Vitamin D not following the industry evolution

[JohannesL]

Dear Vitamin D,

Even if you have slowed down your operations, minimum updates and information would still be needed to keep the product attractiveness and for you to be able to get more customers. A couple of examples here, which I consider to be very basic, even for a company, which is performing minimum investments:
- Official information, if the existing Vitamin D version supports Mac OS X Lion or not. I'm using it with my Lion and Mac Mini, seems to be working without problems
- Information about the capacity demand with the latest versions of Windows and Mac OS X with example configurations. Now, a person, who is considering to purchase the license does not have this info and he might be considering his computer HW is not enough to support the high-def cameras or multiple cameras. E.g my own experience is that with the latest Mac Mini with 2.3GHz i5 and 2GB ram, Vitamin D takes max 12% of the processing power and 110MB memory. I have two highest definition cameras installed (1280x1024). So Vitamin D capacity demand is quite minimum.
- Security cameras are evolving all the time. Today, 640x480 camera starts to be old-fashioned. Megapixel cameras and multi Megapixel cameras start to be standard with serious security installations at home and small offices. The max resolution, Vitamin D still supports is 1280x1024. This should be updated to keep the attractiveness in place.
- 64 bit mode. Mac OS X Lion by default is 64 bit OS. Likewise Windows 7. However, at least the Mac version of the VitaminD is still 32 bit. It would not take from you so much to compile the existing version binaries to 64 bit mode.

I'm writing this message, to support your business. Updates are needed to keep the Vitamin D in speed for evolving cameras and OS support. The feature requests, which are proposed in this discussion forum is of course an other topic.

With Kind Regards
Johannes

[col]

The lack of updates or replies to questions about updates is starting to be a bit of a worry, This is one of the best software for video security that I have found but could soon fall behind.
I have invested quite a bit of money in Vit d and would like to be reassured that it is not being allowed to slowly die.

[jhdude]

Another customer who loves your product!! Looking to buy more - the time is perfect. These analog security systems from swann, q-see etc suck SO bad that customers like myself have to start coming in droves! (ok we hope!)
I REALLY would love to be able to pull up my cameras on my iPad. Give some entrepreneur access to your code if you won't do it, or find one of the better iPad apps like supercam and get things added.
For an IP camera based system, there is nothing better than Vitamin D and hopefully there is enough of a market for y'all to capitalize on.

Drop and update post if you can and give us some hope!
Thanks,
John

[doug]

Hi guys,

...so I don't know that you should take this as the "official stance", but I'll give my $0.02 on the question...

As has been mentioned elsewhere in the forums, we are not working full time on Vitamin D Video at the moment. We all love the product and are continuing to support it (answering forum posts, manning support email, fixing critical bugs), but most of us have full time jobs and families outside of Vitamin D that put a lot of demand on our time and energy.

What does that mean for the "future" of Vitamin D? For the foreseeable future, we plan to continue to at least provide support and critical updates. Since that app is pretty robust (we don't have lots of complaints about failures other than conflicts with Virus Checkers), that critical updates aren't much at the moment. ...but if something was broken with an OS upgrade (like if Lion broke the app), we'd make it a fairly high priority to get it fixed and get an update out there.

Will we ever get back into a cadence of releasing constant updates with new features? Maybe. If one of our team gets to a point in his/her life with lots of free time, it might be a fun thing to do. Should you count on lots of new features? I probably wouldn't.

Would we be open to having someone else work on Vitamin D Video (either purchase it and take over or add new features w/ some type of arrangement)? I think we would, if (and that's a big if) that person was serious and we were convinced that they were going to write quality code. We've had several people express interest in writing something like an iPhone interface to Vitamin D Video. ...but I don't think anything has ever made it past the curiosity stage. Without seeing a fairly major commitment from someone, I wouldn't expect anything.


A few other random answers:

• Really hard to describe CPU demand. Different CPUs are sooooo different. GHz is just not enough. Memory subsystems, cache, CPU architecture, threading, etc are so critical. With modern high-end CPUs, though, you can do a lot of processing.
• We may want to update the set of resolutions, I agree. Of course, the GUI is still really tuned for VGA video (the higher megapixel settings are really only useful for export). Trying to figure out a solution to tune the GUI for high res is much more difficult. Also note that higher resolutions are _much_ more processor intensive to decode/encode.
• 64-bit mode. Yeah, it would be nice if the little thing in the process manager said "64" instead of "32". Will we switch to 64? Very unlikely. I doubt we'd get more than a 5-10% speed increase. There would be a lot of effort involved, since we have libraires that we use that would also need to be updated. ...and if we really needed a 5-10% speed increase, there are better (and less effort) ways to get it. Sorry, but that's just the way it is.

Sorry not to have better news. ...but, on the plus side, we are continuing to support the product and not just letting it fall on the floor, which would have been the other option.

-Doug

[jhdude]

Doug,

Thanks for the honest reply! Really appreciate any updates you have and keep up the great work!
Sounds like lots of good ideas. Possibly license or open it up to some eager folks who might want to take it forward? Too many silly cheap boxes out there.

Is anyone doing just simple web viewing on their Ipad or iphone (not replay - just live viewing). That alone would help me out.

THanks again
john

[doug]

John,

On my Android phone, I use "IP Cam Viewer Pro" to get a live feed of my camera. I think it exists for iPhone/iPad too. It's a totally separate product from Vitamin D and just talks straight to my camera (which means I needed to punch holes through my router myself), but it provides a quick way for me to get access to the camera. I know it would be nice if Vitamin D provided an easier to setup solution, but at least there is something out there...

-Doug

[Semper Vaporo]

When choosing a cell phone what megapixel camera is good for a clear pic? ok i found a fone wit 2megapix is it okay? i mean i really want a clear and cool picture camera fone. i was thinking of buyin a w580i? wat are the cons of this cell any experience? please help.

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I will be watching and when the advertising links show up the admins will be informed and your posting will be deleted and your user name also! Thanks!

[JohannesL]

[*] We may want to update the set of resolutions, I agree. Of course, the GUI is still really tuned for VGA video (the higher megapixel settings are really only useful for export). Trying to figure out a solution to tune the GUI for high res is much more difficult. Also note that higher resolutions are _much_ more processor intensive to decode/encode.
Sorry not to have better news. ...but, on the plus side, we are continuing to support the product and not just letting it fall on the floor, which would have been the other option.

-Doug

Hi,

One and a half year has passed. For sure, cameras have been developing during the time. It would be really nice, if you would be supporting higher resolution cameras. Plain VGA starts to be pathetic.

Regards
Johannes

[col]

Hi guys,
Sorry not to have better news. ...but, on the plus side, we are continuing to support the product and not just letting it fall on the floor, which would have been the other option.

-Doug

Why would you want to let such a great piece of software fall on the floor! if you are bored with it why not sell it on to someone who can develop it?

[ryan]

JohannesL,

Access to higher resolution video in app is certainly something I would like to get in soon.

col,

I'm glad you enjoy the software and I promise that it has not been abandoned and that there is a great desire to see it live on well into the future.