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Ask Slashdot: Is There a Modern IP Webcam That Lets the User Control the Output?
First time accepted submitter Tronster writes Owners of a local shop have a menu that changes daily and wanted an IP webcam to update an image on their web-site. After a frustrating 2 hours of a "Hikvision" refusing to behave, I threw in the towel and looked for a better camera to recommend. The biggest issue today is that the new webcams that come out don't support FTP, they all support sending images/video direct to a "private cloud" (e.g., Simplicam, Dropcam, etc...). Google has been no help; all the sites are either outdated in terms of ranking or the most recent ones recommend a Foscam. They previously tried one of these and it's image quality was too poor. While security systems and home automation has been discussed recently, I haven't found any recent discussions on webcams that give a user control of where the content is sent. Does anyone in the Slashdot community have recommendations, reputable sites that are up-to-date in rankings, and/or hacks to have control over some of these newer cameras?
Second, you could just take a stock webcam, attach it to an RPi, let it make a picture, let's say every 15 minutes and upload it to the desired FTP server. 100% scriptable.
Personally, I think this idea is ripe for abuse. Somebody is going to draw penises on the menu and it will be there on the site for all to see. Overthink your workflow instead of doing this.
Ahhh...the great dumpster continuum. Many a free computer will be found there. -- sowth (748135)
..to snap a photo of the menu with their smart phone and upload it to a website every day? Most restaurants around here do that.
hookers and grits.
Use any webcam or USB connected camera and 'motion' a Linux FOSS tool that lets you program picture taking any which way you want.
Non-Linux Penguins ?
You're looking for a "webcam", stop looking for a "webcam" and you will find what you want.
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
Finally, a proper use case for the Raspberry Pi. And in its natural habitat at that!
I'd go with a Raspberry Pi (35$), either with a camera module or a no-infrared module; a small shell script will do, google for it!
The Sharx brand cameras are expensive (~$280) but have many great capabilities built in, including dumping to a NAS and motion alerts with emailed snapshots. I've run them in some capacity for over five years with no trouble. My only complaint other than price is that the UI is not always very self-explanatory, and they refuse to post PDF manuals on their site, so don't lose the (extensive) paper manual.
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It is a regular pocket camera that can connect to wifi and email photos. It might work for you. Have the people pick the camera up, take a picture of the menu, press the email button, and then have the website poll the email account every 10 minutes for a picture sent by the address associated with the camera.
A little messy but I think that is the way to go. It does require people pick the camera up and do that every day. But is that a problem?
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
If I were to guess, the menu changes daily and is written on something like a chalkboard or whiteboard. They could print it, but the handwriting gives it a homestyle artistic "flare" that the restaurant wants to maintain:
My thought then would be something like this: Get a tablet or smartphone with a wacom stylus (e.g. Galaxy Note 10) and a big TV (say 55", get a used one on CL for about $400 or so.)
Hand write the menu on the tablet (you can use different color writing and background as you desire) and save the image file to a place that uploads it to a computer that is connected to the TV at the restaurant (which is in portrait orientation) and to the website.
Has an added benefit of making it easily readable by the visually impaired, and it looks neat (you can also have it mounted up high somewhere, which might be impractical for a chalkboard/whiteboard.)
I'd imagine you could spend less than $800 on this total setup.
Even my $20 basic D-Link (DCS-930L) IP enabled camera has FTP upload capability. I'm pretty sure the very similar TP-Link one does as well. These are not really as hard to find as the OP suggests. If you spend a few minutes looking at most of the companies that have been doing cameras for more than a couple of years you'll find plenty with FTP upload capability. Just stay away from the overpriced ones with clever names e.g. "Dropcam" and stick to something more basic. If you do want to spend some money and get a much better camera go for a commercial one like an Axis.
It sounds like the owner is writing a menu on a daily basis, and may be updating the menu during the course of business. Webcams has crappy resolutions, digital cameras tends to get "lost", more so when more than 1 person is using it. So, why a camera? My work has one of those digital whiteboards (yes, I know they're more expensive than a webcam), but I imagine it's possible to write once and then pressing a button, a snapshot of what is written on the whiteboard gets uploaded to the proper place?
Which is $800 more than the existing chalkboard, requires power, and will fail/have to be replaced within a few years. And chalkboards can be quite high up, all you need is a stepladder or a chair once a day.
Saying "they tried a Foscam but the quality was too poor" is like saying "they tried food but didn't like it". Which one? Foscam make dozens of models up to at least 960p (I haven't checked their range recently), I find it hard to believe they won't work for this (or at least any worse than the other manufacturers' cameras).
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Restaurant sites are what usability pros show onscreen when they want to get a belly laugh from the audience.
The reason is that restaurants are focused on looks before usability. This leads them to use pictures of text, PDFs, and the hated Flash.
Those technologies range from poor to complete fail when it comes to searchability, mobile adaptability, accessibility, and ability to select and copy/paste text.
Please, use HTML text instead. It's not hard to format it beautifully with CSS, and you'll be helping patrons find you, paste the address into their contacts or GPS, share favorite stuff with friends, and get a dollar out of their hands and into yours.
I came here to learn about Modern IP Webcams.
There is no need for a debate about how to run a restaurant.
Instead of having a camera taking a picture of a chalkboard every X minutes all the time and uploading the pictures to a website how about replacing the chalkboard with a monitor that shows the menu from the website. Then change the menu on the website to look like a chalkboard. When the chef or manager wants to update the menu they use the computer in the office to change the file and upload the changes to the website. The display in the restaurant would get updated (it could poll the web server every minute or ten) automatically. Plus the menu becomes more accessible to those with disabilities.
Consumer TV's are not rated to be on for 12+ hours at a time
And yet it will work fine anyways. Remember that 9 year old LCD TV I mentioned? Yeah well it's been on practically 24/7, and it was a no-name generic bought refurbished at best buy.
- Digital Signage can lead to copyright problems (drawing a copyrighted character is a derivative work, copy/pasting becomes questionable)
The exact same thing applies to a chalk board. Honestly it sounds like you're arguing just to argue.
You're just hair splitter. Off with ya.
I came here to learn about Modern IP Webcams.
There is no need for a debate about how to run a restaurant.
Unless, perhaps, you need a Modern IP Webcam to collect evidence of food mishandling in the kitchen or (in the case of fast food) violence at the counter.