[Liverpool] Linux CCTV

[Ste]

On 04/11/2010 12:50, Sebastian wrote:
> I found the following page useful to work out my options for 
> streaming. If you look under the second section - "Output method / 
> muxer matrix" - under the HTTP column - you will see your choices:
>
> http://www.videolan.org/streaming-features.html
>
> Once you choose your encapsulation, (TS/ASF/PS etc.) - on the same 
> page you can work out your codec options.
>
> Keep in mind that mjpeg is an inefficient format (in terms of 
> bandwidth). In terms of codec - mpeg4 with h264 seems to be the 
> preferred option nowadays. You will just have to choose your 
> encapsulation/container.
>
> One day maybe the Google open-sourced VP8/WebM codec will be the thing 
> to use - but as the browser support is minimal at the moment - I'm 
> afraid it doesn't seem like a viable option just now.
>
> Then again - if you use VLC or some other player on the client (and 
> not a web browser) - things are a bit different then. I think the 
> current VLC already has WebM support.
>
> Sebastian

Cheers for that - sounds interesting. I certainly wouldn't be adverse to 
making a modern browser a requirement to view the stream. On the grand 
scale of things, it certainly doesn't seem like too much to ask. Doesn't 
Chrome support h.264 out-the-box these days?

The only other thing I'd need is a 4-up or 6-up or 8-up display (that 
is, 4, 6 or 8 feeds on the screen at once) rather than cycling through 
each feed every few seconds. Off the top of my head, I can think of two 
ways of doing this:

a) Have the CCTV box encode an extra stream which is effectively 
generated from all the other streams in a grid pattern, and just stream 
that feed over HTTP or RTP or whatever, or b) have the CCTV box serve up 
an html5 web page containing 4, 6 or 8 seperate <video> tags, with each 
one showing a stream from a different camera.

There are pros and cons to both, I suppose!

Ste