Yawcam BETA 2006-05-17

Beta versions of Yawcam will be announced in this section. You are also welcome to discuss the beta versions in here.
malun
Site Admin
Posts: 1589
Joined: Sun Jan 04, 2004 1:29 pm

Yawcam BETA 2006-05-17

Post by malun »

Get the new beta release:
Full version (compressed to .zip):
http://www.yawcam.com/beta/yawcam_beta_2006-05-17.zip (24.8MB)

Full version (compressed to .rar):
http://www.yawcam.com/beta/yawcam_beta_2006-05-17.rar (19.4MB)

Full version (compressed with 7zip):
http://www.yawcam.com/beta/yawcam_beta_2006-05-17.7z (16.1MB)

Or an update (if you already have yawcam_beta_2006-03-09 or above installed):
http://www.yawcam.com/beta/yawcam_beta_ ... update.zip (2.65MB)
(Update instructions can be found here)


What's new since last official release?
- Fixed FREEZE BUG!
- Fixed memory leak in JPEG encoding.
- Allows bigger heap size.
- Changed JRE.
- Added new stream protocol.
- Added possibility to disable zoom in applet.
- Added {date} and {tstamp} variables for file names.
- Added variables {tstampH}, {tstampM} and {tstampS} for file names.
- Added variables {dateY}, {dateM} and {dateD} for file names.
- Added function to save images into a movie.
- Added popup menu for right click on applet.
- Added more options for the applet.
- Added image overlay.
- Added kick and ban applet viewers.
- Added always on top option.
- Added right click menu on tray icon.
- Added tray icon balloon tip text.
- Fixed decimal value bug in ftp and file interval fields.
- CPU optimizations for file and ftp output.
- Fix: Version check doesn't affect startuptime any more.
- Added workaround for webcams that didn't allow hibernation.
- Added stealth mode, which allows hiding windows and tray icon.
- Fixed offline image to save as "out0.jpg" instead of "out{5}.jpg".
- Fixed a problem related to image arrays and FTP.
- Fixed bug in FTP regarding multiline answers to NLST.
- Fixed speedup for FTP image arrays.
- Added experimental way of selecting video source.
- Added more options in image array wizard.
- Added user defined overlay variables (parsed from text file).
- Added a Scheduler.
- Fixed a bug in "silent retry on connection error" for ftp upload.
- Added possibility to use all system fonts in text overlay.
- Added resized images function to fit a PDA's or Mobile phone's screen.
- Fixed a bug where ftp sometimes didn't delete temporary files.
- Fixed that webserver didn't allow filenames containing spaces.
- Added Motion Detection.

What's new since last beta?
- Fixed the problem that Yawcam crashed instead of showing a warning when it couldn't find the webcam. (Thanks to Wayne who found the problem)


Known problems in this beta:
- A lot of text is fixed to english...
- The experimental "select source" crashes once in a while...

If this version can't detect your webcam, read this topic:
http://www.yawcam.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=551


/malun
Last edited by malun on Thu Jan 18, 2007 9:35 pm, edited 3 times in total.
malun
Site Admin
Posts: 1589
Joined: Sun Jan 04, 2004 1:29 pm

Post by malun »

Another known problem:
The information about "Actions taken" in the motion detection's "Motion Events" is not correctly updated.
The text will say that a given action has been blocked by flood control even when this is not the case.
The real action takes place but the information says different...

/malun
tzankoff
Posts: 7
Joined: Sun Jun 04, 2006 2:44 pm

Post by tzankoff »

I just downloaded the software and all the update files to bring it up to 0.2.6>7. Depsite initial streaming frustrations (the CODEBASE needs to start with "http://" [not mentioned in any instructions that I have read]), it works great! My only problem is that every time I close the program, it loses all of my settings. Also, it does not detect my 3Com Home Connect USB webcam. I can live with that for now, but the main concern is the lost settings issue. Help!
malun
Site Admin
Posts: 1589
Joined: Sun Jan 04, 2004 1:29 pm

Post by malun »

What settings are lost? The settings you can access from the menu, "settings -> edit settings..." or settings made to a html page?

