State Management

Camera Readiness

Depending on the camera’s state, it may not be ready to accept specific commands. This ready state is dependent on the System Busy and Encoding Active status flags. For example:

System Busy flag is set while loading presets, changing settings, formatting sdcard, …
Encoding Active flag is set while capturing photo/video media

If the system is not ready, it should reject an incoming command; however, best practice is to always wait for the System Busy and Encode Active flags to be unset before sending messages other than get status/setting queries.

Keep Alive

Unless changed by the user, GoPro cameras will automatically power off after some time (e.g. 5min, 15min, 30min). Therefore, it is necessary to periodically send a Keep Alive signal to maintain the connection.

Camera Control

In order to prevent undefined behavior between the camera and a connected app, simultaneous use of the camera and a connected app is discouraged. A third party client should use Set Camera Control to tell the camera that the client wishes to claim control of the camera.