Maximum CD 2000 November/Maximum CD 2000 Nov.iso/PowerWare/TeVeoLive/data1.cab/Program_Files/README.txt

Text File | 2000-05-24 | 18.5 KB | 402 lines

TeVeo Live 2.0.0 README
May 24, 2000

TeVeo Live software allows you to broadcast live video on the
web from any Windows 98 or Windows 2000 machine. People can then
view your camera by visiting www.teveo.com. Once your camera is
registered with TeVeo, you can use the link to the TeVeo web
site on any HTML page.

Please read the following carefully to ensure that the process
of setting up your system goes smoothly.

Getting Started

In order to proceed, youÆll need to do the following on the
Windows machine youÆre designating for use with your web camera:

1) Install your web camera tools/drivers/software which are
provided from that manufacturer. Each camera manufacturer (Intel,
IBM, Philips, etc.) will have slightly different installation
procedures. Use the cameraÆs documentation to resolve questions
about that companyÆs installer software.

2) Plug the camera into the USB (Universal Serial Bus) socket on
your machine. Since USB delivers power to the camera, you should
be 'live' simply by plugging into the port.

3) After successful completion of steps 1 and 2, you can test
the camera with its own included software that you installed from
the manufacturer. This provides a 'sanity check' that the camera
is functioning correctly out of the box. It is sufficient to
merely view the camera on your PC screen to establish correct
video picture streaming. Camera installation problems should be
taken up with your camera manufacturerÆs technical support team.

4) Install TeVeo Live 2.0 from the TeVeo Live CD or from the web
site download. On some PCÆs, the installation software may indicate
to reboot your machine when completed.

5) Important! In order to take advantage of the web features of
TeVeo Live, your web connection must be active prior to launching
the TeVeo Live program. For home users, this means you have to be
dialed in to your internet service provider (such as AOL or
Compuserve, etc.) or have DSL, cable modem service, etc. TeVeo
Live will run without being online, but web features will not be
active until your machine is online.

6) Once online, youÆre ready to start! After step 4, an icon
will appear on your computerÆs desktop screen (and in your Start
menu) for the TeVeo Live 2.0 program. Double click the TeVeo Live
icon to start the program. You should see live video from your
camera in the TeVeo Live screen. If not, try æTroubleShooting
Tips', below.

7) The first thing new users will have to do is click on the
'Register Now' button in TeVeo Live. This will connect you
automatically to TeVeoÆs website, and the instructions there
will get you on your way. During this process, you will be asked
whether your camera should be marked 'Public' or 'Private'. If
you decide to have a 'Public' camera, anyone who visits
www.teveo.com will be able to see your camera if they want by
clicking on your camera's name. If you have a 'Private' camera,
you will provide a password to TeVeo, and the web site will
prevent anyone from viewing (or even seeing a listing of) your
camera unless they type in your camera's name and password.

8) Once your camera is registered, anyone who is online can
visit your camera at www.teveo.com and typing in the (optional)
password you have selected. To find a public camera on TeVeoÆs
web site, select the 'Cameras' section at the top of the page.


After Installation and Registration

Once you have installed the camera, started the TeVeo Live
program and registered through the TeVeo website, we invite you
to tell your friends and family to view your camera through
their own web connection. Viewers of your camera need NO special
software, just an ordinary browser (e.g. Netscape, Internet
Explorer, etc.). You should be able to be viewed from companies
networks, from Unix and Macintosh machines, from anyone (who
youÆve told your password to) with an internet connection. All
anyone has to do is visit www.teveo.com and they can see your
camera for free.

As you continue using TeVeo Live, please feel free to make
comments and observations, and mail these to [e-mail].
TeVeo will use your feedback to improve the product prior to our
upcoming releases in the next few months.


