Alerts stopped all of a sudden

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lib.r
Posts: 3
Joined: Thu Nov 23, 2023 1:10 pm

Alerts stopped all of a sudden

Post by lib.r »

Hi,
I've been using Blueiris almost flawlessly for the past 3 years, until this morning, when all of a sudden Alerts are no longer saving to disk, nor showing up in BlueIris, nor performing any of the "On Alert" actions.

I have ONVIF triggers enabled for all of my 4 cameras, which are working fine, as the red motion triggers are being shown. I also have CodeProject.AI server running and configured correctly to confirm the alerts, and, from the CodeProject.AI logs, BlueIris is successfully invoking the object detection to run, and CodeProject.AI is finding objects, e.g. car, person.

However, there is nothing shown in the "Alerts" or "Confirmed Alerts" view in BlueIris, and no new files are being saved to the "Alerts" folder. Before the problem started (earlier this morning), files were being saved to the "Alerts" folder, and I could see both "Alerts" and "Confirmed Alerts" in the BlueIris UI, and the "On Alert" actions were being performed just fine. I have not changed any settings anywhere for weeks, and the problem just seems to have cropped up out of the blue, with the last Alert around 7:30am this morning, and then nothing.

I have restarted the BI machine (Windows Server 2022) multiple times, repaired the DB, deleted the entire BlueIris storage folder on disk, and upgraded to the latest (non-critical) version, 5.8.1.0 (previously 5.8.0.16), and still the problem remains.

I feel like there is some kind of bug in BlueIris, which is still processing the alert in memory and invoking the CodeProject.AI confirmation, but fails to save it to disk, and hence not recording the alert ever occurring, also not performing any alert actions.

Any ideas? Everything else, continuous recording etc. seems to be working fine. Just the Alerts have failed to save and complete.
joe
Posts: 5
Joined: Thu Nov 23, 2023 10:08 am

Re: Alerts stopped all of a sudden

Post by joe »

Not sure if it's relevant, but I had a similar issue with BI not performing as I expected (crashing, failing to webserve, overallocating as files weren't being moved) and couldn't pin it down, but then the primary drive went (SSD) so I rebuilt on the storage HDD and it's working fine again.

Perhaps SSDs aren't too keen on the strain that CCTV software puts on them over time. As I said this one was frustrating as I couldn't see anything wrong.

BTW folks, good tip - set the 'auto export' on the main settings page and get it to store on onedrive or the like. I didn't, and the last config backup was very old so had to start all over again.... lesson learned!
canepohl
Posts: 3
Joined: Sat Nov 25, 2023 4:37 pm

Re: Alerts stopped all of a sudden

Post by canepohl »

Similar set-up. What I noticed this morning was that when logged into the console on the VM, it had a yellow !!-1.9TB on the bottom.
Screenshot 2023-11-25 at 11.44.51 AM.png
Screenshot 2023-11-25 at 11.44.51 AM.png (11.47 KiB) Viewed 17108 times
I have a 5TB drive set up and have always let Blue Iris manage for itself.
Screenshot 2023-11-25 at 11.46.25 AM.png
Screenshot 2023-11-25 at 11.46.25 AM.png (27.69 KiB) Viewed 17108 times
It is no longer allowing the full 5TB, and is limiting to 2TB. I had to change my storage options to pull my New\Stored\Alerts under 2TB for it to start recording again.


You'll notice on the screen they also added a bar to show how the drive is being consumed. This is saying that I'm over.
Screenshot 2023-11-25 at 11.45.56 AM.png
Screenshot 2023-11-25 at 11.45.56 AM.png (109.24 KiB) Viewed 17108 times
Last edited by canepohl on Sat Nov 25, 2023 4:59 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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TimG
Posts: 2084
Joined: Tue Jun 18, 2019 10:45 am
Location: Nottinghamshire, UK.

Re: Alerts stopped all of a sudden

Post by TimG »

I would suggest a database repair for that since it doesn't look right. Does the Log give any clues ?
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canepohl
Posts: 3
Joined: Sat Nov 25, 2023 4:37 pm

Re: Alerts stopped all of a sudden

Post by canepohl »

I tried changing the drive type to unmanaged, but I'm worried that means it no longer deletes. When I do that I can set the folder size to how I see fit. I also tried deleting everything on the drives before I found this issue, so there was nothing to reindex\repair.
Screenshot 2023-11-25 at 12.00.26 PM.png
Screenshot 2023-11-25 at 12.00.26 PM.png (105.7 KiB) Viewed 17105 times
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TimG
Posts: 2084
Joined: Tue Jun 18, 2019 10:45 am
Location: Nottinghamshire, UK.

Re: Alerts stopped all of a sudden

Post by TimG »

So that's what "Storage folder drive classifications" meant for this version. Mine is working normally with v5.8.1.1, and all of my (internal) drives are showing as "Managed folder, shared drive".

The Help file shows this:
5.8.1 - November 22, 2023
Recording folders and drives may now be designated as shared, exclusive-use, or unmanaged.
Used and free space are not considered on unmanaged drives. New clips/images are not
added to the database or automatically moved/deleted in unmanaged folders.
The Options/Storage page has been reworked to include an interactive graphical display of
the disk usage to facilitate easier distribution of disk space to folders. Also now you will be
prompted to repair the DB following any folder path changes.
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Problem ? Ask and we will try to assist, but please check the Help file.
IAmATeaf
Posts: 464
Joined: Mon Jun 17, 2019 7:48 pm

Re: Alerts stopped all of a sudden

Post by IAmATeaf »

From wheat I’ve read unmanaged means the BI won’t manage the drive based upon allocated size so you might want to think about this?
canepohl
Posts: 3
Joined: Sat Nov 25, 2023 4:37 pm

Re: Alerts stopped all of a sudden

Post by canepohl »

ok found an explanation that makes sense, but still doesn't register to me why I cant use a managed drive where my allocations are under 5TB.
So how I read this. When I select "Managed folder, unmanaged drive" I am fine as long as I do the math.



Managed folder, shared drive. The default for normal usage. Recordings are
indexed in the database and accessible through the software. Files will be moved/
deleted according to the size and age limits configured for the folder. The drive may
be shared with other applications and the operating system.

Managed folder, unmanaged drive. Use judiciously when the software has trouble
reading used/free space on the drive. Recordings are indexed in the database and
accessible through the software. Files will be moved/deleted according to the size
and age limits configured for the folder, but the software will not regard the used or free
space on the drive when making these decisions.

Managed folder, exclusive-use drive. This setting informs the software to expect
only Blue Iris related files on the drive and to throw appropriate errors or to run
appropriate repair operations if other files are detected. A feature soon may be
added to automatically maximize the use of a drive, but caution should still be taken
not to over-allocate the drive.

Unmanaged folder. Recordings will not be indexed in the database or accessible
through the software directly (you may still drag/drop them into the window). Files
will not be automatically moved or deleted. You will be responsible for the
prevention of the drive running out of space. This option exists primarily to provide
an “output folder” for functions such as AI faces, JPEG snapshots, exports, and
similar. Files in this folder are considered “other files” on a shared drive. An
unmanaged folder should not be configured onto an exclusive-use drive!
lib.r
Posts: 3
Joined: Thu Nov 23, 2023 1:10 pm

Re: Alerts stopped all of a sudden

Post by lib.r »

hi joe
Perhaps SSDs aren't too keen on the strain that CCTV software puts on them over time
Thanks for the suggestion, I'll investigate to see if it's not actually hardware related. Interestingly, I got it working again by changing the Trigger Source from "ONVIF/camera events" to "Motion sensor", and the alert workflow started working fine again. But then this morning, the Alerts stopping working altogether again, so maybe it's something to do with the disk getting overloaded?

A few years ago, before BI had the AI integration, I coded a .NET Core app (I'm a Software Engineer by profession) to scan for JPG files written out by BI during alerts, and performing the call to DeepStack/CodeProject.AI, then run any custom actions (e.g. sending email, turning on security light). As the JPG output from BI still appears to be working fine, I might start using my .NET Core App for this again, as it was definitely more reliable than using BI, and at least I knew what was going on (through logging) when something went wrong.

Given the flakiness of BI with these kind of complex tasks, I wonder if there'd be interest in making my app available as an open source project?
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