Looking for suggestion: simple data entry UI, for welcome screen for visitors

[jakedesnake]

Hi there
I’m a Xibo newbie user, still learning about layouts and widgets and such. We are starting to roll out Xibo with Windows 10 players.
I’m looking to set up a typical reception signage screen, which will feature a welcome page. See this image:

[Album] Imgur

A receptionist will enter the name and company of todays gues (bold text) somewhere. However i’m not sure yet, about having them go through the normal Xibo CMS to edit a layout each day. It may be too complicated since this is not their field.
Is there some other solution you can think of, where the variables for name and company could be read? Some other interface where they could enter those values, and they would be picked up. Imagine something like a google sheets document whose values could be somehow published and read by some xibo component?

[DanBW]

Thank you for your message and welcome to the Community!

The type of setup you are looking for would suit a Dataset, as you could create the Layout and set up the Tickers where you would like the text to appear. Any changes to the text would simply involve logging into CMS, going to the Dataset and entering the new text that you want Displayed.

How this is set up will depend slightly on the version of Xibo CMS you are using. Here are links to the relevant documentation on how to set up a Dataset and have the items appear in your Layout:

https://xibo.org.uk/manual/en/media_datasets.html
https://xibo.org.uk/manual/en/media_module_dataset_ticker.html
https://xibo.org.uk/manual/en/media_module_dataset_view.html

If the functionality is unclear, please let me know your CMS version and I can help with any questions. I may also be able to put together a simple demonstration.

Many Thanks.

[jakedesnake]

Thank you for your reply
If I understand correctly, you mean static pages through the normal layout editor then? What would be interesting would be to see (a screenshot of) how simple such an interface could be, because since i’m a beginner i’m not sure I’m doing things in the most obvious way.

Are there static URLs in the CMS that could point point directly to a layout editor, by the way?

Does a ticker always imply a rolling text?

Cheers

[DanBW]

You are correct, my suggestion would require creating a Layout as you normally would, using the Layout Designer in your CMS.

Tickers do not necessarily need to have any effects applied so you could use one for static text if you wanted. I’m not sure what version of CMS you are using so I will use 2.0.4 to demonstrate what might work for you:

So first I would create the Dataset with a column for the text I want to show:

Next you will need to Edit the Column that the Dataset created when it was set up (although this will involve only small adjustments, as the default column is essentially set up as you would use it). You can access this by clicking the button at the end of the Dataset and choosing View Columns from the drop down menu.

You should now see that you have a default Column:

Click the button at the end of the Column and choose Edit to change the name if you would prefer to something more familiar for the Users. Keep it set as a String Data Type and a Value Column Type. Save to confirm any changes.

Next click the View Data button in top right corner of the View Column page, this will take you to the data entry page for your Dataset. Click the Add Row button in the top right corner of the page and enter whatever text you may want. Save to confirm:

Ok so now we simply use a Ticker Widget (on 2.0.4 you can choose a Dataset Ticker or the Dataset View Widget) to show that text in the Layout.

Here are some screenshots of the Layout I created with the Dataset Ticker. The Region is the size of the area in my layout where I want to show the text:

In the below screenshot you can see that I set the Visual Editor to On but that is up to you. I then used the Snippets box to choose that Column we created in the Dataset. You can see in the editor mine is named Col1|593 but yours will be <name of column|ID for column>:

After saving the changes I made to the Ticker, you can see in the Layout Preview that the text from the Column is now showing in the Layout:

You could add other regions with Text widgets so they contain the unchanging elements of text for your Layout. For example you may choose to create a Region that has a Text Widget for the Today we welcome part of your Layout, but the Regions where the names will change could contain Tickers for column entries.

If you want to change the data, the User simply goes to the Datasets option in CMS, clicks on the button at the end of the Dataset and chooses View Data. They can then double click on the entry, edit the text to whatever they choose and save to confirm. That change will then be received by the Layout, based on the Update Interval you set in the Caching tab for that Ticker in the Layout.

I hope this helps to understand the basics of using a Dataset in a way that would hopefully give you the setup you want, and is easy to maintain for other Users.

Many Thanks.

[jakedesnake]

Thank you for such an elaborate explanation! With screenshots and all.
I tried this, and more or less managed to connect two tickers to the dataset. I think i am on CMS 1.8 because i don’t have the same view, and i didn’t understand the snippet thing.

Still some confusion regarding what is a column and a row in this case, but that comes down to my limited knowledge of databases i suppose…!

Basicly, if i’m welcoming Hank Scorpio from the Globex Corporation, do i need one or two rows in the dataset, and do i need one or two columns?
I sort of think i tried with one column and two rows. I tried using two different tickers, linking in [col1|1] and [col1|2] respectively, but then i got:

Today we welcome
Hank Scorpio
Globex Corporation
from
Hank Scorpio
Globex Corporation

So maybe i need to restructure.
Slightly related question: Is it only tickers that can consume dataset data, not text widgets?

[DanBW]

Thanks for your reply, glad the information and screenshots helped to get you started with your Layout.

To clarify, a Column is where the data is stored, the row contains the data itself. To use your setup as an example, I would recommend 2 Columns for your Dataset, one can be for the name of the person, the other could be the name of the Corporation.

So say I have a Dataset with 2 Columns, Name and Corporation:

I can then enter the relevant data into a single row:

Now in my Layout I can use one ticker to return the Name Column and another Ticker to return the Corporation Column. The static text in between could be created with a Text Widget.

Many Thanks.