ZoneMinder README.Mageia

ZoneMinder is primarily intended as a dedicated CCTV surveillance server, handling multiple cameras,
however it is equally suitable for use with a single web cam on your desktop.

Rather than providing a minimal installation of ZoneMinder which would be difficult to install and 
configure, this package concentrates on making ZoneMinder work "out of the box". 
No prior knowledge is necessary to have a working system within a few minutes of installation.

To this end, this package is based on the use of Apache, and if not present it will be installed as a
requirement.

A large amount of data is collected by ZoneMinder which is stored in /var. It is therefore recommended 
that /var be placed on it's own large partition. 
 
Many configurations are possible, however consideration must be given to the storage capacity of /var. 

No matter how much space is available it will fill up eventually, so it is important to set a filter in
ZoneMinder, to limit the disk usage to about 90%. This will avoid any nasty "disk full" errors or worse!

*** Filling up /var can break your system, you have been warned ! ***

After installing ZoneMinder several steps are still needed to get to a basic running installation:-

1. A mysql root password should be set up.
2. The ZoneMinder mysql database needs to be created.
3. If this is an update from a previous zm installation then the database needs to be updated.

These tasks can be handled by running zmsetup as root, and answering a few simple questions.
To do this open a terminal e.g. xterm or konsole etc. then type "su" (followed by your root password and ENTER)

$ su
Password:   (note that nothing will appear on the screen as you type your password.)

Hit ENTER
Now type "zmsetup" and hit ENTER

# zmsetup

Follow the prompts answering the questions with "y" or "n" followed by ENTER.

Note that the "mysql root password" mentioned is NOT the root password for your system. 
(Although it can be the same if you wish).

When zmsetup completes, ZoneMinder should be running and the ZoneMinder Console may be accessed from a browser using:-

http://<hostname>/zm

The full ZoneMinder documentation is available at http://www.zoneminder.com/