Help / Making content

Your media library

Upload pictures, videos and songs; folders, tags and videos from a link.

What the library is

Media is your business's library: every picture, video, song and document you've uploaded, plus the QR codes, clocks, countdowns, tickers, calendars, menus, YouTube videos and web pages you've made. Anything in it can go in any playlist, as often as you like.

Owners and editors upload and change files. Viewers can look through the library and download files, but not change them.

Find your way around

• Library, on the left, sorts your files by kind: All Media, Videos, Pictures, Music, Templates, QR Codes, Widgets, Countdowns, Tickers, Calendars, Menus, YouTube, Web Pages, HTML5 Packages and Documents. Some appear only once you have one of that kind. Not in a Playlist lists files no playlist uses, handy for tidying up.
• Folders, under it, are your own groups of files. See Folders and tags.
• Search names and tags finds files by name or tag.
• At the top right, switch between a grid and a list, and sort by Newest first, Oldest first, Name or Largest first.

Each card shows the file's shape (like 16:9 Landscape), whether it's used (In 2 playlists or Not used), its first tags, its size and its folder.

Upload files

Press Upload Files or Browse Files, or drag files from your computer anywhere onto the page. You can pick many at once. The Uploads panel opens and follows each file:

1. Uploading, with how much has been sent.
2. Checking file… Every file is checked by what's actually inside it, never just its name, to make sure the screens can play it. This takes a few seconds.
3. Ready, and it's in the library.

Keep the tab open until your uploads finish. You can carry on working in other sections meanwhile.

What you can upload

Files can be up to 50 MB. Pictures are made the size your TVs show as they upload, at most 3840 pixels on their longest side, so a large photo straight from a camera is fine. Videos play without sound; for sound, use background music.

Why a file is refused

A file that can't be used stays in the Uploads panel with the reason, and its card says why. Press Dismiss to clear it.

Make things in the library

Press Create to make something instead of uploading it:

• QR Code: a slide with a code people scan with their phone. See below.
• Clock & Weather Widget, Countdown, Ticker, Calendar, YouTube Video and Web Page: content the TVs keep up to date themselves. See Live content.
• Menu Board: a slide of one of your menus. See Menu boards.
• Video from a Link: download a video from the internet into your library. See below.
• Google Slides: bring in a deck. See PDFs and Google Slides.
• Canva: bring in a design from Canva. See Canva.

QR codes

Choose Create → QR Code, then what The code opens:

• Wi-Fi: type the Network name and Password, and people join your Wi-Fi by scanning. Tick No password (an open network) or Hidden network if that's yours. Anyone who can see the screen can join with this code, so use a guest network.
• Web Link: a web address, such as your booking page or a review site.
• Text: any words, shown on the phone that scans it.

Choose its colours and words, then press Add to Library. The QR code is a picture the size of your TVs, ready to add to a playlist.

To change a QR code or a template slide later, open it and press Edit as a New Picture. That makes a new picture; slides using the old one keep it. To change a slide in place, use Edit Design on the slide in its playlist.

Videos from a link

Create → Video from a Link downloads a video into your library from a web address, so it plays even when the screen is offline. Paste a link to a video file (MP4 or WebM, up to 50 MB) or a picture, give it a name if you like, and press Add to Library. It shows Downloading from the link…, then is checked like an upload.

• The link must start with https:// and be the file itself. A page that plays a video isn't enough.
• Only links on the public internet work, not ones inside your own network.
• A YouTube link belongs in Create → YouTube Video, and a Google Slides link in Create → Google Slides. You'll be told if you paste one here.
• A link to a PDF or a song is refused: download it and upload it instead, so a PDF's pages can be made.

A file's details

Click a file to open its details on the right:

• A preview. Videos and songs play here.
• Its name and kind. Press the pencil to rename it.
• Add to Playlist: pick a playlist and add the file to it as a slide, or a song to its music.
• Technical specs: its resolution, shape, length and bitrate (for videos and songs), file size, how it suits your TVs (Fits one TV, Fits across all TVs or Shown whole, with borders), and when it was added and by whom.
• Playlists: which playlists use it, and how many screens each is on.
• Folder and Tags.
• Download and Delete, at the bottom.

Folders and tags

Folders group files your way, like Lobby or Lunch Menus. Press the folder button beside Folders, type a name and press Enter: Made the folder Lobby. Click a folder to see its files. Hover over one to rename or delete it. Deleting a folder keeps its files in the library. A file is in one folder at most.

Tags are words on files, like summer or coffee, so a search finds them. A file can have many. Add them in a file's details, under Tags, up to 30 characters each; press the cross on a tag to take it off.

Work on many files at once

Tick files (or Select all), then use the bar above them:

• Add to Playlist… adds them to a playlist: each picture or video a slide, each document's pages as slides, each song into its music. With two TVs, choose first between A slide for each file and A different file on each TV, which pairs them up in order.
• Move to Folder… files them, or No folder takes them out: Moved 1 file to Lobby.
• Tag adds a tag to them all: Tagged 1 file “summer”.
• Download downloads each one. Your browser may ask once to allow several downloads.
• Delete deletes those not in a playlist and keeps the others.

Delete files

Open a file and press Delete, or tick several and press Delete. You're asked first, because it can't be undone. A document's pages go with it, unless a playlist uses them.

A file the screens might still show can't be deleted yet:

• In a playlist: the details say, for example, Breakfast uses this file: take it out and publish. Take the slide out of that playlist and publish it, then delete the file.
• Taken out, but not published since: the screens still show it. The details offer a button to publish that playlist; then you can delete the file.
• On the TVs as an urgent message: end the message first. See Urgent messages.

If only older published versions of a playlist use a file, you can delete it, and it's removed from those versions too: you won't be able to restore them.

If something goes wrong

• A file stays on Checking file… for a long time. Most files take seconds. If it's still checking after a few minutes, reload the page.
• This video can't be played in this browser, so it likely won't play on the TVs either. You'll see this when you choose a video for a slide that your browser can't open. Export it again as an H.264 MP4.
• A file is blurry on the TVs. It's smaller than the TVs show. Upload a bigger version; see the right size for your pictures.