AXIS Audio Manager Center

AXIS Audio Manager Center is a secure and scalable solution for remote management and monitoring of large and complex audio systems.

• Organize your sites — You can organize your sites in a structure that suits your organization.

Example

A location named “France” could contain a location called “Paris”, which in turn contains all the sites located in Paris.

Example

A location named “Sales region South” could contain all the cities belonging to that region, which in turn contains all the sites located in those cities.

• Monitor your system — The Dashboard and Sites views gives an overview of your system. Filtering functionality makes health monitoring easy.

• Access your sites remotely — Access the user interface of your sites remotely in a secure way from the Sites view.

• Manage users — Invite users and add each user to one or several user groups. Each user group is given a certain access right, and assigned to a location or site in the sites structure.

Example

A single user can be part of a group with content manager rights for Europe, but also to a group with administrator rights for a site in Paris, France.

• Premium features

• • Scheduling — Schedule announcements, advertisements and music for multiples sites. The application continuously monitor the schedules, and automatically distribute audio to the targeted sites.

• You need to have set up and configured at least one AXIS Audio Manager Edge site. For more information, visit the AXIS Audio Manager Edge User Manual.

• To enable communication between AXIS Audio Manager Edge and AXIS Audio Manager Center, the following ports must be open for outbound traffic on the network where the leader device is located:

• DNS	Port	Information
  dispatchse1-st.axis.com ​dispatchse2-st.axis.com ​dispatcher-st.axis.com ​dispatchus1-st.axis.com dispatchjp1-st.axis.com	443, 80 Outbound, TCP	Proprietary device communication channel. One of these ports is required. Port 80 is only used if port 443 is not available.
  *.devices.audiomanager.axis.com	443 Outbound, TCP	Proprietary device communication channel.
  a1ecdk2dyb75d7-ats.iot.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com	8883 Outbound, TCP	MQTT channel used for sending and receiving data from a device to the cloud service.
  content.audiomanager.axis.com	443 Outbound, TCP	Necessary for content distribution in scheduling.

1. Go to audiomanager.axis.com in your web browser.

2. Log in using the credentials for your MyAxis account. If you don’t have a MyAxis account, you can create one from the login window.

3. At first login you have to create your organization. On subsequent logins you will automatically be routed to the last organization you worked on.

4. Note

   If you have already used some other Axis services like AXIS Device Manager Extend, you might already belong to one or more organizations. You can use the same organization for multiple Axis services.

When you are invited to an organization, you will receive an email with an invitation link from AXIS Audio Manager Center with the subject "User invitation to an organization".

1. To accept the invitation, click the included link or paste it in your browser.

2. Log in using the credentials for your MyAxis account. If you do not have a MyAxis account you can create one from the login window.

3. You will automatically be routed to the organization you were invited to.

Organize your sites in a structure that makes it easy to find a site or group of sites in your organization. You can assign groups of users access to single sites or groups of sites by selecting locations in the structure. For more information, see Manage users.

1. Go to Sites.

2. To create a location:

3. 1. Go to a position in the structure.

   2. Click + ADD.

   3. Name the location and click ADD.

Example

You need to enable AXIS Audio Manager Center integration in the sites you want to add:

1. Log in locally to your AXIS Audio Manager Edge site.

2. Go to System settings > Connectivity.

3. Select the checkbox for AXIS Audio Manager Center integration.

4. If needed, select AXIS Audio Manager Center O3C proxy and enter your organization’s proxy details for the network where the site is located.

5. Click SAVE.

1. Add a site to a location:

2. In AXIS Audio Manager Center, go to Sites.

3. Select location in the structure.

4. Click + ADD SITE.

5. Enter site name, S/N (MAC address) and OAK key (Owner Authentication Key) of the device used as leader in the site.

   Format examples:
   - S/N: XXXXXXXXXXXX (12 digit hexadecimal)
   - OAK: XXXXXXXXXXXX (12 digit hexadecimal)

   To find the OAK key:

6. 1. Log in locally to your AXIS Audio Manager Edge site.

   2. Go to System settings > Leader device settings.

   3. Click Go to device settings.

   4. Go to System > Network.

   5. Under One-click cloud connection and Owner authentication key (OAK), click Get key.

   6. Note

      You find both he S/N (MAC address) and the OAK key (Owner Authentication Key) on a note that came with the product that is used as leader in the audio system.

      Contact Axis in case you lose your note. Proof of ownership is required for receiving a new key.

