Using a retired device to take and send photos

[Duck Redbeard]

I have a retired HTC Aria that is being used as an IP webcam in my garage.  The only way I can use it remotely is to have it streaming on my home network, then I can use one of 3 apps to remotely access a home PC and steer that PC to the webcam's IP address and view it there (remotely on my daily carry device).  Too many steps.  There are probably other ways to do this, but I want Tasker to be involved.

The webcam device does not have a SIM card and cannot send text messages (that I'm aware of).

Ideally, I would be able to send a message (e-mail?) to the webcam that would initiate a "Take photo" task then send it to my daily carry device as an attachment in an E-mail.  Another idea would be that it uploads to drop box.  Is this something that K9 mail would help me do?

I consider myself to be a heavy user of Tasker, but I have not used it much for devices that aren't SMS capable.  Can this be done?

[Marta Hintz]

You may want to look into autoremote plugin.  This may help you with what you want to achieve.

[Duck Redbeard]

So I got the autoremote plugin working.  The lite version does what I need to do.  Seems the lite version only lets you send very short messages (two characters!).  Works for me.  When my webcam device gets a message containing "ph" Tasker runs a task of a beep then a photo is taken.  The photo is automatically uploaded to dropbox, so I can check it there.  What I would like is for the photo to be sent to my daily carry phone via email or sms.  I am still looking for a way to do that.  Can tasker send a message (like a text) without a SIM card installed?

[Jacob Klein]

Can't send a actual text message, but an email would suffice. There's plugins for email control I cannot remember the name but searching around will get you what you need. Autoremote is great, a good setup, much more use than the price in my opinion so if this is your official method and stays that way I suggest paying(gives you more features too).

Another suggestion rather than email/text would be to somehow capture the dropbox link for the picture and then have it popup as a notification on your phone. Then upon pressing it it'll load the picture. Just another suggestion.

Also, using the beep to take the picture may be a bad idea. Now if your using this for security and a burglar, while in your garage, hears a beep and then notices a phone just took his picture, he will more than likely break the phone before the picture has fully uploaded to the internet. Just something to think about, then again I don't know what your using this for.

[easiuser]

+1 on purchasing AutoRemote.  Not sure about the lite version but the paid version can also send files!

[Duck Redbeard]

I added the beep for testing purposes.  Seems the task isn't initiated after the phone has been "display off" for a few minutes.  Upon unlocking, I am getting the beep then photo.  If I get the beep while phone is "display off" then I know it should be working.  

When all this is done, my task will be attached to my leaving from home task.  After connecting to my car's bluetooth, it will launch the browser page that sends the autoremote command, then kill the browser, then open my dropbox to that photo's folder.  Seems this will work.

All this comes from me forgetting to close the garage door.  When complete, I can get confirmation a few minutes after I leave, or I can manually initiate this after I leave, just to double check.

On Thursday, October 2, 2014 8:32:57 PM UTC-4, Duck Redbeard wrote:

[Duck Redbeard]

By what means does it send files?  The file to share would always be the most recent photo, so the file name would be different each time.  In Tasker, the photo's file name is being recorded as the date and time of the photo.  I need those values to confirm that I'm getting the most recent photo.

[Jacob Klein]

There's a variable for the last photo taken in Tasker I believe it's %FOTO.

as for the sharing with autoremote it is possible to send files, and I assume pictures. I've never done it myself nor can I test as I don't have 2 android devices. Sorry I'm no help but maybe someone with experience will chime in.

Just saying autoremote sounds like the go to option here

[Scott]

It uses Dropbox or Drive as an intermediary.  It might be possible to send files directly if you're on the same WiFi network, but I'm not sure about that.  Unless you want the pictures stored in your email account, I'd think that sending the files over AutoRemote, or syncing them with Dropbox (both of which are pretty similar methods) would give you a lot more control on what you do with the pictures.  You wouldn't have to figure out how to download the email attachment  but I honestly have no idea how easy or hard that is.  With the full version of AutoRemote you can always send the file name so you can confirm it on your device if you want to.

You'll have to do a bit of research to confirm this, but I believe that when you receive an AutoRemote message with a file attached, you get the path to that file in a variable.  So you can just use that variable to put that image in a notification, scene or intent/share.  

[Scott]

Out of curiosity, have you given this a shot?  I have an Android Tablet so I tried setting the same thing up.  As far as I can tell you have to use Drive to send the pictures (or at least I never found the option to switch to Dropbox), but pictures under 2048x2048 don't take from your storage limit, so that's nice.  Of all the issues I had, none had to do with the actual sending of the file.  I had trouble getting my S4 to show the picture (the Gallery app wouldn't work but a 3rd party gallery app works fine) and my tablet won't take a picture while asleep, but I think I can get around that fairly easily.  If your old device is already taking pictures correctly then you won't have to worry about that.

If you have a bit of extra Google Play credit (check out Google's "Rewards" app if you don't) then AutoNotification might work really well with this project.  You'll have a lot of options on how you react to the picture you receive that way.

On Friday, October 3, 2014 10:09:16 AM UTC-5, Duck Redbeard wrote:

[Duck Redbeard]

I put this on hold for a few days but I haven't abandoned it. The issue I am having is the autonotification doesn't work well if the phone is asleep. Many times it happens soon as the phone is woke up. Whet it does work, the photo shows in dropbox within a minute or 3.

