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Client Setup

Notes for connecting common ONVIF clients to an onvif-server device: the URL to use, auth, which operations the client leans on, and the caveats specific to this crate’s coverage.

Connection basics

  • Service URL: http://<host>:<port>/onvif/device_service (default port 8080). <host> must match your advertised_host and be routable from the client.
  • Auth: if you called .auth(user, pass), clients need those credentials; otherwise leave the client’s credentials blank. GetSystemDateAndTime is always reachable unauthenticated for clock sync.
  • Streams: the RTSP/snapshot URLs are whatever your MediaService returns — they are independent of the ONVIF port and must be reachable too.

Frigate

  • Configure the camera with onvif: host/port/user/password, plus the RTSP stream from ffmpeg: inputs (Frigate does not learn the stream URL from ONVIF — you set it directly).
  • Frigate calls GetServiceCapabilities and the PTZ control surface for onvif-based PTZ. This crate returns MoveStatus as an attribute (which Frigate requires) and implements the PTZ moves/stop/presets via your PTZService.
  • Caveats: PTZ buttons do nothing unless you implement PTZService. Frigate does not depend on this device for motion events (it does its own detection), so the lack of event delivery is not a problem for Frigate.

Home Assistant (ONVIF integration)

  • Add the ONVIF integration and enter host, port, username, password. HA calls GetDeviceInformation, GetCapabilities, GetProfiles, and the stream/snapshot URIs, and sets up PTZ services and an event subscription.
  • Caveats: HA subscribes to events (the pull-point handshake succeeds), but this device never delivers events, so no ONVIF binary sensors / motion events will fire — use HA-side motion detection instead. Implement get_device_information, get_stream_uri, and get_snapshot_uri or HA setup steps will fault.

ONVIF Device Manager (ODM)

  • Windows diagnostic tool. Point it at the service URL (or discover on-LAN with the discovery feature) and enter credentials.
  • Good for verifying enumeration: it exercises device info, profiles, video configs, PTZ nodes, and the live stream. Operations this crate marks absent (most Set*, imaging options, etc.) show as errors/blank in ODM — that is expected, not a bug.

python-onvif-zeep

  • ONVIFCamera(host, port, user, pass, wsdl_dir). zeep builds its client from WSDLs, so point wsdl_dir at a local ONVIF WSDL set (zeep does not fetch the device’s ?wsdl).
  • Call only the operations in the coverage matrix; others return a ter:ActionNotSupported fault that zeep raises as a Fault. Example: cam.create_devicemgmt_service().GetDeviceInformation().

VLC / RTSP players

  • VLC is not an ONVIF client. It plays the RTSP stream directly — open the URL your MediaService::get_stream_uri returns (e.g. rtsp://<host>:554/stream).
  • Use VLC to confirm the underlying media path works independently of ONVIF signalling.