FAQ

Everything works! but live streaming does not - either in ZoneMinder or ZMNinja

Check if streaming works in the web interface. If it does not work, zmNinja won't work either. Fix ZM first

Everything works! but live streaming does not in ZMNinja (works in ZoneMinder)

Go to zmNinja settings and fix your cgi-bin path. the automatic path that is filled in won't work. Here is a hint, go to zoneminder->options->paths and check the value of the cgi-bin path - your zmNinja path will be "base path of your server" + cgi-bin path.

Everything works! but event viewing does not work - I see question marks

There are two situations why this may happen

• You don't have php5-gd installed (or php-gd). You need this package. For ubuntu it's sudo apt-get install php5-gd. Make sure you restart apache.
• It's possible you are not using the latest version of ZM and you need to replace your version of web/views/image.php with this file

Everything works when I use LAN IP, but I get "not authenticated" when I use WAN IP

This is likely happening if you use self signed SSL certs. If you are using self signed certificated, you should make sure the "common name" matches the hostname (or public IP) of the server you are installing ZM in. If not, zmNinja's SSL handshake will fail.

If you have used 'make-ssl-cert' or a similar tool that automatically generates the cert for you, its very likely you have certificate that uses the 'unix hostname' of your server. That will not work.

Assuming you are usin apache and have SSL enabled, here is how to regenerate the certs

This will create a self-signed certificate/key pair and store it in /etc/apache2/ssl (you may have to create that directory, or store it elsewhere)

sudo openssl req -x509 -nodes -days 365 -newkey rsa:2048 -keyout /etc/apache2/ssl/zoneminder.key -out /etc/apache2/ssl/zoneminder.crt

Next up, edit your apache ssl config (example /etc/apache2/sites-available/default-ssl.conf) And add/modify the following lines:

SSLCertificateFile /etc/apache2/ssl/zoneminder.crt
SSLCertificateKeyFile /etc/apache2/ssl/zoneminder.key

restart apache

sudo service apache2 restart

I use self signed certificates with SSL and zmNinja auth doesn't work! (works with http)

Starting release 1.0.6, you no longer need to install SSL certificates on the phone. If you are running a version less than 1.0.6 the stuff below applies:

For versions <1.0.6: Please read [the SSL guide] (https://github.com/pliablepixels/zmNinja/blob/master/docs/SSL-Configuration.md). Summary:

• You need to make sure the common name used while generating the cert is the same as the hostname you specify in zmNinja
• You need to make sure you import the SSL cert into your phone (if you are using the mobile app).

I have 20 monitors but zmNinja only shows 10

Go to developer settings - increase the limit.

HTTP Basic Auth is not working

The login/password fields of zmNinja are not passed on to basic auth. They are for ZM's own OPT_AUTH system. To use basic auth, specify the URLs as user:password@server.com/path in the ZM URL, API URL and cgi-bin URL. Also enable authentication and put in any random login/password in the ZM auth fields (x/x)

It doesn't work

It does. If you need more help, please enable Debug Logs (Developer Settings) then please look at the logs and let me know what you see.

My events list is stale - I don't see the latest events

Tap on the "..." menu option and tap refresh. Alternately, exit events view, load another view, and go back to events.

I'm using mocord/record and I don't see events without alarms

Tap on the "..." menu option and toggle "Show all events". By default, it shows events with at least one alarm frame

Pan/Tilt/Zoom doesn't work

Tilt/Zoom/Presets support has not been added. But for this to work, PTZ needs to work in ZM first. Once it works in ZM, try it in ZMNinja.

What is this Event Server

The Event Server is a contribution I made to ZoneMinder that adds a daemon to the existing list. It listens for new events using shared memory (aka very efficient) and then sends notifications of events to listeners (you can write your own app that listen as well as use zmNinja). This is a chapter on its own, and I have a dedicated page/project for this here. I'd encourage you to install and use it - its very nice.

I am using your event server. I get push notifications to my desktop apps, but not my iPhone/Android phone

Both Apple and Android require that only trusted "servers" can push notifications to your phone. By "trusted", they mean the server needs to use the same SSL certificates that zmNinja uses. That way they can make sure only the author of the app can send the app messages. This makes a lot of sense, because otherwise anyone could spam your phone.

What this means is that you need to enable "usePushProxy" in the event server and have it point to my public push server. If you install the event server, this is enabled by default. If it is not working, check your ZM logs (not ZMNinja) to see if zmeventserver is complaining about anything

It looks like you allow me to modify the frequency of push notifications. Very cool - will it send me all events that I missed if I make the frequency of a monitor event push to say, 600 seconds?

Nope. It only sends the latest events. What it does is before sending push notifications, it checks if the last time a push was sent for this monitor is < the time you specified. If it is, it does not send. That's all.

Oooh. I have 20 cameras and I have 15 phones. I've registered push on all of them and I love getting notifications

Awesome. Happy you liked it. But please help me by configuring zones properly so you don't keep routing a huge number of false alarms to my server. Its running in a VM in an iMac and I'd appreciate you tuning your intervals and zones so my server doesn't die. The push server is now hosted by a kind ZMNinja user in Europe on a VM - but please be kind to that load too!

Is this free?

The source code is free, grab it, compile it, use it. The desktop ports are free as of today. I may charge for it some day. The mobile ports are in Appstore/Playstore for a fee.

Who are the developers behind this?

Me.

Is zmNinja an official ZoneMinder product?

No. But the ZM developers are amazing people who have been very helpful.

I want to donate money

I'd strongly encourage you to donate to to Zoneminder. They need funds much more than I do as ZoneMinder is a very complex product. If you have already, or would still like to donate to zmNinja, let me know and I'll set up a donation page (which I don't have now).

I want to donate time/expertise/code

Great. Make sure you read the license , read the contributing guidelines and if it works for you, happy to see what you'd like to do.

How to report errors

• I'm not a magician. I don't know why something is not working if you don't provide sufficient inputs. Enable debug logs in zmNinja Developer options and then email me the logs. Thats a good start.
• Its often hard to infer a problem especially when its due to some unique apache/nginx mungling you might have done but haven't told me about it. In such cases, try and give me remote access to your ZM for a day. Configure a limited user with just one monitor. It will save hours of frustration (mostly on my side). Thanks