Playing Images Directly from Webserver

Question

I'm re-designing our presentation look while at the same time trying to more narrowly target audiences with messaging.  What I'd like to do is a streaming video box on one part of the screen with another box for still image assets and possibly one other box with other image assets.  The design isn't my problem, though.
The issue is, with the video box in the presentation, I can no longer use the playlist function of the Digital Signs module, which means I have to add all the assets to the presentations manually, which can be quite time consuming with the number of presentations we have (26).
The idea I have is for each presentation to pull from a corresponding folder on a webserver, with the contents of that folder displaying in sequence.  Ideally this would act in the same way as the playlist function, allowing us to update the list by adding and removing files using a quick copy/paste.  I am aware that it would be possible to add everything to a Flash file and play that out, but I would then have to rely on the individual campuses to add my content to their files, and I wouldn't be able to monitor their images at a glance without having to wait for the file to play out.
We are already using the server to host the files and ACNS to manage the bandwidth.  I guess what I need is some kind of script that will play the contents of the folder when it is accessed by the DMP, but without having to name each file in the script, because they will be changing often.
We are on version 5.3 with 4400G endpoints.  I have looked into a CMS like AppSpace, but we don't currently have the budget to purchase one, so I am looking for a temporary solution while waiting for the next budget cycle.

Answer 1

I think the confusion comes from having two kinds of playlists in different modules.  DMD playlists can hold Digital Signs (DS) playlists.  If there is more than one DMD playlist, though, only one can use DS playlists.  All the others must have individual assets assigned to them, as only one DMD playlist can display video, and since DS playlists *could* have video assets in them, DMD treats them as video and restricts their use in non-video playlists.
What I want to do is have a video, such as CNN, etc., on-screen while displaying messaging with still images.  As you know this requires at least 2 playlists; one for the video and the other for stills.  I will also be limiting the still playlist to 10 minutes of content, so your suggestion could work, except it becomes more complicated when I want an image in heavier rotation, or when I don't have enough images to fill 10 minutes.  DMD playlists also don't have the Duplicate function of DS playlists, so adding more instances of an asset is tedious.
Per your example, it might look like this:
Campus-01
Campus-02
Campus-03
System-01
Campus-04
Campus-05
Campus-06
System-02
We have dated content that doesn't always have something ready to replace it when it expires, but limiting the time available may create some queues.  I'd still worry about empty "containers" and managing that inventory.  Keeping that organized could still be problematic.  Addtionally everyone is wearing multiple hats, and more "creative" types, so I'd like to find a solution that allows them to simplify their workload, instead of adding to it more than I have to.
It may not be "supported," but I was thinking of something where I could point to a URL and that link would show the images.  AppSpace, from the demo, seems like what we need to do what we want, but we can't afford it, currently.