How to get a computer to go to two web sites only

[Idontwantspam]

OK, here's my simple solution:

Use firefox. Add these two addons:

R-kiosk

BlockSite

Don't install R-Kiosk until you're all done though. If you read the addon's page, you'll see that it restricts firefox very effectively.

Open the ad-ons manager, and click options for BlockSite. Choose the whitelist button. Add the two sites you wish to use. For example, if you only want to allow MSFN and microsoft.com, you'd add these to the list:

*microsoft.com/*

*msfn.org/*

Any other site will result in a warning that the sit has been blocked, a la IE Information Bar.

The problem with R-Kiosk is it allows no address bar. This is good if you want to restrict it to only two sites, but bad if you want to allow it to access multiple sites. So, I've created a handy dandy html page to set as the home page if you wish that basically lets you put in the address and it will appear in an iFrame. Because of the way I wrote it, you can't go to anything on the local filesystem, i.e. file:// . This was half bug, half feature. It's not coded very well, and if anyone wants to make improvements, go ahead. The code calls for an image, but I haven't made a logo yet. Anyone interested in a donation of their photoshop skills?

Anyhow, here's the next part. You use group policy to set firefox as the shell for the user, meaning they will never see windows explorer - when they log on, they'll go directly to firefox in a locked down state. I've included some reg files below to set the necessary policies, as well as with better instructions. The policies implemented will also:

• Disable the command prompt
  
• Disable all options in the Control-Alt-Del box other than log off, shut down, and of course, cancel.
  
• Prevent the user from using the run command
  
• Prevent access to the C:/ drive
  
• Uses the run only specified windows applications policy to restrict the user to using only firefox.exe, opera.exe (if you choose to use opera rather than firefox. It has a built-in kiosk mode, opera.exe -k. No blocksite though.)
  
• Forces Windows Classic theme
  
• Prevents access to shared documents
  

I think that's it. See the attached zip for all the necessary files, and a detailed readme. Hope this works!

kiosk_project.zip

[PC_LOAD_LETTER]

to fix the no address bar issue in firefox R-kiosk

add the following to C:\Documents and Settings\--USER--\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\--RANDOMCHARS--.default\user.js (file prolly wont exist)

user_pref("rkiosk.navbar", true);

this will show the back, next, refresh, stop, address bar, go button, and search box

to remove any of those

execute firefox with the -safe-mode switch

select disable addons

disable R-Kiosk via the addons menu

restart FF in normal mode

edit toolbar and remove items and reenable R-kiosk

restart FF

this one is also of some use too (keeps people from leaving a page up on the kiosk)

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/616

biggest drawback to turning navbar on it FF can be close with the X button and i cant find the extention i used on my kiosks for removing that -if its a problem lemme know and ill go check one out tomorrow while im at work

[Idontwantspam]

If you can find that, I'd be grateful, as I'm sure others would be.

Do note however that with R-Kiosk, clicking the minimize, maximize and close buttons does nothing. Alt+F4 does work, however.

Maybe someone who's better at programming/scripting than I am can write something that will monitor firefox and if it's closed, prompt the user whether they'd like to log off or restart firefox, and if they don't answer after, say, 20 seconds, automatically restart and put something in the event log. That would be sweet. It could be added in that user's startup registry key. Any volunteers?

[PC_LOAD_LETTER]

Ill try to remeber to look tomorrow

I also had looked at http://webconverger.org when setting these things up but at the time, it didnt look like a workable solution. but i bookmarked it anyways

[rav0]

• Uses the run only specified windows applications policy to restrict the user to using only firefox.exe, opera.exe (if you choose to use opera rather than firefox. It has a built-in kiosk mode, opera.exe -k. No blocksite though.)
  

Opera can block sites. You can filter using your choice of blacklist or whitelist for different websites, filetypes and combinations of these and others.

[Idontwantspam]

• Uses the run only specified windows applications policy to restrict the user to using only firefox.exe, opera.exe (if you choose to use opera rather than firefox. It has a built-in kiosk mode, opera.exe -k. No blocksite though.)
  

Opera can block sites. You can filter using your choice of blacklist or whitelist for different websites, filetypes and combinations of these and others.

That's good to know!