Message of the Day program

[dangermouse68]

Is there a way to prevent users (students) from editing the Message of the Day, while it's displaying. I have the .txt file hidden away as read only so that's not a problem (and the systems boot PXE).

What my concern is, when the message is being display (we use it as our acceptable use policy), it can be changed, cleared out and retyped to the users desires. Then it gets reloaded upon hitting disagree/agree.

If you use this tool, you can see what I mean when it displays . Just highlight all the text and hit delete. Then type what you want.

 

[marvhuffaker]

What tool are you talking about? You should be locking that stuff down with ZENworks and Group Policies.

Marvin Huffaker, MCNE

http://www.redjuju.com

 

[dangermouse68]

Maybe it's not understood what it is I'm looking for.

Here's a link to the app. that I'm talking about.

http://www.novell.com/coolsolutions/trench/14633.html

The issue of being locked down isn't a matter. It's when the application runs and displays the text from the file. That's when students can go and modify it, only when it's in RAM.

Another way of looking at this problem is this. Imagine a progam that displays a bunch of text. When it's displayed a person can highlight the text, then delete it or modify it, but is unable to save those changes back to the file. The display is the only place the changes can occur.

What I'm wanting to know, is if there is a way to lock the display of the text down, so that it's not changeable.

 

[TheLad]

You could always use a different method to display your acceptable use policy. A favorite way of doing this is using the LegalNotice options within Windows.

The MS TID below gives you some tips, the message will appear when a user presses Ctrl-Alt-Delete and cannot be modified unless the users have access to the registry:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/315232/en-us

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"It's true, its damn true!"
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[dangermouse68]

Thanks Lad,

I'll check that out. Right now we don't use the Ctrl-Alt-Delete, so I'll have to see how it works in our environment.

 

[dangermouse68]

Well that worked pretty good. However, I can't use it because of a limitation on character count (255 for the string vs. over 3000 for the actual text).

Thanks anyway.

 

[marvhuffaker]

I guess I don't understand the issue. Why does it matter if they can change the text? It's only temporary. And they can't write. it reverts back the next time. I doubt that it's logging this to a file saying that JOE agreed to 'XXXXXX' Text.. So what difference does it make if they mess with it?





Marvin Huffaker, MCNE

http://www.redjuju.com

 

[TheLad]

Another thing you can try is to create a custom bitmap with all of your acceptable use details on and have it displayed at the Ctrl-Alt-Delete prompt instead of the NeetWare Bitmap.

To do this, create a simple Bitmap file in Paint (no bigger than say 600x400 pixels), add your required details to it, and save the file as C:\Windows\NWELCOME.BMP (overwriting the existing one). Hopefully, when you reboot the Ctrl-Alt-Delete screen will be this bitmap. And providing your PCs C: are restricted by ZEN Policies, the users will not be able to edit this Bitmap.

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"It's true, its damn true!"
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[LawnBoy]

Marv, my guess is the kids are leaving 'cute' messages there for the next student who logs on.

 

[dangermouse68]

LawnBoy,

Yes, they've been messing with it. Nothing major so far, I'm looking to be proactive here and prevent a harassment issue.

 

[Provogeek]

Use somthing else

http://www.novell.com/coolsolutions/tools/13797.html

This looks pretty kewl, but I wish I didn't test it my self on my system just to see what it does. If you click on disagree, it shuts down the PC. Would be amusing to sit in the library watching the students deal with this. Just waut for that smart ars to click disagree. You do have to install somthing on the PC, you'll have to play with this to make sure it's somthing you want to use.

Personally, I would write a script using AutoIT that would do pretty much the same thing, only it would be a self contained EXE requiring nothing to be installed on the PC.

=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+
Brent Schmidt Certified nut case
Senior Network Engineer
Keep IT Simple

http://www.kiscc.com

 

[marvhuffaker]

I was just going to suggest AUTOIT myself.. It would be a great way for you to create something that does exactly what you want. and you can tweak it until perfect.

Marvin Huffaker, MCNE

http://www.redjuju.com

 

[dangermouse68]

Thanks Provo and Marv,

I'll check it out this weekend!!!