Expose latest generated timelapse as "latest.mp4"

[henrikeri]

Hi Aaron,

It is possible relatively easily to expose the latest timelapse as "latest.mp4" similar to the latest photo? I expose the photo on a separate web page and would like to add the video as well if there is an easy way for indi-allsky to put it as the name above in a folder. I use this to show the data to non-tech-savvy users whom one could not expect to be able to open it from the timelapse menu after entering user names and passwords :)

Best regards,
Henrik

[aaronwmorris]

Merged #1368 . This uses the "watch timelapse" view to show the latest timelapse if no ID is specified:

https://hostname/indi-allsky/watch_timelapse

[henrikeri]

Thanks Aaron this is awesome
Is there a meaningful way to access this server side? I am exposing this on a separate webpage to my non-tech users.

I had a look at the folder structure and there does not seem to be an easy way to implement it wihout implementing server side parsing of the folders.

[aaronwmorris]

Querying the database is how that view does it. What programming language would you want to do this in?

[henrikeri]

@aaronwmorris I hacked together a bash script that finds the last changed folder and file and combines it to one with ffmpeg. Works for now so I'll close this.

[aaronwmorris]

Let me know if you want me to write something in python, it should be pretty simple

[henrikeri]

@aaronwmorris any chance we could add an option to generate a timelapse of the last 24h and store it as yesterday.mp4? The bash script seems to be misbehaving a bit :-/

[aaronwmorris]

Would you want midnight-to-midnight or noon-to-noon?

[henrikeri]

I would prefer noon-to-noon, but why not let the user set the time from a dropdown? Then it will not have to be picked up again if someone wants midnight-to-midnight or similar

[aaronwmorris]

I just developed the mini-timelapse generator that does just that. I also just submitted a change to increase the available window for the mini-timelapse generator.

If you update to the latest code, find the midpoint for the video you want to create (say like at midnight) and select a window of 12 hours before and 12 hours after, set a FPS, name, and generate.

[henrikeri]

I cannot seem to find where you configure the mini panorama, I only find where you view them. Is it not yet in the main branch? Will it be able to run automatically in the background?

[aaronwmorris]

Sorry, I meant to add this. It is in the Image viewer. The original intent of the Mini-Timelapse generator is picking an event you want to showcase, generating a video with frames before and after the event. However, with the extended time options, you could pick midnight as the image and add 12-hours before and after the event for a full 24-hour timelapse.

[henrikeri]

Tested it now, it creates a time lapse that works somewhat, it seems when the duration in any direction goes into the next or previous day, it cuts off at 2359 (noon -> noon)

Also is it a large work/any way to run this on a schedule to generate daily with a known file name? I use this outside of indi-allsky. I am ok triggering it from the terminal if reqd.

[aaronwmorris]

There's nothing in the code that would limit the time to before or after noon.

Ultimately, it would probably be easier to write an external script that generates a timelapse. The trouble is dealing with timestamps on the command line. Let me sit with this for a few days.