Can anyone recommend a webcam for use with Linux (Fedora Core 1)?
i.e. one that they use and any experiences they have had with it. I
want to use Gnomemeeting.

Thanks

On Tue, 17 Feb 2004 08:38:08 -0800, Fountain of knowledge wrote:

I use a Logitech QuickCam Zoom which uses the pwc kernel module.
Works perfectly. Most of the Logitech cams seem to be reasonably well
supported.

The following google should give you more than enough information.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&l...=Google+Search

Regards,
Dave

On Tue, 17 Feb 2004 21:56:13 +0000
Dave Millen <postmaster@[127.0.0.1]> wrote:

Great, I ever thought it was (not yet) possible to heard such a thing !
(because of what is stated at <http://www.smcc.demon.nl/webcam/#news> )

I own a Logitech QuickCam Zoom, and can't get it working. Will you help
me (and probbably other people), reporting me (us) your kernel version,
pwc version, modules parameters, kernel log, and whatever you estimate
that may help !

regards,

laurent.

On Tue, 24 Feb 2004 01:13:07 +0100, GONZALEZ Laurent wrote:



One thing you may want to check is whether your system is loading the
usb-uhci module for usb1. This is required. I have to force loading of
this, since my M/B has usb2 and it picks the usb2 module by default. The
following line in /etc/rc.d/rc.local cures this for me:

/sbin/modprobe usb-uhci

Distribution: RH 9 fully up2date
Kernel: 2.4.20-30.9
pwc version: 8.8 (Stock module that comes with the RH 9 kernel rpm).

Here are the relevant boot messages - but *please note* the
module does *not* auto-load, I have the following line in
/etc/rc.d/rc.local:

/sbin/modprobe pwc

and I don't need to pass any parameters.

Once loaded, the following relevant lines appear in syslog:

Feb 24 00:00:55 eden kernel: pwc Philips PCA645/646 + PCVC675/680/690 + PCVC730/740/750 webcam module version 8.8 loaded.
Feb 24 00:00:55 eden kernel: pwc Also supports the Askey VC010, Logitech Quickcam 3000 Pro, Samsung MPC-C10 and MPC-C30,
Feb 24 00:00:55 eden kernel: pwc the Creative WebCam 5, SOTEC Afina Eye and Visionite VCS-UC300 and VCS-UM100.
Feb 24 00:00:55 eden kernel: usb.c: registered new driver Philips webcam

The strings command on pwc.o shows what seems to be support for the
following devices:

Visionite VCS-UC300
Sotec Afina Eye
Creative Labs Webcam 5
Samsung MPC-C30
Samsung MPC-C10
Logitech QuickCam Pro 3000
Logitech QuickCam Zoom
Logitech QuickCam Pro 4000
Askey VC010 webcam
Philips 645 webcam
Philips 646 webcam
Philips 675 webcam
Philips 680 webcam
Philips 690 webcam
Philips 730 webcam
Philips 740 webcam
Philips 750 webcam

Sorry if any of the above wraps strangely.

Good luck,
Dave

On Tue, 24 Feb 2004 01:11:42 +0000
Dave Millen <postmaster@[127.0.0.1]> wrote:

indeed, I do /sbin/modprobe uhci. It completely slipped my mind to test
with the former !

for me, a vanilla 2.4.25 kernel and pwc 8.12
I probably need to hack a bit around the driver.

Are you able to grab a custom sized picture ?
Thank you for your answer.

regards,

laurent.

On Tue, 24 Feb 2004 08:53:11 +0100, GONZALEZ Laurent wrote:

Well, gnomemeeting gives me 3 possible sizes that can be grabbed and saved:

320 x 240 #zoom in
160 x 120 #default
80 x 60 #zoom out

The above sizes have a grey border around them, making the actual image
sizes slightly larger.

Oh... and the output from the cam can also be viewed fullscreen, although
a dump to file at this size doesn't seem to be possible.

Using /usr/bin/webcam, I have not been able to change the size of the grab
from what seems to be the default size of 160 x 120. I can change the size
of the saved image, but the additional size is just a larger grey
background with the 160 x 120 image in the middle.

If anyone knows how to modify ~/.webcamrc to achieve the full 640 x 480
that this cam should be capable of(or even 320 x 240), I would be grateful.

Regards,
Dave

On Tue, 24 Feb 2004 14:05:14 +0000
Dave Millen <postmaster@[127.0.0.1]> wrote:

After looking the sources of the driver and making some experiments, I
really think the driver is broken. I guess that 160x120 is the default
setting of the camera (hard-wired in its firmware). You got 320x240 and
80x60, because gnomemeeting post-processes the grabbed frame.

to be continued ...

On Wed, 25 Feb 2004 21:12:48 +0100, GONZALEZ Laurent wrote:

OK, I have made everything work! Can now grab at up to 640 x 480 without
interpolation(i.e. a true 640 X 480).

I was missing the pwcx module. You can't get the source for this as it
contains closed source code. The latest precompiled binaries work across
kernel versions though, if you use insmod --force to load them. A good
page that I found with instructions and download links is at:

http://seismo.ethz.ch/linux/webcam.html

This is my current ~/.webcamrc for 640 x 480 grabs which is working
perfectly both for single images(as below) and repeating images(change
'once = 1' to 'once = 0'):

[grab]
device = /dev/video0
text = "webcam %Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S"
infofile = /root/infofile
fg_red = 255
fg_green = 255
fg_blue = 255
width = 640
height = 480
delay = 3
wait = 0
input = Webcam
norm = pal
rotate = 0
top = 0
left = 0
bottom = 479
right = 639
quality = 75
trigger = 0
once = 1

[ftp]
host = localhost
user = webcam
pass = XXXXXXXX
dir = /home/camgrabs
file = webcam.jpeg
tmp = uploading.jpeg
passive = 1
debug = 0
auto = 0
local = 1
ssh = 0

Good luck,
Dave