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Persistent Home Videoconferencing Solution?
An anonymous reader writes "I'm moving very soon for work, and will be several hundred miles away from my young family for six to nine months. Obviously I'll travel back as often as possible, and there's always Skype and XBLA video, but the whole 'now it's time to talk to dad' thing seems ... a little weak. I was wondering the Slashdot community could help me come up with a more persistent solution. Ideally what I want is an always-on connection between a pc/monitor/camera/speakers in my old kitchen and my new kitchen, so if we're in the kitchens, we can see each other and interact semi-normally. (We're a kitchen-focused family.) Most solutions I can find time out pretty quick, or require some knowledge on the part of the users, and the tech-savvy people are only going to be in one kitchen, to put it politely!" (Read on for a few more details.)
"I do have a reasonable number of Windows PCs and Macs (and game consoles), but no alt. OS machines, so something for retail OSes would be better — I haven't tested the PS3 camera for long durations, but I know the conferencing quality with a PS3 is pretty good, and that could be an option too. Any camera recommendations would be good. We have sweet access at our house, but it will need to be wireless to the kitchen from the router."
Create a dedicated Skype account which is set to auto start video and accept calls from it's contact list, add your skype to that contact list and you're all set. All you have to do is click call whenever you're in your kitchen and there will be a video uplink. Runs on windows or mac with any old x86 box and webcam, pretty close to $0. Just make sure the PC doesn't go to sleep (more than $0).
I'll have to disagree about your creepy statement (but I do appreciate still offering your advice).
Dads being gone, especially with little ones can have pretty large effects. I think it'd be kind of cool to still be able to have that "hey dad guess what!?" pop out of the middle of no where. It's those unscheduled moments that are going to win with a good set up.
quit your job, or move your family with you.
I live overseas, and a couple of times I tried to "sit in" on family gatherings (Thanksgiving & Christmas) by virtually "being there" via a webcam and wireless laptop. I literally had a seat in the living room with a laptop sitting there. It didn't work as well as I would have liked. Why? Well for one I couldn't move the webcam about, so as to look at people. Eye contact is very important, I discovered. It gets tiring staring at the same scene directly across from the laptop, and people can't be bothered to move you about. Sort of like being a head in a jar on Futurama - they all have Kabuki-style dedicated assistants to carry them (or robotic bodies). Second, as you're remotely in and your voice is tinny by being on a laptop speaker, it's kind of distracting for everyone else. It always seemed to sidetrack the discussion whenever I said anything. Maybe this was due to novelty, I'm not sure if your family would get used to it after time. Third, even though I was eating the closest thing I could get to a nice dinner (the fanciest bento box they had at the department store, like fifteen bucks which I would have never bought ordinarily), it still wasn't the same as having dinner with the family. Fourth, the time zones although if you go north-south this isn't an issue. I gave up after a few times and just telephoned in and the family handed the phone around until I had had a chat with everyone. Maybe if they fastened the laptop onto a Roomba or something that would have helped.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I'm not seeing the most obvious answer. Put two laptops in the kitchen. Use wireless internet. Use laptops with built in video cameras. Run any of the IM programs that have video capability. Just leave the laptops turned on. Someone walks in, looks over, and says "Hi!"
Agile Artisans
What if you or your wife want to bang someone on the kitchen table?
He's not talking about following them around with the camera, or surveilling the whole house. He's talking about setting up a two-way link between two terminals in fixed, public (in the context of the home) locations. If someone doesn't want to be observed, simply don't stand in front of the terminal.
I realize that ridiculing ordinary Americans with uninformed speculation never gets old, but these days the kitchen has replaced the living room as the center of the home. My Dad built his new house so that the kitchen was the centerpiece - the living room is only used for watching TV, really. It has a large central island with many seats so as to fit a lot of people. Sit around, read the newspaper (yes Dad still subscribes), drink coffee, play games, etc. Everyone who comes over raves about it and says they wish their home was the same way.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
I would use projectors not screens. Set up a whole wall of the room (or a large bordered portion) to act as a window.
... little things like cameras being the same height off the table are important to make it feel continuous.
...... But it'd be pretty damn cool!
The goal is to have it close enough to something that people are comfortable with allowing for some suspension of disbelief. Working towards that end have the camera in each room in a similar position to make it as close as possible to acting like a window. Stick a pointless frame/trim on the wall to encourage the illusion. Continuous lines and such when standing and looking into the 'window' from the most common position are important. Similar rooms would help as well. Or common elements
It would not be the same thing as a window of course because of the lack of 3d. One thing you could do though to partially alleviate this would be to use head tracking to determine how close you are to the camera and as you move closer have it zoom to match the right field of view that you would expect. This would help add some realism. Another thing you could do would involve 3d sound recording + reproduction which is doable. It makes the connection feel more real if they can hear you move across the room.
More expensive the better pretty much. Costly internet connection helps a lot. Good camera and microphones would be good. Good projector would be very important. Fancy business telepresence stuff probably is good and expensive too.
I'm sure a good driven programmer/engineer could set this up and get it working smoothly with under 20k and a month or so
It's only weird when it's one way. The key is to make sure that when you can see someone on the screen, they can also see you on their screen. If the screens are big enough, it's almost like a window.