Camera Manufacturers

The industry of web cameras is still maturing. TeVeo has noticed
(and is constantly logging) compatibility problems, as well as
idiosyncratic behavior with certain cameras that weÆve tested.
Additionally, new cameras with new software drivers arrive on the
scene daily, so what might not work today could work fine a month
from now with the new manufacturer's driver. WeÆve made a simple
list of cameras and rated them according to compatibility with
TeVeo Live as of the release of our software. Individual camera
features that can be adjusted to improve performance are covered
in the TroubleShooting Tips, below.

Highest Camera Reliability with TeVeo Live:

We support any camera that has a WDM (Windows Driver Model)
capture driver. We can also support in many cases, a camera that
uses the older VfW (Video for Windows) standard. IMPORTANT! If
BOTH types of drivers (WDM and VfW) drivers are available for
your particular camera, we highly recommend using the WDM drivers
(try downloading the latest drivers from your manufacturerÆs
website).

Philips (all USB web cams)
Kensington (all USB web cams)
Intel (all USB web cams)
IBM (all USB web cams)
Nogatech USB A/D converter (with any VHS camera, like X10, etc.)
Belkin USB A/D converter (like the Nogatech)
TNC Taiwan USB Camera
Kodak DVC325
LifeView FlyCam/RoboCam USB
Logitech QuickCam USB Cameras
Video Blaster WebCam Go (ONLY with the latest WDM drivers from www.creative.com)

Medium or Low Camera Reliability with TeVeo Live:
Aiptek HyperVCam (only with EZonics drivers!)

Does not work with TeVeo Live:
AverMedia InterCam-USB
Ezonics EZCam USB and EZCam Pro

TroubleShooting Tips

To get the best result from this list, weÆve divided it into
two parts: First, for problems related to the TeVeo Live program;
Second, for trouble viewing a camera on www.teveo.com.

TeVeo Live Tips

- TeVeo Live 2.0 does not work on Windows 95!
Upgrade to Windows 98 or Windows 2000 to use TeVeo Live 2.0.

- How can I customize my guest page that viewers see?
You can modify the file guest.htm which is a simple HTML file
that occurs in the application directory (default is
"C:\Program Files\TeVeo\TeVeo Live 2.0"). Be sure not to remove
any reference to the "jload" applet or to rename/delete this
file!

- How can I use audio with TeVeo Live 2.0?
TeVeo Live does not support sound. Our focus is to provide
camera owners with the best looking motion and image possible
from their cameras. However, you can download sound/chat
functionality from www.hearme.com and incorporate it to the
file GUEST.HTM in your TeVeo directory. While this is an untested
and unsupported feature, it has worked for many of our users.

- The frame rate that users see is slow
Smoothness (frame rate) is effected by many factors (Internet
connection, picture size etc.) Smaller pictures and less quality
will make the video go smoother. You can adjust these on the
Camera Controls form (click the camera button). Of course a DSL
or Cable modem will bring better results too.

- How do I know who is watching me?
As for the number of viewers watching you, there are 3 places to
check this: First, if an 'eye' appears on the TeVeo Live application
while you are connected to the internet (and registered properly
with teveo.com), then someone just started watching you. A little
'bloop' sound will play as well. Move the mouse pointer on top of
the eye, and the number of viewers will display as a floating
tool-tip. Second, if you click the new "i" (information) button on
the title bar, you can see not only how many viewers there are, but
also how many viewers have ever watched your camera since a certain
date (which can be cleared at any time). Lastly, if you go to
www.teveo.com and select the "Cameras" tab (top of page), then
select "All Live Cameras", you'll see a picture next to each
camera indicating how many people are currently watching that
camera. Once that number gets bigger than 10, the picture changes
to "a bunch of eyes". Note that when machines are being watched
by many users, the video stream will slow down.

- Camera does not display video
Generally, to solve problems of this nature, we start by checking
the manufacturerÆs software to see if video displays ok. Run any
of the sample applications that shipped with your camera to see
if video is visible. If not, then the camera or manufacturerÆs
software may be corrupted, or there may be compatibility problems
between your machine and that camera.

Make sure that no other applications are currently using the
camera. For example, you should close all the native camera
applications (software that ships with the camera) before starting
TeVeo Live.

