A Cost Effective Information Display System Based on Open Source Technologies

The design and development of an information display system are discussed in this paper. This system is used to display dynamic content (e.g., announcements, news, slideshows, and other information) on HD TV screens that are distributed across the university campus. The low cost and small size raspberry pi devices running a Linux-based OS are utilized to open a dynamic web page in web browsers and then transfer the views to the corresponding screens for display. To cut costs further, the management software to update the displayed content is developed in-house and deployed using free open source software technologies such as the Apache server, PHP engine, and MySQL database management system. Furthermore, users may interactively scan a QR code on a screen using a reader running on their smartphones to easily access the offered services.