Need software to shut down G4 against child's wishes

[matthewroth]

i didnt read all entries but in ur router add her mac address to access restrictions then deny acces during times she is not allowed on. very simple and other computers will still have access.

[tlarkin]

vicki

thanks for the review. I work for a school district and something like this may be handy for what we do. I also sub contract as an onsite technician on the side.

I just got back from a clients house tonight that has two young kids (like 6 and 9) and they are inheriting their father's old imac. I installed and set up the new imac for my client but for the kids I had to set up a bunch of parental controls. I just used the built in ones available in tiger because I was unfamiliar with all third party apps.

After reading the features from lumasoft's page and your review I can say I am impressed. The time and day feature has been part of windows group policy since NT4 (i think, maybe it was 2000) and I have been wanting apple to develope a more robust group policy where you can even micromanage the time users are allowed to access certain resources, apps, or even the computer itself. Macminder does this, and it is a feature that I wish OS X would just put in natively. I administer both macs and PCs at both my jobs, so I get to work in both enviroments, and i wish I could just take the best of each OS and drop the bad parts and just make that my OS of choice

Only a few things concern me, because I must admit, some of these high school kids today are pretty smart, and they find out how to hack stuff all the time.

Resetting the PMU/SMU sometimes resets the date back to 1960 or whatever, I am curious to how that will effect macminder. What happens if you reboot the system and log back in. I read that the new feature of mac minder is that it has its own master password and does not use the admin password. I suppose tossing an open firmware password on a system would not allow the users to boot off an OS disc, change the password, or be able to boot into open firmware. A physical lock on the case would not allow them to reset the PMU (except for the new imacs and some laptops which can be reset by key commands, or in the imacs case, automatically).

We use a PC app called NetOP, and it is pretty sweet. It allows teachers to broadcast their desktop (ie show every student what is on their computer), take over their desktop, lock them out of certain applications, shut their system off, monitor, and do one on one chat learning sessions. They do not make a mac version. it also runs in stealth mode, meaning no process shows up as running in task manager so they can't kill it via gui or command line. it installs in stealth mode and we push it out over our network so it can be installed via network.

I am doing summer projects right now, and worked about a 16 hour day today with both my jobs, so once we calm down and get the bulk of our summer projects done at the schools I want to download macminder and give it a whirl, but for now I will pass their link over to our head macintosh admin.

I would be really interested to hear your full report of what you think about mac minder. Also just curious if you have the application running on the client side (aka your kids computer) does the process show up in the terminal ir you run a top command? I know that making the user a simple user and not granting them access to the terminal would bypass this, but I am just curious.

If it did, that leaves a way for the user to kill the process, there would be hacking involved and well if you kid pulled it off I would consider them gifted, and you should probably enroll them in some sort of computer course.

Like I said earlier kids these days are smart, working in a school district I can not even begin to tell you how many computers we find hacked and loaded with just tons and tons of video games. I have even watched kids play unreal tournament in the computer labs. So not only are they hacking them, but they are setting up dedicated game servers and playing each other over our network in the computer labs! LOL Its not my job to punish the students because I work IT, and am not a teacher. However I do have to reimage the system when they hack the crap out of it. I don't get mad, I consider that job security!

[roncross@cox.net]

My daughter and son have a computer (imac with intel processor) that they use quite a bit. They mostly visit the disney channel and play lots of MarbleBlast (Ok, I also play a lot of MarbleBlast too).

There are two accounts on the computer. Me as the administrator and their account which is under parental control.

I am using the administrative account for Backup, remoted desktop login as well as running an Apache Web Server.

Will Macminder allow you to lock out the children's account while letting you into the administrative account to continue to do work? Or does Macminder lock out the entire computer?

I like the screen saver idea in the sense that the computer is locked out and what is happening on the screen is not being displayed. Currently, when I am doing administrative work on the imac, everything is visible. Sometimes my daughter will inadvertantly log me out or quickly switch to her account via fast user switching while I am in the middle of an upgrade.

kind regards
RLC

[roncross@cox.net]

I downloaded the software and put it on my children's computer. I am able to easily set limits on their use and effectively lock their account.

The problem that I have is since I also use the computer via remote login, I need to have a curtain or screen saver that will not display the admin work that I am doing. If they see an account open, such as the admin account, they will mess with it in unintented ways. They do not know if an account belongs to them or the administrator.

So for now, this software wouldn't work for me unless it has an admin curtain, lock, or screen saver that will allow me to work remotely without letting my children know that there is an available account to play with.

If anyone knows of something that provides the scheduling of mac minder plus the curtain for admin, please reply.

with warm regards
RLC

[cwtnospam]

System Preferences -> Security -> Require password to wake this computer from sleep or screen saver

System Preferences -> Dashboard & Exposé -> put Start Screen Saver in a corner.

Start your screen saver before leaving the computer alone. Any active processes will continue.

[JDV]

I think version 3 of Apple Remote Desktop (an expensive option, no doubt about it) will permit you to lock the screen from the client machine while you work on it. There are surely less expensive options available, but this is listed in the feature set of ARD.

Joe VanZandt

[roncross@cox.net]

Quote: Originally Posted by JDV There are surely less expensive options available.

