By default, Players download all content published to them, regardless of the playback schedule or rules. This is useful to ensure content is available even when the device is not continuously online. However, it can also take up storage space and use up network data unnecessarily.
These three examples illustrate when this can have a negative impact and you will want to change it.
- Players will download all published content ahead of time, even if it is actually scheduled to only play several months in the future. This can take up too much of the Player's storage.
- Players will download content even if restricted to not play on them. For example, the Player name is X and the playback rule is "don't play when the Player name is X", or the Player doesn't have the tag Y and the playback rule is “play only when the Player has the tag Y.”
- Published content will be kept on the Player storage until it is explicitly unpublished, even if it is already expired by the restriction.
To address these situations, you can enable Download Restrictions on the Player. When enabled, only content matching this Player's playback rules will be downloaded. While the download restrictions only mention dates, other types of restrictions are included.
- Following the settings, the content will be downloaded 3, 5, or 7 days ahead of the scheduled playback date.
- The content will be removed from the player 48 hours after the last day it is scheduled to play, freeing up storage space.
- Content which is not meant to play on this Player due to restrictions, such as Player name, Tag, or Location, will not be downloaded to this Player.
Here is a step-by-step guide on how to easily enable the Player's Download Restrictions.
- Select the Player where you want to restrict content download.
- Go to Settings in the Player menu.
- Scroll down to the Network Data Usage settings and enable Download Restrictions.
- Confirm with the orange Save Changes button on the bottom right.