Pier Webcam Problems

[Island Girl]

We webbies like to know what can go wrong and how to fix it.

[webmaster]

Originally Posted by Island Girl

We webbies like to know what can go wrong and how to fix it.

This might be TMI but here goes:

A combination of things caused the problems.

First, during the transition from Metrocast to Atlantic the static IPs that business customers had were changed. I don't know if it affected all customers but both Anchor Marine and the pier went offline (at different times). At Anchor Marine the router had to be restarted and the phone system and webcam's server adjusted before things started working again.

At the pier we had similar problems but even more complicated. First I lost all remote access to the pier's router and cameras. The staff at the pier doesn't have any IT experience but were able to disconnect and reconnect the power to the router. That reset the DNS and DDNS and gave me partial remote access so I could see what was going on. I could see that the system IP number and other DNS settings had changed and that my server was not allowing camera uploads from the new IP number. I fixed those problems and the WeirsCAM started working but I was still seeing some strange behavior and I couldn't access the Flightcraft camera at all.

Last Monday I took a trip up to the pier and discovered that someone had connected an old cheap 10/100 network switch into the network and had moved the webcams to the cheap switch. One of the ports on that switch was completely dead and the other ports were erratic. I bypassed that problem switch and everything started working normally.

The lesson here is to use higher quality equipment in a business installation that is unattended for most of the year. Using an old 10/100 switch that sells for under $10 was not a good idea. If these problems had developed in January it would probably have been a few months before I could access the equipment and get everything working again.

Also, Atlantic/Metrocast didn't seem to notify anyone that the system changes were coming. At least no one at Anchor Marine or the pier were aware of it. If we knew we could have been prepared for the changes.

Keeping the webcams running has been interesting at times but having remote access lets me fix most problems from home. It's hard to believe but the WeirsCAM has now been running for 20 years! Time flies.