Raspberry Pi IP Webcam

[IziWhatNow]

Hi guys,

I've been playing with my Raspberry Pi and made a nice IP web cam out of it.

I used this guide

There are basically 3 steps:
1. Install Raspbian Weezy
2. Install Motion & webcam drivers
3. Enable port-forwarding on router

This is working perfectly and I can now see what's going on at home, from work! I can view the live feed in my browser, or use the Mjpeg Viewer app on Android.

I'd still like to do the following:
1. Replace the LAN cable with USB Wifi
2. Find alternate power source (battery pack, solar panel etc.)
3. Build webcam & pi into single enclosure

With my current setup, not having a static IP is a bit difficult.
So I'd like to find a way to retrieve my router's public IP somehow from outside.
Any ideas on how this can be done?

I'd also like to be able to create a wifi hotspot on my phone and let the Pi connect to that. Then I can easily pop the webcam into the car (powered from lighter) and have a makeshift dashcam.
But I need advice: will it be possible to access the Pi from outside, since I can't enable port forwarding through the phone's wifi hotspot?

In the future it might be useful to have something that automatically sends you a few images via email as soon as motion has been detected. That might be very useful for security.

I have a live ASP.net server at my disposal too, so I might write some service for that.

There are lots possibilities with this setup, although a stand-alone, pre-built solution will almost always work better.

But in the end, it's more about the fun of setting it up!

If anyone else would like to try the setup and is having trouble with the guide mentioned above, let me know and I might help out. But I should mention that I'm no Linux guru, I too just followed the guide and Google'd a bit

 

[SpoonTech]

For a USB WiFi dongle for the Raspberry Pi I would recommend a WiPi from PiFactory. (pifactory.co.za)

It will save you time as some WiFi cards do not work, draw too much power or require compiling drivers from source and tinkering to get them to work nicely.

If you are looking at solar you will need 2 x 5 Watt panels. They output between about 12 and 18 volts amd saturate quite easily with outdoor light. You can stabilise and regulate this down to 5 volts and pull about 1 to 1.6 amps off this for a USB port

 

[IziWhatNow]

For a USB WiFi dongle for the Raspberry Pi I would recommend a WiPi from PiFactory. (pifactory.co.za)

Ah I see, R180. Thanks

 

[SpoonTech]

Look into no-ip.com. They will allow you to use a free domain (or map your existing domain to your dynamic IP). You then install the linux client and it will auto update to that domain (every X minutes set in config).

The catch with the free service is that you have to login online once every 30 days or they will terminate your free service. Its not really a problem and they send you an email reminder to do so.