Now I know most will not think beyond this point of the mad king Hamlet’s soliloquy, but if we dig a little deeper into the recesses of our secondary education, perhaps he was speaking of PoE? To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there’s the rub. A rub he claims is what I found implementing IP cameras utilizing my dream of PoE network switches or in the parlance, endspans.

I remember telling end users how great it would be when everything was IP based and one could simply plug a camera into a network switch and have it deliver both power and data. How all of the cameras would be protected from the evils of electrical impurities such as brownouts, sags and spikes. How they would stay up even when the power to the rest of the facility was down because they, as with the entire critical infrastructure, were now in-line with the UPS and the backup generator.

Power over Ethernet (PoE) is a wondrous thing for those have used it for IP telephony, wireless access points and for the most part cameras. So where is my rub you ask? For me it started in San Francisco in the penthouse of The Clay-Jones building overlooking the best view of the city and the bridges I have ever seen. My team and I had been asked to design an IP-based security solution that would allow video and door control both via iPads placed in the walls and around the penthouse, as well as via iPhones used by the asset and the PSD (Personal Security Detail) personnel. Genetec Security Center with Mobile was the perfect solution to the specific needs.  We were able to lock the controlled doors from anywhere, view the lobby, elevator and stairwell cameras from inside the penthouse as well as see the penthouse cameras from the car prior to arrival home, everything the asset wanted. After installation we were called out to troubleshoot why some of the IP cameras were not working properly. After installing some monitoring tools and setting up remote access, we tracked the problem and noticed just a subset of the cameras were dropping out within a 3 day period but not fixed to any cycle we could ascertain. Read more...

There is no denying that increasing market demand for our innovative security solution is spurring more growth at Genetec. Specifically, regions across Europe, Middle East and Africa are showing tremendous interest in our IP security solutions, prompting us to expand our offices. But for Genetec, opening an office in London and doubling our square footage in France and Dubai was not only about accommodating more talent, strengthening our local support or getting extra meeting space; it was about investing in facilities that would continue to inspire our team and our partners to demonstrate, conceptualize and engineer some of the most cutting-edge security solutions.

If you're reading this blog, you're likely familiar with the range of solutions that we offer, including our unified security plaform, Security Center. But when it comes to security, there are so many more components that are provided by our leading-edge technology partners. So, incorporating a creative space in our offices where our team, partners and customers can come together to build real-life applications and experience first-hand the power of unified security was a primary objective in our expansions. Read more...

We had a development team focusing on an IP intercom module for Security Center. Again, we took the open platform approach and designed it upfront to support different IP intercom vendors. The first release will support intercoms from Commend, Zenitel Stentofon and Castel.

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Non-Proprietary:  This is a term that can apply to a few different aspects of an access control system. The first and most important, in my opinion, is that the system is available from several different sources (integrators) for procurement and servicing.  There are still several products on the market that are the integrator’s “house brand”, meaning it is only available from that one integrator for procurement and servicing. I am not knocking the quality of these proprietary systems in any way; I just believe it is not ideal for an end-user to be locked into one supplier – especially when there are several enterprise class access control manufacturers who make their product available through a roster of integrators for procurement and servicing.  

The second application of the non-proprietary term applies to the selection of software and door controllers. The classic model for a manufacturer was to have their door controllers work exclusively with their software and vice versa. This is slowly changing with a few software manufacturers opening up to several door controller manufacturers and vice versa. This means not only will an end-user be able to procure his access control system from several integrators, he will also have the flexibility to potentially switch to a different software or door controller (for new doors), without having to do a “rip and replace”.  Read more...

This is a great video which demonstrates how easy and efficient parking enforcement can (and should) be simply by using a license plate recognition (LPR) system.

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