In order to use AXIS Audio Manager Center you have to be registered as a user in an organization. There are four pre-defined user roles:

• Owner – Owners is a user role and a pre-defined user group which have full read/write access to all settings and configurations for the organization and to all locations and sites. Owners are also the only ones with the rights to manage other users and assign access rights. The creator of an organization is automatically registered as an owner.

• Administrator – Administrators have read/write access to the locations and sites that are assigned to their user group. If they are assigned a location in the sites structure, they can add new locations and sites below that location.

• Content manager – Content managers have access to upload and schedule content (music, advertisements and announcements) in all sites assigned to their user group. If they are assigned a location in the sites structure, they have access to all sites below this location. Content managers can also set the opening hours and set music volumes for their assigned sites.

• Volume operator – Volume operators have access to setting the music volumes in all sites assigned to their user group. If they are assigned a location in the sites structure, they have access to all sites below this location.

The total access rights for users are decided by what user groups they are members of. Each user group have a defined user role and have sites assigned to the group. A user can be a member of several user groups and the highest access rights for a particular site takes precedence for that user.

Example

Imagine a ser that belongs to both of the following groups:

• Group: Content managers France

• • User role: Content manager

  • Location: France

• Group: Administrators Paris

• • User role: Administrator

  • Location: Paris (sub-location to France)

The user will have content management rights for all the sites in France, except for those in Paris, for which the user will have administrator rights. This is because the administrator rights are of a higher level than content management rights. When a user belongs to several groups, it is possible that multiple user roles applies to the same location. When this happens, only the user role with the highest level of access rights will be applied to the location.

1. Invite a user to your organization:

2. Go to User management.

3. Create a user group and assign it a user role and site access:

4. 1. Click CREATE.

   2. Name the user group.

   3. Select a user role.

   4. Click CREATE.

   5. Select the newly created user group.

   6. Click Add next to Sites assigned.

   7. Select a site for access to a singular site or a location for access to all sites below that location.

5. Invite a new user to the user group:

6. 1. Click Add next to Members.

   2. Click INVITE USER.

   3. Enter the email address to the user you wish to invite.

      The user group is pre-selected.

   4. Write a message that will be included in the invitation mail.

   5. Click INVITE.

Invited users will receive an email with a link to your organization. When they follow the link, they will be prompted to login after which they will be automatically routed to the correct organization. A user can be part of several organizations.

1. Add existing users to a user group:

2. Go to User management.

3. Select the user group which the user should be added to.

4. Click Add next to Members.

5. Locate the user in the list and click ADD.

The status of your system can be monitored from the dashboard where you among other things can get information about your sites' connection state and the connection state of all devices in your organization. Most of this information is also available in the Sites view.

1. Go to Dashboard.

   Found issues are displayed under Health monitoring.

2. • To configure what is shown on the dashboard, click .

3. Click an issue in the dashboard:

4. • Pending — Waiting for O3C connection. Added devices start in this state. If they do not leave this state, check your network settings (proxy etc) and reboot the device.

   • Failed — The device attempted to register, but couldn’t. A possible reason could be that Edge is not configured or the FW version is too old. Check that Edge is configured and update the FW.

   • Blocked — The device that is trying to connect is not an audio device.

   • Disconnected — The device has either lost the network connection or had One-click disabled. This has likely disrupted the secure remote connection to the site. In that case, local on-site troubleshooting is required.

   • Limited — MQTT is disabled. Check the MQTT client on device level.

5. Clicking an issue will take you to Sites with the list filtered on the type of issue.

AXIS Audio Manager Center supports sending notification emails for site or device connection changes to any recipients added by an owner of the organization.

1. Create a recipient:

2. Go to Notifications.

3. Click All recipients.

4. Click CREATE RECIPIENT.

5. Enter the name and email of the recipient.

6. If applicable, choose what notifications the recipient should receive.

7. Click CREATE.

1. Edit or delete a recipient:

2. Go to Notifications.

3. Click All recipients.

4. Scroll or search for the recipient.

5. Click > Edit recipient or Delete recipient.

1. Set up a notification:

2. Go to Notifications.

3. Click Site status or Device status.

4. Set the notification delay (0-1440 minutes).

5. Note

   The notification delay decides how long the change in connection state have to persist for the notification to be sent. If you for example set the delay to 60 minutes and have a short power outage or network glitches disconnecting a site for less than this time, no notification is sent. The system default is 5 minutes.

