Installation USB camera

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This brief guide provides information on how-to install a simple, cheap USB webcam under Linux. I have used the following webcam. This installation guide is based on this guide.

1. If you haven't got these packages already, install them:

sudo apt-get install build-essential linux-headers-`uname -r`

2. Check if your USB Webcam is connected properly:

lsusb

My webcam was recognised as follows:

Bus 001 Device 004: ID 05a9:8519 OmniVision Technologies, Inc. OV519 WebCam

2. Get the modules for the webcam, I found mine using Google. Fortunately my webcam was supported. For this OmniVision OV519, you can find them here.

3. Untar this file, compile and install it.

tar -xvf ov51x-jpeg-1.5.9.tar.gz
 
cd ov51x-jpeg-1.5.9
 
make
 
sudo make install
 
sudo depmod -A
 
sudo modprobe ov51x-jpeg

4. You can now test the webcam by using, for example, xawtv.

5. To load these modules at start-up, or to perform autodetection additional steps are needed. You can find them here.