[mythtv-users] linking mythtv with zoneminder live view

Tue Mar 20 15:14:36 UTC 2018

I wrote a script to detect movement on the live camera feed via ZM and
then auto popup a PIP window on the mythfrontend showing the live feed
a few years back, the practical problem was you do tend to get a lot
of false positives (wind blowing bushes, cats fighting foxes,
unexplainably half naked women walking around at 2am - true story) and
it became a distraction so I took it of the system.

I may have a copy of the script still somewhere in an archive if you
get no joy elsewhere.

On 20 March 2018 at 11:58, Mark Perkins <perkins1724 at hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> On 20 March 2018 4:10:20 pm Mark Perkins <perkins1724 at hotmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>> On 20 March 2018 9:20:11 am Anthony Giggins <seven at seven.dorksville.net>
>> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On 20 March 2018 at 06:37, Mark Perkins <perkins1724 at hotmail.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Hoping someone may be able to offer some insight into linking mythtv
>>>> with zoneminder live view.
>>>>
>>>> Running mythtv fixes/29 updated in the last week or two and zoneminder
>>>> 1.30.4. They are on completely separate systems. Have installed the
>>>> mythzoneminder plugin and added the mythzmserver to zoneminder server.
>>>>
>>>> The connection mostly works. Information Center - Zoneminder - Show
>>>> Connections looks correct and I can control the camera (change mode).
>>>> And Show Events works and I can select and playback events (except they
>>>> are in 4:3 mode instead of 16:9 mode but I can work on that later).
>>>> Those two parts seem to work / integrate perfectly.
>>>>
>>>> However Show Live View doesn't work. In mythfrontend I get the following
>>>> set of messages repeated 4-10 times followed usually by a mythfrontend
>>>> segfault or a hang. Note that the contents of the protocol error seems
>>>> to change every time and often includes bizarre non standard characters
>>>> (black question marks, boxes with numbers and dots, etc). The number of
>>>> "bytes pending" changes too:
>>>>
>>>> 2018-03-20 06:42:06.350644 I  Using protocol version 11
>>>> 2018-03-20 06:42:06.393538 N  Monitor: Front Garage (1) is using 3 bytes
>>>> per pixel
>>>> 2018-03-20 06:42:07.565156 E  MythSocket(7f3368003530:31): Protocol
>>>> error: '******++' is not a valid size prefix. 8680 bytes pending.
>>>> 2018-03-20 06:42:08.467368 E  MythSocket(7f3368003530:31): No response.
>>>> 2018-03-20 06:42:08.467414 N  Connection to mythzmserver lost
>>>> 2018-03-20 06:42:08.467470 I  Connecting to zm server:
>>>> 192.168.251.131:6548 (try 1 of 2)
>>>> 2018-03-20 06:42:08.569109 E  readData: Error, readBlock
>>>> 2018-03-20 06:42:08.569903 E  ZMClient::getLiveFrame(): Failed to get
>>>> image data
>>>>
>>>> In mythzmserver I get this set of messages repeated the same number of
>>>> times:
>>>>
>>>> Using server protocol version '11'
>>>> getZMSetting: ZM_SHM_KEY Result: 0x7a6d0000
>>>> Shared memory key is: 0x7a6d0000
>>>> getZMSetting: ZM_PATH_MAP Result: /dev/shm
>>>> Memory path directory is: /dev/shm
>>>> getZMSetting: ZM_EVENT_IMAGE_DIGITS Result: 5
>>>> Event file format is: %05d-capture.jpg
>>>> Analysis file format is: %05d-analyse.jpg
>>>> getZMSetting: ZM_USE_DEEP_STORAGE Result: 1
>>>> using deep storage directory structure
>>>> getZMSetting: ZM_CREATE_ANALYSIS_IMAGES Result: 1
>>>> using analysis images
>>>> Got 1 monitors
>>>> Opened mmap file: /dev/shm/zm.mmap.1
>>>> new connection from XXX.XXX.XXX.XXX on socket 5
>>>> Processing: 'HELLO'
>>>> Processing: 'GET_MONITOR_LIST'
>>>> We have 1 monitors
>>>> id:             1
>>>> name:           Front Garage
>>>> width:          1920
>>>> height:         1080
>>>> palette:        0
>>>> byte per pixel: 3
>>>> sub pixel order:6
>>>> -------------------
>>>> Processing: 'GET_ALARM_STATES'
>>>> Processing: 'GET_LIVE_FRAME'
>>>> Getting live frame from monitor: 1
>>>> Frame size: 6220800
>>>> Processing: 'GET_ALARM_STATES'
>>>> socket 5 hung up
>>>> Closed mapFile for monitor: Front Garage
>>>> ZMServer destroyed
>>>>
>>>> Both the mythtv system and zoneminder system otherwise seem to be
>>>> running very well. The only tweak I have had to apply is that it appears
>>>> that zm.conf no longer contains the version number and mythzmserver
>>>> checks for that before starting. Appending "ZM_VERSION=1.30.4" fixed
>>>> that ok.
>>>>
>>>> Any advice greatly appreciated.
>>>>
>>>
>>> let me recheck mine tonight, I haven't checked it since I originally set
>>> it up.
>>>
>>> but just check that your PATH_ZMS is set correctly, which is usually the
>>> cause for liveview related issues.
>>>
>>> what I'd really like to do however is have it pop up on mythtv PIP when
>>> alerts come in, perhaps it can do this with the zmeventserver?
>>>
>>> Cheers,
>>>
>>> Anthony
>>>
>> Thanks for the tip. I had a quick check and the path looks ok and matches
>> with the cgi settings in zoneminder.conf but I'm not much of an Apache
>> expert. I did notice that my path was set to /cgi-bin-zm/nph-zms rather than
>> /cgi-bin-zm/zms which the help text implies is the default but changing it
>> made no difference. Live viewing via browser works fine either way just not
>> via mythzmserver.
>>
>> I will double check it tonight.
>
>
> After a lot of stuffing around I think (I think) I can say it is not the
> PATH_ZMS. After trying lots of tweaks without any real success I wound the
> camera resolution back to 1280 x 720 greyscale. At that I get the exact same
> types of error messages but I also get a few seconds of live video before
> the segfault. I think if the path was wrong then it should be impossible to
> get any video.
>
> Other than that I have not discovered anything useful or got any closer to
> understanding the problem. Perhaps a zoneminder protocol change?
>
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