Users Tab, Homepage. What is it and how to use?

danbutter

Getting the hang of it
May 28, 2017
139
47
I'm trying to get BI setup to serve an image of one and only one of my cams. I have the URL and it works fine. It is for someone outside my house and I'm trying to keep bandwidth consumption down.
I was setting up a new user for them and noticed the "homepage" box at the bottom of the window.
I looked through the help file and it is in the screenshot, but no mention of it in the text.

I was kinda hoping I could set the /image/{cam-short-name}?q=50&s=80 in there, but it doesn't work.
When doing that and then logging in as that user it goes to the /default.htm.

Anyone know how to use it?
 
I'm trying to get BI setup to serve an image of one and only one of my cams. I have the URL and it works fine. It is for someone outside my house and I'm trying to keep bandwidth consumption down.
I was setting up a new user for them and noticed the "homepage" box at the bottom of the window.
I looked through the help file and it is in the screenshot, but no mention of it in the text.

I was kinda hoping I could set the /image/{cam-short-name}?q=50&s=80 in there, but it doesn't work.
When doing that and then logging in as that user it goes to the /default.htm.

Anyone know how to use it?

I don't know about that 'home page' box either but regarding having that remote user open a browser and have a snapshot from a certain cam come up, this is tested and works remotely (WAN) from my iPhone :

Code:
http://YOUR-WAN-IP:BI-SERVER-PORT/image/{cam-short-name}?q=50&s=80

If you do not have a static WAN IP and are using DDNS, just put your hostname (like "danbutter.dyndns.us" ) in place of 'YOUR-WAN-IP' in the above URL. Don't forget the BI port after that IP or DDNS hostname.

It first prompted me for username and password then displayed the cam snapshot. You could created a shortcut to the URL on your remote user's desktop or favorites.

BTW, it also works on my LAN using the BI server's LAN IP address in place of the WAN or hostname (Plus ':BI-SERVER-PORT').


EDIT:
This method I suggested may fall short in that your remote user can see all your cams. You could restrict the user to a new group and put that 1 cam on that group but they could still stream that 1 cam and you said you wanted to limit the bandwidth they'd use. Now that @fenderman has clarified the function that 'Home Page' on the 'Edit User' page I (or you) should be able to come up with the HTML to place in BI's 'www' directory to bring up that image when that user logs in. It's 11 PM central now and I will be out of town all day Monday so I can work on it later and perhaps come up with something Tues. if you still need it or if someone else on the forum doesn't come up with something before then.
 
Last edited:
This was added in BI3...from the release notes..
  • On Options/Users, you may specify a user-specific home page to use in place of the standard default.htm and jpegpull.htm.
 
  • Like
Reactions: TonyR
Ok I tried it and it works fine, but seems to be limited to .htm pages as the /image/cam short name urls don't work. I just get sent to the default.htm when I try.
I'll have to email support and see if that would be an easy change he may be willing to make in the future.
I can't see many people needing it so I'd understand if he didn't, but it would be great for me if he would! Exactly what I need.
Thanks for the help getting more insight into this.
 
Ok I tried it and it works fine, but seems to be limited to .htm pages as the /image/cam short name urls don't work. I just get sent to the default.htm when I try.
I'll have to email support and see if that would be an easy change he may be willing to make in the future.
I can't see many people needing it so I'd understand if he didn't, but it would be great for me if he would! Exactly what I need.
Thanks for the help getting more insight into this.
I dont understand, are you trying to give someone access to only a still image?
 
Ok I tried it and it works fine, but seems to be limited to .htm pages as the /image/cam short name urls don't work. I just get sent to the default.htm when I try.
I'll have to email support and see if that would be an easy change he may be willing to make in the future.
I can't see many people needing it so I'd understand if he didn't, but it would be great for me if he would! Exactly what I need.
Thanks for the help getting more insight into this.

Please read see my 'EDIT' at bottom of post #2.
 
