Point-of-sale data flows

Last modified: Monday September 04, 2023.

To integrate the information from the point-of-sale (POS) devices, the devices or the POS system must send data to Alta Video.

Data sent directly from the cash registers

To provide Alta Video with near real-time data from the POS devices, data needs to be sent directly from the devices to Alta Video. However, the POS devices typically do not cache the data to be sent to Alta Video, so if the connection between the POS devices and Alta Video temporarily goes off-line, then data is not uploaded.

Data sent from the central POS system

The POS devices cache their data and upload it to the central POS system. The central POS system then uploads all data, typically at the end of the trading day, to Alta Video. This method of uploading the data is more robust than each individual POS device uploading to Alta Video, but is not near real-time.

Data sent from both the POS devices and the central POS system

By configuring both methods to send data, you have the benefit of near live data being available to Alta Video when network connectivity is good, with any missing data being supplied and processed when the central POS system communicates with Alta Video.