That's a lesson you can't always follow. If you want internet-accessible surveillance cameras that you can view when you're not home, for instance, buying hardware that requires an app is basically a requirement.
An IP camera plus an Asus router with the built-in VPN enabled will do the trick just fine. It requires a small amount of technical know-how to get the VPN set up on your devices, but at that point it's all locally hosted under your control.
Still an app for the VPN, of course, but I'm assuming OP meant an app that relies on a cloud you don't control.
people have been setting up internet-accessible surveillance cameras they could view when they weren't home since 01991, long before you could install apps on phones: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trojan_Room_coffee_pot
it's not a technically difficult thing to achieve (just plagued with annoying compatibility struggles, which have gotten much better since usb became widespread), and none of that hardware requires an app
Interesting, but how do you do that in the modern age, when you aren't allowed to have a fixed IP address or run a server at home, as is the case with most ISPs now?
tailscale, wireguard, scp to a vps, upload to s3, save to dropbox, zerotier, ipfs, passive-mode vnc, stream to twitch with obs studio, or just upnp or configure a bastion host on your cablemodem if you aren't behind cgnat. there are probably a zillion ways i haven't thought of
i mean maybe there's a packaged turnkey setup that i don't know about, too, i'm just saying diy isn't rocket surgery in this case
That was never the argument. You said it was impossible and you HAVE to buy the sketchy ass cloud camera. That's not the case.
As a side note, remember that Ring for a good almost decade allowed remote stalking via their cameras. That's right, MANY people were stalked and it was completely allowed by corporate security policy. That being, any employee had any access to any camera, anywhere.
There is a cost for convenience. People could do with being more technically minded. A few decades ago it was common for a run of the mill secretary to make and run SQL reports. Now people require goo goo ga ga level devices to do anything.
there's a difference between 'If you want internet-accessible surveillance cameras that you can view when you're not home' and 'if a two-dimensional gender stereotype wants internet-accessible surveillance cameras that they can view when they're not at home'
my friend ann was always pretty annoyed when people applied that stereotype to her, unaware that she'd written a commercially successful operating system in assembly language. and most of the things on the list are things my wife does in order to set up gaming servers on our residential cable modem connection
Getting downvoted for pointing out that regular people can't figure out complicated networking workarounds and set up their own DIY internet-accessible cameras... Definitely peak HN.
Yes and no, as long as you can connect P2P not with the mediation of some third party...
I do that for my home, simply via a homeserver (a cheap entry level celeron desktop) and wireguard to my mobile. I need a landline ISP and a mobile carrier with mobile data or something equivalent of course, but they are generic services, not product-bound ones, at least, so far...
