By taking advantage of the GPIO ports available with BrightSign HD, XD and XT models, you are able to integrate Signagelive with your Emergency Messaging (or any other instant messaging requirement). Using GPIO and Web Triggers technology, your signage can react and respond to events in the surrounding environment.

Configuring your GPIO device

Check and update firmware

Begin by powering on your supported BrightSign device without a micro SD card inserted, this will lead the Player to power on and show the hardware information and the current Firmware version on the connected display.

We recommend that you update your BrightSign device to the appropriate firmware before configuring Signagelive, you can download the firmware files below and instructions for the update process can be found here.

Please find the firmware download link for your device on our configuration page here.

1. Download the Signagelive GPIO Interface client here.
2. Open the Signagelive App zip folder on your laptop and ‘extract all’ to the root of the micro SD card. (The "root" is the directory you open to when you first open the micro SD card)
3. Create a folder on the root of your micro SD card and name it ‘data’ (see the section titled “What will be on my micro SD card when configuring all the above?” if you are unsure where to create the data folder).
4. Add the settings.json file from your downloads folder to the data folder on the micro SD card.
5. Optionally if you generated one add the network.json file to the data folder.
6. Remove the micro SD card from your laptop and insert into the powered off BrightSign Player
7. Power on your BrightSign Player

Your player will now launch with the Signagelive GPIO app. Since there are no graphics as part of this, there is no need to connect your device a screen.

Wiring your GPIO

Your BrightSign will support the connection of two 6-pin terminal blocks which can be inserted into GPIO connector on your device. These blocks can be wired according to your application.

The example below is based on having buttons to trigger content, but it can also be used for a connection to a relay for a fire alarm for instance.

For the purpose of this application you will be wiring the ports as follows:

When wiring the buttons, wire one end into the corresponding Port Number, and the other into the Ground.

Each button has an UP and DOWN state. This means that each button can be used to trigger 2 separate changes, one when it is pressed, another when it is released. Please have this in mind when thinking about the content changes you wish to make.

Configuration

At the moment there is no User Interface, and our Support Team will work with you to create and upload the necessary files.

To help you set this up, our Support Team will need to know the following:

• Which buttons/relays are you using?
• Are these buttons going to trigger content for UP or DOWN. A button press ON or a button release OFF?
• What are the Triggers? I.e. What is going to be sent to the Web Triggers API, and what is the Interrupt ID? (For information on setting up your web triggers please see our Web Triggers API page)
• Which Groups/Players do you want to trigger content on?
• What is the serial number for the BrightSign device you are using (connected to GPIO)?