Hello all,
As this is hardly a mainstream forum, it seems reasonable to check here
for recommendations. My goal is to simply and easily lock down winxp
and 2k machines w/o really locking them down. IMHO, the most attractive
approach is to change the shell to something that feigns ignorance of
IE, Outlook, etc. In exchange for never having to wonder what new
shortcuts have been added to this or that part of the main menu, I would
gladly make a separate explicit menu that is presented to end users.
Beyond that, I would want an additionally password-protected way to get
to a command line and hopefully explorer itself.
Do any of you have experience with shell replacements? There are many
of them available, though most appear to be in some level of distress.
LiteStep (open) and Aston (commercial) both replace enough of explorer
that they require the machine to be locked down via standard methods.
Options I am considering include: (1) hack LiteStep to limit choices;
(2) build a shell in Dolphin or Squeak. Dolphin has the edge on Winows
integration (arguably important for a shell), but Squeak has a readily
tweaked VM which might be of value. A third option is to spend lots of
time hassling with policies, but I have very little faith in that, as
the machines I have seen "locked down" by such methods have IE readily
accessible and willing to run ActiveX controls that are marked as safe
for scripting (which is a complete joke IMHO).
Any ideas?
Bill
Wilhelm K. Schwab, Ph.D.
University of Florida
Department of Anesthesiology
PO Box 100254
Gainesville, FL 32610-0254
Email:
[hidden email]
Tel: (352) 846-1285
FAX: (352) 392-7029
Locked
