21-02-2023

BlackBox VX Firmware 4.0.3 released

We have just released version 4.0.3 of the BlackBox VX firmware that brings additional privacy features, camera and sensor support plus much more to the firmware. The update will be downloaded and installed by the systems automatically, most likely when they are in harbour next. The main features included in the release are:

• Privacy features
• On-Demand consent: In certain scenarios fishers may desire to know what video data is being requested and uploaded from their system, and to provide their consent before any requested data is uploaded. In order to facilitate this, on-demand requests can be sent from the Analyzer that require such consent. When a consent required on-demand request is received, a window displaying details of the video requested will be displayed on the main screen of the user interface, in a similar manner to a high priority message. The fisher will need to provide their consent to this on-demand request before the request is processed. If desired, a fisher can set an auto-consent flag which would result in consent required on-demand requests being processed straight away upon being received.
• Live View privacy: It is not always desirable that the live camera feed is shown directly on the wheel house screen, while in harbour for example. So instead of removing the live feed manually from the view when returning to harbour, it is now possible to activate a setting that will automatically hide the live video feed when it is not recording.
• Role based security: It is now possible to password protect various features of the system by adding users. Which features should be password protected along with which users have access to what are configurable.
• Camera support
• Axis cameras: Support to add, configure, and record from Axis cameras has been implemented. This enables cameras such as the AXIS P3265-LVE which support face blurring to be added and configured via the Black Box VX firmware.
• Recording strategy
• Added support for multiple different sensors for first activity registration. There are different scenarios for when video capture should commence, such as upon leaving harbour, within specified geographical areas and/or upon the start of fishing activities. For starting video capture upon the start of fishing activities, this functionality has been expanded to enable any type of sensor, or a combination of sensors, to initiate video capture.
• Network priority
• You can now enable/disabled ethernet adapters directly from within the network prioritization tab under system settings.
• You can now see which network priority ethernet adapters are disabled and which are currently active.
• You can now give each network priority item a custom name.
• Sensor support
• The firmware now supports sensors reporting in NMEA-0183 format. This enables the system to collect data from a large variety of sensors without needing additional hardware or software converters. The sensor data can be logged to separate files or be included as part of the standard data and thereby included in the main Analyzer graph.
• Support for the EMPCB2S1 CAN Module has been added.
• Support for InnoMaker CAN modules has been added.
• Remote configuration
• Up until now, Live View has been used for verifying system performance and for configuring the systems remotely. However, it can in some monitoring strategies be difficult to catch a system online to enable or disable a general feature. Anchor Lab has therefore implemented functionality to queue a specific setting for specific systems without requiring remote access. The next time a system comes online and is in harbour, the system automatically grabs any queued settings and applies them. Currently it is only possible for Anchor Lab to queue the settings.
• Additional changes
• It can now be configured whether the harbour zone state should be preserved at system reboots. With this enabled, the system stores its harbour zone state before a reboot, so it can start up without recording immediately, until it determines whether it is in a harbour zone or not. The functionality works with both geozones and the standard location monitor.