[gentoo-user] BTTV Mini-HOWTO -- how do I use multiple inputs?

[gentoo-user] BTTV Mini-HOWTO -- how do I use multiple inputs?

[Daevid Vincent]

Followed the howto here:
http://www.faqs.org/docs/Linux-mini/BTTV.html
(which by the way is 5 years old)

I have an old hauppauge bt878 card with 4 inputs on it.

I have the video1 working fine, but how do I enable the other inputs?
They're all the same RCA kind.

I ran the MAKEDEV script, but it didn't seem to make all the video* and vbi*
nodes other than the first one...

I manually created the rest using the HOWTO as an example:
I don't know anything about nodes and all this stuff, so I guessed that the
'c' number is the same as the ones that were created, and the number next to
that increments from the one created.

daevid bin # ll /dev/video*
lr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 11 Nov 27 19:42 /dev/video -> /dev/video0
lr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 10 Nov 27 19:46 /dev/video0 -> v4l/video0
lr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 10 Nov 27 20:36 /dev/video1 -> v4l/video1
lr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 10 Nov 27 20:36 /dev/video2 -> v4l/video2
lr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 10 Nov 27 20:36 /dev/video3 -> v4l/video3
daevid bin # ll /dev/vbi*
lr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 9 Nov 27 19:42 /dev/vbi -> /dev/vbi0
lr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 8 Nov 27 19:46 /dev/vbi0 -> v4l/vbi0
lr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 8 Nov 27 20:37 /dev/vbi1 -> v4l/vbi1
lr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 8 Nov 27 20:37 /dev/vbi2 -> v4l/vbi2
lr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 8 Nov 27 20:37 /dev/vbi3 -> v4l/vbi3
daevid bin # ll /dev/v4l/*
crw-rw-rw-  1 root video 81, 224 Dec 31  1969 /dev/v4l/vbi0
crw-rw-rw-  1 root video 81, 225 Nov 27 20:35 /dev/v4l/vbi1
crw-rw-rw-  1 root video 81, 226 Nov 27 20:35 /dev/v4l/vbi2
crw-rw-rw-  1 root video 81, 227 Nov 27 20:35 /dev/v4l/vbi3
crw-rw-rw-  1 root video 81,   0 Dec 31  1969 /dev/v4l/video0
crw-rw-rw-  1 root video 81,   1 Nov 27 20:35 /dev/v4l/video1
crw-rw-rw-  1 root video 81,   2 Nov 27 20:35 /dev/v4l/video2
crw-rw-rw-  1 root video 81,   3 Nov 27 20:35 /dev/v4l/video3


If I try to take a picture:

/usr/bin/v4lctl -c /dev/video0 snap jpeg 320x240
/home/dae51d/public_html/nokia_cam.jpg
/usr/bin/v4lctl -c /dev/video1 snap jpeg 320x240
/home/dae51d/public_html/ittybitty_cam.jpg

Then the first one works fine, but the second one is failing with:

v4l2: open /dev/video1: No such device
v4l2: open /dev/video1: No such device
v4l: open /dev/video1: No such device
no grabber device available

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Re: [gentoo-user] BTTV Mini-HOWTO -- how do I use multiple inputs?

[Nick Rout]

On Sun, 27 Nov 2005 20:54:02 -0800
"Daevid Vincent" <daevid@daevid.com> wrote:

