Many people seem interested in single machine nodes at the moment. There are lots of good reasons to have such a setup (besides just being able to say that you've done it). In particular, they're great for desktop systems with a single USB camera, and also for laptops.
However, from a useability point of view, they're not ideal for multiple camera nodes. There's an instance of vic (VideoProducer or VideoService) for each of the video capture streams, say 3 in a typical node. Thats probably OK for an experienced operater, but even then its a bit inconvenient (and, at the very least, messy) having the additional vic instances on the display machine. For a casual node operater, its really confusing. With a separate capture machine, the multiple vic capture instances are tucked away on another machine with only a single VideoConsumer on the display machine. Its a much neater solution. The more useable a system is, the more its likely to be used. chris Christoph Willing Ph: +61 7 3365 8350 QPSF Access Grid Manager University of Queensland