Check that you have a yawcam_settings.xml in your yawcam directory. This is where alla settings should be saved.
(the CODEBASE needs to start with "http://" [not mentioned in any instructions that I have read])
Hmm... perhaps that's not mentioned... I'll have a look at that.

Does the "3Com Home Connect USB webcam" support VFW? Does the webcam work together with the software supplied with the camera?

/malun
tzankoff
Posts: 7
Joined: Sun Jun 04, 2006 2:44 pm

Post by tzankoff »

malun wrote:What settings are lost? The settings you can access from the menu, "settings -> edit settings..." or settings made to a html page?
All of them.
malun wrote:Check that you have a yawcam_settings.xml in your yawcam directory. This is where alla settings should be saved.
The file exists, but its contents are much more now than what the were before. I looked at the file before I lost all of my previous settings and the XML file was much smaller than what it is now. It's as if the file was not updated after a setting change.
malun wrote:
(the CODEBASE needs to start with "http://" [not mentioned in any instructions that I have read])
Hmm... perhaps that's not mentioned... I'll have a look at that.
It's not. It just says to swap in the IP adress of the computer running the software.
malun wrote:Does the "3Com Home Connect USB webcam" support VFW?
I am not sure.
malun wrote:Does the webcam work together with the software supplied with the camera?
Yes.
malun
Site Admin
Posts: 1589
Joined: Sun Jan 04, 2004 1:29 pm

Post by malun »

tzankoff wrote:All of them.
This has never happened before :shock:
tzankoff wrote:The file exists, but its contents are much more now than what the were before. I looked at the file before I lost all of my previous settings and the XML file was much smaller than what it is now. It's as if the file was not updated after a setting change.
Only the settings that are different from the default values will be written to the settings file. I you use all values as default the file will be almost empty.


Open the settings window, "settings -> edit settings..." and then click the OK-button. Now, check in the console-tab in the main window. Does it say "settings saved"?
tzankoff wrote:
malun wrote:Does the "3Com Home Connect USB webcam" support VFW?
I am not sure.
On this page:
http://www.3com.com/products/en_US/deta ... e=purchase
Is says it does. So the webcam should work together with Yawcam. Have you tried the "settings -> select source..." option?

/malun
tzankoff
Posts: 7
Joined: Sun Jun 04, 2006 2:44 pm

Post by tzankoff »

malun wrote:Open the settings window, "settings -> edit settings..." and then click the OK-button. Now, check in the console-tab in the main window. Does it say "settings saved"?
Yes, it does. What I will try doing is assign all of my settings again and save the resulting file so that if this happens again, I will have a backup of sorts.
malun wrote:On this page:
http://www.3com.com/products/en_US/deta ... e=purchase
Is says it does. So the webcam should work together with Yawcam. Have you tried the "settings -> select source..." option?
I have tried and *sometimes* the window will not even load at all. During the times where it has, it does not list the webcam. It will only list my (ATI) TV capture card.
tzankoff
Posts: 7
Joined: Sun Jun 04, 2006 2:44 pm

Post by tzankoff »

I think the program is aware that I am on to it. Now that I have recreated all of my settings and saved a copy of the resulting XML file, the setting are not being forgotten anymore. :lol:

When attempting to detect cameras, the light on the webcam does flash for several seconds which would indicate that the camera has been detected; but when the scanning process was finished, the camera was not found.
malun
Site Admin
Posts: 1589
Joined: Sun Jan 04, 2004 1:29 pm

Post by malun »

tzankoff wrote:I think the program is aware that I am on to it. Now that I have recreated all of my settings and saved a copy of the resulting XML file, the setting are not being forgotten anymore. :lol:
Haha... You never know what the software decides to do when it has a free will. :wink:
tzankoff wrote:When attempting to detect cameras, the light on the webcam does flash for several seconds which would indicate that the camera has been detected; but when the scanning process was finished, the camera was not found.
Apparently the software scans the camera for all the video size modes. This is a good sign.
My guess is that the software somehow gets confused by your tv capture card. Try to occupy your tv-card with some other software first, then start Yawcam at the same time. This could be a good test. If Yawcam finds your webcam now, at least we know that Yawcam is compatible with the camera, but gets confused by the tv-card.

/malun
pipco
Posts: 1
Joined: Thu Jul 27, 2006 5:11 am

Possible Freeze Bug?