If you have been able to see video previously, but now there is
no image in the TeVeo Live window, it may be necessary to reboot
your machine to æclearÆ the cameraÆs software drivers.

You should check the camera controls screen (Click the æControlsÆ
button in TeVeo Live) and make sure the cameraÆs æbrightnessÆ is
not set to 0.

On the same controls screen, try changing to different picture
sizes (TeVeo has noticed that some camera manufacturers provide a
list of picture sizes they support, though the camera does not
display accurately for each entry on their list).

For users with more than one camera device on your system, we've
added a feature in Live 2.0 to help you. There is now an "i"
button (information) on the title bar. When you click it, a new
form will display, and there is a button that gives you the option
to manually switch camera drviers. This may be necessary if you
have both a capture card AND a USB camera on your machine. Some
capture card drivers are known to be loaded erroneously with
TeVeo Live 2.0

As a final help, we ask you to contact [e-mail] and
attach the file 'Startup.log' that will be in the directory you
installed TeVeo Live into. For expert users, you can read the text
in Startup.log and look for messages indicating a more detailed
description of your startup problems.

- Web site links do not work
TeVeo Live will attempt to connect you to www.teveo.com if you
click the TeVeo logo, the æRegister NowÆ button, the æLivecast'
button and the æMy ProfileÆ button. The main thing to make sure
of is that your internet connection is 'live' on your machine. If
not, you must close TeVeo Live, start your browser (or dial in),
then restart TeVeo Live.

- 'Camera not found' message appears on startup
There are several possibilities that could be happening to cause
this error. The first case is related to multiple (different
manufacturer) cameras installed on the same machine. We notice
that sometimes, the incorrect driver is selected for a camera so
that no video will display. It will be necessary for you to
validate that this is the problem by running your cameraÆs
native software and checking that video is behaving normally in
its own environment. It may be necessary to uninstall the drivers
for the extraneous camera. Again, reboots can be helpful,
especially if a lot of other software is currently running on
your machine. What you can try is to click the "i" (information)
button on the title bar, and click the "Change Driver..." button
that appears. You will be presented with a list of drivers that
TeVeo Live will 'prefer' when starting up.

- Disconnecting the camera manually from the USB port while
TeVeo Live is running causes a failure. This is a known bug.
It may be necessary to reboot your machine in order to
successfully restart TeVeo Live.

- You want to use a different 'stop' screen image.
When the user stops the camera by clicking the 'Stop' button,
an image appears that says 'Back in a few minutes'. This
image is called 'TimeoutPicture.jpg' and is in the application
directory. You can edit this picture to be anything you want,
as long as the format (JPG) and name remain the same.

- TeVeo Live crashes on startup, or displays
incorrect TCP/IP address. A known problem will occur if your
system has 2 ethernet cards, or has both a modem and a network
connection active. You need to take action that the live
connection is the one selected by TeVeo Live. In the
network/modem case, you have to disconnect yourself from your
network (unplug the cable) and reboot your machine in order
to use the modem. In the dual card case, you need put your
mouse over the 'My Computer' icon on your desktop, right-click
the mouse, select Properties, then select Device Manager,
click on the '+' sign next to Network adapters, and under
General select the Ethernet adapter card that is not plugged
into your Network, select the Properties option, and check
the box at the bottom of the screen under Device
usage/Disable in this hardware profile, then select OK.

- My IBM camera will lock up my system after some period
of time. This is a known problem with some cameras on some
machines. The company that manufactures the IBM camera,
Xirlink, recommends trying to run the camera without audio
and overlay. To do this, open the IBM camera software pages
(you can access these via TeVeo Live in the controls panel
- click the æAdvancedÆ button). Go to Camera Options->Video
 Format and uncheck 'Enable Overlay', then go to Camera
Options->Capture Control and uncheck 'Enable Audio'.

- My Nogatech device does not display video correctly.
Nogatech is one of several companies that supplies an
older, VfW (Video for Windows) software driver for its
device AS WELL AS a newer WDM (Windows Driver Model) set.
If you have an older Nogatech device, you should download
and install the newer WDM drivers from www.nogatech.com.
Note that the Windows 2000 driver for the Nogatech device
seems to show the best performance.

