Introduction

Welcome to ZoneMinder, the all-in-one security camera solution for Linux
with GPL License.

Commercial “security systems” are often designed as a monitoring system
with little attention to recording quality. In such a system, locating and
exporting relevant video can be challenging and often requires extensive
human intervention. ZoneMinder was designed to provide the best possible
record quality while allowing easy searching, filtering and exporting of
security footage.

ZoneMinder is designed around a series of independent components that only
function when necessary, limiting any wasted resource and maximising the
efficiency of your machine. An outdated Pentium II PC can have multiple
recording devices connected to it, and it is able to track one camera per
device at up to 25 frames per second, which drops by approximately half for
each additional camera on the same device. Additional cameras on devices
that do not interact with other devices can maintain the 25 frame rate per
second. Monitoring several cameras will not overload the CPU as frame
processing is designed to synchronise with capture.

A fast video interface core, a user-friendly and comprehensive PHP based web
interface allows ZoneMinder to be efficient, friendly and most importantly
useful. You can control and monitor your cameras from home, at work, on the
road, or a web-enabled cell phone. It supports variable web capabilities
based on available bandwidth. The web interface also allows you to view
events that your cameras have captured, which can be archived, reviewed or
deleted. The web application directly interacts with the core daemons
ensuring full co-operation at all times. ZoneMinder can also be installed as
a system service to reboot a system remotely.

The core of ZoneMinder is the capture and analysis of images and a highly
configurable set of parameters that eliminate false positives whilst
ensuring minimum loss of footage. For example, you can define a set of
‘zones’ for each camera of varying sensitivity and functionality. This
eliminates zones that you don’t wish to track or define areas that will
alarm if various thresholds are exceeded in conjunction with other zones.

ZoneMinder is free under GPL License, but if you do find it useful, then
please feel free to visit https://zoneminder.com/donate/ and help us fund
our future improvements.