Run a live display
Open a channel in a full-screen browser and prepare it for unattended playback
Each channel has a public player designed to fill a browser window. Save the channel, then open this path on your public site:
/channels/<channel-slug>The URL uses the channel's editable slug. Changing the slug changes the address that the display must open.
Preview before going live
Use Open screen from the channel record or the Schedule view. The admin opens a signed preview URL when available.
Preview adds controls and information that are deliberately absent from the public display:
- Previous and next buttons when several slides are active
- Channel and slide names
- Slide position in the active sequence
- Playlist name and duration
- Titles of linked records
- Status text when the channel is missing or nothing is scheduled
Use the clean /channels/<channel-slug> address on the physical display.
Treat screen content as public
Channel playback data is publicly readable so a display can open without an admin session. The public /channels page can also list the site's channels and link to their players.
Do not place private, embargoed, or staff-only information in screen slides or channel names. Site password controls do not turn the screen player into a private signage system.
Set up the display browser
- Open the public channel URL.
- Put the browser into full-screen or kiosk mode.
- Disable sleep and screen-saving settings on the device.
- Make sure the device clock and network connection are reliable.
- Confirm that the browser window matches the channel's intended shape.
The player uses server time and the site's configured timezone for scheduling. It scales the channel uniformly inside the available browser window, leaving unused space black when the shapes differ.
The beta player relies on a network connection and a normal browser session. Device pairing, offline content storage, and remote heartbeat monitoring sit outside the current Screens workflow, so manage those device concerns separately.
Understand live playback
The player:
- Shows the single active time slot for the channel.
- Plays its playlists back-to-back in order.
- Shows each slide for the duration on its playlist row.
- Repeats the combined sequence after the final slide.
- Starts at the first slide when a different time slot becomes active.
- Checks for saved content and schedule changes every 15 seconds.
When a change arrives, the player keeps the current slide where possible. If that slide or its active slot no longer exists, playback starts at the beginning of the new active sequence.
If a later refresh fails, the last successfully loaded schedule can continue playing while the player retries. An initial connection failure has no last-known content to use, so the display stays black until a request succeeds.
Blank and error states
The public display remains black when:
- No time slot is active.
- The active slot has no playable slides.
- A slide cannot be rendered.
- The initial screen-state request has not succeeded.
Preview mode shows status text for common blank states. If the Screens add-on is not enabled for the site, the player shows Screens not enabled.
Check common problems
The display is black
Open the signed preview and check for Nothing scheduled right now. Then confirm the site's timezone, the slot's weekdays and brackets, and that its playlists contain finished slides.
For a custom channel, confirm that both width and height are positive numbers.
The layout has the wrong proportions
Compare the channel, template, and slide aspect ratios with the physical display. For a custom shape, use the same width and height throughout.
Linked content is missing
Open the finished slide record and check every linked-content field. A sample selected while designing a template does not become the finished slide's real record automatically.
A recent change has not appeared
Save the source record and wait at least 15 seconds. If the signed preview updates but the physical display does not, check that both are using the same channel slug and public site.
Video does not start
Confirm that the media file loads and that Autoplay and Muted are enabled. Browsers commonly block autoplay with sound.
Unattended-display checklist
- Preview every playlist in full.
- Check all linked records and any optional fields that may be empty.
- Test the start and end of each scheduled period.
- Test any bracket that crosses midnight.
- Confirm the intended black periods between slots.
- Verify normal and inverted logos.
- Test custom fonts, images, video, and iframes on the real device.
- Restart the browser once to confirm the public URL loads without an admin session.