- My Video Blaster WebCam hangs after being up and
running for an hour. Video Blaster tech support has
recommended a patch to their driver at
http://support.soundblaster.com/files/download.asp.
Also according to their tech support, that camera
is not meant to be left up and running for long
periods of time.

TeVeo website tips

- I can't see any cameras on www.teveo.com
Java and Javascript must both be enabled on your machine.
There are settings to do this if you select the "Start"
menu for Windows, pick "Settings" followed by "Control
Panel". Go to the section marked "Internet options". On
this dialog, go to the "Advanced" tab. Scroll down to
the section marked "Java VM" and check all 3 boxes. There
may be other advanced settings to select on your browser
or in your ISP (AOL, etc.) page to make sure that java
and javascript are enabled.

- My private camera can't be accessed by people I gave
the password to
Note that passwords are case-sensitive, so "Password"
is not the same as "PASSWORD".

- People I want to see my camera canÆt find it on
teveo.com. There are two ways to access public cameras
on www.teveo.com: One - click the 'Cameras' tab at
the top of the screen. Second, scroll down the main
web site page and select one of the categories and
follow that by selecting one of the subcategories. If
you can't find the camera you are looking for (and you
know it's active) perhaps the camera has been
registered as a 'private' camera. In this case, you'll
need to know the camera's name and the guest password
to access the view. You enter these in the blanks at
the upper left of the web site.

- People I want to see my camera canÆt open the camera
from their browser. For the time being, if you are
broadcasting from a home network, make sure that VPN
(virtual private network) is disabled. Additionally, older
browsers that do not support Java may not behave correctly.
There is a section on how to deal with this under "support"
on www.teveo.com. In this version of TeVeo Live, if you go
to the camera controls, there is an opportunity to switch
the default port number used by Live to reach the outside
world. Caution: This is an advanced feature.

- I saw a camera with inappropriate content on teveo.com
TeVeo strives to keep all inappropriate content in the
'private camera' part of our web site (meaning it will
not be visible, unless you happen to know the camera name
AND the camera owners password). There is no public list
of 'private' cameras anywhere on our site. Any time content
such as this is seen, we push the camera off to the private
part of our site. We work as a team to monitor cameras and
prevent these cameras from reaching our public lists.


Advanced Users

TeVeo Live relies on an initialization file called
"TeVeoLive.ini" which is created in your windows directory
(e.g. "C:\windows\teveolive.ini"). There are some advanced
features which can be modified. TeVeo recommends against
trying to edit this file without care:

The 'DropFrames' paramater is used to control
frame dropping.  If it is greater than one, it
indicates that some of the frames received
from the capture driver should be dropped and
neither displayed nor sent to the a web page.
The numeric value indicates the cycle length.
There is only one frame displayed for each
cycle.  (e.g., 2=drop every other frame; 3=
drop every 2 of 3 frames; 4=drop every 3
of 4 frames, etc.)  The parameter can be
useful in cases where the camera is too fast
for the CPU.  It may also be useful in handling
problems with older VfW drivers.

If non-zero, the 'MaxBitRate' parameter limits the
bandwidth of each video stream.  The number is
expressed in kilobits per second (kbps).  This can
be useful in limiting bandwidth consumption on a
network. It might also potentially help solve certain
problems with slow machines on a fast network.

The entry under settings 'AlternateDialog=n' where
n = 1, 2, 3 or 4 (try these in order) can be used to
access advanced settings screens for video capture
card devices.

Make sure that the driver listed in the .ini file is
the expected driver for the camera you are using. It
will appear after the 'LastUsed' keyword. If it's not,
you can delete or modify that line and try starting
TeVeo Live again. TeVeo Live will search for a 'correct'
driver and re-add the line to the file. Note that some
camera drivers have been known to get 'selected' by a
camera device that doesn't match! You may have to
delete the offending driver from your machine.