Configuring your webcam to work under Linux

**PWallace** · 13-10-2010

I have a new Labtec 1200 usb webcam. You also all are aware of that it only brings driver for the mac / windows. I have my homemade debian linux server and I would like to run that on it because I want to keep my eyes to my home when I am out of home. The problem is that this camera is not supported on linux. I want to know the way to do this or any other altenative option for that. Please suggest.

**Eru** · 13-10-2010

You should use the command dmesg | more and will let you know that whether the camera was detected during bootup. If you find the reference to it then search /lib/modules for the /usb subfolder and see that whether loadable kernel module exists for it or not. According to the distribution the position for this subfolder varies. Like:

For Debian it will be /lib/modules/kernel/build/drivers/usb,
For Fedora 7 it is /lib/modules/kernel/kernel/drivers/usb

**Kickapoo** · 13-10-2010

These days you should use the lsusb if you have the a USB camera or graphical tool v4l2-tool to see a list of USB devices if your distribution includes it. You have to locate the camera by its name. You will find a eight digit number with a colon in-between. This number identifies the vendor and product ID and you can use that to find the available driver on internet. Download the driver and install that in your computer.

**Felix46** · 13-10-2010

This is really hard to encompass a list of everything that is compatible because there are many out there. There are many drivers available in the market but UVC and spca are the two which are very famous and common for cheap cameras. I am using the pwc driver for my older Logitech. It is working very nicely. You should also try one of those drivers.

**Aandaleeb** · 29-10-2010

Working of the webcam on Linux is mostly depending on the type of the webcam, distribution and application. When I plugged in my webcam into Ubuntu it started working fine. I selected V4L in Ekiga and the whole thing was peachy. The problem was that I tried V4Lv2 first which did not work and then I tried my old one and it worked for me.