Modern Cloud Digital Signage Software Solutions
In the early days of digital Signage, people would be pleased with showing PowerPoint slides on large CRT monitors. They can show cartoons, pictures, text and videos in a constant loop. Using movement was better than static, printed material. It did not really matter whether the content was well designed. The novelty factor was enough to get the message noticed. But, there were still plenty of issues about upgrading and scheduling content. The initial solutions were little more than scheduling motors with very fundamental skills. Another issues centered on connectivity. Network connections were slow and hard to configure which frequently meant updating content by CD or DVD because this was before 3G mobile data and higher capacity USB storage.
Plasma flat-screens were just coming out in the marketplace. These were a significant improvement over CRTs and back projection LED TVs nevertheless they were still extremely costly, heavy and were more prone to burn-in. Content creators required to make certain that there were no static images on screen for too long otherwise the images would become permanently embedded in the screen. This improved a lot in later years to the point where it is no longer a problem. You cannot purchase a widescreen display anymore but some of them are still in use today.
Technological and manufacturing Improvements meant bandwidth increased exponentially as did PC and display screen functionality. We now have a wide selection of playback options for our articles. We can use small form factor or stick PCs, Android media players that come in a variety of shapes and sizes as well as tablets. The cloud based digital signage also has improved dramatically through the years. Solutions can be hosted locally or at the cloud. Content is currently mostly video-based and there’s far more streaming information available. Live information is also quite common so there’s less and less reason to be showing cable TV programming on a public display.
It is also important to mention that dashboards are becoming more accessible via mobile devices so network operators and brand-owners can control their message from virtually anywhere. Gone are the days of the sneaker net where CD-ROMs were sent out throughout the nation. Modern solutions can trigger Content and respond to different sensors. By way of instance, motion detectors can be used to change content using a wave of the hand. Digital signage displays can display on-demand content when an alert is triggered or when a RFID tag is present. Recently, beacons are becoming more popular and some are utilized to activate specific content based on proximity. Beacons are also utilized to exchange content with Smartphone users. By way of instance, promotions or other targeted content can be sent out when somebody walks by a digital screen.