[gentoo-user] Re: {OT} video monitoring

[James]

Grant <emailgrant <at> gmail.com> writes:


> I've been using motion along with USB cameras for a while.  I need to
> expand my monitoring capacity and I'm wondering if I should consider
> changing software or hardware.  motion seems fairly dead but is
> stable.  I'm reading conflicting info about the current status of
> zoneminder.  Is anyone using IP cams?


Hello Grant,

Some years ago, the slickest webserver plus zoneminder setup was this

http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/cherokee/users/2450

cherokee + zoneminder + php


Another solution is to get some pci cards that take a coax input
from a coax cable (RG/59 or RG6 for distance) directly into the PC.
There you can convert the streaming video into h.264 and move it
around the ethernet. Encoder (coax to h.264) pci cards use to abound
such as Qsee, Avermedia etc etc.

You can also get embedded boards from TI that include the DaVinci
package which take in coax and convert it to H.264.

I use to get the best information about the  key chips reading the 
linux
kernel driver documentation found in the old drivers. Many of 
the drivers (most?) have been unified and the in-driver 
documents therein
will be mostly useless, so old 2.4 and 2.6 drivers for specific
chipsets is the best source, if you really want to dig into
video over IP.   Most currently manufactured IP cams go to great links
to make their hardware a "black box" on what they are doing
to output the H.264. [2]

Furthermore, you have to delve in the "container" versus the packets
when you find incompatibilities.   Many of the advanced ethernet
sniffing software packages have h.264 filters build in [1]. It's all
H.264, just a lot of software gymnastics to frustrate folks from
rolling their own video solution.

If I were to get serious about video/IP, I'd go with 
VP8 (google's standard)
and find a codec (opensource) that could be put on a micro
processor board; pandaboard? [3].  Googling around and I'm 
sure you can find
something. [4]


usb video sucks, once you try to "scale up" for any sort of 
serious video
surveillance system; imho.

hth,
James

[1] http://www.wireshark.org/docs/dfref/h/h264.html

[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VP8

[3]
https://wiki.linaro.org/WorkingGroups/Middleware/
Multimedia/Specs/1105/OptimizeVp8Decoding

[4] http://www.webmproject.org/tools/