@danbutter :

OK, if you want a REMOTE user to open a browser and fetch a still image (snapshot) of a specific camera that is served by Blue Iris, this worked for me. It was tested on a PC 10 miles away and on my iPhone. There could be an alternative that is simpler and/or more efficient and if so, maybe someone else can share that method. Until then, this will achieve your goal.

1) Create the new remote user with username and password; in examples below, the new user is 'dan'.
2) Edit the new user as shown in image 1 to limit to a new group 'snapshot' and to insure that if they are crafty enough to type in 'default.htm' or any other valid Blue Iris.htm file in the BI server's 'www' folder they will see ONLY the camera that you allowed them to receive the snapshot from and even then it will be limited as far as bandwidth and time before being allowed to log back in, etc. Those are found in the settings 'per session (min):' and 'Between sessions (min):'
3) In image 2, on the camera's 'General' tab, set the 'Groups' to the new group 'snapshot'.
4) Using a text editor like notepad, copy & paste the below text that's between the '===' lines into a new text file, save as 'snapshot.htm' (no '.txt' file extension), but do so ONLY in your 'documents' folder or anywhere but BI's 'www' folder. You get it into the 'www' folder there by a different means, below.

Be sure to change the camera's 'short name' from my 'Cam3' to whatever your cam's short name is and save.

Copy and paste the corrected 'snapshot.htm' into BI's 'www' folder as show in image 3; the path is 'C:\Program Files\Blue Iris 4\www' .

==========================

<html>
<head>
<title>Blue Iris Snapshot</title>
</head>

<img src="/image/Cam3?q=50&s=80"

</body>
</html>


==========================

5) The URL for the remote user will be http://YOUR-WAN-IP:BI-SERVER-PORT; put in correct IP and port.

If your ISP does not provide a static WAN IP (in other words, it can change), then consider a DDNS provider, then put the created hostname (such as
'danbutter.noip.org' in place of the WAN IP. The remote URL would then be 'http://danbutter.noip.org:BI-SERVER-PORT'

Of course, put in the correct Blue Iris server port so the complete URL will look something like 'http://danbutter.noip.org:8080'

The remote user will open a browser, put in the correct URL (like 'http://danbutter.noip.org:8080') and hit <Enter> and BI's login screen will appear. The user will log in with their username (in this case 'dan') and their password (both of which you created in step #1 above) and the snapshot will load into their browser. That snapshot will be loaded because of the 'snapshot.htm' file which you placed into BI's 'www' folder AND the configuration you set at the bottom of the 'Edit User' page where you entered the 'Homepage' as 'snapshot.htm' as seen at bottom of image 1.

The user won't be allowed to refresh and get a new image for 1 minute as I have configured it; that's determined by the settings at the end of step #2, 'per session (min):' and 'Between sessions (min):' which you can edit as you see fit.

Good luck!

Image 1
user_dan2.jpg

Image 2
Cam3_dan.jpg

Image 3
snapshot-path.jpg
 
Last edited:
FYI, the remote login screen looks like image 4 below and the snapshot looks like image 5. Both are grainy because I logged into a PC across town via Teamviewer then used that remote PC to log into my BI server as the remote user 'dan'.

Image 4
remote_snap_login.jpg

Image 5
Cam3_snapshot.jpg
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: looney2ns
I dont understand, are you trying to give someone access to only a still image?
Exactly what I'm doing.
Right now I'm just having them bookmark the full URL with the /image/{cam-short-name}?q=50&s=80 in it and that will work ok. It would just be cleaner the other way.

I didn't realize you could make your own .htm page and toss it in the directory. Thanks for the tip and explanation Tony! It may even give me a way to see my cams in kodi using one of the security cam addons.
 
  • Like
Reactions: TonyR
Right now I'm just having them bookmark the full URL with the /image/{cam-short-name}?q=50&s=80 in it and that will work ok. It would just be cleaner the other way.

Yes, that simple method has worked from the beginning, I just figured my (more complicated) method would give you some control over access, bandwidth, etc. You can lock him out by username very easily and he cannot keep refreshing the image every second.

Glad I could help and good luck using with kodi! :D