Ok, what are they? Curtains please

ctwnospam as soon as I log into the admin account remotely, the screen saver goes aways. So your options will not work for my purpose. I need the display to be visible only on the remote display and the curtain to be on the machine being accessed.

kind regards
RLC

[edalzell]

I take it you can't do what it is you want to do via the command-line? If you can do it via the command-line, just SSH in and you are good to go.

[roncross@cox.net]

Quote: Originally Posted by edalzell I take it you can't do what it is you want to do via the command-line? If you can do it via the command-line, just SSH in and you are good to go.

I will try to ssh but I am not sure if this will disable the display on the admin machine. Mabye there is a command for disabling the admin display while you work on it remotely. Currently, I don't know what that command would be, do you?

kind regards
RLC

[roncross@cox.net]

I did contact the developer of mac minder about adding the curtain feature and here is his reply,

"Hi Ronald,

To be honest, it will probably not appear in Mac Minder. I try to keep my software simple and only add features that will benefit a majority of the customers. You're the first person to ever ask for this. Sorry about that.

John
"

Well at least he is honest, it just seems natural to have a curtain in an application like this. Wouldn't you agree?

kind regards
RLC

[ThreeDee]

I know that a VNC programs for Windows allows you to stop the person from using the mouse or keyboard while you admin the computer, but it doesn't cover the screen.

[roncross@cox.net]

Quote: Originally Posted by ThreeDee I know that a VNC programs for Windows allows you to stop the person from using the mouse or keyboard while you admin the computer, but it doesn't cover the screen.

I am currently using chicken of the vnc. It doesn't seem to have the ability to freeze the hardware (keyboard, mouse, display, etc...) while I am logged in remotely to the administrative account.

Any cheap VNC that will do this? Please reply.

with kind regards
RLC

[tlarkin]

Man I can not be 100% on this, but I thought that ARD had a lock workstation option when remoting in, preventing the user from use. However, the whole "curtain" thing I am not sure of, however if you were able to lock the work station while admin they should not be able to control the system until you log out and end your session

[JDV]

From the ARD site:

Quote: Simplify system configuration and management by automating time-consuming administrative tasks. * Control your Macs or any Virtual Network Computing-enabled computers including Windows, Linux, or UNIX systems. * Transfer files between Macs via Remote Drag-and-Drop, or copy/paste information between any two computers. * View the new System Status Indicators for color-coded details on available disk space, memory, and CPU utilization. * Prevent end users from viewing the screen while you control system to accomplish system management tasks with new curtain mode. * Use the Remote Desktop widget for instantaneous, at-a-glance views of remote computers. (2)

which clearly indicates it has a curtain mode. But it IS $300 unless you can manage to eBay it with luck.

Joe VanZandt

[edalzell]

Quote: Originally Posted by roncross@cox.net I will try to ssh but I am not sure if this will disable the display on the admin machine. Mabye there is a command for disabling the admin display while you work on it remotely. Currently, I don't know what that command would be, do you? kind regards RLC

Well with SSH it doesn't matter who is logged in. Any user could be logged in and you could still SSH in as the admin. Does that work for you?

[roncross@cox.net]

Quote: Originally Posted by edalzell Well with SSH it doesn't matter who is logged in. Any user could be logged in and you could still SSH in as the admin. Does that work for you?

I guess as long as I can be tied to the terminal, it will work. How about when I need to use a GUI? Does the same rule apply?

I still need to get around to setting up ssh on the machine.

kind regards
RLC

[edalzell]

Quote: Originally Posted by roncross@cox.net How about when I need to use a GUI? Does the same rule apply?

Nope, if you want to use the GUI you are back to your original quest. What do you need the GUI for?

OSX VNC, now called Vine Server, from Redstone Software, might be able to log into the GUI while another account is active.

[roncross@cox.net]

Quote: Originally Posted by edalzell Nope, if you want to use the GUI you are back to your original quest. What do you need the GUI for?

I might have to read a pdf document or view images or visit a web page on the remote machine. I might want to change the setting in parental control. There is probably a way to do all of this via the terminal, but I am spoiled on GUI's for the most part.

Quote: Originally Posted by edalzell OSX VNC, now called Vine Server, from Redstone Software, might be able to log into the GUI while another account is active.

I have Vine Server installed on one machine with the vnc viewer being cotvnc and there is no way to lock the screen. I just read the vine viewer document and it doesn't mention a way to lock the display either.

So for now, it appears that Apples has a monopoly on this feature. $300 is steep, so I will not pay that because it is overkill for what I need to do.

with warm regards.

[Warhaven]

Oh, this will be so much easier in Leopard. Apple includes exactly what you're talking about in the next OS, with a bunch of parental control features to set usage hours for kids, web content filters, etc. I hope, for the mean time, this MacMinder thing will work for you 'til January.

[tlarkin]

Quote: Originally Posted by Warhaven Oh, this will be so much easier in Leopard. Apple includes exactly what you're talking about in the next OS, with a bunch of parental control features to set usage hours for kids, web content filters, etc. I hope, for the mean time, this MacMinder thing will work for you 'til January.

I thought Leopard was going to be released in Spring of 07?


I do agree though adding ACLs and more parental controls will be nice, especially if its native. I really hope they offer a lite version of remote desktop built in natvie as well.