How to make Windows inaccessible from my software user?

[Mahesh Devjibhai Dhola]

Hi all,
The following are my need:
1. When a PC starts, my software should come up directly without any user
interaction.
2. Only my software will be accessible to the user and they will not be able
to access anything from Windows - nothing at all.
3. A super user can access the software as well as the full windows

The windows OS may be windows 2k, windows XP or windows 2k3.

Temp solution:
I can place my software in start-up and will make it full screen, without
any control buttons like minimize, maximize, close, resize etc so user will
see always my software at start up.
Problems: Some one can restart PC and in Safe-mode or other options they can
use and they may access windows and if I am disabling all these options
some-how then when we need PC access for maintenance or some other
administrative purpose then it will not be available to me. So, for that I
will create a super user account in my software through which super user can
access the window.
Also, if I make Alt + Ctrl + Del, Alt + Tab, Ctrl + Shift + Esc, Windows +
D, Windows + E, Windows + R etc keys disable then I will need to manipulate
all these keys individually and may be there will be lot more.

So I need some way through which I can restrict the normal user to access
anything from windows and they will only be able to access my software
only - nothing else and a super user can access the software as well as
normal windows access too - and all I want to do programmatically and if
possible using only C# - but its not hard requirement - I can use other
languages too.

I heard about user - security policies but I don't know any programmatic way
to work with it, also dont know what and how to do....

Any pointers/help or your guidance will be very much helpful to me

Thanks in Advance,

Mahesh Devjibhai Dhola
"Empower yourself...."

 

[adebaene]

Please do not cross-post to so many groups, especially those
irrelevants to your question!

Mahesh Devjibhai Dhola a écrit :

Hi all,
The following are my need:
1. When a PC starts, my software should come up directly without any user
interaction.
2. Only my software will be accessible to the user and they will not be able
to access anything from Windows - nothing at all.
3. A super user can access the software as well as the full windows

- Replace the default shell (explorer.exe) with your app, which should
be a fullscreen graphical app. See registry key
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows
NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\Shell.

- Provide a way in your soft for the super-user to launch the "usual"
explorer.exe if it needs too.

- Forget about hooking CTRL+ALT+SUPPR : It is not intended to be done,
and is is a bad idea from asecurity point of view anyway. On the other
hand, what you can do is disable the task manager for non-admin users
with group policy.

Arnaud
MVP - VC

 

[Nicholas Paldino [.NET/C# MVP]]

Mahesh,

What you are looking for is a kiosk app. I would do a google search on
it (and maybe windows as well) and see what that turns up. It should give
you some information you are looking for.

Hope this helps.

 

[Rocky]

Try this out. It's in VB but I'm sure you can figure it out.
http://vbaccelerator.com/home/VB/Code/Libraries/Windows/Creating_New_Desktops/article.asp

Mahesh,

What you are looking for is a kiosk app. I would do a google search on
it (and maybe windows as well) and see what that turns up. It should give
you some information you are looking for.

Hope this helps.

--
- Nicholas Paldino [.NET/C# MVP]
- (e-mail address removed)

Hi all,
The following are my need:
1. When a PC starts, my software should come up directly without any user
interaction.
2. Only my software will be accessible to the user and they will not be
able
to access anything from Windows - nothing at all.
3. A super user can access the software as well as the full windows

The windows OS may be windows 2k, windows XP or windows 2k3.

Temp solution:
I can place my software in start-up and will make it full screen, without
any control buttons like minimize, maximize, close, resize etc so user
will
see always my software at start up.
Problems: Some one can restart PC and in Safe-mode or other options they
can
use and they may access windows and if I am disabling all these options
some-how then when we need PC access for maintenance or some other
administrative purpose then it will not be available to me. So, for that
I
will create a super user account in my software through which super user
can
access the window.
Also, if I make Alt + Ctrl + Del, Alt + Tab, Ctrl + Shift + Esc, Windows
+
D, Windows + E, Windows + R etc keys disable then I will need to
manipulate
all these keys individually and may be there will be lot more.

So I need some way through which I can restrict the normal user to access
anything from windows and they will only be able to access my software
only - nothing else and a super user can access the software as well as
normal windows access too - and all I want to do programmatically and if
possible using only C# - but its not hard requirement - I can use other
languages too.

I heard about user - security policies but I don't know any programmatic
way
to work with it, also dont know what and how to do....

Any pointers/help or your guidance will be very much helpful to me

Thanks in Advance,

Mahesh Devjibhai Dhola
"Empower yourself...."

 

[Me]

Any thoughts on if this works on PDA devices (PPC and/or WinCE)? I gave it a
quick try and got some errors - chopped up your code to remove all the
unsupported stuff I could find and then got an unsupported exception in
CreateDesktop().

Thanks

Try this out. It's in VB but I'm sure you can figure it out.
http://vbaccelerator.com/home/VB/Code/Libraries/Windows/Creating_New_Desktops/article.asp

Mahesh,

What you are looking for is a kiosk app. I would do a google search
on it (and maybe windows as well) and see what that turns up. It should
give you some information you are looking for.

Hope this helps.

--
- Nicholas Paldino [.NET/C# MVP]
- (e-mail address removed)

Hi all,
The following are my need:
1. When a PC starts, my software should come up directly without any
user
interaction.
2. Only my software will be accessible to the user and they will not be
able
to access anything from Windows - nothing at all.
3. A super user can access the software as well as the full windows

The windows OS may be windows 2k, windows XP or windows 2k3.

Temp solution:
I can place my software in start-up and will make it full screen,
without
any control buttons like minimize, maximize, close, resize etc so user
will
see always my software at start up.
Problems: Some one can restart PC and in Safe-mode or other options they
can
use and they may access windows and if I am disabling all these options
some-how then when we need PC access for maintenance or some other
administrative purpose then it will not be available to me. So, for that
I
will create a super user account in my software through which super user
can
access the window.
Also, if I make Alt + Ctrl + Del, Alt + Tab, Ctrl + Shift + Esc, Windows
+
D, Windows + E, Windows + R etc keys disable then I will need to
manipulate
all these keys individually and may be there will be lot more.

So I need some way through which I can restrict the normal user to
access
anything from windows and they will only be able to access my software
only - nothing else and a super user can access the software as well as
normal windows access too - and all I want to do programmatically and if
possible using only C# - but its not hard requirement - I can use other
languages too.

I heard about user - security policies but I don't know any programmatic
way
to work with it, also dont know what and how to do....

Any pointers/help or your guidance will be very much helpful to me

Thanks in Advance,

Mahesh Devjibhai Dhola
"Empower yourself...."

 

[Tamas Demjen]

Also, if I make Alt + Ctrl + Del, Alt + Tab, Ctrl + Shift + Esc, Windows +
D, Windows + E, Windows + R etc keys disable then I will need to manipulate
all these keys individually and may be there will be lot more.

I can strongly recommend KCSDK from Meliora Software, which does exactly
what you want. I have very good experience with it (with a kiosk
application that we developed). It can disable any key combination
(Ctrl+Esc, Ctrl+Alt+Del, Alt+Tab):

http://www.meliorasoft.com/kits/keyboard/index.php

Tom