Using .Mac to Display Your Webcam

If you subscribe to the .Mac service provided by Apple, you undoubtedly are aware of .Mac's ability to host a personal web site. What may not be completely obvious, however, is that .Mac can serve any HTML web page, not just the ones you create with .Mac's built-in site creation tools. This of course means that you can broadcast your webcam image using .Mac! All you need to do is create a custom web page and use ImageCaster to periodically upload your webcam image. This tip shows you how!

Step 1 - Understand Webcam Basics. While the details surrounding the upload of webcam images to .Mac are a bit different from a 'standard' webcam installation, the basic concepts still apply i.e. you need to capture a video image, upload it to a web server at regular intervals, and have a web page on that server designed to display the image. Because the basic process is the same, we encourage you to read Tip - Webcam Basics. All aspects of that tip, except the FTP upload, apply to broadcasting a webcam image on .Mac. This tip only covers the specific differences that apply to using .Mac as your web server.

Step 2 - Get Connected. Before you can use .Mac to broadcast your images, you must make sure the .Mac service is properly configured on you computer. This tip assumes that .Mac is properly configured on your computer. If you have yet to sign up for .Mac, or have not configured it on your computer, you can visit the .Mac home page and follow the instructions presented there to get up & running.

Note. To ensure that site changes get updated both locally and to your site, be sure to "uncheck" the "Create a local copy of your iDisk" option found in your iDisk settings within your System Preferences (System Preferences->.Mac->iDisk).
You can sign up and configure your .Mac account by visiting
the .Mac home page at http://www.mac.com.

Use the Finder to click on your iDisk to mount it. Next, navigate to the
"Sites" folder and create another folder for your webcam files.
Step 3 - Mount Your iDisk. If .Mac is properly configured, your iDisk will appear as an icon on your desktop. Simply double-clicking it will initiate the connection process. If no iDisk icon appears, you may choose "iDisk" from Finder's "Go" menu. After a brief delay, the iDisk contents will be displayed in a Finder window. Your iDisk is now mounted!

Step 4 - Create a Destination. Using the Finder, navigate to the folder named "Site" on the iDisk. This is where your personal web pages are stored. You can place the webcam files directly in "Site", but we recommend creating a sub folder to keep everything neat & tidy.

With the "Site" folder open, choose "New Folder" from Finder's "File" menu. Give the new folder a meaningful name such as "MyWebCam".

Step 5 - Setup ImageCaster. Go ahead and create an ImageCaster document. Instructions on how to do this can be found in ImageCaster's manual or online help system. You should also refer to Tip - Webcam Basics so that you understand the basics.

All the settings for the ImageCaster document can pretty much be kept at the defaults, with the exception of the Destination panel. Here you must indicate that your iDisk is where the webcam image must be placed.

To do this, change the "Destination Type" (that appears in the Options Drawer) to "Local File". Your iDisk uses a protocol named WebDAV - even though the iDisk isn't local, it appears as a local disk to your computer. For the "Image File Destination", click "Browse" and choose the "MyWebCam" folder (or whatever you named it) created in Step #4.

To test everything out, click "Deliver Now" in the toolbar. If there is a problem, an alert icon will appear at the bottom corner of the document window - clicking it will tell you what the error was.


You instruct ImageCaster to place the webcam image on your iDisk
by using the Destination panel. Just click "Browse", or drag-n-drop
the desired folder from the Finder.

The Web Page Panel will provide you with components
to easily create your own web page.
Step 6 - Create a Web Page. The pieces are almost all in place. Now you must copy an HTML web page to your "MyWebCam" folder. This file needs to references the image file that ImageCaster is uploading. If you know how to do this, go ahead and create one.

If you don't know how to create an HTML webpage, we suggest you take advantage of the web page templates located on the Web Page Panel. These templates assist you in creating your web page by providing user input on certain components of the page. Once an upload is invoked, an HTML page will be generated and placed in the folder specified in the Destination Panel.

Step 7 - Go Live! With the webcam image uploaded and the HTML page referencing it in place, it's time to let the world know about your webcam. Assuming you created a folder named "MyWebCam" and that you named your HTML page "CamPage.html", the URL for your webcam will be:

http://homepage.mac.com/membername/MyWebCam/campage.html

Be sure to change "membername" to your .Mac member name. Open this address in any web browser and you'll see your camera image live on the world wide web! You can link to this page from your personal .Mac site or just email the URL address to your family and friends.


That's it!

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