Digital Signage System

[Liam-FD]

Hi all,

 

I'm investigating a digital signage system for use on several WiFi-enabled TVs across our 3 sites. These will be placed in staffing areas and so we would like to display the staff events calendar in one section, another section for other upcoming important dates, maybe a ticker for something else.

 

I'm aware of SedaoLive software from another school within our MAT that use this, but they wouldn't recommend. Are there any other similar softwares that manage digital signage?

 

Thanks

[kidpressingbuttons]

xibo- free, open source and works well

[Mr_Jiminy]

Screenly, SignageLive or Onelan.

[InterwebsGuy]

xibo- free, open source and works well

It's good, but it's a PITA now they've gone the Docker route.

Edited November 15, 2018 by InterwebsGuy

[pete]

It's good, but it's a PITA now they've gone the Docker route.

 

Manual install still works if you don't want to faff with Docker for one unique snowflake of an application.

[SamanthaD]

On a different note - I hope by TV's you mean digital signage screens? TV's are not designed to be used in the way digital signage is, and will fail or suffer from burn in a lot quicker than a professional display...

 

Unfortunately the answer to your question comes down to budget.... How much do you have in the coffers?

[kidpressingbuttons]

yeah I decided to use an older version with xammp rather than messing around with docker

[Liam-FD]

On a different note - I hope by TV's you mean digital signage screens? TV's are not designed to be used in the way digital signage is, and will fail or suffer from burn in a lot quicker than a professional display...

 

Unfortunately the answer to your question comes down to budget.... How much do you have in the coffers?

 

This is the first I've looked into this so I could mean digital signage screens - yes!

 

We have some money, but as per usual with school budgets not a huge amount. I'm looking for 3 solutions initially as we want 1 on each site.

 

If there are any recommendations for companies who can provide a full solution rather than me compiling all of the elements individually I'm happy to take those on board.

 

But again, I'm also happy to look at individual software and screens and compile these - just looking at what is recommended by others that have completed this before.

[howartp]

We've got a trial of Trilby.TV at the moment.

 

Works well but there is a cost; depends how many displays you're wanting as to whether it's financially appropriate.

 

Was all set to go Xibo but the docker thing is awful and the non-docker is throwing errors left, right and centre.

[MarkSixsmith]

We also had the Trilby trial but went with Planet eStream - we actually already had it but weren't using its signage. Unlimited screens at no cost per screen and easier to use workss well for us.

[FishCustard]

We use Chromebits and Google Slides - receptionists can edit it just like a PowerPoint, and I've built a little webpage that hosts the slides and refreshes them every ten minutes to ensure content is up to date. Don't even need a Chrome Management License for that!

[FragglePete]

Using Xibo - got it running without Docker - Server looking after it is a VM Server 2016, running IIS, MySQL and PHP quite happily. Didn't take too much hassle to get working, documentation is a bit all over the place for non docker installs but got there in the end. I have four displays running old or NUC type PCs. Seems to work well.

 

Pete

[supportman]

We just built a HTML Webpage and used google chrome in kiosk mode to auto refresh it every 6mins. Hardware is Intel Compute stick.

 

Works very well and easy to update with new posters or live RSS feeds from out website and calendar.

 

EDIT: tried XIBO but it had a shocking UI, poor templates, terrible documentation and needed a server to run it unless you paid for their cloud option.

Edited November 15, 2018 by supportman

[FishCustard]

We just built a HTML Webpage and used google chrome in kiosk mode to auto refresh it every 6mins. Hardware is Intel Compute stick.

 

Works very well and easy to update with new posters or live RSS feeds from out website and calendar.

 

EDIT: tried XIBO but it had a shocking UI, poor templates, terrible documentation and needed a server to run it unless you paid for their cloud option.

Pretty much my experience too. I liked the features of Xibo, but it was built by people who never had to use the user interface....

[3s-gtech]

Been using Xibo for around ten years now. We stuck with a pre-Docker version which is excellent - no issues with the UI or any of it. Runs on one of our web services VMs, pretty light on resources. I have no inclination to upgrade it, but had to work through some little registry quirks.

[Chris_Cook]

Our older screens are Xibo, but the newer ones are google slides running from a raspberry pi. Much easier to just give access to staff to google slides, and then they can worry about it. Much less training and logins too.

