Digital signage on a Mac, iPad or iPhone

A Mac mini behind a TV, or an iPad on a wall mount, makes a good sign. ScreenTinker has a native player for macOS and an app for iPad and iPhone. Both are new: treat them as beta, and try one screen before you roll out a fleet.

Which one?

A Mac (Mac mini, iMac, MacBook, macOS 12 or later) runs the native player, the same engine as the Raspberry Pi and Windows players. It plays from its own offline cache, does zones, transitions, video walls, LAN triggers and the remote terminal.
An iPad or iPhone (iPadOS / iOS 16 or later) runs the ScreenTinker app, which shows the web player full screen with the screen kept awake. It needs the network to start: iOS does not let an app's web view keep an offline media cache for a server it does not know in advance.
Apple TV cannot run a player — tvOS has no web view. Why, and what to use instead.

Set up a Mac

Download ScreenTinker-<version>.dmg from your instance's downloads page, open it and drag ScreenTinker to Applications.
The first launch: Control-click the app and choose Open, unless your administrator distributed a notarized build.
Start it at login, pointed at your server. In Terminal:
```
/Applications/ScreenTinker.app/Contents/MacOS/ScreenTinker --install-autostart --server https://your-server
```
It restarts the player if it ever crashes; Exit player on the on-screen menu leaves it stopped until the next login.
Allow Local Network access when macOS asks, if your server or trigger senders are on the LAN.

Set up an iPad or iPhone

Install the ScreenTinker app your organisation distributes (TestFlight or your device-management system).
Open it, type your server address and tap Connect. Pick an orientation lock if the device is mounted.
For a screen the public can touch, lock the device into the app: Guided Access (Settings → Accessibility) on one device, or Single App Mode from device management for a fleet.

To get back to the setup screen, hold three fingers on the screen for three seconds.

Pairing

Both show a six-digit code. In the dashboard, choose Add Display, type the code, and name the screen. The pairing survives restarts and app updates.

Keeping it up unattended

A Mac keeps its displays awake while the player runs. Turn on automatic login for the player account and Start up automatically after a power failure (System Settings → Energy), so a power cut ends with the sign back up.
An iPad stays awake while the app is open. Keep it on power, and use Single App Mode so the app comes back after a restart — without device management, an iPad that restarts waits at the lock screen.

What the dashboard can and cannot do

Playlists, schedules, layouts, widgets, proof-of-play, mute and the live view work on both. A Mac also takes screen on/off, volume, the remote terminal and LAN triggers; an iPad or iPhone does not — iOS gives an app no control over the panel or the media volume. Neither can be rebooted or updated from the dashboard: a Mac is updated from the .dmg or by device management, and the app updates through Apple. The dashboard only shows the buttons a screen can honour.