HobbyCamLite app for iPhone and iPad

This is the FREE version of HobbyCam realtime webcam streaming app. It retains the FULL functionalities of HobbyCam 1.2.4 with following limitations:

* You have one minute of connection time with your HobbyCam server. After one minute, your connection will be automatically terminated.

* There is a ten minutes of cool-down period between successive connections. That is, after you have disconnected from your server, you will have to wait for ten minutes before starts another connection.

* FREE version contains iAds.

HobbyCam is a simple, intuitive and high performance application for streaming images from a standard webcam to iPhones/iPod Touches. This is (probably) the only app in its category that has native server backend for the three most popular operating systems: Linux, OS X and Windows. The streaming rate can reach up to 25 FPS (on lowest resolution) even on a 3G network (see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JdMsF8-OHTo).

HobbyCam offers the ability to control your webcam settings remotely from your iPhone/iPod Touch. For example, you can "instantly" change your webcams resolution, brightness, contrast, frame rate etc. (Note, a setting control is only available if your webcam and its driver supports it.).

HobbyCam also supports multi-user access of your webcam. That is, you can have your video streams to multiple iPhones/iPod Touches devices simultaneously (see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dlkcJnuceQA)!!! Secure user authentications are supported.

For further details and server package, visit http://apps.galaxynetwork.org.

Check out server setup howto video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BcqWlmJUKnA.

A Quick FAQs
Q. What types of webcam does HobbyCam support?

A. For linux and OS X, HobbyCam server supports UVC compliant webcam. For a compatibility list, check http://www.ideasonboard.org/uvc. For Windows, any webcam that is windows compilant driver should be fine.

Q. Does HobbyCam support streaming on both WiFi and 3G?

A. Yes!

Q. Can HobberCam server really stream live images to multiple iPhone/iPod Touch devices simultaneously? Does all these devices need to be on the same network?

A. Yes (for the first question) and NO (for the second)! There is no restrictions on which network these devices must be on as long as they can connect to the server. You could have one iPhone on 3G network and one iPod Touch on local wireless network. There is no theoretical difference in terms of streaming live images. Check out the demo video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dlkcJnuceQA.

Q. Can I put HobbyCam into full screen?
A. Yes. Simply double tap the screen after the streaming starts.

Q. Will HobbyCam’s performance be severely downgraded when I use 3G?

A. A short answer is NO, based on my own experiments (on a not-so-good 3G network). There will be longer delays between the commands you send and the responses you get back. Once the streaming starts, the performance difference is barely noticeable. However, if you are using an unstable 3G network, you may get frequent network drop off and you will have to log back into your server again.

Q. What is the server CPU load when it is streaming at full speed?

A. Using my test server (first version of mac mini with 1.24GHz G4 CPU) as an example, streaming VGA (640×480) resolution image at 25FPS put ~50% load on the machine; whereas streaming QQVGA (160×120) resolution image at 25FPS puts only ~8% load on the machine.

IMPORTANT NOTE: If you have problem of receiving live image from your webcam (i.e. you can connect to the server but receive a warning message "Video stream stalled" immediately after you start streaming), you should go to Settings.app and switch on "behind a firewall" switch in the HobbyCam settings. After this change, make sure you restart HobbyCam from scratch.