Alliance Aims for Peer-to-Peer Security Networking Open API to Give Integrators More Choices
Two technology trends that have begun to go hand-in-hand are the integration of access control or building management systems with video surveillance, and the trend towards using data networks to connect system components.
Initially data network connectivity for video systems focused on digital video recorders (DVRs), while cameras continued to be connected to those DVRs over an analog coaxial cable or fiber connection. More recently, however, some systems integrators have found value in using video cameras that connect directly to a data network. Such systems may be more flexible than traditional systems, in which each DVR supports a specific number of devices. Adding the 33rd camera to a system with a 32-port DVR, for example, would require adding another DVR. But in a fully networked system, “you can normally add things one by one,†notes Fredrik Nilsson, U.S. general manager for networked video camera manufacturer Axis Communications, Chelmsford, Mass.