Alexa and Blue Iris integration

[Bill Dossett]

Hi, I've read the whole Blue Iris and Alexa integration thread now and Alexa has discovered my Blue Iris server fine... but I am not really sure where to go from there. I just got started with an Alexa Echo dot - is there some way I can tell alexa to say show my cameras on my Mac? so... I know people were saying they were getting video to pop up on their screen but I don't quite get how that works or what screen they mean, I assume computer.

2nd question - can you get alexa to pop up a camera on an Echo Show? I think that would be the best solution for me anyway - can anyone confirm if that works?

Thanks, I'm new around here but seems like some really useful info on these forums.

 

[clickcosmo]

Hey there. How where you able to find Blue Iris? Did you activate a skill on Amazon Echo? I tried activating the Hue and the Wemo skill but it asks me for the specific devices in order to work. I clicked the Connect to Amazon Echo on BlueIris but Alexa did not find any devices (they are in the same network).

 

[Bill Dossett]

Its been a while since I did it... as I don't use it, I can't really find any use for it as all my cameras are on and recording all the time... and no one answered my question on if I got a Amazon Show if I would see my cameras on it... plus I have it on my phone so no need really. Looking at my alexa devices it seems to say it is a hue light... I followed the instructions ... either on the blue iris site or here, just google blue iris and alexa I think, make sure you have the latest blue iris and I think there's a button in blue iris... yes, under Mobile Deives, button to connect to amazo echo, it worked for me fine, but as I say, I still haven't found a use for it as all my cameras are on and recording all the time and I couldn't find anyway of telling alexa to show me the front door camera, I just have a motion detect on that and it pushes to my phone and rings the doorbell on my phone, works great that way - all I need.

 

[jjsmd]

I have been trying for a while and cannot get blueiris and alexa to work together.

 

[Bill Dossett]

Sorry I'm not much help on this... I don't really know what they are supposed to do together. I had no issues getting Blue Iris to add Alexa, and Blue Iris shows up in my devices, but offline. I don't have any profiles or anything, my system just has triggers and records on those. I was hoping that I might be able to see camera video on an alexa view or spot ... but no one has confirmed that will work at this point so I am unwilling to shell out for that.

 

[RobbieH]

When I saw this option on the Mobile Devices page, I was hoping I could pull up cameras on my Echo Spot.

 

[mattcham]

I was wondering the same thing. I tried to link BlueIris to my Alexa account using the steps detailed here, but it really looks like all you can do is set Blue Iris options (change profiles, turn cameras on and off, etc.), not actually view streaming video from the cameras on your Alexa Show or other Alexa device with a screen.

That made me sad for a while, but then I realized that all of my cameras are just streaming RTSP video to Blue Iris, so why can't I capture that stream directly on the Alexa (basically bypassing Blue Iris)? Turns out this is totally possible, and I have it working now for all my POE IP cameras! The down-side is that since Blue Iris is my DVR, and I'm not actually connecting to Blue Iris to view video from the cameras, I'm limited to looking at LIVE video ONLY (i.e. you can't view recordings from the past) on your Alexa. But I don't really want to do that anyway. I just want to see who's at the front door "right now" or what my dogs are doing in the back yard (normally digging up my begonias).

I registered an account with https://monoclecam.com/, and entered my cameras IP addresses and connection URL's there, then added the MonocleCam skill to Alexa. Instantly Alexa detected all my cameras, and I can ask it to "Show me the Front Door" or "Show me the Garage" to have the current live stream over RTSP show up on my Alexa screen.

Since I don't allow inbound connections to my IP cameras through my firewall, even though my camera information is registered on the Monocle site, no one could use it to view my streams from outside of my home network. All that the camera registration on the Monocle site does is provide the 192.168.x.x IP address and connection string to my Alexa (which is inside my firewall, and can connect to the camera streams just fine).

Oh, and if you have trouble figuring out what the cameras RTSP connection port and URL is, you can get it directly from your Blue Iris software. Just open the Admin UI for Blue Iris, select the camera you want info on, and click the Camera Properties button. From there go to the Video tab and click the Configure button. The IP address, port numbers and video path URL are all on that screen.

Good Luck!

 

[Dwellonroof]

I,m not technical but maybe you could use Alex with a Firestick to view on your TV?
I'm just thinking to myself : I tried the jailbreak thing but as I said I'm not techie.