Publishing Content on Devices

Scalefusion's Content Management is one of the frequently used add-ons. This service helps you distribute your enterprise content in a safe and secure manner to your Scalefusion managed devices. It also provides features to place content at custom locations on your devices.

For smooth Content Distribution Scalefusion provides a custom application named as FileDock. FileDock gives you the ability to distribute files and folders to your managed devices, quickly and efficiently.

This document guides on how to upload your enterprise content on Scalefusion Dashboard and then push it onto your managed devices, all this using FileDock and Content Management.

Before you Begin

  1. On the Scalefusion Managed devices, you would need the following
    1. Latest version of FileDock on Android and Windows devices
    2. iOS: latest version of Scalefusion iOS Agent.
    3. macOS: Latest version of Scalefusion - MDM client application
  2. Make sure you have an active subscription to Scalefusion Content Management.
  3. Make sure you have access to the Google Drive account and the files that you want to publish.

To learn about installing FileDock on devices, please click here
Content Management is paid add-on service post the free trial period.

Upload Content on Dashboard

  1. On the Dashboard, go to Content Management > Content
  2. To add a file click on UPLOAD FILE
  3. This opens the File Upload dialog box which has two separate tabs
    1. Upload from Computer
    2. Upload Using External Link

      Upload from Computer

      Through this, you can upload any file lying on your system. To do so, either drag and drop files here or click on UPLOAD FILE and select the file you want to upload, from your machine.
The total upload limit is based on the plan you have purchased

Scalefusion's Content Management service comes with 50MB, 100MB or 200MB bundles, but sometimes the space might not be enough to push your enterprise content, as you might be having a large training video or you might want to use Content Management in Presentation mode where there are multiple large marketing videos.

To address these use-cases,  we have allowed you to use your Google Drive files to be distributed via Scalefusion Content Management. The steps below guide on how to upload/link your Google Drive files to Scalefusion Content Management.

Making the File accessible on Google Drive
  1. Sign In to your Google Drive account.
  2. Navigate to the folder and right click on the file that you want to publish via Content Management service.
  3. From the list of options select Share
  4. On the dialog as shown below click Advanced
  5. Under the Who has Access option, click Change
  6. From the dialog shown below,
    1. Select On - Anyone with the link
    2. You can leave the access permission at it’s default that Can View.
    3. Click Save
  7. Now copy the url link of the file that is shown in Link to Share box.
Linking the File on Content Management
  1. Sign In to your Scalefusion Dashboard
  2. Navigate to Content Management > Content
  3. Click on UPLOAD FILE
  4. In the Upload dialog,
    1. Click on Upload Using External Link
    2. Paste the URL that you copied from Google Drive as shown below
    3. At this point, Scalefusion's Content Management tries to fetch the details of the file. If it succeeds then the file information is shown as shown below. Note that we cannot fetch the size of the file and hence it is shown as 0 bytes. If the file format is not supported OR if there is an error then an error is displayed.
    4. Click on SAVE EXTERNAL URL
  5. Once saved, this file will now appear on your Dashboard.

From this point you can publish/unpublish this file to your devices and groups like you do with a locally uploaded file.

Files uploaded using this option are not uploaded to our servers. In short they do not consume your Content Management space.  
You can filter the list of files on Dashboard to quickly see the ones that were uploaded locally or linked from Google Drive.
Points to Remember
  • If the Google Drive file is deleted after it is uploaded on Content Management, then on devices the downloads will fail.
  • If the Google Drive file does not have the required access permissions as described in the steps above,  then neither the dashboard nor device can retrieve the file details.
  • Only the following file formats are supported for upload, pdf, doc, docx, ppt, pptx, xlsx, xls, mp4, avi, mkv, 3gp, mp3, wav, 3ga, m4a, aac, ogg, amr, gif, txt, zip, db, json, exe, msi, pen, pff, cslog, csdb, pen, ss, js, html, jpg, png, kmb, kml, kmz, mwm, tpk, css
  • Although Scalefusion's Content Management supports upload of formats mentioned above, FileDock application can natively open certain file formats. You would need 3rd party viewers on the device to open unsupported file formats.

Support for Folders and Sub-folders

Scalefusion provides capability to add Folders / Sub Folders on dashboard and push entire folder/sub folder on managed devices via FileDock. To add a folder,

  1. Navigate to Content Management > Content
  2. Click on ADD FOLDER
  3. Enter a folder name in the Create Folder dialog box and click Save.

The folder will get created.

To upload content (file) inside folder, click on Upload File button placed inside the Folder. Follow the same steps explained in the above section to upload content.

Sub Folder

  • Sub-Folders can be created inside main folder.
  • Sub folder feature is only supported for Android devices.
  • Sub folders can be created up to 3 levels.
  • To create Sub Folder, click on ADD FOLDER button placed inside the main folder, enter a name and click Save.

Publishing Content on Device

  1. Once the file gets uploaded, it will be available on the dashboard.
  2. Click on the file. This opens a panel on the right side showing brief information related to the file (name, file type, size, date added etc.). Here, click on Publish button.
    1. Show this file at Root Level: Enabling this setting will show the selected content at the root/top level on the device else selected content will be shown inside its parent folder on the device. Click Ok on the dialog box that opens on enabling this setting, if you want the selected file at the root level on the device.
      Published On: Gives the count of devices on which the File is published
      Downloaded On: Shows the count of devices on which the file is downloaded. This number is updated on Dashboard after syncing analytics on the device.

  1. This opens the dialog box where you need to select the Device Groups/User Groups/Device(s) on which you want to publish the file. After selecting, click Publish

  1. On the device, tap on FileDock App. (Below is a screenshot of an Android device)

  1. On Windows Devices, a folder with the name Scalefusion gets created in FileDock app. Click on it and the file you just published will be available there.
    In Android devices, a folder with the name Mobilock gets created in FileDock app, and the file you published is available inside this folder.
    Mobilock folder is the default location where the published files/folders get stored. Scalefusion also provides the capability to configure custom locations to store the content. This is explained in next section.

