Digital displays are a ubiquitous feature of public spaces; London recently deployed a whole network of new displays in its Underground stations, and the screens on One Time Square (New York) allow for presentation of over $16,000$ square feet of digital media.
However, despite decades of research into pervasive displays, the problem of scheduling content is under-served and there is little forward momentum in addressing the challenges brought with large-scale and open display networks.
This paper presents the first comprehensive architectural model for scheduling in current and anticipated pervasive display systems.
In contrast to prior work, our three-stage model separates out the process of high level goal setting from content filtering and selection.
Our architecture is motivated by an extensive review of the literature and a detailed consideration of requirements.
The architecture is realised with an implementation designed to serve the world's largest and longest-running research testbed of pervasive displays.
A mixed-methods evaluation confirms the viability of the architecture from three angles: demonstrating capability to meet the articulated requirements, performance that comfortably fits within the demands of typical display deployments, and evidence of its ability to serve as the day-to-day scheduling platform for the previously described research testbed.
Based on our evaluation and a reflection on paper as a whole, we identify ten implications that will shape future research and development in pervasive display scheduling.