Scheduling Basics

Scheduling Basics

Each screen in BrandCast has its own schedule. You decide what plays and when by dragging Design blocks onto a week-view calendar — one calendar per screen. No separate schedule objects to create, no assign step.

How it works

Content flows in two steps:

1. Build a Design — a Design is a set of Pages that play in sequence. Author it once in the Designs hub, then reuse it across as many screens as you like.
2. Place it on a screen’s calendar — open the screen’s detail panel, pick the Design, and drag to draw the time window it plays. Repeat for each day or time slot you need.

Day-parting (time of day)

Drag a Design onto a day column, then resize it to cover the hours you want. Each block snaps to 15-minute intervals.

Common day-parting patterns:

Morning (6 AM – 11 AM):  Breakfast or opening content Design
Midday (11 AM – 2 PM):   Lunch-specials Design
Afternoon (2 PM – 5 PM): General rotation Design
Evening (5 PM – 9 PM):   Dinner or closing content Design

Blocks on the calendar don’t overlap — drag them next to each other to tile the day.

Day of week

Draw different blocks on different day columns to change what plays on weekdays versus weekends.

Mon–Fri: Business content Design
Sat–Sun: Weekend promotions Design

Seasonal

Seasonal campaigns are Design-level decisions. Create a seasonal Design, then add its blocks to the weeks you need it. When the campaign ends, remove those blocks — the rest of the calendar is untouched.

Multi-location

Each screen has its own calendar and its own timezone. A “9 AM” block on a screen in New York activates at 9 AM Eastern; the same block on a screen in Los Angeles activates at 9 AM Pacific. Set each screen’s timezone in the Display Detail panel.

Night mode

The asleep bands on the calendar (hatched, usually at the bottom and top) mark the screen’s night-mode window. Content blocks can’t be placed inside asleep hours — the calendar enforces this automatically.

Time zones

Each screen has its own time zone. Blocks on the calendar are always in the screen’s local time.

1. Open the screen’s detail panel.
2. Find the Timezone row in Settings.
3. Click Change and enter the IANA timezone (for example, America/Chicago).

What shows when no block is active

If no Design block covers the current time, the screen holds on the last frame played. Add a low-priority fallback Design to cover any gaps, or let night mode take over if the screen should be dark.

Troubleshooting

Wrong Design is playing. Open the screen’s detail panel and read the calendar. Check which block covers the current time. Confirm it points to the Design you expect.

Content isn’t changing at the expected time. The calendar snaps to 15-minute intervals — verify the block’s edge is at the time you intend. Also check the screen’s timezone.

Screen is asleep when it shouldn’t be. Drag the wake/sleep boundary on the calendar to move the night-mode window. The hatched band moves in real time.

What’s next

• Scheduling content on a display — step-by-step on the screen-week calendar
• Managing your library — organize Designs and content
• Content types — what you can put inside a Page