Webcam Service - Serving camera recordings

One of the main purposes of a Trimble 4D Control setup is monitoring a site using the information of several sensor types and issuing alarms, if some of the measurements exceed certain thresholds. While the information the alarm contains is mainly of abstract nature, pictures or movies taken synchronously of the site may additionally clarify the actual situation and indicate reasons for alarms. For example: You might monitor an object using accelerometers for detecting sudden movements which might be induced by accidental or willful property damage. An image would immediately give the reason for this alarm and might help detecting the origin of that damage. Therefore, Trimble 4D Control Server includes a feature to automatically steer camera recording at a monitored site and to append selected recorded video files to alarm e-mails.

For setting up a webcam system, operators use the Trimble 4D Control Web application for configuring Trimble 4D Control webcams, configuring Trimble 4D Control sensors, setting up alarms including automatically generated e-mails for the configured sensors, and for enabling camera recording at the monitored site. On the Trimble 4D Control Server side of the system, the Webcam Service module acts as the service that steers Motion JPEG file recording in compressed MP4 format, and connects to the monitoring database for configured webcam information. With an active camera and with recording enabled, an additional e-mail sent when an alarm has been raised will contain an appended MP4 video file. It is the Webcam Service module that selects from all MP4 files being stored on a user-specified location the sequence that covers the point in time when the alarm was issued.

The Webcam Service module does the following:

• It provides the location for storing recorded video files.
• It connects to the Monitoring database for webcam configuration information.
• It specifies the recording settings, such as the length of a video, how long video data is kept in the storage folder, and how often the information on available webcams is read out.
• It sets up the MP4 file that matches the webcam and the time, for which an alarm has been raised.

Prerequisites

For the system to add MP4 video files to alarm mails, it needs the following:

• At the monitored site, a video camera streaming Motion JPEG videos over HTTP must be installed and connected with the IP network.
• The Trimble 4D Control Web application must be set up with the following:
  • A webcam must be configured with its TCP/IP address, user settings, and it must be enabled for recording.
  • The sensor(s) for monitoring the site must be set up with alarms generating e-mails.
• The Webcam Service module must be configured to store file recordings for a period that covers potential alarm situations.

Adding the module

The module is available from the Tree view root Trimble 4D Control Server. Trimble 4D Control Server needs (and accepts) only one Webcam Service module for the whole system. When the module is being added, the Webcam Service Properties dialog appears. It lets you define and select Webcam Service module configurations. Each configuration holds communication information. You may remove a configuration from here, if you do not need it anymore. You may change the settings of the selected Webcam Service configuration at any time.

Module status

In the Tree view, the Webcam Service module is represented by its configuration name and a status-identifying icon.

To view the history of module-related status messages, use the History module-view.

Logging into the database

All successful downloads are logged into the central database. The database contains the following table referring to Webcam Service:

*By default, the data of these tables is reduced depending on settings of the TableLifeTime table.