Questions/ Suggestions/ Feedback? Please enter your query below. Positive feedback is very much appreciated! Please note that I can only respond to English questions.

 

FAQ

Is there a MAC version available?

No not at the moment, maybe sometime this year.

iSpy crashes - help!

The #1 reason for ispy crashing is that you've overloaded your PC. iSpy lets you add as many cameras and microphones as you like but there are obviously limits to this imposed by your hardware. If you are experiencing crashes then try reducing the number of cameras you are monitoring or recording. If you want to monitor a lot of cameras it's best to use multiple PCs to do this and then access the agregated content through ispyconnect. If you are sure the problem is not due to your computer overloading (check your memory usage/ free disk space/ CPU usage etc) then please do let us know - check the log files (View -> Log Files) as any details in there will be useful.

Can I sell iSpy, or include it in a commercial package?

No, iSpy is open source LGPL - so you can't sell it as a commercial product. If you extend iSpy your modifications will also need to be open source. iSpy uses a lot of open source projects which also have the same licensing restrictions so we're unable to sell you a commercial license. You can however modify and redistribute iSpy and make money by becoming an affiliate.

How come you charge for alerts/ remote access?

Support, alerts and remote access cost us $ to provide so we have to charge for providing them. The fact that we charge for remote access and alerts is spelt out on our homepage.

Why do you charge for email alerts?

Charging for emails massively reduces the load on our email servers - providing free email services to 40,000 concurrent users (with framegrabs!) would require a lot of servers and a lot of $! If you want to use your own SMTP mailer you can setup a batch file to send email from the command line and then execute this on motion detect. There are many ways to do this. Example.

Why do you charge for youtube uploads?

The youtube uploader requires a youtube development key to access it. If everyone that downloaded ispy used our development key to automatically upload videos that key would get banned very quickly and then everyone would be complaining that it doesn’t work. The only way to restrict the number of people that are using it is to put it behind the paywall.

I can't access iSpy remotely!

Run the "troubleshooter" on the web settings control. Then read the trouble shooting guide. Failing that, contact us with details of everything you've tried, any error messages or entries in the Log file (View- Log File in iSpy) and the output from the network troubleshooter.

Do I need to leave a computer switched on for iSpy to work?

Yes. iSpy needs to be running on a computer to detect and record motion. If your computer is switched off, iSpy won't work or be accessible. You can purchase cameras with built in computers though through XIMEA.

I haven't received an MMS alert (but SMS is working)

MMS messages are delivered by a third party provider and go over a different network - they are generally delivered a lot slower than SMS messages. We recommend using SMS alerts if you require fast notifications.

I'm receiving loads of MMS/ SMS alerts

Check the "Minimum Alert Interval" on the Alerts tab. We recommend a setting of at least 180 seconds (max one alert every 2 minutes), if you set this to a small value you will use up your alerts credits very quickly. Email alerts are throttled to 10 every 30 minutes.

Will my brand of camera work with iSpy?

Most probably yes, without direct access to every type of camera it's hard to help with this one. You will need to find a direct link to the stream provided by your camera. Usually these addresses are available in the documentation of your camera or are available from the manufacturer on request. We've got a connection wizard here which may help. Another thing to try is to install WireShark or Fiddler and run it whilst accessing your camera - it should provide you with the URL the webpage is using to communicate with the camera and you will then be able to use that to connect to it with iSpy. You may also need to add in your username and password in the form of http://username:password@ipaddress/whatever.asf.

Does my multiple camera network video card work with iSpy?

iSpy uses DirectX to access the cameras so if the card comes with proprietary drivers and software you may be out of luck. If you can access the individual feeds with VLC then you should be able to use the VLC plugin in iSpy to connect to them

Can you add support to control my PTZ camera?

This is hard to do without direct access to your PTZ camera to find out what commands it takes to control it. iSpy uses a simple XML configuration script to control PTZ cameras. You can find this script in the folder:

C:\Users\USERNAME\AppData\Roaming\iSpy\XML (where USERNAME is your username)

You can have a go at adding support for your camera (if you're technically minded) by editing this file. Some key points to consider:

1) Make sure you specify a new ID in the Camera entry
2) The CommandURL entry is relative to the network address of your camera, so shouldn't start with http://...
3) The entries for the PTZ directions (Left,LeftUp etc) get appended to the querystring in CommandURL. iSpy automatically builds the URL.
4) If you get it working - please send it to me so I can include it in future versions of iSpy (and make it available to download as an update).

A good tool to use to find out what all the entries should be is Fiddler - run this whilst controlling your PTZ camera and look at the network requests to get at the relevant information.

If the above sounds like total gibberish to you then you'll need to set up remote access to your camera for me to be able to help, which i'm happy to do :)

 

Other Resources

Check the forums first as your question may already have been resolved by someone else.

Download the latest version - if you're using an old version of iSpy it's quite likely your problem has already been fixed... Check out our change log for more info.

Read through our help pages - or use the Help menu at the top of the page.