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What Advice For a Single Parent As Server Admin?
Dragon_Eater, with "lots of experience setting up PCs and a passable knowledge of Linux but severely lacking in the server/client department,"
writes with a situation that probably faces a lot of parents:
I want to set up three kids, 12, 14, and 15, with newer computers so they will stop fighting for time on the one ten-year-old Dell they share now. I can get the individual computers and a server put together without any problems, but the computer-handicapped single parent needs to be able to do the following via an simple application/web page: View client computer status, On/off, sleeping etc.; Deny Internet access, not LAN, just the web; Schedule time usage of computer, ex. 7 am to 10 pm on school nights etc.; Force log-out and/or shutdown of clients, for grounding purposes; and Apply some kind of firewall filter for blocking undesired web content. And as the administrator for this network I would like the following options: Remote virus scanning of client machines, or scheduled task; Some kind of hardware monitor, high temp / fan speed low etc.; and Email alerts for various log files / alarms.
Given the lists above I am thinking about a Linux-based router/server machine and running Windows on the clients for game compatibility. I also know that a server and network boot client is possible but not sure where to start on that one."
you got a whole deal of connectivity/administration project there. quit your day job.
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One issue will be the specific games that they will be playing. If they require administrator access, you're going to have a big headache.
Schedule time usage of computer, ex. 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. on school nights etc.; Force log-out and/or shutdown of clients, for grounding purposes
If they don't get admin access, then you can do some of that with windows scheduler.
If you're severely lacking in the client/server department you don't have a passable knowledge of Linux, which is primarily a server operating system. Perhaps you may have a "passing acquaintance with Linux as used on the Desktop".
Most of what you described can be done with a decent modern router. The hardware monitoring is a bit overboard, logs will tell you what you need to know in the event of a disaster. The force log out could be done via router too, just deny internet. Alot of this can be done with very little technical effort and more parenting skill. Most of this is going to take a dedicated person to monitor it over the course of the installation.
Good-bye
It's amazing what kids can figure out when it comes to getting by the restrictions their parents set forth.
They're going to learn about networking, proxies, virtual machines, ip spoofing etc. All because they want to get on Facebook. Which they will.
OpenDNS will work well for filtering sites, just set the DNS server on the computers you wish to filter to the OpenDNS servers and set up an account to filter stuff.
http://CryoLANparty.com/ A lan I'm staff on!
this is really easily done! 1) talk to your kids, be a real parent!!! i don't think you'll ever have a case where little billy gets in trouble at 1pm and you need to disconnect his computer rights from work. 2) if they need to be punished unplug the computer and take it away. 3) have admin rights to their computers so you can keep tabs on what they're doing and can't hide anything from you.
problem solved.
next.
Sounds like this list needs to be broken down into multiple sub-functions.
Web filtering, site access control, and total Internet denial are functions for a web proxy or other content filter. You should be able to find a linux-based web proxy that will do what you want in that department.
Scheduling usage hours, forcing logout, etc. is the sort of thing you can do with "policy" objects if you had a Windows Domain Controller. That's probably outside of your budget. But, generally, you need to be looking for client/workstation policy tools.
The computer health monitoring stuff might be part of the policy tools, but might not.
the simplest and most effective block is to go over and shut the computer off. Take away the computer if you have to (or just the cords if that's too much trouble).
Sounds like your kids are working for a corporation, not living at home...
Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
The person does not know how to do security...
Here is the problem. Kid A.... "Parent parent parent I need to get a project done and you shut down my computer at 10PM. And if I don't get this project done I will get an F!"
At this point the parent's security is blown to bits because they need to make an exception. And how often will this kid say, "parent parent I have a "project""
The easiest way to answer this is as follows:
1) Own the route to the Internet. That means you give or deny access to the Internet. Kids loose interest REAL quick if they can play with the Internet.
2) Let the kids have access to the computer anytime they want. WITH the exception that you can remotely log in at any time. Install VNC server and periodically log onto the machine and see what your kids are doing. Yes it is big brother, but it also keeps people honest when they know you can log in at any time.
3) NEVER give out the password. And that means you as the parent need remote access to the home network. Because imagine being out for the day, kid comes home and needs access to the Internet. They phone you, and unless you give them access you are going to have one angry kid. Thus make sure that you can remotely access your network, make the changes and move on...
Otherwise the rest is silly and life should be fine...
"You can't make a race horse of a pig"
"No," said Samuel, "but you can make very fast pig"
The children are old enough.
You could save yourself a lot of time and do the job better by building character rather than trying to restrict them with technology. Ultimately teaching them how to use the internet responsibly and how to live responsibly is going to be the better way to go than trying to control what they can do and when. Both you and your children will be happier for it.
China allready has this
Where to start: Scrap all your ideas and start over.
Yes, everything you asked for can be done. The reality is though is that, with the amount of complexity you are asking for, you will be a full time sysadmin for them - you might as well quit your day job now.
Your setup is simply too complex for a non-techie (and to be honest, as a techie, I don't want to have to admin something that complex at home). You need to stop asking "can I" and ask "should I?"
Windows PCs joined to active directory can let you manage them, set logon hours, etc.
Why do you care to know if the PCs are sleeping/on/off/whatever?
A router running DD-WRT will let you deny internet access based on hours and/or PCs in a simple manner. To be perfectly honest, I hate the concept of internet filtering (by parents or otherwise) as I believe it is another step toward turning people into drones, rather than teaching them to think for themselves, so I'm not even going to offer any suggestions on that subject.
