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Kiosk Builder

INTRO TO THE KIOSK

In this Chapter we'll be covering the Kiosk. Kiosk are a set of features that enables a user to interact with the Screen. You can think of an ATM machine as a Kiosk, or a user digitally ordering food at a restaurant, or a customer buying movie tickets through a terminal. These are all Kiosk examples. Our Digital Signage platform has the Kiosk capability; so you can take advantage of the latest touch screen and tablet technology and provide a kiosk solution to your customers.

We also developed a custom Kiosk SDK Module so you can develop your own kiosk solution.

Next, we'll be covering the different aspects of the Kiosk feature:

- How to Enable the Kiosk Mode for Your Campaigns
- How to Upload the Different Kiosk Modules onto the System

We will demonstrate the Kiosk feature by downloading a Kiosk module we've developed and use it as an example. This Kiosk module is a restaurant food finder and you can download it from the following link: Kiosk Module

After you downloaded the zip file you can upload the file named RestaurantModule.swf onto the server from the Resources section of the SignageStudio.

After the resource has been uploaded and saved on to the server, we need to mark it as a Flex module. This is because the module was developed using the open source Adobe Flex framework available through the Apache repository.

Also, we must allow the uploaded resource to access external domains by enabling the Trust content option.

The Flex module and Trust content options are located in the Properties panel of the selected Resource.

After you click on the Trust content option, a Warning message appears on your screen.

Click OK to enable the Trust content option. Remember to SAVE the settings.

Next, we will access the Scene Editor area of the SignageStudio by clicking on the Scene Editor tab from the main Navigation menu.

After we've created a new Scene, we'll drag the RestaurantModule.swf resource onto the Scene. We'll set a blue border for it so it will be seen more easily. We will also increase the size of the resource, because we want the Kiosk module to occupy the full Scene.

You can easily change the size of a resource or Component within a Scene using the Constrains feature. If you anchor the object, which in our case is the SWF file, type the number 0 on the x and y axes and the resource will match the size of the Scene.

Next select the Campaign tab from the main Navigation menu.

CAMPAIGN KIOSK MODE

To enable the Kiosk mode for a Campaign, you select it in the Campaign panel and click on the Kiosk tab in its Properties panel.

In the Kiosk section of the Properties panel you enable the Kiosk mode.

Enabling the Kiosk mode option, will allow mouse and keyboard interactivity with this particular campaign; you can also use your finger and virtual keyboard in tablets and touch screen capable screens.

After you've enable the Kiosk mode, you also have to define a Kiosk exit key. The Kiosk exit key, allows an Administrator to exit the Kiosk. You don't want public users to go in to the OS and exit the Kiosk.

Enter in the Kiosk exit key field the password you want to set as an exit key phrase.

Note: Only the SignagePlayer Desktop version uses the ESC + password functionality (not the Web Player).

To actually close the Kiosk as an Administrator, you press the Escape key on the local machine and enter the password you've set in the field described above.

After we setup the Campaign and enabled the Kiosk mode, we'll drag onto the Timeline the Kiosk Scene we've created earlier.

After you added the Kiosk Scene to the Timeline, double click on it to access its Properties panel.

In the Properties panel, you enable mouse and keyboard functionality for this Kiosk Scene and you'll do this by enabling the Kiosk inputs option.

You can enable or disable Kiosk interactivity per specific resource making the Kiosk functionality more flexible. If you want mouse and keyboard interaction you must enable the Kiosk inputs option per specific resource on the timeline. This will allow for example to enable interaction with one HTML component, but not with other swf animations and HTML components.

The final thing we should do is to preview the presentation. We'll use the SignagePlayer Web version for this, but we recommend using the SignagePlayer Desktop for better performance (and remember that password protection is only supported on Desktop version).

You can click on the images and test the mouse interaction with the Kiosk module.

If you have a touch screen device or tablet, you'll be able to use your fingers to interact with the Kiosk module instead of using an actual mouse.

SCREEN SAVER MODE

In this section we're going to discuss using a Digital Signage presentation in a Screen Saver mode. This feature is useful if you have for example, a Point of Sale system and you want to integrate the Digital Signage presentation as a Screen Saver; so if the operator stops using the Point of Sale system for a certain number of seconds or minutes, the Presentation can kick in and start playing. First, access the Campaign area of the SignageStudio by selecting the Campaign tab from the main navigation menu.

In the Campaign area, select a Campaign you want to use the screen saver mode in. Next, access the properties panel of the campaign, click the Kiosk tab and you'll see the two main options under the Kiosk section:

- 1. Kiosk mode
- 2. Interrupt mode

INTERRUPT MODE

To use your Signage Presentation in a Screen saver mode, select Interrupt mode.

To kick off the Presentation after a user stops moving the mouse, enable the interrupt mode for the selected Campaign.

and set it to [Show desktop]

This means the entire Signage Presentation will start playing normally, but only when there is no mouse activity for the designated timer length.

In the same section, you'll also see two additional fields which are used to setup the waiting period; or how long to wait before no mouse activity is present to begin and play the presentation.

The first field from the left is where you'll enter the minutes. The second field is used for seconds. You can either type numerical values in the fields or use the UP and DOWN arrow keys.

INTERRUPT MODE WITH KIOSK MODE

In the previous section, we covered using the interrupt mode and having the [Show desktop] option enabled; that will allow the Signage Software to play your entire Presentation normally (every time a user stops using the mouse for a predefined period of time). We said this can be accomplished by setting terms of minutes or seconds.

Another option of using the Interrupt mode is together with the Kiosk mode. If you enable both Kiosk mode and the Interrupt mode, you'll be able to set a particular Timeline to play and allow users to interact with a predefined timeline.

To demonstrate this, we'll enable both the Kiosk mode and the Interrupt mode for a particular Campaign.

Under the Interrupt mode checkbox, there is a field named timeline having two buttons. You'll see the default option corresponding to these buttons is the [Show desktop] option.

Next, select a Timeline containing a Kiosk module you want users to interact with.

click on the use current button to bind the selected timeline as the Interactive timeline for your touch screen.

this action will replace the [Show desktop] with your selected interactive timeline.

Now the Presentation will play like it normally does, with the settings you defined, and as soon as a user moves the mouse or interacts with the screen, Timeline 1 (in our case) is going to run for the Kiosk mode and users can interact with it across touch screens and tablets.

If a user stops interacting with the Timeline for the pre-defined period of time, then the Signage Presentation will begin to play normally until someone moves the mouse or interact with the Screen again.

Press the Clear button to revert back to [Show desktop] screen saver mode.