On Mac Devices, the files are available inside Scalefusion MDM client application under FileDock tab

The content is published on device.

Publishing Folders and Sub Folders

  1. When a folder is published it becomes visible when you tap on FileDock > MobiLock on the device and the content inside the folder also becomes available.
In case of Windows, it will be in Scalefusion folder.

  1. For Subfolders, at the time of publishing there is an additional setting Show this Folder at Root Level. Enabling this setting will show the folder at the root/top level on the device, else will show the folder inside its parent folder on the device.

Important points on publishing folders and sub folders

  • If a folder is published then all the Sub-Folders and Files inside of it will also be published. A folder can be published on all platforms.
  • If a sub folder is published, then files inside sub-folder will be published only on Android devices. At the time of publishing, devices of all platforms will be visible in the Publish dialog box but they will only be published on Android devices.
  • If any file which is inside a sub folder is published individually, then it only gets published on Android devices not on any other platforms. In this case only Android devices will be visible at the time of publishing.
  • On other platforms you can only publish entire folder, not any individual file inside it.

Configure Custom Locations for Android Devices

Sometimes you may want the Files to be downloaded to a custom location instead of Scalefusion’s default folder. We allow IT Admins to configure Primary Folder Location and Additional Locations using the Settings option in Content Management screen. Clicking on the Settings button initiates the flow,

  1. On Scalefusion Dashboard, navigate to Content Management > Content
  2. Click on SETTINGS button

This opens the Android FileDock settings dialog box.

Primary Folder Location

  1. In Android FileDock settings dialog box, under Primary Folder Location you can configure the default folder location
  • Use Default Location - The content (files and folders) gets published on the device in Scalefusion's default folder, that is, Mobilock. This is selected by default.
  • Use Custom Location - Define the location where the files and folders should get stored on your device, once published. It should be defined by putting a forward slash followed by folder name. For eg. /ABC/DEF
a. When you define a custom location, the existing content which was in default folder, also moves to the new location.
b. You can also use custom properties like $device.properties in defining custom location
  1. After specifying location, click SAVE.
    The primary location gets configured.

Define Additional Locations

IT Admins can also pre-define the additional targets (specific location) that can be used during Publishing files.

  1. In Android FileDock settings dialog box, under Additional Locations, click on ADD button
  2. In the input area, enter the location's path by putting a forward slash followed by folder name. For eg. /AddLocation
    You can also use custom properties like $device.properties in defining additional targets
  3. Click SAVE
    The additional location gets configured.
    Once an additional location is saved the next time you open FileDock settings dialog, the locations are non-editable. The saved locations can only be deleted.

Publishing Content after defining Locations

The steps to publish content are same as described above (Publishing Content on Device). The difference being, when you define Primary and Additional locations, the publish dialog box has the options to publish the content on primary location, or additional location or both.

Publish to Primary Location

If you select to publish content to Primary Location, you will notice on the device, the files and folders are placed at the location defined in Custom Location.

If you have defined a path in custom location as /ABC/DEF, then

  1. In FileDock app on the device, the files get stored in the root folder, that is, DEF [The last path segment is treated as folder name].
  2. In File Manager of your device, the files will reflect inside ABC > DEF folder.
Publish to Additional Locations

At the time of publishing select the file's location (as defined in additional targets). For eg. if you have defined additional target as /AddLocation, it should be selected in the Publish dialog box.

Folders can also be published on the Additional locations

On the device, the folder AddLocation will be created in File Manager and the selected file/folder will reflect there.

Unpublish Content

A file or folder once published, can be unpublished from the device. To do so:

  1. On Scalefusion Dashboard, navigate to Content Management -> Content
  2. Click on the file. This opens a panel on the right side showing brief information related to the file (name, file type, size, date added etc.). Here, click on Unpublish button.
  3. This opens a dialog box which lists the Device Groups/User Groups/Devices on which the file/folder is published. Select the Device Groups / User Groups / Devices from which you need to unpublish the concerned file or folder and click Unpublish
    If any file/folder is not published yet, the Unpublish dialog box will show as empty.
On Android device, the file / folder will be removed from inside FileDock's Mobilock folder

If files/folders have been pushed to primary or additional locations, the Unpublish dialog box shows all the locations where the file is published and you can select the ones from where the content has to be unpublished.

When you unpublish any file from the additional location, the file won't be removed from local storage of device, that is File Manager
Files or Folders published to additional locations will not be deleted from the device when un-published from the Dashboard.

Other actions

Other actions that can be performed on a file from Scalefusion Dashboard. These actions can be accessed by clicking on the three dots in the right side panel that opens on clicking a file:

  • Create File Shortcut: For selected file, shortcut will be added on devices where it is published. If a shortcut is already created, the action changes to Remove File Shortcut which removes the shortcut from devices.
    This feature applies to Android devices only.
  • Rename File: The files can be renamed with this feature. Clicking on Rename File brings up a dialog box where you can enter new file name and Save.
  • Move to Folder: Move the selected file to another folder
  • Copy to Folder: Copy the selected file to another folder
  • Download: Downloads the file on the system
  • Delete: Deletes the file

Presentations

Scalefusion's Presentation mode is an Android, Windows and iOS device specific feature on top of the Scalefusion Content Management add-on, that lets you easily turn your Scalefusion managed devices into Digital Signage Kiosks or use your content as screensavers.

To know more about creating a presentation and publishing it onto your devices, please click here


How did we do?


Powered by HelpDocs (opens in a new tab)