Contenu dynamique avec des ensembles de données

Static images are fine until the price of a coffee changes and someone has to re-export a graphic, re-upload it and hope every screen catches up. Dynamic content separates data from design: the layout stays as it is, and the numbers, lines and headlines inside it update on their own. easyCMS offers two flavours, DataSets you control, and live widgets fed from outside sources.

Qu'est-ce qu'un jeu de données ?

A DataSet is a small table that lives in the CMS, independent of any layout: you define columns (Product, Description, Price) and fill in rows (Espresso, single shot, 2.50€). Layouts then display the table through data widgets. Change a price in the DataSet and every screen showing it updates at the players’ next check-in, no design work, no re-uploads.

Classic uses: meeting-room and event schedules, KPI dashboards, arrival and departure boards, staff rotas, price lists.

For a café, bar or restaurant menu specifically, use Menu Boards instead. They give you categories and products as their own thing. That fits a menu far better than a generic table, and whoever updates prices never has to think about columns.

Création et remplissage d'un ensemble de données

1. Create a DataSet and give it a clear name (“Lunch menu”).
2. Define its columns. There are three kinds: Value for data you type, Formula for values computed from other columns, and Remote for fields filled from an external feed. Every new DataSet arrives with a column called Col1 already in place. Edit or delete it from its row menu rather than working around it.
3. Add rows by hand through the CMS grid, a friendly, spreadsheet-like form anyone can edit, or import them from a CSV file when migrating an existing price list.
4. For data that lives elsewhere, a remote DataSet pulls rows automatically from an external JSON or CSV source, keeping the CMS copy in sync without anyone touching it. Two things to know before you design around it: the fetch runs hourly by default, and the columns have to be typed to match what the feed sends.

Watch out A remote DataSet suits data that changes a few times a day, not a live feed. Do not build a departures board expecting minute-by-minute accuracy.

Whoever updates the rows needs no design skills. With permissions set accordingly they need no access to layouts either, so a store manager can edit today’s specials without being able to break the design.

Affichage du contenu du jeu de données sur une mise en page

On the layout, add a data widget to the layout and point it at your DataSet:

• Table-style widgets render rows and columns with fonts, colours and templates you control, the natural fit for menus and lists. Long tables can page through rows across multiple screens-worth automatically.
• Ticker-style rendering feeds rows one at a time into a scrolling or cycling presentation, good for announcements pulled from a DataSet.

Design the widget once; from then on the content team only ever touches the data. DataSet-driven signage is included with the easyCMS PRO and Enterprise accounts; on the standard 49€ account, contact us and we will tell you what upgrading involves.

Live widgets: RSS, weather and web content

Not all dynamic content needs a DataSet. easyCMS layouts can include widgets that fetch their content live:

• RSS/news tickers: point a ticker widget at any RSS feed (news, your blog, an internal feed) and headlines flow across the screen, always current.
• Weather: current conditions and forecasts for a location, styled to match your design.
• Clocks and calendars: time, date and upcoming events.
• Web page / embedded HTML: render an existing dashboard or web app inside a frame on the layout, useful for KPI screens that already exist as a URL.

DataSet, RSS, weather and clock content is cached on the player, so a brief connection drop keeps showing the last known data rather than an error. It is not indefinite: there is a freshness check, and past it the widget switches to its “no data” message rather than showing figures nobody can vouch for. Webpage content behaves differently, since a live page cannot be cached meaningfully.

A worked example: café menu board

1. DataSet “Menu” with columns Item, Price, Available.
2. Portrait layout with a header image above a data widget showing the DataSet, filtered to available items.
3. Ticker along the bottom fed by the café’s news feed.
4. Staff update prices and availability in the DataSet grid from a phone, and screens follow at their next check-in. Worth setting expectations honestly: a change is not instant. It waits for the player to collect, and a layout already on screen carrying a long-running item finishes that item first, so a screen looping five-minute videos can be several minutes behind the grid.

That is the whole operating model: design once, then run the signage from data.

Related articles: Creating Layouts, Playlists and the Media Library, Users and Permissions