I'll be honest; I don't know the solution to your problem. But I've been reading the replies, and between people giving you career advice (without any concept of what your job is, how much you love it, how hard it may be to change it, etc.), disregarding the flamingly, ass-poundingly obvious (normal IM won't work because you have to be close to the laptop, it times out on its own, etc.), or simply telling you that what you're asking about is creepy, I can see you have your work cut out for you.
Hang in there, man...and remember, this very thing that you are doing, this clear and persistent description and communication of a need, is what drives innovation in the IT and consumer electronics industries. Go for it, and keep it up until you get what you want!
For your security, this post has been encrypted with ROT-13, twice.
I think we should give the OP the benefit of the doubt and assume he's got his family onboard with the idea. Assuming so, do (all of you expressing negative opinions of the OP's idea) have anything constructive to add, or are (all of you) just into expressing your opinion regardless of whether it solves the problem as requested?
Little girls, like butterflies, need no excuse. -- L. Long
he's hot gay
Well-placed typo!
Actually Scott Hanselman has a better option using Skype and a dedicated PC he uses to talk to his family at home.
http://www.hanselman.com/blog/SkypingTheWifeFoolproofVideoConferencingWithYourFamilyWhileOnTheRoad.aspx
Doesn't take much to set up and would probably get one most of the way there.
-- What did Spock find in Kirk's toilet? The captain's log.
Video conferencing is for two parties to voice chat, video chat, and share data, etc for a set period of time. I think what you really should think about is a webcam streaming service. There are many sites out there that allow you to embed a live feed from a webcam in a webpage for a small fee. A lot of them will provide the page and give you direct URL and provide the local client software to stream the feed to the web page. You get one for your computer, your wife gets one for the home PC. You watch their page and they watch yours. All of this is designed to run full time as long as the PC is on, can be set to start at boot up, will save your settings and logon info etc. That way you have an always on solution. I don't remember the service I used to use. A quick look at google got me to ustream.com
You'd need to do some port-forwarding in each router (UDP 5060 + the RTP ports) and 'dial' the other site by IP address - it's not hard on the GXV phones and it saves setting up proxys/sip servers/asterisk, etc. If you set each phone to auto-answer then it's not hard to re-establish the link if it fails for whatever reason.
Failing that, if you want to be PC/Laptop based - look for Ekiga...
I use a combination of GXV3000 video phones, Ekiga and my Nokia N900 to make/take video calls from my family and in-laws, although I use an Asterisk server to co-ordinate everything and we don't stream 24/7!
Axis IP cameras are cheaper than Panasonic, and aren't as reliant upon IE running on specific versions of Windows.
(Disclaimer: I sell both.)
But: The problem with IP cameras is that you still need a computer-ish device to view them with. There are apps for something like an iPod Touch which can do it, but I have my doubts about them having good audio support.
And there won't be any echo cancellation happening, which is really rather needed if headsets aren't used for audio. (Nothing quite like hearing "Hey Dad!" echo over and over again with a second or so of latency as bounces back and forth across the country...)
So, it's going to need teleconferencing-specific software. My suggestion, therefore, is a cheap, used laptop at each end, preferably with a built-in camera. Several-years-old laptops are plenty fast enough to do this sort of work.
For software? Who knows... Try some of the obvious choices, and see if any are dumb enough to get the job done persistently, while being smart enough to get the things right that need gotten right (echo cancellation, for instance).
Kid-proof tablet..
I have been on the road for 3 weeks using iPhone 4 daily for over an hour after work talking and interacting with my family. My 4 year old calls me and says "Daddy we're almost home so we can FaceTime." He knows WiFi is required and we only have that at home. Whatever hotel I'm in I make sure I have wifi and if not I bring my AirPort Express to set up the wifi. I do have to reboot the iPhone sometimes before the video works but here's the real reason to use a mobile solution: My family was working on the backyard and they could show me what they were doing. It was awesome. Also my little ones would show me what they are playing with and I would show them the hotel room I was currently in and it was just so much more like being there and not having to be stuck with a 6-8 pound laptop on my chest. It kept me sane and I highly recommend it for anyone with a family in an extended work situation away from home. The little ones forget so easy what you look like / and they are SO much more engaged with conversation when they are stimulated with their eyes and ears. My conversations before with just voice were like (literally): Hi Dad. Hi love you how are you. Good. What's new. Nothing. Bye Dad. It really sucked and there was no bonding. This way the bond was kept and interestingly enough made stronger cause when I got back on Friday my little one said, Dad I wish you go back again. I said why. He said so you can bring me more presents and we can do FaceTime. It was priceless.
"It's only weird when it's one way."
Well, what about half way?
Here's whatcha do.
You get a male, adult mannequin, dress it up like dad (get the facial hair just right!), and prop it up in the breakfast nook. Put the video camera that dad will be getting his feed from behind one of the eyes of the mannequin (I do NOT recommend the "Third Eye" effect. THAT shit is creepy) and put the speakers he will be heard over behind the mouth.
If anybody wants to chat with dad, they go sit with him in the breakfast nook. Rap about school over bagels and lox.
If you add accessories, your wife can haul it into the bedroom after the kids go to sleep. I suggest http://www.adulttoys.com/ and http://www.apogeekits.com/pc_remote_controls.htm combined for a full array of functions.
Dad can also be parked on the front porch while everyone is away, keeping a watchful eye on the home-front. Park a nice lemonade or beer next to him for the full effect.
"Get off of my lawn, you punk kids!" BBZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ!!!!!