottom line, 310 for outdoor, 210 for indoor.

Software

Zoneminder

• http://www.zoneminder.com/
  • Welcome to ZoneMinder.com, home of ZoneMinder the top Linux video camera security and surveillance solution. ZoneMinder is intended for use in single or multi-camera video security applications, including commercial or home CCTV, theft prevention and child, family member or home monitoring and other domestic care scenarios such as nanny cam installations. It supports capture, analysis, recording, and monitoring of video data coming from one or more video or network cameras attached to a Linux system. ZoneMinder also support web and semi-automatic control of Pan/Tilt/Zoom cameras using a variety of protocols. It is suitable for use as a DIY home video security system and for commercial or professional video security and surveillance. It can also be integrated into a home automation system via X.10 or other protocols. If you're looking for a low cost CCTV system or a more flexible alternative to cheap DVR systems then why not give ZoneMinder a try?

• http://www.zoneminder.com/wiki/index.php/Hardware_Compatibility_List
  • Looks like it works with USB
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_2QfjJiwXE
  • Looks like Mobile Support via app and web interface

Like a suite? Background service.

Motion

• Motion is a program that monitors the video signal from cameras. It is able to detect if a significant part of the picture has changed; in other words, it can detect motion. See more below.
• http://www.prupert.co.uk/2009/03/18/motion-1-zoneminder-0/
  • Oh how wrong I was. Motion is so much better than ZoneMinder, I am sorry to say. It has a very basic web interface, allowing you to start and stop motion detection and view a live stream from one camera at a time. However, it really beats ZoneMinder into a cocked hat when you look at support for webcams. I had so many problems getting my webcams working in ZoneMinder, but in motion, you just tell it your video device locations (/dev/video0 etc) and off it goes.
  • There are some additional php packages out there allowing you to create webcam stream montages and view previous alerts created by motion. Although all configuration is done via a text config file, the file is well laid out and well commented and thus easy to understand.

Backround/Serving Service? Config files. Looks like mobile support via web interface.

iSpy

• http://www.ispyconnect.com/download.aspx
  • I started writing iSpy back in 2007 after finding a superb open source c# .net project called AForge. I spent a while looking around for decent, free motion detection and recording software but didn't have much luck finding any with the capability that AForge provides - so I decided to write it myself. The motivation for writing it was that I had a healthy but sceptical interest in ghosts and UFO's - and I figured that if people had some decent software to use with all those webcams and microphones out there, and if there was something weird happening, iSpy was sure to find it!
  • You can install a 'client' on a system and network USB devices and mics on systems to a main server.

Looks like mobile support via web interface FREE! Still Windows Though. Looks like it has proxy serving service? Looks like you have to connect through proxy :/ some crap about authentication tokens.

Bluecherry

• http://store.bluecherry.net/categories/Bluecherry-DVR/Version-2-DVR-software/
  • Looks like an all in one solution based of ubuntu.
• http://sourceforge.net/projects/zoneminder-cd/
  • Live 'Bluecherry Live CD' but seems not made by same company.
• www.bluecherrydvr.com/v2beta
  • The opensource offering but where is version 1? And its a beta?
• I thought GNU required release of this stuff. Looks like when beta runs out, so do you. You need to purchase licences.
  • Why is this not free?

Answer:

We get this question alot. The short answer is absolutely not.

While it's common place for some companies to use existing open source software and build on that (a good example is Boxee), our software is completely written from the ground up for commercial applications. It does not contain any code from Zoneminder, and never will.

We do use some open source libraries, and comply with any licensing for those. We also give back to those libraries and supply patches for bugs that we found, or features that we want added. A good example is our patches to libav.

What is Zoneminder?

Zoneminder is free open source security / recording application that is written to work with Video4Linux supported capture cards. While it does support network cameras it does not support audio and does not have a GUI interface. Zoneminder is community supported and commercial support / SLA is not available. It is also licensed GPL, which means we couldn't use any of the source code if we wanted to in a closed source application.

So this is not zoneminder. Instead it is custom software.

• http://www.bluecherrydvr.com/zoneminder/

Looks nice if you have cash to fork over.

NovaSun Cyweb

• http://www.novosun.com/index.php
  • 14 Day trial
  • 'Optional' extentions (More money?)
    • Object Counting, Fire analy, etc
• Windows Crapware

Same as any other active forground monitoring software.