Setting it up

An afternoon, most of which is deciding what you want on the wall. Here is every step, including the one you cannot do yourself.

What you need first

A television, and somewhere to put it.
A small computer to sit behind it — a Raspberry Pi is what this is built for.
Wi-Fi, or a network cable, in the room the screen is in.
A person who will review submissions. This is the real requirement. Everything else is an afternoon; this is every week.

1. Your organization gets created

There is no sign-up form. Someone creates your organization and your first admin account, and you get an email with a link to sign in. Organization signup is not self-serve yet, so this first step is handled for you.

Ask, and you will be told honestly whether it is a fit.

Email support@snailengineering.com

2. Decide what the screens show

A board is one stream of content. Every screen is pointed at a board, and approved photos are sent to one or more of them. Most organizations start with one board and add a second the first time they want the lobby showing something another space does not.

The Boards screen listing the boards an organization has set up. — Boards are the one decision worth making before anything else.

Categories colour-code events on the screens — announcements, programs, social. You can leave them alone; the defaults are fine.

3. Plug in a screen

A screen with nothing set up shows a six-character code on the television. You type that code into the console, pick a board, and it starts playing within a minute. Nothing is typed at the television, and every screen is imaged from the same card.

The Displays screen, with a section for screens waiting to be claimed above the connected ones. — Screens waiting to be set up appear here as soon as they are plugged in.

Step-by-step, with what goes on the card: Setting up a screen.

4. Get people sending

Print a poster with a QR code and put it where people meet, or send them a link and let them sign in. A QR page can take anything from anyone, ask for an email address first, or be limited to people you have approved.

The Upload pages screen, listing the QR pages an organization has published. — Each QR page has its own name, its own poster and its own answer to who can send.

5. Set the rest to taste

How long each photo stays up, how far ahead the calendar looks, whether the screens print your organization’s name or ours, whether moderators and admins get a daily email when something is waiting. Each one is explained in a sentence beside its control.

The Settings screen, with each setting explained in a sentence beside its control. — Every setting says what it does and what it is currently following.

Then it mostly runs itself

The weekly job is the review queue. Moderators and admins can get one email a day, on days something is actually waiting, so nobody has to remember to check.

How it works Help