[Bug]: MQTT topic frigate/<camera_name>/status/record does not become offline when connection to the camera is lost

[hoksalot]

Checklist

• I have updated to the latest available Frigate version.
• I have cleared the cache of my browser.
• I have tried a different browser to see if it is related to my browser.
• I have tried reproducing the issue in incognito mode to rule out problems with any third party extensions or plugins I have installed.
• I have asked the AI at https://docs.frigate.video about my issue.

Describe the problem you are having

When Frigate loses connection to a camera, the camera's 'record' status on MQTT (topic: frigate/<camera_name>/status/record) remains in the online state and a new MQTT topic gets added named frigate/<camera_name>/status/CameraRoleEnum.record with the value offline.

This behaviour is consistent across all cameras in my setup.

Expected behaviour:

1. frigate/camera/status/record = online
2. Connection to camera is lost
3. frigate/camera/status/record = offline

Observed behaviour:

1. frigate/camera/status/record = online
2. Connection to camera is lost
3. frigate/camera/status/record = online, frigate/camera/status/CameraRoleEnum.record = offline

Steps to reproduce

1. Configure Frigate such that it connects to an MQTT broker and at least one camera's RTSP stream.
2. Sever Frigate's connection to the camera. (For example by disabling the network interface, or by unplugging the camera.)
3. Observe the camera's status topics over MQTT (frigate/<camera_name>/status/+). You should see a topic named CameraRoleEnum.record appear with the value offline, while the record topic's value remains online.

Version

0.17.0-f0d69f7

In which browser(s) are you experiencing the issue with?

No response

Frigate config file

# Something similar to this should be enough to reproduce, I prefer not to share my real config:
mqtt:
  enabled: true
  host: (redacted)
  user: (redacted)
  password: (redacted)
  client_id: (redacted)

go2rtc:
  rtsp:
    username: (redacted)
    password: (redacted)
  streams:
    cam1:
      - rtsp://(redacted):(redacted)@(redacted)/(redacted)
    cam1-sub:
      - rtsp://(redacted):(redacted)@(redacted)/(redacted)

ffmpeg:
  input_args: preset-rtsp-restream
  hwaccel_args: preset-nvidia

cameras:
  cam1:
    ffmpeg:
      inputs:
        - path: rtsp://localhost:8554/cam1-sub
          roles:
            - detect
        - path: rtsp://localhost:8554/cam1
          roles:
            - record
    record:
      enabled: true

docker-compose file or Docker CLI command

docker run -d \
  --name frigate \
  --restart=unless-stopped \
  --log-opt max-size=(redacted) \
  --mount type=tmpfs,target=/tmp/cache,tmpfs-size=(redacted) \
  --shm-size=(redacted) \
  -v (redacted):/media/frigate \
  -v (redacted):/db \
  -v (redacted):/models:ro \
  -v (redacted):/config/config.yml \
  -v (redacted):/config/.jwt_secret:ro \
  -v (redacted):/etc/localtime:ro \
  -p (redacted):5000 \
  -p (redacted):8971 \
  -p (redacted):8554 \
  --gpus=all \
  ghcr.io/blakeblackshear/frigate:0.17.0-tensorrt

Relevant Frigate log output

-

Relevant go2rtc log output

-

Operating system

Proxmox

Install method

Docker CLI

Network connection

Wired

Camera make and model

irrelevant

Screenshots of the Frigate UI's System metrics pages

irrelevant

Any other information that may be helpful

I think the problem might be incorrect substitution of role at these locations:

• frigate/frigate/video.py

  Line 439 in f0d69f7

  f"{self.config.name}/status/{role}", "offline"

• frigate/frigate/video.py

  Line 454 in f0d69f7

  f"{self.config.name}/status/{role}", "offline"

  
  I believe substituting role.value instead would fix the issue.
  Alternatively the

  frigate/frigate/config/camera/ffmpeg.py

  Line 91 in f0d69f7

  class CameraRoleEnum(str, Enum):

  class could be inherited from StrEnum instead of str, Enum, that way it could in theory be used in the code as it currently is.

[inkeep-ai-assistant[bot]]

Based on the available documentation, I can confirm that Frigate version 0.17 introduced dedicated MQTT topics for camera health status.(1) The expected behavior is that when a camera connection is lost, the status topic frigate/<camera_name>/status/<role> should reflect the offline state.(1)

The issue you're describing—where frigate/<camera_name>/status/record remains online while a new topic frigate/<camera_name>/status/CameraRoleEnum.record appears with value offline—suggests a bug in how the role enum is being converted to a string in the MQTT topic path.

Your analysis pointing to the code locations in video.py appears correct. The role enum needs to be properly converted to its string value when constructing the MQTT topic path. This would be a code-level bug rather than a configuration issue.

For monitoring camera uptime in the meantime, you could:

1. Monitor the incorrectly-named topic frigate/<camera_name>/status/CameraRoleEnum.record until this is fixed(1)
2. Use alternative monitoring approaches like checking frigate_process_fps metrics via Prometheus, where values below 1 for 15 minutes typically indicate an offline camera(1)
3. Monitor the go2rtc streams API at http://xxx.xxx:1984/api/streams to track producer/consumer counts(1)

This appears to be a legitimate bug that should be reported to the Frigate development team if it hasn't been already, as the MQTT status topics are intended to provide reliable camera health monitoring.(1)

📚 Sources:

1. Camera Uptime Monitoring

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Have another question? Just tag @inkeep.

[NickM-27]

Thanks, fixed in #22376