> Followed the howto here:
> http://www.faqs.org/docs/Linux-mini/BTTV.html
> (which by the way is 5 years old)
> 
> I have an old hauppauge bt878 card with 4 inputs on it.
> 
> I have the video1 working fine, but how do I enable the other inputs?
> They're all the same RCA kind.
> 
> I ran the MAKEDEV script, but it didn't seem to make all the video* and vbi*
> nodes other than the first one...
> 
> I manually created the rest using the HOWTO as an example:
> I don't know anything about nodes and all this stuff, so I guessed that the
> 'c' number is the same as the ones that were created, and the number next to
> that increments from the one created.
> 
> daevid bin # ll /dev/video*
> lr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 11 Nov 27 19:42 /dev/video -> /dev/video0
> lr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 10 Nov 27 19:46 /dev/video0 -> v4l/video0
> lr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 10 Nov 27 20:36 /dev/video1 -> v4l/video1
> lr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 10 Nov 27 20:36 /dev/video2 -> v4l/video2
> lr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 10 Nov 27 20:36 /dev/video3 -> v4l/video3
> daevid bin # ll /dev/vbi*
> lr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 9 Nov 27 19:42 /dev/vbi -> /dev/vbi0
> lr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 8 Nov 27 19:46 /dev/vbi0 -> v4l/vbi0
> lr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 8 Nov 27 20:37 /dev/vbi1 -> v4l/vbi1
> lr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 8 Nov 27 20:37 /dev/vbi2 -> v4l/vbi2
> lr-xr-xr-x  1 root root 8 Nov 27 20:37 /dev/vbi3 -> v4l/vbi3
> daevid bin # ll /dev/v4l/*
> crw-rw-rw-  1 root video 81, 224 Dec 31  1969 /dev/v4l/vbi0
> crw-rw-rw-  1 root video 81, 225 Nov 27 20:35 /dev/v4l/vbi1
> crw-rw-rw-  1 root video 81, 226 Nov 27 20:35 /dev/v4l/vbi2
> crw-rw-rw-  1 root video 81, 227 Nov 27 20:35 /dev/v4l/vbi3
> crw-rw-rw-  1 root video 81,   0 Dec 31  1969 /dev/v4l/video0
> crw-rw-rw-  1 root video 81,   1 Nov 27 20:35 /dev/v4l/video1
> crw-rw-rw-  1 root video 81,   2 Nov 27 20:35 /dev/v4l/video2
> crw-rw-rw-  1 root video 81,   3 Nov 27 20:35 /dev/v4l/video3
> 
> 
> If I try to take a picture:
> 
> /usr/bin/v4lctl -c /dev/video0 snap jpeg 320x240
> /home/dae51d/public_html/nokia_cam.jpg
> /usr/bin/v4lctl -c /dev/video1 snap jpeg 320x240
> /home/dae51d/public_html/ittybitty_cam.jpg
> 
> Then the first one works fine, but the second one is failing with:
> 
> v4l2: open /dev/video1: No such device
> v4l2: open /dev/video1: No such device
> v4l: open /dev/video1: No such device
> no grabber device available

yes, you probably have one bttv device with a number of inputs. you
need to switch inputs. they are usually called TV, Composite, S-Video
etc. If there is more than one composite they might be called
Composite-1, Composite-2 etc

On the other hand they may be audio inputs? 4 composite inputs is
rather excessive I would have thought.

By the way which package does v4lctl come in?


> 
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Re: [gentoo-user] BTTV Mini-HOWTO -- how do I use multiple inputs?

[Nick Rout]

On Mon, 28 Nov 2005 23:17:37 +1300
Nick Rout <nick@rout.co.nz> wrote:

> yes, you probably have one bttv device with a number of inputs. you
> need to switch inputs. they are usually called TV, Composite, S-Video
> etc. If there is more than one composite they might be called
> Composite-1, Composite-2 etc
> 
> On the other hand they may be audio inputs? 4 composite inputs is
> rather excessive I would have thought.
> 
> By the way which package does v4lctl come in?


ok it is part of xawtv. just refreshing myself, you can see a list of
available parameters with

v4lctl -c /dev/video0 list
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[gentoo-user] Re: BTTV Mini-HOWTO -- how do I use multiple inputs?

[James]

Nick Rout <nick <at> rout.co.nz> writes:


> > By the way which package does v4lctl come in?

> ok it is part of xawtv. just refreshing myself, you can see a list of
> available parameters with

> v4lctl -c /dev/video0 list



What about 'media-video/came' although it's masked it says:
Description: rewrite of the xawtv webcam app, which adds imlib2 
support and a lot of new features


Just curious if anyone has used came with a frame grabber board?
Does it interfere with xawtv? complement?


James

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Re: [gentoo-user] Re: BTTV Mini-HOWTO -- how do I use multiple inputs?

