BrightAuthor:connected User Guide

Overview

BrightAuthor:connected is BrightSign’s free, all-in-one app for player setup / management, authoring, and content management. Key features include:

• Multi-Platform
  Available for Mac or PC and is also accessible via a web browser at https://bsn.cloud.

• Player Setup
  Configure and set up players for use.

• Player Management
  Monitor and troubleshoot players over the Internet.

• Presentation Creation
  Create presentations consisting of video, images, audio, HTML, and text.

• Presentation Publishing
  Publish presentations for players to display. Presentations can be delivered to players via several available Publishing Modes as described here.

New to BrightSign?

If you are new to BrightSign, you are highly encouraged to go through the Start Here section which provides a quick, high-level overview of how BrightSign’s products work. Given that BrightSign’s products function in highly unique ways, this is highly recommended reading.

From there, you can visit the Quickstart page where a number of Qiuckstart guides exist to help you quickly set up your player and publish a presentation.

Release notes for the production release and all future releases of BrightAuthor:connected and BSN.cloud can be found here.

Requirements

To create presentations and publish them to your player, you will need the following:

Mac or PC

Mac

Any Mac computer running one of the last two major production releases of the macOS.

Windows PC

Any Windows PC that meets or exceeds the following minimum requirements:

• 2.3 GHz CPU

• 2 GB RAM required (4 GB recommended)

• 100 MB available hard disk space for program files (additional disk space required if storing content and/or presentations on your hard disk)

• One of the following operating systems:

  • Windows 11

  • Windows 10 (32 or 64 bit)

  • Windows 8 (32 or 64 bit)

  • Windows 7 (32 or 64 bit)

The following is optional but recommended:

• Bonjour 3.x or later: Required for automatically discovering players on the local network; available with the Airport Utility installer.

Chrome Browser

If you are using the browser version of BrightAuthor:connected, we recommend accessing it with a Chrome-based browser (i.e., Google Chrome, Brave, or Microsoft Edge) for full feature support. Your Chrome version should be within five major releases of the current production release. Alternative browsers like Firefox or Safari may work as well.

BrightSign Player

Any of the following models, which must be running the indicated minimum OS version or higher:

• Series 5:

  • AU335, XCx55, XDx5, LSx5, HDx5, XTx5

  • AU335 minimum OS version is 8.2

  • All other Series 5 players have a minimum OS version of 9.0.22.3

• Series 4:

  • XTx44, XDx34, HDx24, LS424, HS124

  • Minimum OS version is 8.0

• Series 3:

  • XTx43, XDx33, HDx23, LS423, HS123, HO523

  • Minimum OS version is 8.0

• Series 2:

  • 4Kx42 only

  • Minimum OS version is 8.0

Display

A monitor, TV, or touchscreen with an HDMI^® input.

Storage Device

As mentioned here, players require a separate storage device. These can include any of the following:

• microSD card (note that some very early player models may require the larger SD card)

• USB Flash Drive (supported on models with a USB port)

• M.2 SSD (XCx55, XDx35, XTx45, XTx44, XTx43, XDx34, XDx33 models only)

• mSATA drive (4Kx42 models only)

microSD Card Formatting

Card Reader/Writer

Only required if publishing setup files and/or presentations to an SD or microSD card. The card reader/writer must be connected to your Mac/PC and must be compatible with your storage card.

Input Device

Required for interactive presentations only. Depending on the model, BrightSign players support the following input devices:

• Touchscreen equipped with a supported touch controller. See this link for a list of many supported touch controllers. 

• BrightSign BP200 and BP900 USB button panels 

• Many brands of USB keyboards 

• Many brands of USB mice or trackballs 

• Many brands of USB bar code scanners

• Quadravox Serial Button Board

• AMX, Crestron, and similar control devices

• Any GPIO (open/close contact switch) button, signal, or LED (your custom board or LED display); GPIO connections may require Phoenix-type GPIO terminal blocks.

• PC (via UDP or serial)

• IR input/output devices using the NEC or Pronto Hex remote control protocols