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My sisters house was robbed Christmas evening :(

I talked with her about making a surveillance system for her. The idea is to have a system that detects intruders and then send a SMS to you while streaming it to a private website.

The hard part:

How and where do I storage the data from the camera so it's streamable?

I think I can manage to do the streaming, website and SMS server, but I need the data (fundamentation).

Thanks, any help is much appreciated.

Brian Tompsett - 汤莱恩
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radbyx
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2 Answers2

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For a do-it-yourself system here is a rudimentary idea:

Equipment

  1. A webcam capable of sensing motion and starting recordings. I have one from Logitech.
  2. A wireless NAS hidden away (in a closet / attic / etc)

On this NAS, designate a folder to store the videos into.

Write a .Net program that will monitor the folder for new files. If one is found, then send email / SMS to desired addresses.

You should know that motion sensing cameras are easily tripped by fruit flies, spiders, pets, etc.

Raj More
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  • I have never had a camera. What format is the data from the camera (usually?). Is it one big file or many chumbs or is it saved in a DB? I wondering how to get from data to actually streaming. If i can make it a byte[] i think i can do the rest. – radbyx Dec 27 '10 at 23:58
  • Most camera data is in the form of a AVI or some similar format file. They are usually horrendously large. You can probably use another encoding and get smaller files. If the NAS is wireless and hidden away, then it can be very hard to find. – Raj More Dec 28 '10 at 13:57
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You might want to look over the product offering from Blue Iris. I have been using it for several years now at home and I am quite happy with it. The cost is only 49.95 for the full version.

Costique
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madarp
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