We have a developed a plugin that supports Professional+/Corporate which pulls video data from the camera based on set criteria. Our customer is asking if it supports the Professional version. I understand that Professional is quite a different piece of software than Corporate/Pro+.
What kind of plugin did you write? Smart Client, Admin, Background? Normally plugins should work across code bases, but I’m curious how you’re pulling the video and where it’s going. The “non-plus” products don’t support edge storage to my knowledge, so if you’re relying on that feature it would only work on the Advanced VMS products I think.
If you wrote a component integration, it should also work across products as the SDK abstracts away most of the differences.
If you wrote a protocol level integration or anything interfacing with the Configuration API or Server Command Service WCF interfaces, those will only be compatible with the Advanced VMS “plus products”.
Ultimately I would encourage you to test it yourself to be sure - you should be able to acquire a Professional test license.
We wrote both a SC plugin and a MC plugin(Both work on Corporate). The one we are focusing on at the moment is the MC plugin. Under MIPplugins in the MC navigation hierarchy.
Our plugin will pull data for 1 or many cameras, in BLK XProtect type format(AVI or JPG as well), write that pulled data to a HDD/NAS, and then archive the data to permanent storage.
It’s a C# .NET solution.
We may see about pulling out of the MC and make our GUI stand on its own.
Based on that it sounds like you shouldn’t be limited to using it on XProtect Corporate, though the media database formats are completely different so you would need to account for that.
Understood regarding the media database folder structure.
Will the smart client player still work on the E-code type folder exports? (as far as I remember, c-code exports have an scp file that associates with the player.
Yes SC Player will work against both database formats. The format of the SCP project file may be different between the two so if you’re building it yourself you may need to accommodate for that.
But I am curious. An “admin” plugin will normally work in Management Client (c-code) and in Management Application (e-code), so if you rebuild the plugin making absolutely sure it is 32 bit and not 64 bit then in theory it should work without any issue! Have you tried this?
It is supposed to work like this:
- A 32 bit admin plugin can load and run in Management Application
- A 64 bit admin plugin can load and run in Management Client
- AnyCPU admin plugin can load and run in Management Application and Management Client
The exporter classes should also work fine no matter if the target is c-code or e-code XProtect.
There might be elements in your solution that is not equally prepared for e-code and c-code, but you have not mentioned anything (yet) that to me indicate this to be the case.
Recommended read: https://developer.milestonesys.com/s/article/debugging-techniques-for-Management-Client-plugins