6. Click ADD next to Recipients.

7. Click ADD next to the recipients you want to add.

8. To activate the notification, turn on the switch under Status.

AXIS Audio Manager Center provides secure remote access to added sites. This enables remote site configuration using the local AXIS Audio Manager Edge system. When accessing a site, the rights of you user role or user group will decide what you will be able to do remotely. Owners and administrators have full access to all settings on the site, while content managers and volume operators have limited access.

1. To open AXIS Audio Manager Edge on a local site:

2. Go to Sites and find your site.

3. Click .

When you have setup AXIS Audio Manager Center and assigned users as well as permissions to your users, then the users will also have access to the audio system through the AXIS Audio Remote mobile app for iOS and Android.

By selecting Connect remotely in the mobile app, your users can log in to AXIS Audio Manager Center and select a site to control.

AXIS Audio Manager Center have features that are only available if your organization is licensed. These features are typically advanced features that perform operations on several sites at once, such as content distribution or batch scheduling of music.

AXIS Audio Manager Center supports distribution of content files to your sites for local scheduling. For each site, the content will be stored on the leader device and added to the library of the corresponding content type. The files will not be added automatically to any schedule.

Supported file formats: mp3, mpeg, ogg, opus, wave

Maximum allowed file size: 20 MB

1. Go to Distribute content under CONTENT MANAGEMENTS.

2. Click the content type (music, announcement or advertisement).

3. Click ADD next to Files.

4. Select the files to distribute and click Open.

5. Click ADD next to Sites.

6. Select locations in the sites structure.

   The content will be distributed to all the sites in the location, including sites in sub-locations.

7. Click DISTRIBUTE CONTENT.

With AXIS Audio Manager Center you can schedule announcements, advertisements and music to multiple sites at once. When you create a schedule, you target sites by selecting a location. All sites below that location and all sub-locations are included. You can also select a label to further filter the selection.

When you enable a schedule, it is automatically applied to the sites included in the schedule, as long as the site is connected. If a site is not connected, then the schedule will be applied as soon as it becomes connected.

If the schedule is enabled, it will automatically include new sites that are added to the selected locations or its sub-locations, or if more sites have the selected label applied to them.

AXIS Audio Manager Center also distributes the media content necessary for executing a schedule, to all targeted sites. The exception is music schedules that was created with a local library or source tag.

When you schedule relative to opening hours, there is a risk that the event is set to play outside the day (0–24). This audio will not play. For instance, if you schedule an announcement to play 5 hours after closing time, and the closing time is 9pm, the event will be schedule for 2am the next day, and hence will not play.

Learn more:

• Labels

• Source tags

• Locations

Example

You have a clothing store chain with stores all over the world. You want all the stores in one country to automatically announce when the store is opening and closing, with the following messages:
– “The store will soon open” ten minutes before opening time.
– “The store is now open” at opening time.
– “The store will soon close” ten minutes before closing time.
– “The store is now closing” at closing time.

1. Create a schedule:

2. 1. Go to SCHEDULING > Announcements.

   2. Click + CREATE SCHEDULE.

   3. Name the schedule and select a location.

   4. Click CREATE.

3. To se a list of your sites, go to SITES.

4. To upload audio files, go to TRACKS.

5. Configure the schedule:

6. 1. Go to SCHEDULE.

   2. Click a in the schedule.

   3. Configure the time intervals and select the tracks to play.

   4. Click ADD.

Advertisement scheduling can be used for any content that should play repeatedly during a certain time period.

Example

You have a clothing store chain with stores all over the world. You want to inform the customers about a summer campaign. The advertisement message should play in all the stores of one country.

1. Create a schedule:

2. 1. Go to SCHEDULING > Advertisements.

   2. Click + CREATE SCHEDULE.

   3. Name the schedule and select a location.

   4. Click CREATE.

3. To se a list of your sites, go to SITES.

4. Create a playlist:

5. 1. Go to PLAYLISTS.

   2. To upload tracks to the advertisements library, click Advertisements library > UPLOAD TRACK.

   3. Click + CREATE.

   4. Name the playlist and click CREATE.

   5. Click ADD TRACK.

      You can select the same track multiples times to the same playlist, for example if you want one advertisement to play more often than the others. You can also adjust the order of the playlist.

   6. For playing the playlist in a random order, turn on Shuffle.

6. Configure the schedule:

7. 1. Go to SCHEDULE.

