[TLDR] I need webcam software and hardware which will do video calls using Slackware64-15.0.[/TLDR]

The Long Story:
I am a disabled Vietnam Veteran who travels to the Veteran Medical Center in Lebanon PA. USA. They Provide excellent medical care. When my care does not require a three hour road trip I use a government website MyHealthVet to order prescription refills schedule appointments, or just message one of my physicians. Suddenly after all these years of successfully usage I'm being told I must use one of two more secure messaging services to login.
login.gov or id.met
After hours of trying to open an account I have discovered that because I use a cable company telephone the login services cannot verify my 'web-phone'. After much digging and calling I discovered that if I photograph or scan and submit to id.me the following:
My passport card
My Pennsylvania drivers license
A selfie
They will allow me to logon.
After numerous scans I have them submitted I get an email telling me I must have a video call with a referee to verify my identity.
So if anyone has success in video calls on 15.0
Please Advise hardware and software
I have seen the huge list on Linux UVC driver page, but my concern is with Slackware64-15.0
Thanks in Advance
John
PS I do not own a cell phone

Hello John, Sorry to hear you're having trouble with the USA bureaucracy. Although I skipped serving in the military, 2 generations of my family served in all major 20th Century conflicts.

Hardware:
Any USB UVC webcam will work with Slackware. The driver is a kernel module (uvcvideo, etc) and has been available in Linux (and therefore Slackware) for so long I forgot when it was added. Forget about driver installation. Just plug it in and Fuggedaboutit.

I use: but any UVC USB webcam from Creative, Logitech, etc will work.

Software:
Many web based video telecon software through Firefox browser will work. No additional software needed. I've used:
https://zoom.us/ (free version)
https://meet.jit.si/ (open source) - see also https://jitsi.org/

MS Teams via online Office 365 (web) does not support video. I never used Webex or Rind Central on Linux.

Slackbuilds.org has a number software packages geared for various uses: jitsi, guvcview, wxcam, zoom-linux, skypeforlinux, to name a few. There is also teams (for Microsoft Teams) but I haven't tried it.

There are several web pages to test your webcam (no additional software needed):
https://webcammictest.com/
https://webcamtests.com/

You did not mention what software your referee wants to use. This is important and will drive the selection of video call software you may need to install.

7 members found this post helpful.

Thanks kingbeowulf.
Just the response I was looking for.
They sent me link to click in an email so I would presume that the call will be thru my browser (firefox)
Thanks Again
John

By the way I am still using your script for virtual machines with qemu.

I'm using a usb uvc webcam on my desktop system also. No setup was needed, since it just uses the uvc drivers from the kernel. Theres a range models/prices out there, but you'll probably want to make sure it has camera and a microphone (unless you have a separate mic). In my case I have a logitech model:
I also confirm that uvc webcams work fine with the MS Teams slackbuild on SBo (and also on the discord sbo build). Teams also works in browser so you could do the call without actually installing the teams package. Programs like gucview are useful for viewing your webcam locally, but the settings and selection of camera are usually done in the specific platforms settings.

It would be nice to know the platform you are using, just to be sure that there are no surprises. The link might give a clue in its name.

3 members found this post helpful.

My system is:
To add to the above:
Motherboard is a customized (by System76)AMD X570 ATX gaming motherboard with PCIe 4.0, 2.5 Gbps and Intel Gigabit LAN

128 GB of Dual Channel ECC DDR4 ram

500 GB of PCIe Gen 4 NVME for original OS installed by manufacturer

1.5 TB of PCIe Gen 4 NVME for Slackware64-15.0

10 TB of spinning rust for long term storage

Vuesonic 27" WQHD Monitor IPS Display 2560x1440

4 GB GTX 1650 Super graphics card

Das Keyboard acc-dko13t

1000 Watt Power Supply

I always used to self build, but I shake to much anymore for fine hand work, so I farmed this one out to System76.
Thanks
john

4 members found this post helpful.

Nice machine, I bet it flies.

Good luck with your video calls, I hope you get it fixed up soon.

Wow! Great specs!

Some of the video conference platforms I am obliged to use will not run in Linux and I am forced to use Windows in those instances and I keep a couple of NTFS partitions on my computer. Using windows always makes me appreciate linux and slackware more. Nikon has a free utility for using their cameras as a webcam, so my webcam is a Z6.

1 members found this post helpful.

Nice rig!

I guess you, at least for the most part, have gotten the needed answers needed by now, but I'll add a couple of cents worth (I hope).

These days I would not have worried much about getting a new webcam and have it not working in Linux (or more specifically Slackware 15.0 as you ask about).

Besides webcams that have actually been defective in one way or the other I believe all I have actually tested have worked.
Probably a couple dozen different ones over the years.
Even the old, round Logitech Quickcam type webcams (640x480pixels resolution) worked right away as far as I remember.
Older than that might not work though I would think (usb or, especially, anything with serial port).

I think main question is;
Which resolution do you want/need?
720, 1080 or 4k?

For just making video calls, the 720 should be sufficient.
4k is probably unneeded/overkill unless you want to start recording videos for e.g youtube or similar.

The more pricy and well-known brands will likely be better (as in giving a better and sharper picture) than the really cheap webcams. I have tried both, and the the somewhat unsurprising tendency is that higher price is better quality.
I've also had a couple of no-name/unknown-brand cams straight up being faulty on delivery, so build quality and quality control might have been a bit so-so with those.

One consideration I have, but that might not be relevant to other people; does the webcam have a standard tripod mounting hole?
If it does, the options for mounting is much greater, but possibly not relevant if you would just hang it of the top edge of the monitor anyway.

As someone else also mentioned there might be options for using e.g DSLR or other digitals photo or video cameras as a webcam too, but that's a whole different ballgame and one I don't have much experience with at all.


Hope my might be helpful.


Thanks
--
KarlMag

1 members found this post helpful.

another method that works for linux and slackware is to install "scrcpy" which allows viewing and controlling your smartphone on your linux box and view the camera. obs-studio will then let you share the phone screen as a virtual camera. scrcpy v.1.17 is available as a SlackBuild.

On the phone you just need to enable usb debugging in developer mode and allow access when prompted by scrcpy/adb.

1 members found this post helpful.

Thanks to All
Purchased Kingbeowulf's suggestion. All if fine now. Got certified
Thanks
john

2 members found this post helpful.

And if you use Plasma, you also have kamoso to take selfies

2 members found this post helpful.

I left off kamoso since whoever is the developer/coder/whatever wrote one of the worst functioning programs I have seen in I while. It always seems to default to a 5 fps image capture format. You are better off using the available QT V4L2 test and capture utilities. At least with QT V4L2 test there are settings to change the values.

Opinion: kamoso sucks donkey balls, so BURN THE WITCH!

maybe OT? possible to network stream internal webcam?

I have mjpg-streamer experimental doing this with usb webcam, trying to get to seeing if it'll work with internal.