[supportman]

Our older screens are Xibo, but the newer ones are google slides running from a raspberry pi. Much easier to just give access to staff to google slides, and then they can worry about it. Much less training and logins too.

 

Out of interest, how do you auto load the slide URL on the Raspberry Pi?

[PotNoodleTech]

Our older screens are Xibo, but the newer ones are google slides running from a raspberry pi. Much easier to just give access to staff to google slides, and then they can worry about it. Much less training and logins too.

 

That's an interesting and very cheap way of doing it!!

 

Did you use any online guides to set that up??

[FishCustard]

That's an interesting and very cheap way of doing it!!

 

Did you use any online guides to set that up??

 

We use a similar system, and it's just a case of writing a quick webpage to host the Google Slides player in an iframe, then using some JS to auto-refresh it every so many minutes. Host the page on an internal webserver, load it on your RPi or Chromebit or old PC - job done.

 

Here's our 'host' page. Change the "600000" in the setInterval to whatever interval you want, set the Google Sheets URL appropriately and off you go. If your screens aren't 1920x1080, you'll want to change the width and height of the iframe and container div too. There's 32 pixels worth of controls and branding that you want to shove off the bottom of the screen, hence the iframe height is 32 pixels greater than the actual screen height.

Edited November 16, 2018 by FishCustard

[pslater]

On a different note - I hope by TV's you mean digital signage screens? TV's are not designed to be used in the way digital signage is, and will fail or suffer from burn in a lot quicker than a professional display...

 

Unfortunately the answer to your question comes down to budget.... How much do you have in the coffers?

 

We've been using Samsung consumer TVs nonstop for over 2 years and have had no issues - We figured that the cost of digital signage screens is far more than just replacing a screen if it fails. Had no evidence of screen burn on LED screens too

 

http://www.edugeek.net/forums/av-multimedia-related/175672-xibo-how-we-do-signage.html#post1505121

[Chris_Cook]

We use a similar system, and it's just a case of writing a quick webpage to host the Google Slides player in an iframe, then using some JS to auto-refresh it every so many minutes. Host the page on an internal webserver, load it on your RPi or Chromebit or old PC - job done.

 

Here's our 'host' page. Change the "600000" in the setInterval to whatever interval you want, set the Google Sheets URL appropriately and off you go. If your screens aren't 1920x1080, you'll want to change the width and height of the iframe and container div too. There's 32 pixels worth of controls and branding that you want to shove off the bottom of the screen, hence the iframe height is 32 pixels greater than the actual screen height.

 

Next time I rebuild one of these, I may steal this!.

 

The guides tend to change with each version of the raspberry pi. Normally I google how to do it, but I think these are my notes from last time:

 

* Normal Ubuntu mate install.

* Add Chromium-browser

* Don’t set a Keychain password, otherwise it will always prompt on start. If set, change it back to an empty password.

* Add Chromium-browser as a start up item. Command should be:

chromium-browser –kiosk –incognito “http://www.google.com/”

* setup auto login

 

I would now save the above html page on the raspberry pi, and point the chromium browser to this page. But for simplicity, you can just change the url to the published url of your google slide show. You will probably then have to reboot the pi to update the content.

[SamanthaD]

 

Samsung consumer TV used in a digital signage application - on 24/7. Photo taken 2 mins ago, installed less than a year ago. (Bodge job using available kit and no budget, won't be doing it again!)

[Wubbalubbadub]

Signage live here. I must admit that i don't have much interaction with it, other than approving the invoices, but the cost seems reasonable and the tech who uses it says it is alright. My old boss uses Xibo and swears by it.

[bushby]

Our previous setup was just PowerPoint. But not long after I started at the place I'm at. I changed it to xibo, still on 1.2 of the server and client I have it. We have a Toshiba screen consumer grade. And there is no screen burn after 3-4 years of constantly being on

[Liam-FD]

I've had a look at Xibo, I like how customisable it is. My only concern is getting it up and running as it is only me (with limited expertise in this area) to setup! Android looks like the easiest way - are there any recommendations for android-based TVs/screens to use? Not looking for anything too fancy as just for staff room use rather than public display.