ZoneMinder and Multiple OS's

As I'm working through my ZoneMinder setup (and more posts are coming), I ran into a capacity issue.  I thought it'd be a good time to do a bake-off between ZoneMinder on Ubuntu/Linux vs FreeBSD.  This wasn't as easy as I thought...

VPNs - A Routing Warning

VPNs are great things.  They allow secure remote access to your resources, either for your home or your job.  At work the solution is simple to use because typically someone else sets it up for you.  But if you are that person that does the setup (either at home or if you're the "network person" at work), VPNs can be complex.  I'd like to cover a quick thing to watch out for targeted at small VPNs, especially since I talked about VPNs in a previous ZoneMinder article.

ZoneMinder Sample Infrastructure

So far I've been talking about how to configure ZoneMinder to do certain things.  I haven't said anything about what the ZoneMinder topology looks like.  ZoneMinder can be setup many different ways, but I'm going to stick to the simplest way for the purposes of this post.

Basic Security with ZoneMinder

ZoneMinder "out of the box" is setup with the most basic of features configured and simple to get going.  And security is never simple, so by default ZoneMinder is configured to be wide open to anyone who accesses the URL.  As I'm sure you've probably noticed.  In this post I'll cover some of the basics of ZoneMinder authentication, as well as some additional ideas on securing a ZoneMinder setup.

ZoneMinder - My First Zone

My saga with ZoneMinder continues!  In this post I'll discuss adding in my first camera / zone and testing in the web UI on a PC.  In theory at the end of this post there will be a camera setup that will capture motion events.

My Quest With ZoneMinder - Deciding and Installing

For the past several years, I've been using Milestone Systems XProtect as my NVR software package for my security cameras at home.  Recently I've ran up against the limits of the free version (8 cameras).  In looking at what it would cost me to keep up to date with XProtect, it's become obvious that it's not possible for me to continue using XProtect.  Further, XProtect is quite expensive for some of the people I do consulting work for.  As such, I started looking at alternatives and ZoneMinder came up.  I did some quick feature comparisons and for my purposes, ZoneMinder seems to fit the bill.  After doing some research on the Internet, I decided I should document my thoughts and work since there is a lot of scattered information out there, as well as lots of old information.

SCUBA Diving At Night: A Comparison To Human Behavior

As you may have noticed from my last post, I just got back from a SCUBA vacation.  And while on that trip Carissa and I completed several PADI Specialty Diver classes though our local shop (SeaVentures).  One of the ones that I did (and Carissa already had) was the Night Diver Specialty.  During the class you always get asked "so why do you want to complete the X specialty".  My answer was "to get more comfortable diving at night, and be able to appreciate the creatures that come out on the reefs after the Sun goes down".  I finished the specialty, got some good experience, and had fun doing it.  I wasn't prepared for what came next.