Managing Terminals Remotely: Sending Commands to POS Devices 🖥️📡

When you are troubleshooting a tricky terminal error, need to pull diagnostic logs for an support engineer, or simply want to test a cash drawer's alignment from the back office, running back and forth to a physical terminal on the floor can slow you down.

The NX Portal includes a powerful backend feature: Remote Device Commands. This allows administrators and support teams to securely trigger diagnostic operations, initiate resets, or download local system logs from any active terminal in your venue—completely over the air.

🛠️ Step-by-Step: Sending a Remote Command

Because remote commands are executed per station, you can troubleshoot a single terminal on your floor without interrupting service for the rest of your staff.

Step 1: Locate Your Target POS Device

1. Log into your master NX Portal back office.

2. On the left-hand navigation column, click on the Venue dropdown, select Devices, and click on POS Devices to view your master terminal dashboard.

3. Locate the specific station you need to interact with and click the Edit (Pencil) Icon on the far right of its row.

Step 2: Open the Commands Workspace

Once inside your selected terminal's settings profile, click on the Commands tab located in the top navigation bar.

Step 3: Choose and Dispatch Your Action

1. Click the dropdown menu under the Commands window to display your available remote actions.

2. Select your target command and click the purple Send button.

🔄 Available Core Remote Actions

The system features several quick-action commands designed to resolve common terminal roadblocks instantly:

• Upload Logs: Pulls the device's internal operational history and makes it available for download in the portal. Excellent for investigating transaction errors or app blips.

• App Restart: Safely force-closes and restarts the NX Restaurant application on the target terminal without rebooting the physical Android operating system.

• Device Restart: Triggers a complete physical power-cycle (reboot) of the entire Android tablet or register hardware.

• Drawer Kick: Sends an electronic pulse to test and open the terminal's locally wired cash drawer—perfect for confirming printer-to-drawer connections.

• Emv Pad Reset: Power-cycles and refreshes the terminal's integrated credit card reader gateway when facing a chip-reading connection drop.

🔍 Tracking History & Downloading Log Files

Every single action dispatched from the portal is documented chronologically under the Command History grid below the action bar. The grid displays a real-time status badge showing whether the terminal is Pending or if the command is Complete.

When you trigger an Upload Logs action, once the green Complete badge lights up, a clickable Download Logs link will appear in its row. Downloading this file unlocks your itemized system logs—broken down by dates and service protocols (such as local Epos2Log text prints or database DSI queries)—giving you exactly what you need to share with support engineers to pinpoint hardware issues!

Need Help? 💡

Why is a command I sent stuck on a "Pending" status badge?

A pending status means the NX cloud gateway is waiting for the floor terminal to check in. If the physical register has lost its internet connection, been powered off completely, or its local app has locked up, the command will sit in a queue. Check the terminal's Last Heartbeat timestamp on your main device dashboard to verify its active network status!