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I want to use my old (1GHz) PC as webcam video stream server (like you can see those road cameras).

I thought of using VLC and already tried using http output but it was not really good. Too cpu hungry, too big stream (kBps), not stable...

I been reading VLC how-to's but thre is still a question.

  • Which output should I use? Http, RTSP, UDP? I want to make for more than one computer at the same time (multicast).
  • Which codec should be good? PC is not so fast so it shouldn't be too cpu hungry codec. Mpeg2, mpeg4, xvid?
  • how much video buffer should I use (vb=?)?
  • What about setting IP and ports?

So I need some help with ideas, but if someone can make a VLC command line it's even better :)

Oh, computer has direct internet connection and own IP.

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Should it be VLC? You can achieve that task by using a web service. I personally prefer the usage of USTREAM which is flash player based, fully embeddable (if you wish to put it in your website, in example), low resources and easy to run from a lightweight browser (chromium browser will do the trick with ease). ustream.tv There is a free version (which embeds a small USTREAM logo watermarked in the video) and a paid version that features more quality, no watermarking and better bandwidth when broadcasting. You can also control who can view your broadcast. – Geppettvs D'Constanzo Feb 22 '11 at 16:06
1  
@hhlp thanks for editing! :) @Geppettvs, thanks for suggestion, but I would really like to use free solution without some service or prop. software. – gsedej Feb 22 '11 at 17:30

2 Answers

up vote 1 down vote

I certainly wouldn't use VLC. It complicates things for users and is far too high-bandwidth for public consumption.

Hvae you looked at the package webcam-server. You tell it what webcam to show and it provides a networked video source. It also comes with a java applet that you can host on a web page that connects directly to the webcam-server daemon.

I don't know if you want to make this publically viewable but you'll have to open up some ports and route traffic through so the java applet can communicate with the daemon.

This tutorial should get you started. The package might come with its own initscripts and you certainly don't have to host the applet page on the same machine as the daemon as the tutorial states... But this should get you to a stage where you know what you're doing.

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thanks for idea. Webcam is not being developed anymore. I tried MJPG_streamer, but I actually don't have webcam but framegrabber, which does not have MJPG encoding. Currenctly I am using line cvlc "v4l2:///dev/video0" :v4l2-fps=50 ":sout=#transcode{vcodec=DIV2,vb=300,scale=0.5,acodec=none}:std{access=http,mux=‌​ts,dst=0.0.0.0:8080}" but it's still very cpu intensive... – gsedej Feb 23 '11 at 13:48
up vote 0 down vote

you will need also Apache installed. Users can access webcam with web browser

webcam_server is a program that allows others to view your webcam from a web browser. The program itself is a server that provides a live feed of images to clients using a Java applet embedded in a web page. webcam_server uses the video4linux interface.

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Thanks for suggestion, but all those programs just opes up stram, and send MJPG video stream that get from WebCAM. MJPG isn't really good codec, I want to make it smaller. – gsedej Mar 24 '11 at 21:12

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