HOW TO – Update BEAMTV Content Remotely
Version 1.0
Introduction
The best way to upload content to the BeamTV solid-state hard disk on the the BW280 system is by using a local connection to the onboard SFTP server. This is because media files tend to be large in size and so would be impractical or expensive to copy files over the air (mobile network). The following section of the BeamTV manual explains how this is done locally:
BeamTV User Manual – Uploading Content
However, if you do decide that you want to remotely update media files then you can use the Beam Content Distribution Service (CDS) to do this.
The Beam CDS is accessed using FTP, allowing you to easily create and copy over file and folder structures of your choosing to the server which will then be distributed over-the-air to your Beam units. If you have an in-house content management and publishing system then you can also configure that to publish files to the Beam CDS server using FTP. This can be useful if you want to publish advertising and other content files in an automated way.
Note: The Beam CDS service is available at no extra cost to customers that have our BEAMplus subscription. If you do not have BEAMplus then please contact our Sales department for pricing options.
Using the Beam Content Distribution Service
Before continuing, please read the following article which will help you set up and familiarise yourself with Beam CDS.
HOW TO: Update the Beam Portal Content Remotely
Transferring Data to the BeamTV Hard Disk
With the BeamTV disk content, there is no versioning feature, as the client on the BeamTV unit will essentially just one-way synchronise what’s on the cloud account with the hard disk (no files will be deleted). Therefore the content and appropriate file structure for the media server simply needs to be uploaded to a root folder called @DISK for either the device or group, as shown in the following screen.
So for example, if your unit’s serial number is ABCD1234 then you would copy the content to be published to the folder on the FTP Site:
/devices/ABCD1234/@DISK
Anything that is in the /@DISK folder will then be copied to the BeamTV hard disk on the device, to root of the mount point. By default this is \mnt.
BeamTV Media Centre File Structure
It’s important to maintain the correct file structure for the Media Centre otherwise it will not be able to find and index your content. As such, the default folder structure that should be within your /@DISK folder is shown below:
Once new content has been downloaded to your BeamTV device, you may need to update the media library on the device.
Note: It can take up to several minutes for the data to be copied from your account folder to the master cloud server, and that files are downloaded to your Beam device following a reboot and first-time connection to the Internet. The sync process will run every hour thereafter.
