“Mirror, mirror on the wall…” is no longer only a line out of Snow White. Wireless mirroring of your device to a display has become the norm, especially among Apple users where the AirPlay protocol enables sharing or streaming content from an iPhone or an iPad, for example, to an Apple TV. To do that, AirPlay uses Bonjour – a zero-configuration networking software as advertised by Apple – that allows the discovery of devices before mirroring them.
Bonjour is great at home, but not in an office setting
This is all very easy to do… unless you’re in a larger setting like an office or a school where devices are connected to multiple networks. This throws a major wrench in the works, because once the devices that you’re trying to connect are on different networks, Bonjour will not be able to discover them… without some help.
NovoConnect can help
This is where our NovoConnect technology comes in and provides the help needed. Because, whether you’re using a NovoDisplay or NovoConnect (NC-X900 & NC-X700), our technology remedies the obstacle Bonjour has with discovering devices on multiple networks in one of two ways.
Discovery over Bluetooth
Since discovering devices on different networks is impossible, it makes sense to do it over Bluetooth. Luckily, the new generation of NovoConnect devices features this option so you can easily pair your devices on a Bluetooth channel and effortlessly share your content to the main display.
Discovery with a proxy server
If for some reason, you cannot use Bluetooth to discover your devices, you can use a Bonjour proxy server. Such a server does not relay traffic between the networks, but simply serves as a lookup mechanism which takes service announcements from one network and announces them on the other networks.
This is a slightly more complicated set up, which involves using Avahi – a software used for service discovery that can be used to announce services from NovoConnect devices. Here is a step-by-step manual that will take you through the set-up process.
As you can see, the new generation of NovoConnect devices can solve all the Bonjour network’s obstacles and make iOS mirroring as easy in the office, as it is at home. But that is just one among many benefits of using NovoConnect products which deliver wireless and touchless collaboration along with office-wide digital signage. Contact info@vivitek.eu and schedule a demo to see how they can transform your office.
