Advanced Tools
This page / section pertains to BrightAuthor Classic, our legacy app. BrightSign Author is our latest app for managing content and players.
Development of BrightAuthor Classic has largely ceased and the app will eventually be deprecated and replaced with BrightSign Author.
Advanced tools (accessible by navigating to Tools > Advanced) let you remotely control units on your BrightSign Network account or set up a USB flash drive to retrieve device data and perform device actions. The Advanced Tools window is divided into three tabs: the Setup USB Drive tab, as well as the Update Autorun and Unit Control tabs, which are only available if you have a BrightSign Network account.
Setup USB Drive
The Setup USB Drive tab allows you to configure a USB flash drive to extract data or perform specified actions (e.g. reboot the player) on a BrightSign player. The following checkboxes determine what actions will occur when the USB flash drive is inserted into the player:
- Copy log files: Extracts all log files.
- Delete log files: Deletes all log files on the BrightSign player.
- Reboot: Reboots the BrightSign player.
- Display status on screen during data capture: Displays the status of the above actions on the display while the USB flash drive is inserted into the BrightSign player.
Once you've selected the desired USB actions, follow these steps to carry them out:
- Click Setup drive and navigate to the location of the USB flash drive on your computer. Click OK.
- When the Setup Complete window opens, click OK.
- Remove the USB flash drive from your computer and insert it in the player.
- If you are extracting data from the player, reinsert the USB flash drive into your computer to retrieve the data.
You can retrieve data from multiple players using a single USB flash drive. The filename of each variable, media counter, and log record will include the serial number of the applicable player, so the number of unique player records you can put on a USB flash drive is limited only by storage space.
Update Autorun
Use the Update Autorun tab to update the Autorun on players linked to your BrightSign Network account. Check the boxes corresponding to the groups you wish to update. Then click Update now to update the Autorun version for players in the group(s).
See this How-to to learn how to distribute custom Autorun scripts using the BrightSign Network.
Unit Control
Use the Unit Control tab to send commands to players linked to your BrightSign Network account.
- In the Serial Number field, type the serial number of the player you want to control.
- Click the Action dropdown list to select the action you want the player to perform.
- Reboot unit: Restarts the player.
- Upload logs: Uploads the current log files on the player (based on the Logging settings selected when setting up the unit.). Log files can then be retrieved in the BrightSign Network WebUI.
- Recover – reformat: Puts the player into recovery mode and reformats its storage device.
- Recover – don’t reformat: Puts the player into recovery mode and downloads the latest Autorun script to the storage card without reformatting it.
- Click the Add action button to have the player perform the action the next time it checks in with the BSN servers.
You can add multiple actions to a single player. You can also use the Remove action button to cancel an action before the next check-in.
