pisignage-server Documentation

The server provides management capabilities for digital signage deployments:

Player Management

• Auto-discovery of players on the local network.
• Real-time player monitoring.

Group Management

• Create groups and assign players to them.
• Configure display settings (1080p/720p, landscape/portrait).
• Deploy default, scheduled, or advertisement playlists to groups.

Asset Management

• Support for video, mp3, html/zip, images, links, and Google Calendar feeds.
• Automatic Processing: Videos are converted to .mp4 using ffmpeg; thumbnails and metadata are extracted automatically.
• Organization: Add labels to assets, rename/delete files, and view file details.

Playlist Management

• Create, rename, and delete playlists.
• Drag-and-drop asset ordering.
• Set custom durations for non-video assets.
• Select layouts (e.g., 1, 2a, 2b, 3a, 3b, 4, 4b, 2ab).
• Enable tickers with custom text.
• Create advertisement playlists with configurable interval timers.

Once the service file is created, use the following systemctl commands to manage the pisignage service:

• Reload systemd configuration: Run this after creating or modifying the .service file.
• Start the service: Starts the server immediately.
• Check status: Verifies if the service is active (running) and shows PID/resource usage.
• Enable auto-start: Configures the service to start automatically on system boot.
• Stop the service: Shuts down the server.
• View logs: Use journalctl to inspect the service logs.

# Reload systemd to recognize the new service
systemctl daemon-reload

# Start the service
sudo systemctl start pisignage

# Check if the service is running properly
sudo systemctl status pisignage

# Enable the service to start on boot
sudo systemctl enable pisignage

# Stop the service
sudo systemctl stop pisignage

# View the last 200 lines of the service log
sudo journalctl -u pisignage.service -n 200

To run the server directly on your host machine, follow these steps:

1. Prerequisites

Ensure the following are installed on your system:

• MongoDB: The open-source document database.
• Node.js and npm: The server framework.
• ffmpeg: For video conversion (requires ffprobe for metadata extraction).
• ImageMagick: For image editing and thumbnail creation.
• Git: For version control.

2. Setup Steps

1. Clone the repository:

   git clone https://github.com/colloqi/pisignage-server

2. Create required media directories:

   mkdir media
   mkdir media/_thumbnails

3. Install dependencies:

   cd pisignage-server
   npm install

3. Configuration and Execution

• Port Configuration: The default port is 3000. To change it, modify config/env/development.js.
• Run the server:

  node server.js

• Access the UI: Open http://localhost:3000 or http://[your-ip]:3000 in a browser.

4. Post-Installation Configuration

• Authentication: Default credentials are pi / pi. Change these in the Settings tab.
• License/User Sync: Under Settings, configure the username to match your sign-in username at pisignage.com (use your username, not your email ID) to enable player licenses.
• Upload Licenses: Download license files from pisignage.com and upload them via the Settings tab.

To ensure the pisignage-server starts automatically on Linux systems using systemd after a reboot, create a service file at /etc/systemd/system/pisignage.service.

Configuration Details

• User/Group: By default, the example uses the pisignage user. To run the server as root, comment out the User and Group lines.
• Dependencies: The After=mongodb.service directive ensures the server waits for MongoDB to be running before starting.
• Environment Variables: You can set NODE_ENV and PORT within the [Service] section.
• Logging: The example redirects output to /var/log/pisignage.log via the ExecStart command.

[Unit]
Description=pisignage Player -  Server Software
#Include the After directive to make sure mongodb is running
After=mongodb.service

[Service]
# Key `User` specifies that the server will run under the pisignage user
# Hash User & Group out if you want root to run it
#User=pisignage
#Group=pisignage
Restart=always
RestartSec=10
WorkingDirectory=/root/pisignage-server
ExecStart=/usr/bin/node /root/pisignage-server/server.js >> /var/log/pisignage.log 2>&1
#StandardOutput=
#StandardError=/var/log/pisignageserver.log
Environment=NODE_ENV=development PORT=3000
[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

After booting your player (e.g., Raspberry Pi), you must point it to your local server's address and port. The server address in player settings must include the port (e.g., 192.168.1.12:3000).

Method A: Web UI

Access the player's local web interface at http://[player-ip]:8000/settings and configure the admin and media server URLs.

Method B: Physical Keyboard

1. Connect a keyboard to the player.
2. Press Ctrl-N or F6.
3. Change the config and media server to http://[your-server-ip]:[port] (e.g., http://192.168.1.30:3000).
4. Open a terminal using Ctrl+Alt+T and delete any existing _config.json and _settings.json files located in /home/pi/piSignagePro/config.

Method C: SSH

1. Connect via SSH.
2. Edit /home/pi/piSignagePro/package.json to set the admin and media server configuration.
3. Delete any existing _config.json and _settings.json files in /home/pi/piSignagePro/config.

The server.js file serves as the main entrypoint for the application. When executed, it performs the following bootstrap sequence:

1. Environment Setup: Sets NODE_ENV to development if not already specified.
2. Database Connection: Connects to MongoDB using the URI defined in config/config.js. If the connection fails, the process exits with code 1.
3. Directory Creation: Ensures required application directories exist: releasesDir, licenseDir, syncDir, and thumbnailDir.
4. Model Bootstrapping: Automatically loads all Mongoose models located in app/models.
5. Express Configuration: Initializes the Express application and applies settings from ./config/express.
6. Server Protocol: Starts either an HTTP or HTTPS server based on the config.https setting. If HTTPS is enabled, it expects pisignage-server-key.pem and pisignage-server-cert.pem to be present in the root directory.
7. Socket Initialization: Sets up multiple real-time communication channels (Socket.io and WebSockets).
8. Scheduler: Starts the internal scheduler service.

To run the server, ensure your MongoDB instance is running and your configuration files are correctly set up.

You can deploy the pisignage-server stack using Docker Compose. The setup includes the main application service and a MongoDB instance for data persistence.

Service Details:

• pisignage-server: Runs on port 3000. It depends on the mongo service.
• mongo: Runs version 5.0 and exposes port 27017.

Persistent Volumes: To ensure data is not lost when containers are stopped or removed, the following volumes are used:

• mongodb: Stores the database files (/data/db).
• mongodb_config: Stores MongoDB configuration (/data/configdb).
• media: Stores media assets used by the signage server (/media).
• data: Stores application-specific data (/data).

version: '3'
services:
  mongo:
    image: mongo:5.0
    restart: unless-stopped
    ports:
      - 27017:27017
    volumes:
      - mongodb:/data/db
      - mongodb_config:/data/configdb
  pisignage-server:
    image: pisignage/pisignage-server:latest
    restart: unless-stopped
    ports:
      - 3000:3000
    volumes:
      - media:/media
      - data:/data
    depends_on:
      - mongo

volumes:
  mongodb:
  mongodb_config:
  media:
  data: