Using a remote control

A remote control's D-pad drives three things on a display: the content language, the settings overlay, and the reset gesture. On a Fire TV Stick, an Android TV box or a commercial panel, it's the only input you have.

Exactly one of those three owns a given key at any moment.

The controls

Three controls, on a remote with no other buttons that reach the app.

Step through content languages

Left and Right step through your project's languages, wrapping at both ends so you can go round in either direction.

This works when all three of these are true.

• The language switcher is enabled in project settings.

• The project has more than one language.
• Nothing is layered over the playing screen.

While the settings overlay or the PIN prompt is open, Left and Right belong to whatever is on top. See Content languages and the language switcher.

Open the settings overlay

Press Up five times within three seconds. The settings panel opens behind a PIN.

From there you can reload the display, check its activation key and app version, turn the audio companion QR on, and disconnect the display. See Open the on-device settings overlay.

Reset the display

Hold OK / Select for five seconds. The display asks for the PIN, then disconnects itself and returns to the provisioning screen.

This does the same thing as Change activation key in the settings overlay. It works from anywhere, including when the app is in a state where you can't get the overlay open.

Any display that has been online long enough to receive its PIN asks for it before resetting. Without the PIN, you can't reset the display this way.

A display with no PIN known anywhere resets directly, unasked. That's a screen whose page has never successfully loaded, so it was never sent a PIN. It's exactly the screen this gesture exists to recover.

Older documentation and runbooks saying "hold Select to re-pair" are correct only for that second case. On a working display, expect a PIN prompt.

See Open the on-device settings overlay for how the PIN prompt behaves.

Type with a remote

On the provisioning screen, the display switches to remote mode automatically.

• Up and Down move between the fields. The hint at the bottom reads ↑ ↓ to move · OK to select.

• OK on the activation key field opens an on-screen keyboard, with a number row, a QWERTY layout, Delete and Done.
• Left and Right step through the regions, wrapping at both ends.

The PIN keypad is navigable the same way.

Some fields in the settings overlay are read-only on a remote-driven device, the location Server URL in particular. The effective values are still shown, and those fields are better set in Builder. See Set a display's location source.

Bind a custom key

Project settings has a Keybindings section where a specific key can be bound to a specific language, plus a Menu command key. Use it for installations with physical buttons, such as a kiosk pad, a custom remote, or a wall panel with a button per language.

An explicit language binding on Left or Right overrides the normal stepping behavior. See Content languages and the language switcher.

Devices without a remote

Other devices reach the same two things by gesture or keystroke.

To open the settings overlay:

• Touchscreen or pointer: five taps or clicks in the bottom-right corner within three seconds.

• Keyboard: Esc.

To reset the display, the equivalent of holding Select on a remote:

• iPad or iPhone: a two-finger long press.

• Mac: the menu item Configure Display… (⌘,).
• Android with a touchscreen: a long press.

Those three reset gestures ask for the PIN first, then disconnect the display. They do not open the settings overlay.

Good to know

• The playing screen stands down completely while an overlay is open, rather than sharing a key. A cursor moving in an overlay never also changes the language underneath it.

• The five-second hold is picked up ahead of everything else on screen, so whatever has focus doesn't matter.
• Holding OK / Select on the provisioning screen does nothing, because there's nothing to reset.
• Up is the way in because it's the only free D-pad direction. Left and Right are taken by the languages.
• The Menu button doesn't reliably reach the app on the platforms this runs on, so no route is built on it.

FAQ

Left and Right don't change the language.

Check the language switcher is enabled in project settings and the project has more than one language. Check nothing is open over the playing screen.

Up five times does nothing.

Five presses need to land within three seconds. Try again a bit faster.

Holding Select does nothing.

Hold for five full seconds, and not on the provisioning screen. A display already showing the provisioning screen has nothing to reset.

I get a PIN prompt and don't know the PIN.

Contact your CSM or the STQRY support team.

Next steps

• Open the on-device settings overlay

• Content languages and the language switcher
• Troubleshooting a display