Since the third-party players “poll” (that is, request playlists) at irregular intervals, the third-party player itself is responsible for reporting POPs.
When there is a one-to-one relationship between the Broadsign Air player and the Broadsign Control “player” registered for it, no additional work is needed. Each confirmed playback results in a single POP.
When a venue consists of multiple third-party players represented by a single player registration in Broadsign Control Administrator to play the exact same thing while using Broadsign Air to provide synchronized playlists, the POPs are handled differently. As each third-party player confirms playback, Broadsign Air accumulates the individual confirmations server-side, based on the optional screen_identifiers submitted with the playback confirmation. When all the third-party players confirm playback, Broadsign Air issues a POP that includes the screen multiplier.
For example:
- In a venue with 20 players, each player independently reports its playback, in near real-time.
- In the current model, each player counts for 1/20th of a POP, with some rounding.
- A threshold is defined: 80% of expected players checking in equals to 1 confirmed POP. For information on how to configure the threshold, see Configure the POP Threshold.
- Aggregation is server-side, with POP submission as soon as the threshold is exceeded.
- A venue is modeled in Broadsign Control as a single player with multiple monitors (player.nscreens).
In that case, the multiple physical players will each have their own screen_identifier for the same player_identifier. Broadsign Air uses their screen_identifier to properly count playback confirmations until the POP threshold is reached. Once enough players have checked-in with their confirmations to meet this threshold, then the corresponding item will count as a Broadsign Control Proof-of-Play.
To accommodate screens that may be offline or with poor network connectivity, you can optionally configure a threshold so that Broadsign Air generates the POP when something less than 100% of the third-party players have confirmed playback. In this case, when the threshold number of players has been confirmed, Broadsign Air reports a POP for all the players.
The threshold must be configured in Broadsign Control Administrator by adding a Player Variable that affects this threshold (Under Player Properties -> Settings -> Variables). For more details, see Settings Section - The Variables Tab in the Broadsign Control Administrator documentation.
The variable name is max_pop_not_confirmed. It is a number that specifies how many screens are accepted to be missing before reporting the POP.
For example, if max_pop_not_confirmed is set to "2" and there are 20 screens in the player, Broadsign Air will count the POP as soon as 18 physical players/screens have checked in for the same playlist item. If there are 5 screens in the player, then Broadsign Air will report the POP after 3 check ins.
In all cases, there must be at least one player that checks in (required_checkins = screen_count - max_pop_not_confirmed, this value cannot go below 1).
If the max_pop_not_confirmed value is absent, all screens must check in to count the POP (that is, the same as if max_pop_not_confirmed=0).
Note: This feature requires Broadsign Control Administrator v14.3 or later.
While the threshold mechanism for issuing POPs is ideal for the majority of multi-screen Broadsign Air deployments, it presents a revenue-impacting limitation when multi-screen Broadsign Air players are operating on screens that are integrated and shared with another external playback system. Consider what can happen when the external system has the ability to interrupt individual screens throughout the day and for lengths of time of its own choosing. For example, at any given time in a 24-screen deployment, it may be 5, 10, or all 24 screens that are interrupted. Under these circumstances, it is impossible to find a “best fit” threshold level that reasonably accommodates all varieties of interruption.
Timebox for POP Confirmation
The Timebox for POP Confirmation value can be used to report POPs based on the exact number of screens that have actually confirmed playback. Using this value, Broadsign Air will accept POPs until the timebox (start time + duration + tolerance for POP confirmation) is elapsed. For example, if content was scheduled to play at 10:00 am for 1 minute, and the timebox for POP confirmation tolerance is 5 minutes, then the last playback confirmation accepted would be at 10:06 am.
Once the timebox for POP confirmation is exceeded, Broadsign Air reports the POP with the number of screens that have actually confirmed playback (nscreens). For example, if 20 third-party Broadsign Air players are using the same playlist, and 16 have confirmed playback by the the time the timebox has elapsed, then Broadsign Control Administrator reports a POP of 1 with an nscreens value of 16.
The deadline for POP confirmation interacts with the threshold (max_pop_not_confirmed) value as follows:
- When no threshold is set, Broadsign Air produces the POP for the actual number of players that have confirmed playback when the timebox for POP confirmation expires.
- When a threshold is set, Broadsign Air produces the POP for the actual number of players that have confirmed playback, if the threshold is satisfied when the timebox for POP confirmation expires.
To set the timebox for POP confirmation tolerance value:
- Open Broadsign Control Administrator.
- Go to: Domain Properties Menu > Edit Domain.
- Click the Settings section, then the Air tab.
- Check Enable timebox for POP confirmation, then enter a value in milliseconds.
- Click OK.
This indicates the period over which confirmed playbacks will contribute to the POP. The default value is 300,000 ms (5 minutes).