Post by pipco »

I don't know if this is the FREEZE bug or not, but I do have a situation that might be similar.

I'm using the newest beta (0.2.6>7).

1. I set up File captures every second. In the scheduler I set this to run 24-7.
2. I set up http streaming. I also set this in the scheduler to run 24-7.
3. I set up motion detection, but only have it set in the scheduler M-F 9am-6pm.

Today was the first day that I ran the whole setup. It worked fine during the day... it created the files correctly, streaming worked, and motion detection worked great. When I got home, I looked through all of the image captures (the ones from the File, not Motion Detection) and I noticed that at 6pm, the same image was repeated over and over. So, basically I have discreet images from 12am to 6pm and then from 6pm on the image captures were the same image. It seems a coincidence that this occured exactly as motion detection was shutting off from the scheduler.

I'll run it the same way tomorrow and see if it happens again.

In the last few days I've tried a lot of webcam apps looking for the perfect one, and BY FAR Yawcam is the best. Thanks for your hard work on it. I think the motion detection stuff is really great.

One feature request... I love the "Images to Movie" option. How about putting that in the scheduler as well? I'd love to have a movie of the previous days images produced automatically at the end of the day, named with the date and then have the images deleted after the movie was created. I found a command-line tool that creates a movie out of images and it works great, but it might be nice to have it incorporated into Yawcam.

Thanks!

*** UPDATE! I ran it again today and it froze at the same point. 6pm exactly when the motion detection was turning off with the scheduler. And just to be clear, the duplicate images I'm seeing have the overlay correctly updated... the actual image is static, the time on the overlay keeps updating. I'll run it again tomorrow without the scheduler.
aretarmy
Posts: 1
Joined: Wed Jul 26, 2006 1:42 pm

Camera Freeze

Post by aretarmy »

Background: I’ve been using Yawcam off and on for a while now using 0.2.6 then to 0.2.7 and now BETA 2006-05-17.

Issue 1: I did incremental upgrades as they came out. I had no problem with camera detection as this was an upgrade. I had to rebuild a PC and went straight to BETA 2006-05-17 but the camera did not work. So ultimately I ended up going back and install 2.6 and let it the detect camera. Extracted 2.7 and 05-17 overwriting existing files and started Yawcam . The camera came on working as it should. I know it shouldn’t work due to overwriting files. I can only surmise that Yawcam.exe is reading an old file that did not get replaced OR the .exe is reading/writing a data in a different way. I hope this helps.

Issue 2: As stated in the previous post on freezing frames, I too am having the same problem. (BTW, I only use the Stream function and have not tried to use any other function) The only difference is that when there is sudden change of light (from light to dark), that’s when the camera freezes. The streaming still works because I have the date/time stamp showing that keeps going. This did not happen in 2.7 so naturally I would attribute this to the motion detection feature. To go into more depth on trying to “fix” this, I have tried to narrow down a solution but could not. The only way to fix the freeze is a reboot. Exiting Yawcam does not work. On exiting and restarting Yawcam, Yawcam assumes it is still running and gives the Port 8081 already in use and tries to use 8888. There were 2 Yawcam.exe's running in task manager. (BTW, it correctly locates the camera on re-executing Yawcam) After being patient and closing normally, I checked the Task Manager and noticed a Yawcam.exe still running. I attempted to end the Yawcam.exe but could not. The CPU was at 0% but still could not end it. While Yawcam is running but there are no active viewers does not seem to be an issue. Only when there are active viewers it seems to freeze.

I hope this will guide you to a solution that will provide an even better product. I will definitely donate more money in the future.

Additinal information: Exiting the view seems to freeze the camera also. Even though the time is moving the picture is frozen, HOWEVER, I can watch the FPS counting using the right mouse click. I can change the protocol, packet size, everything as if it is a live picture to include the resolution. It would seem like the problem is the browser window but then the preview window on the server is black, soooo.
beantree
Posts: 5
Joined: Fri Aug 04, 2006 12:18 pm

Post by beantree »

Just like the previous post, I installed the beta on a PC that had never seen Yawcam and it would not detect the camera.

I deleted the files and installed 0.2.5 which worked fine.
I then installed the 0.2.6 update. Also fine.

