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WebCam Monitor
v5.03 |
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Configuring
Your Camera and PC for Internet Streaming |
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One common use for
webcams is to see what's
happening at your home,
or your business, when
you're away.
WebCam Monitor makes
it easy, streaming video
from one or more
cameras. However,
as network security
becomes tighter, you may
have to change your
network settings to make
the video visible from
outside your own local
network. |
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The most common type of
computer network today
uses the Internet
Protocol,
almost always
abbreviated to "IP".
There are two types of
IP addresses - Private
and Public.
The numbers that begin
with 192.168.x.x are
called Private IP
addresses - and they are
only useful inside
your network.
So your desktop computer
might be 192.168.2.2,
and your laptop might be
192.168.2.3. Public
IP addresses are
assigned by your ISP.
You can see your Public
IP address by visiting
http://www.MyPcIPInfo.com. |
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A typical home or small
office LAN has a router that connects to the Internet.
Every other device on the
network connects to
Internet servers by
going through the
router. The router
in these situations is
often called a
"firewall". |
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In order to see a WebCam
Monitor video stream
from outside your
network, you need to
instruct the router to
let certain requests
into your network from
the Internet. |
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Because
there are so
many brands
of router
that you may
be using, we
can't give
detailed
instructions
for each.
By following
the basic
procedure
shown here
you should
be able to
set up your
own router
to allow
WebCam
Monitor
video
streams to
be seen from
the
Internet. |
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For most routers, there
are two ways to allow
the video out of your
network: put the
computer in the DMZ
and use Port
Forwarding. |
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In the special
vocabulary of network
firewalls, the DMZ is a
zone which has no
security. All
connection attempts are
permitted through.
If you put your PC in
the DMZ, WebCam Monitor
streams will be visible
from outside, but so
will every other network
port, which may leave
your computer open to system
hijackers.
Therefore, we recommend
that instead, you use
Port Forwarding. |
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Port Forwarding |
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One aspect of IP
networking is the use of
different "ports" for
different kinds of
network service. In Port
Forwarding, you will
instruct your router to
pass along requests that
come to the video
streaming port to your
PC, while ignoring other
requests. |
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First of all, you'll need
to open the configuration utility for your router.
Of course, different companies use different systems,
but a common one is to open a web browser and type a
particular address into its Address Bar, often
192.168.1.1. You can find out how to do this from
the manual for your router, or the manufacturer's web
site. |
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Now you'll need to
locate the Port
Forwarding configuration
for your router.
This will look different
for every brand and
model of router, so
don't expect yours to
look exactly like my
illustration. Some
common names for this
configuration screen may
be 'Virtual Server' or
'Applications'. |
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You will need to pick a
port to forward.
WebCam Monitor lets you
select any port for
streaming. The
default is port 80, but
when streaming using a
cable modem or DSL modem
to connect to the
Internet, we recommend a
higher-numbered port,
like port 4569.
There are two reasons
for this:
- Most Internet
Service Providers
now block access to
commonly-used ports
in order to keep you
from running a
server in your home
while only paying
for a consumer
account. Ports
frequently blocked
by ISPs include 25,
80, and 8080.
- Using a
randomly-selected
high number port
avoids the
possibility of
conflicting with a
port used by other
software.
In our example we'll
use port 4569. |
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As you can see, when
setting up Port
Forwarding, you enter
the port to forward from
the outside, what
computer to forward it
to inside your network,
and what port to forward
it to. It would be
possible to forward port
4569 from the Internet
to port 80 on your own
computer, but in this
case we'll keep it
consistent. Some
routers must be
restarted before the
change in configuration
takes effect. |
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You must also set up
WebCam Monitor to use
the correct port.
You can do that by
clicking the Tools
menu, then Options,
switching to the
Remote Monitoring
tab, and pressing the
Configure button for
Streaming. |
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That should do it. |
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To connect from outside,
you need to know what
URL to type into your
browser. You can
find that out by opening
a web browser on the
machine running WebCam
Monitor and visiting
MyPCIPInfo.com.
That gives you your
Public IP address. My
IP address is shown as
65.119.205.151. To
this, you add
mms:// at the
beginning, and
:4569 at the end
(substituting your IP
address, and the port
you selected for 4569).
The final URL would look
like this:
mms://65.119.205.151:4569
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Several other ways to
remotely view camera
information are
explained in
this article. |
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WebCam Monitor give
you the ability to "keep
an eye on things" with
video streams from your
web cameras. Using
the tips in this
article, you can
configure your network
and connect from
anywhere. |
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