[Nick Rout]

On Mon, 28 Nov 2005 15:00:14 +0000 (UTC)
James wrote:

> Nick Rout <nick <at> rout.co.nz> writes:
> 
> 
> > > By the way which package does v4lctl come in?
> 
> > ok it is part of xawtv. just refreshing myself, you can see a list of
> > available parameters with
> 
> > v4lctl -c /dev/video0 list
> 
> 
> 
> What about 'media-video/came' although it's masked it says:
> Description: rewrite of the xawtv webcam app, which adds imlib2 
> support and a lot of new features
> 
> 
> Just curious if anyone has used came with a frame grabber board?
> Does it interfere with xawtv? complement?

I think I tried it years ago, probably without success as the memory is
very dim. I think it is written camE (with the capitalised "E"). The
latest source file is dated June 2004 so maybe it is not maintained ?
Anyway it is a 38 k download.

If you want something to watch tv try media-tv/tvtime, brilliant for
watching live tv or a vid-cam pluged into your framegrabber. (It will
not work with hauppauge pvr cards that do mpeg encoding in hardware)

> 
> 
> James
> 
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Nick Rout <nick@rout.co.nz>

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[gentoo-user] Re: BTTV Mini-HOWTO -- how do I use multiple inputs?

[James]

Nick Rout <nick <at> rout.co.

 I think I tried it years ago, probably without success as the memory is
 very dim. I think it is written camE (with the capitalised "E"). The
 latest source file is dated June 2004 so maybe it is not maintained ?
 Anyway it is a 38 k download.
 If you want something to watch tv try media-tv/tvtime, brilliant for
 watching live tv or a vid-cam pluged into your framegrabber. (It will
 not work with hauppauge pvr cards that do mpeg encoding in hardware)


Thanks

James

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RE: [gentoo-user] BTTV Mini-HOWTO -- how do I use multiple inputs?

[Daevid Vincent]

> > If I try to take a picture:
> > 
> > /usr/bin/v4lctl -c /dev/video0 snap jpeg 320x240
> > /home/dae51d/public_html/nokia_cam.jpg
> > /usr/bin/v4lctl -c /dev/video1 snap jpeg 320x240
> > /home/dae51d/public_html/ittybitty_cam.jpg
> > 
> > Then the first one works fine, but the second one is failing with:
> > 
> > v4l2: open /dev/video1: No such device
> > v4l2: open /dev/video1: No such device
> > v4l: open /dev/video1: No such device
> > no grabber device available
> 
> yes, you probably have one bttv device with a number of inputs. you
> need to switch inputs. they are usually called TV, Composite, S-Video
> etc. If there is more than one composite they might be called
> Composite-1, Composite-2 etc
> 
> On the other hand they may be audio inputs? 4 composite inputs is
> rather excessive I would have thought.

The PCI card looks kind of like this one:
http://www.hauppauge.com/pages/products/data_impactvcb.html
But it has 3 RCA Inputs and and S-VIDEO input (see bottom of page)

> By the way which package does v4lctl come in?

# equery belongs v4lctl
[ Searching for file(s) v4lctl in *... ]
media-tv/xawtv-3.94-r1 (/usr/bin/v4lctl)

> ok it is part of xawtv. just refreshing myself, you can see a list of
> available parameters with
> 
> v4lctl -c /dev/video0 list

attribute  | type   | current | default | comment
-----------+--------+---------+---------+-----------------------------------
--
norm       | choice | PAL     | PAL     | PAL NTSC SECAM PAL-Nc PAL-M PAL-N
NTSC-JP PAL-60
input      | choice | Televis | Televis | Television Composite1 S-Video
Composite3
audio mode | choice | mono    | mono    | mono stereo lang1 lang2
bright     | int    |   32768 |   32768 | range is 0 => 65535
contrast   | int    |   32768 |   32768 | range is 0 => 65535
color      | int    |   32768 |   32768 | range is 0 => 65535
hue        | int    |   32768 |   32768 | range is 0 => 65535
mute       | bool   | off     | off     |
chroma agc | bool   | off     | off     |
combfilter | bool   | off     | off     |
automute   | bool   | on      | off     |
luma decim | bool   | off     | off     |
agc crush  | bool   | on      | off     |
vcr hack   | bool   | off     | off     |
whitecrush | int    |     207 |     207 | range is 0 => 255
whitecrush | int    |     127 |     127 | range is 0 => 255

So this doesn't mention anything about the inputs.

