motioneyebot 0.1.2

1) Create a GroupMe bot and add it to your selected group.

You can create bots by registering an account on https://dev.groupme.com/. This is also where you may find your access token, bot ID, and group ID which you will be prompted for the first time you launch the program. It is recommended that you paste these items in a text editor buffer for later use.

2) Install a web server on the machine that will run this program.

Below demonstrates how to install Apache in Linux, though any web server will suffice.

sudo apt install -y apache2

3) Ensure ownership of directory containing your server’s index file.

Below demonstrates giving user ownersip to Apache’s html directroy in Linux. This is the location where the program will download an image from the motion camera and post to GroupMe on a user’s request. Keep note of this path as you will be asked to enter it the first time you run the program.

sudo chown -R [username]:[username] /var/www/html

4) Ensure a static IP address and forward TCP port 80 to the address.

You must ensure that the device which will run this program and host your server has a static IP address. This process will vary depending on the device you are using and the type of network/router being used.

You must then forward the HTTP/TCP port 80 to the device’s static IP address. Port forwarding settings are available in most routers’ administrator settings. If you are already forwarding port 80 to another device, try using a port such as port 8000 or 8080.

You will also need to find your public ip address. This will be used to allow GroupMe API to locate your HTTP server to download images from. If you used a port besides 80, record your public IP address in the form [IP]:[port] (i.e. 12.345.67.89:8000). This will be what you enter in the 6th step of setup upon executing the program for the first time.

5) Configure the MotionEye camera’s settings if needed.

Locate the IP address of your MotionEyeOS camera. If you haven’t already, open the MotionEye system’s settings and assign the camera’s IP address as static. You will be asked to enter this IP address in the first time you run the program so you may want to record it as well.

OPTIONAL: If you have specified a Dropbox or Google Drive folder for your MotionEye camera to upload content to, you may enter the URL in the ‘UPLOADS_URL’ field. Otherwise, you may leave this section blank.

6) Installation

pip3 install motioneyebot

7) Execution

The program should now be able to execute successfully. Note that if your device has a power management feature that disconnects a network interface (commonly WiFi), you will need to disable it to allow the program to run continuously without having to reconnect to the internet. The first time you execute the program, you will walk through a setup process that looks like this:

motioneyebot

################ motioneyebot Configuration ################

Thank you for using motioneyebot! If you haven't already,

take the time to read README.rst before continuing with setup.

        Press Enter to continue or 'q' to quit. >>

        1) Enter the your GroupMe access token >> f8ket0k3n
        2) Now enter your GroupMe bot ID >> f8k31d
        3) Now enter your GroupMe group ID >> f8kegr0up1d
        4) Enter the path to your server's index page >> /var/www/html
        5) Enter the IP address of your MotionEye camera >> 192.168.1.125
        6) Enter the public IP address of this device >> 12.345.67.89:8000
        *Optional* Enter the URL to your camera uploads >> https://drive.
        google.com/fakeurl
        *Optional* Enter the name for your Bot (only
        displays in this program) >> Pops
        *Optional* Enter the name for your Group (only
        displays in this program) >> Pops Alerts

After the initial setup, the program should start working automatically. In the future, the program will look like the screen below after execution wherein the box of text printed will repeat every 5 seconds as long as the program was successfull in each attempt to fetch messages from the GroupMe API.

motioneyebot

####################
# Bot: Pops
# Group: Pops Alerts
# Status: Listening
###################

8) Editing the configuration.

You can rerun the configuration script from the first launch of motioneyebot any time by running the command below.

motioneyeconfig

9) Messaging the Pops Bot in your GroupMe group: