The Live Cams application requires only a few items of information in order to connect to your cameras. You are probably used to typing a "URL" into a browser to log into your device. The URL is a long string that defines an address and a protocol for your webbrowser to connect with. For example:
http://backyard.viewnetcam.com:8080/login.htm
The first part (in pink, "http://") specifies the protocol for the browser to use. In this instance we are using a standard HTTP protocol.
The second part (in yellow, "backyard.viewnetcam.com") is the host name.
The third part (in green, "8080") is the port. For http connections, ports use TCP as the transfer protocol.
In Live Cams you would enter "backyard.viewnetcam.com" in the host field and "8080" as the port.
Here's another example:
http://backyard.viewnetcam.com/login.htm
In this example everything is the same except the port is missing. When the port isn't specified, webbrowsers assume a default port of "80" and use this automatically. It works the same as if you had typed "http://backyard.viewnetcam.com:80/login.htm"
Secure connections on HTTP use something known as SSL (Secure Socket Layer). If your camera is configured to use SSL (also known as HTTPS) then you can toggle this option on when entering or editing your camera information.
If your camera does not use a host name but uses an IP address instead, the same logic applies as the examples above. For example:
http://192.168.1.115/index.htm
This camera uses a "Host or IP" of 192.168.1.115 and since the port isn't specified, it uses the default of 80.
http://192.168.1.115:8080/index.htm
Same as the previous example but the port is now "8080" instead of "80".
One very important thing about IP addresses is that anything starting with 192.168 like the example above is a "local network" address. It is valid as long as you are connected to your router via Wifi or ethernet but as soon as you connect to a different network (or cell tower) the number will not be valid and therefore unreachable. See our tutorials on dynamic DNS accounts in order to conquer this problem.
