Article summary: The Speakap Timeline Feed Syndicator allows you to easily display your network's main feed on digital screens throughout your organization. This guide explains how to configure the syndicator and share the feed URL with your digital signage (narrowcasting) provider.
1. How the Syndicator works
The Timeline Feed integration provides a simple method for connecting Speakap to screens throughout your organization, without requiring your digital signage provider to develop a complex, custom integration via the Speakap API.
Speakap installs this integration on your network. Once active, it generates a unique URL that acts as a secure data feed. You provide this URL to your third-party digital signage provider, and their application uses it to continuously pull and display feed content on your company's screens.
2. Configuration settings
Once the integration is installed by Speakap, Network Administrators can access the configuration panel to define the feed's behavior.
- Navigate to your Network Settings and locate the Timeline Feed Syndicator configuration.
- Select output format: Choose the data format required by your digital signage provider (e.g., Atom).
- Number of messages: Define the maximum number of recent posts that should be included in the feed at any given time (e.g., 10 messages).
3. Sharing the Feed URL and Security
The most critical part of the configuration is managing the secure URL.
- Timeline Feed URL: Copy this unique link and send it directly to your digital signage provider to establish the connection.
- Regenerating the Token: The feed URL contains a secure token. If you ever suspect that the URL has been shared with unauthorized individuals, you can click the Regenerate token button.
- Important: This action immediately makes the old URL invalid. You must then provide the newly generated URL to your signage provider so they can update their systems.
4. Limitations of the Syndicator
While the Timeline Feed Syndicator is easy to set up, it does have a significant limitation regarding data filtering compared to a custom-built API solution.
Network-Wide Content Only: The feed will only output items that are addressed to the entire network. It is not currently possible to filter the feed to display content from specific Business Units, Local Departments, or groups.
If your organization requires granular filtering (e.g., showing only local store news on that specific store's screens), the third-party provider must build a custom integration using the Speakap API. If you wish to explore custom API development, please reach out to our support team.