   2. Click a in the schedule.

   3. Configure the time intervals and select playlist.

   4. Click ADD.

You can create background music schedules that start and end with an offset relative to the opening hours of a site.

For more information, see Opening and closing offset.

• Supported music sources:

• The local library of each site.

• A web stream distributed from AXIS Audio Manager Center.

  For more information, see .Audio Manager Center Source.

• A source tag that targets local site sources, such as line-in and on-board applications.

  For more information, see Source tags.

• Prerequisites:

• The music schedule must be applied relative to the opening hours at the local site. To set the opening hours for a local site, go to AXIS Audio Manager Edge > SCHEDULING > Opening hours.

Example

You have a store and want to play radio music from a webstream. The music should start playing ten minutes before the store opens, and stop playing ten minutes after closing time.

1. Create source tags (optional):

2. 1. Go to SCHEDULING > Music > SOURCES and click + CREATE SOURCE.

   2. Name the source.

   3. The type is currently limited to web stream, which is pre-selected.

   4. Enter the URL for the web stream.

   5. If the URL requires authentication, activate Use authentication and enter username and password.

   6. Click CREATE.

3. Schedule music:

4. 1. Go to SCHEDULES and click + CREATE SCHEDULE.

   2. Name the schedule.

   3. Select a location.

      For more information, see Locations.

   4. Select a label, if needed.

      For more information, see Labels.

   5. Click CREATE.

   6. If you want to see all targeted sites, go to SITES.

   7. Go to SCHEDULE and set the offset time relative to the opening and closing hours.

      For more information, see Opening and closing offset.

   8. Select a music source.

   9. • Audio Manager Center Source

        For more information, see Audio Manager Center Source.

      • Source tag

        For more information, see Source tags.

      • Local library

   10. Save the schedule:

   11. • If you want to save your schedule without activating it, clear the Enabled checkbox and click SAVE.

         The schedule is now saved and available in your Music schedules list but is not yet enabled.

       • If you want to save your schedule and activate it, select the Enabled checkbox and click SAVE AND PUBLISH.

         The schedule is now available in your Music schedules list and is enabled, which means that it will be distributed to all targeted sites.

A location is a node in the sites structure. For more information, see Create a structure for your sites.

When scheduling content in AXIS Audio Manager Center, you must first select a location where the schedule shall be distributed. All sites at the location and in its sub-locations will be available for the schedule.

Labels are used to add an identifier to a site that can be filtered on or searched for in AXIS Audio Manager Center.

• You can filter and search on a label in the Sites view to easier find sites.

• You can include a label in an AXIS Audio Manager Center schedule to further filter the selection to only include the sites which have that label as an attribute.

The schedules are created relative to each local site's opening hours. This solves the problem when sties that are targeted by a batch schedule configuration have different opening hours. The opening offset determines when the music starts playing and the closing offset when the music stops playing.

The Audio Manager Center Source is a source created under SCHEDULING > Music > Sources. It is automatically distributed to all sites in the organization. The source is managed centrally through AXIS Audio Manager Center and can be used both in AXIS Audio Manager Center schedules and in local music schedules. Currently, only web stream sources are supported.

If you plan to use sources local to your Axis Audio Manager Edge sites in your AXIS Audio Manager Center schedules, then you will have to assign a source tag to these sources in each of your local sites. Source tags are created in AXIS Audio Manager Center and are distributed to all connected sites in the organization. To configure a source in a local site with a source tag, go to AXIS Audio Manager Edge > SCHEDULING > Music > SOURCES, select the correct source and assign a source tag. This source can then be used in a schedule distributed by AXIS Audio Manager Center.

• Examples of sources that must be defined locally:

• Line-in

• Playlist

• ACAP

• Unique web stream URLs (i.e. where the URL is unique to each site)

Example: An organization have bought an online streaming music service that uses an installed ACAP to deliver the service. They create a source tag "ACAP streaming" in Axis Audio Manager Center. Each site that has the ACAP music source must then assign it the source tag "ACAP streaming" to allow this source to be scheduled from Axis Audio Manager Center. When creating the schedule, they ensure that the correct sites are targeted using location and the destination tag, then they set the wanted opening/closing offset and finally select the music source "Source tag" with the tag "ACAP streaming". The targeted sites now have a music schedule playing music via the streaming music service.

For issues with sites, see Monitor the system.

If you need more help, go to axis.com/support.