Getting started

This takes a few minutes per camera.

What you need

  • Indigo 2022.1 or later, on a Mac on the same home network as your cameras.
  • One or more Dahua cameras, or a Dahua or Amcrest video doorbell. The Your cameras page says which kinds work and what to switch on in each.
  • The network address of each camera. This is the set of four numbers separated by dots, such as 192.168.1.64, that the camera’s own web page, its app or your router’s list of connected devices shows. A name your network knows the camera by works too.
  • A username and password for the cameras. The plugin uses one username and password for every camera, so each camera needs an account with the same details. The account needs to be allowed to read the camera’s events and settings, which an administrator account is.

It helps to ask your router to keep giving each camera the same address, which most routers call a reserved address or DHCP reservation. The plugin finds a camera by its address and has no way to follow it to a new one.

1. Install the plugin

  1. Go to the Releases page and download DahuaEvents.indigoPlugin.zip
  2. Unzip the downloaded file — you will get DahuaEvents.indigoPlugin
  3. Double-click DahuaEvents.indigoPlugin — Indigo will install it automatically

Indigo asks whether to enable the plugin. Say yes.

2. Give it the camera username and password

Open Plugins → DahuaEvents → Configure, fill in Camera username and Camera password, and click Save.

If you run several of my plugins you can keep these in one shared file instead, and the Settings page explains how. Leave everything else as it is to start with.

3. Add a camera

  1. In Indigo, create a New Device and set its Type to DahuaEvents. The camera dialog opens.
  2. Fill in Camera name — a short name such as Drive. The devices are named after it, so Drive gives Drive Person and Drive Vehicle. Keep to plain letters, numbers and spaces, because the plugin changes accented letters and the characters &, <, >, " and ' into question marks.
  3. Fill in Camera address with the camera’s network address.
  4. Click Check This Camera. The plugin asks the camera what it can do, shows the answer under Camera reports, and ticks each detection that will work. The Your cameras page explains the answers.
  5. Tick the detections you want, if the check did not already tick them: People, Vehicles, Tripwire (line crossed), Intrusion (zone entered) or Doorbell button. People and Vehicles are ticked to start with.
  6. Leave Hold override (seconds) blank to use the plugin’s 20 seconds.
  7. Click Close. The plugin creates one device for each ticked detection, and the Event Log has a line for each one it created.

Repeat this for each camera.

4. Check it works

Within a few seconds each new device shows Connected as its stream state. If a device shows a red message instead, such as no rule drawn on the camera, the When something goes wrong page explains it.

Now walk in front of the camera. The Person device should switch on, and switch off again about 20 seconds after the camera stops seeing you.

If you want to check a camera before adding it, or after a firmware update, Plugins → DahuaEvents → Probe a Camera… asks it about people and vehicles without creating anything. The plugin menu page explains it.