I just need to get a reliable trigger to Tasker, initiated from a remote source.

[Scott]

AutoNotification or AutoRemote?  My experience is that AutoRemote is pretty reliable when it comes to sleeping devices.  I haven't tried to use AutoNotification as a remote trigger.

I'll update you more when I get this figured out, but if I use AutoRemote from my phone and tell my table to take a picture, it takes under a minute to get the picture back to my phone using AutoRemote (though I've been testing with relatively low resolution pictures).  I haven't had any issues getting my tablet to trigger from AutoRemote, it's just that the camera app doesn't work if the tablet is asleep.  So it will get the AutoRemote message but the camera will fail and the error will show up in the AutoRemote log.  My plan is to just have Tasker wake up my tablet before it takes the picture, but I ran out of time this morning to test it out.

I use AutoRemote to get the battery level from my tablet to my phone as well.  When I unlock my phone it sends a message to the tablet.  That triggers a task that sends a message back to the phone that contains the battery level and whether or not the tablet is charging.  It works every time, no matter how long the tablet has been sleeping.  Sometimes the message takes longer than normal to make it back to the phone (like a minute rather than a few seconds), but I haven't had it fail unless my WiFi at home is down.  Granted I only have one set of hardware to test it on (Galaxy S4 phone and Galaxy Tab 2 7.0), but Tasker seems to run pretty consistently from device to device. 

[Duck Redbeard]

I need that tablet battery inquiry!

[Scott]

It's super easy.  

On the phone find some profile (trigger) (I use Display On) to run a task that has an AutoRemote action that sends a message to the tablet (e.g. "battery request").

On the tablet have AutoRemote profile that triggers on "battery request."  The task will send an AutoRemote message to the phone with the battery level (e.g. "tabletbattery=:=%BATT").

On the phone have an AutoRemote profile that triggers on "tabletbattery".  In the task do a Alert>Flash of %arcomm.

That's the most basic version but it's a good start.  Once you get that working you can feature creep the crap out of it.   I get a persistent notification if the battery is below 25% that won't go away until it's charging and I have the tablet battery displayed in a Minimalistic Text widget.

[Duck Redbeard]

Can you export this to me? Seems to be a function that I could tweak to do a few things I've been wanting to do. I have autonotification and autoremote on all devices now (tablet, daily carry phone, and WiFi-only retired phone).

I am good with Tasker, but these plugins are puzzling.

[Scott]

What parts do you have questions about?  My set up has three Minimalistic Text widgets that would be required and a ton of extra explanation.  It would be much simpler and faster to just start with what I described above than to try to decide which parts of what I have are useful.

You can also check out the "Tasker Plugins by joaomgcd" Google community and website:

http://joaoapps.com/autoremote/

and the Pocketables article:

http://www.pocketables.com/2012/09/beginners-guide-to-tasker-part-6-autoremote.html

For tutorials.

[Duck Redbeard]

So I figured out how to do the remote battery check. Pretty cool.

I also worked out a "take photo" task but I can't figger out how to send it back to the phone.

[Scott]

You just send an AutoRemote message to the phone and pick a file to send.  On the phone you'll have an %arfiles array with the paths to the files.  If you only have one file you can just use %arfiles() for the path.

So on the retired device, after you take the picture you send a AutoRemote message with something like "sendingpicture" as the message and tap "file" and pick your file.

Then on the receiving device you have an AutoRemote profile that triggers on "sendingpicture" and you do an Open File on %arfiles().

Again, that's the most basic version. It's pretty trivial to get that picture into an AutoNotification notification (you just put %arfiles() as the picture).  You can then have the notification send an AutoNotification message that tells your phone to do something once the notification is tapped.  

So my action for "Action on Touch" in AutoNotification is "show picture=:=%arfiles().

I have an AutoNotification profile that triggers on "show picture" and the associated task does an Open File on %ancomm (everything to the right of the =:= in the AutoNotification message).

You just have to remember that the AutoNotification messages are just like AutoRemote messages, but you can only send it to yourself (i.e. the same device you're using).

Again, on my Galaxy S4 I had to download a separate galley app (QuickPic) and associate it with pictures to get the last part to work because the built in Gallery app wouldn't recognize the folder that my AutoRemote pictures get downloaded to.

So...clear as mud?  ;)  Once it all "clicks" it will seem a lot more simple.  You just have to familiarize yourself with the AutoApps Command System and remember the local variables the AutoApps supply.

http://joaoapps.com/autoapps-command-system/

http://joaoapps.com/variables/

[Duck Redbeard]

I have found a combination that works. " Email me pro" is an app that has a plugin function that has the easiest setup.  I currently have two ways to initiate the photo capture then send via email to the carry device.  Both ways work, but if the "retired" device is asleep, it doesn't see the message or notification (from autoremote and autonotification).  When I wake the retired device, it registers the trigger, takes the photo then sends it.  I have wifi on while sleep, but had "always allow scanning" disabled.  I just enabled that and will try again in about 10 minutes, expecting the device to be mid nap.

I just need to get it to trigger while the device is asleep.

[Scott]

So the retired device won't receive a AutoRemote message if it's asleep?  If you haven't already I'd ask on the joaomgcd Google group to see if he has any suggestions.