I think this is a great piece of software that I only discovered today and I hope my comments help the development.
mikepfly2
Posts: 1
Joined: Thu Aug 10, 2006 3:27 pm

Beta Download No Cam Detected and FTP PW Issue

Post by mikepfly2 »

First, great software, I've been using v 0.2.6 for a week now and love it and ready to make a little paypal contribution to keep it up. Thanks!

Could some please clarify that this beta version zip file is the WHOLE program or is it similar to an upgrade where I'm supposed to replace v 0.2.6 files? When I use it as a standalone it doesn't recognize my logitech camera which worked fine in previous versions. Am I supposed to upgrade 0.2.5 to 0.2.6 to earlier beta, to this beta?

Also, regarding v 0.2.6: I have my FTP password saved and it will upload 1 or 2 images fine to my server then the FTP username/password dialog box will pop open and not upload anymore...When I enter my password and click "Save password" and Ok, the box repeatedly pops open again and the password field is blank. I can only get out of it by clicking cancel which disables the FTP upload.

Is this a known issue that is fixed in any of these beta versions? My corporate proxy blocks most ports so I'm unable to stream but hope to get the FTP up and running.

Thanks much in advance,
Michael
Kenneth
Posts: 2
Joined: Thu Aug 17, 2006 6:41 pm

Re: Beta Download No Cam Detected and FTP PW Issue

Post by Kenneth »

mikepfly2 wrote:
Could someone please clarify that this beta version zip file is the WHOLE program or is it similar to an upgrade where I'm supposed to replace v 0.2.6 files? When I use it as a standalone it doesn't recognize my logitech camera which worked fine in previous versions. Am I supposed to upgrade 0.2.5 to 0.2.6 to earlier beta, to this beta?
I would also like an answer to this question.

How about a detailed, comprehensive install guide for the beta?
kwikone
Posts: 17
Joined: Thu Jul 20, 2006 5:40 pm

Beta 0.2.6>7 does not detect camera that works with 0.2.6

Post by kwikone »

I just finished trying to get the latest beta version installed and working (hoping that it would solve my problem with 0.2.6) BUT :cry: it keeps indicating that it does not detect a camera. When I go through the Detect Camera it shows that Camera Detection FAILED almost immediately after starting (where 0.2.6 takes quite some time with camera detection and does detect the camera - vfw:Microsoft WDM Image Capture (Win32):0 :vfw://0 - it is a logitech camera).
I saw where you had made a debug batch file so I tried running the debug for you

Code: Select all

jre\bin\java.exe -Xmx512m -cp .;jre\lib\ext;jre\lib;jre\bin yawcam.Main > debug_log.txt 2>&1
The following is from the debug_log.txt file. I started yawcam, got the error indicating did not find a camera, then the options dialog opened, I canceled it, then clicked on menu Detect Camera and went through the detection phase, had the options dialog open up and canceled it and closed it down (note that I did not click on edit settings and the settings/options dialog opened on its own):

Code: Select all

YAWCAM - Yet Another Webcam Software
url: http://www.yawcam.com/ver.dat
url: http://www.dtek.chalmers.se/~d00malun/yawcam/ver.dat
F: http://www.yawcam.com/ver.dat
F: http://www.dtek.chalmers.se/~d00malun/yawcam/ver.dat
0.2.6>7 == 0.2.6  -> 2
Passwords:
---------------------------------
---------------------------------
Banned ip:
---------------------------------
---------------------------------
java.io.FileNotFoundException: motion\EventList.xml (The system cannot find the file specified)
	at java.io.FileInputStream.open(Ljava.lang.String;)V(Native Method)
	at java.io.FileInputStream.<init>(FileInputStream.java:106)
	at java.io.FileInputStream.<init>(FileInputStream.java:66)
	at yawcam.Main.<init>(Main.java:278)
	at yawcam.Main.main(Main.java:799)
camusers: 0
Stream-server started...
Font lagrad: Abadi MT Condensed Light
väntar in bättre tider...
Startar test nu!
Font lagrad: Abadi MT Condensed Light
Saved XML...
What can I do to get it to detect my camera (especially since 0.2.6 does)??? :?:
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