Kiosk

Introduction

The goal of this page is to reference and offer configuration solutions for computers that are in public access like those in clubs.

Solutions Mac

iCab

To make a Kiosk on Mac, it's possible to use an iMac G3 (All-in-one computer) which CD/DVD drive is withdrawn to avoid reboot onto system disk. iCab is installed and has an interesting Kiosk mod (Tools, Public mode) protected by a password which the Mac Os X Dock and tool bar don't appear.

Unfortunately, iCab doesn't exist for Windows.

If you want open directly booking page after system booting and after your session is opened, you have to setup the start-up script written in applescript. This following script constantly displays the booking page and refreshs it when needs.

tell application "iCab"
    Activate
    enter kiosk mode with password "password" 
       -- The password that will be used to exit Kiosk mode with the shortcut [Commande-k]
    OpenURL "http://mysite.org/?login=mylogin&password=mypassword" toWindow -1 
       -- Open as foreground the page in iCab by inserting login and password of user with rights
end tell

To delete all display bars : Address, State bar, Tabs, Url, it's into Preferences and put OF as home page.

It's necessary to keep the navigation bar to relaunch the browser when connection is lost.

It's possible to only allow connection to one or several sites by using the filter system. It's easy to only lock only the browser to OF.

This Kiosk mode must be launched from an user session with password (to allow openings and automatic closure at night) Bien entendu, ce mode kiosque doit être lancé depuis une session d'un utilisateur lancée sans mot de passe (permet les ouvertures et extinctions automatiques la nuit), an user with no managing rights utilisateur on the computer and who works on a restrict Finder.

A free version exists, a Pro version without limitations is available for $20.

Opera

Opera recently became free and has a Kiosk mode but it causes some display problems on OF.

wKiosk Browser

It exists too wKiosk Browser, especially created for this usage but fee-paying ($69 for one work-station, the trial version lasts only 1 hour). It has good setup and can relaunch connection to the site when computer is completely booted.

Solutions for PC

XNet

Seems based on Windows XP Pro and doesn't look free ...

All browser

If you cannot use Kiosk mode, it's always possible to put OpenFlyers into default page on your browser.

• For Firefox or Internet Explorer, go to Tools-->Options... then into "General" tabs and specify "Display my home page" with address of the site.
• To extend the customization, it's possible to put into the address, the login and password of the user without right (visitor type) in order to permanently keep displayed the booking book and when the browser is launched. To do that, follow the explained method into "iCab" part : http://www.my_club.org/resa/?login=visitor&password=visitor if login and password of visitor profile are "visitor" and "visitor". Note that it works only if the user account has only a visitor profile and nothing else.
• If you put it into a shortcut to your browser into menu Start->Programs->StartUp, your browser will display the booking book in visitor mode after the system booting.