I would have thought they would be /dev/video0 ... Video2

Since the way that I take a snap with one camera attached to the card is
like this:
/usr/bin/v4lctl -c /dev/video0 snap jpeg 320x240
/home/dae51d/public_html/nokia_cam.jpg

Notice the "-c /dev/video0"


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Re: [gentoo-user] BTTV Mini-HOWTO -- how do I use multiple inputs?

[Nick Rout]

On Mon, 28 Nov 2005 23:09:31 -0800
"Daevid Vincent" <daevid@daevid.com> wrote:

> > > If I try to take a picture:
> > > 
> > > /usr/bin/v4lctl -c /dev/video0 snap jpeg 320x240
> > > /home/dae51d/public_html/nokia_cam.jpg
> > > /usr/bin/v4lctl -c /dev/video1 snap jpeg 320x240
> > > /home/dae51d/public_html/ittybitty_cam.jpg
> > > 
> > > Then the first one works fine, but the second one is failing with:
> > > 
> > > v4l2: open /dev/video1: No such device
> > > v4l2: open /dev/video1: No such device
> > > v4l: open /dev/video1: No such device
> > > no grabber device available
> > 
> > yes, you probably have one bttv device with a number of inputs. you
> > need to switch inputs. they are usually called TV, Composite, S-Video
> > etc. If there is more than one composite they might be called
> > Composite-1, Composite-2 etc
> > 
> > On the other hand they may be audio inputs? 4 composite inputs is
> > rather excessive I would have thought.
> 
> The PCI card looks kind of like this one:
> http://www.hauppauge.com/pages/products/data_impactvcb.html
> But it has 3 RCA Inputs and and S-VIDEO input (see bottom of page)
> 
> > By the way which package does v4lctl come in?
> 
> # equery belongs v4lctl
> [ Searching for file(s) v4lctl in *... ]
> media-tv/xawtv-3.94-r1 (/usr/bin/v4lctl)
> 
> > ok it is part of xawtv. just refreshing myself, you can see a list of
> > available parameters with
> > 
> > v4lctl -c /dev/video0 list
> 
> attribute  | type   | current | default | comment
> -----------+--------+---------+---------+-----------------------------------
> --
> norm       | choice | PAL     | PAL     | PAL NTSC SECAM PAL-Nc PAL-M PAL-N
> NTSC-JP PAL-60
> input      | choice | Televis | Televis | Television Composite1 S-Video
> Composite3
> audio mode | choice | mono    | mono    | mono stereo lang1 lang2
> bright     | int    |   32768 |   32768 | range is 0 => 65535
> contrast   | int    |   32768 |   32768 | range is 0 => 65535
> color      | int    |   32768 |   32768 | range is 0 => 65535
> hue        | int    |   32768 |   32768 | range is 0 => 65535
> mute       | bool   | off     | off     |
> chroma agc | bool   | off     | off     |
> combfilter | bool   | off     | off     |
> automute   | bool   | on      | off     |
> luma decim | bool   | off     | off     |
> agc crush  | bool   | on      | off     |
> vcr hack   | bool   | off     | off     |
> whitecrush | int    |     207 |     207 | range is 0 => 255
> whitecrush | int    |     127 |     127 | range is 0 => 255
> 
> So this doesn't mention anything about the inputs.

Read again, it says you have inputs called "Television, Composite1,
S-Video and Composite3".

Do not confuse your video device with the card's input.

You get one video device, and unless you have another v4l device
present it certainly will be /dev/video0

You get a number of inputs to that device, which controls what is seen
on /dev/video0. 

I note that on your device there are 4 physical composite inputs, but
only two compsite inputs are exposed by the driver. This may be because
no-one ever wrote the bttv driver expecting a card with 4 composite
inputs, or it may be because the kernel has not recognised the card
properly and has set up the driver wrong.


Take a look at the kernel documentation in Documentation/videoforlinux,
in particular CARDLSIST.bttv. If you can find your card number you can
add it to your module loading line as is well documented for these
cards.


> 
> I would have thought they would be /dev/video0 ... Video2
> 
> Since the way that I take a snap with one camera attached to the card is
> like this:
> /usr/bin/v4lctl -c /dev/video0 snap jpeg 320x240
> /home/dae51d/public_html/nokia_cam.jpg
> 
> Notice the "-c /dev/video0"
> 
> 
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> gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
> 
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