I agree with the other posters, the system you have suggested will end as follows:
1. The kids will learn how to hack around it. This can be a good thing or bad thing, depending on your point of view
2. The system is so complex it will never work and the parent will never use it as they have no clue
3. You will grow to hate it as it will take too much of your time.
Mandriva has very easy to use admin functions that can allow you to shut off a fair amount of what you are trying to do. With Dos Box installed it will play older games well and can have WINE added for newer ones. I have used SUSE, Fedora and ubuntu and believe that mandriva has the best root/admin control functions for setting up and keeping a computer running while disallowing changes by a user. Just be sure to create a STRONG password since your kids will be trying every possible way to defeat your settings. Oh, don't let a LIVE disk lay around for them to find. They will defeat all of your efforts with that after a while of practicing....
Maybe a real solution is to place the computer in the living room where you can see them while they use it and shut it off all other times.
We use a program called SynchronEyes which does most of these things, allows you to see essentially thumbnails of what each machine is doing, see its status remote on/off etc. It's Windows only. I see they've changed their product. It's called SMART Sync now. I don't see pricing which is probably not good. Here's a link
It's a pretty front end for VNC like functionality which would be free/oss but nowhere near as easily set up (but I'd wager largely what people will say since you specifically mention Linux and Windows and it works on both). I'm not really an expert on this part, but SychronEyes has worked well, after I added it to a custom Ghost image for that lab and set the clients to use hostnames instead of usernames for identification. It might be overkill for what you need though.
Seriously! Just stop!
1. You either come up with a "normal" computer usage policy, you know, talking to your kids about stuff like porn, sex, appropriate computer policy in your house (better not be too strict on this one :P), purpose of getting them the computers, internet privacy, etc, or,
2. don't and the kids will get to all the "inappropriate" places anyway and may get you into more trouble than you ever imagined.
Frankly, you can't "filter" porn. If someone wants to get it, they will. Maybe this is one of the good sides of internet porn - parents forced to deal with sex-ed of their kids. Although most go the "easy way" and pretend it doesn't exist - "but I installed a filter!!"
Second, I would be much more nervous about insisting that your kids DO NOT use any of the file sharing software without prior permission, on case-by-case basis. Explain about the MAFIA, I mean, MPAA and the like on their lawsuit campaigns.
Regardless, your solutions are *parenting* human solutions, not technical ones.
I'm doing something similar but in our family, we've got a 7 and an 8 year old and a 3 year old, so it's a different "ball game".
In our situation, I don't bother trying to put Linux on any of their machines. I've found that for the younger kids, the vast majority of their time spent playing anything Internet/web-based involves Shockwave Flash based sites (or sites using other proprietary 3D player plug-ins). Unfortunately, nothing runs this stuff quite as well as either a Windows XP (or later) OS, or a newer Mac running a recent version of OS X.
I found a free add-on for Firefox called Kidzui that was pretty nice. It basically turns the browser into a "kids' browser" that has a "home page" with good suggested sites for them to visit, and lets them click and explore around in a big collection of known "kid safe" web sites. Basically, it doesn't allow going anyplace except sites they pre-approved, but they make the whole experience feel like the kid is just getting around the net without restrictions. Additionally, it can email the parent weekly stats on the sites they spent the most time using, etc.
If you're using a Mac, OS X has pretty nice parental controls built into the OS for things like not allowing use of the machine after certain hours. I didn't find Windows had nearly as nice of capabilities for that, out of the box (though Windows 7 was closer than any previous version of Windows to offering it).
Honestly, I'm not that "sold" on putting forth the effort of setting up a lot of centralized administration and maintenance for the machines on a small home network (like for 3 kids). You may as well put free anti-virus/spyware software on each computer and let them auto update themselves independently. The products that support centralized management of the AV software tend to be expensive and/or buggy. (You get weirdness like one box that gets out of sync with the server console, so you have to mess with things to get them to both be on the "same page" about the workstation's status again.)
If anything, I think it'd be worthwhile to image the drives of all the machines, once they're freshly set up with the OS and applications and configuration defaults you like. Then, if one gets screwed up, you can just wipe its drive and re-image at will from your network server. Typically, on a kids' PC, they don't have that much important data to worry about losing anyway. If they're doing most things on the net, the sites they use are saving their high scores, user profiles, and such.
... forget the techie crap, and try spending more time communicating with your children.
I'd rather have a kid who I know I can trust to turn off his PC for the night, than have to rely on tech control and surveillance.
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
As a parent, you are supposed to exert some control over your children. That is why they are called children... That are not yet adults, and are not yet expected to show adult responsibility.
Yes - and you exert that control by talking to them, occasionally looking over their shoulder and showing them some amount of trust, not by installing a totalitarian regime in your home. Technology does not substitute for parenting.
Ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.
It's a little over the top but parents are supposed to keep an eye on what their own kids do.
At least that's the reply whenever parents try to foist that particular burden on society rather than do it themselves.
Where N is the number of computer users and you want them in a shared space, not in each child's room. Providing each child a personal computer, especially in his room, is a guarantee that any kind of interaction between you and your kids and between themselves will end. Ensuring computer "scarcity" will force you and, more importantly, your kids to interact with each other. It may even force you and your kids, gasp, to share a computer.
This also has a couple side benefits:
1. There are no "secrets" on the computers so you have no need for the tight monitoring and/or policing you seem to think you want.
2. Virus infections become a shared painful experience with obvious lessons being learned on how to avoid it the next time.
HW monitoring is kind of pointless as it won't tell you anything.
This only leaves you with a couple problems to deal with:
1. backup - there are plenty of backup solutions out there. Generally, you'll want some kind of external drive setup with automated user data backups.
2. virus recovery - If you like anti-virus software, use it. However, you should probably also keep a fresh install method handy so you can simply re-install without having to deal with the mess (this is where a good backup becomes very important). Taken a step further and to save lots of time you could have all your machines running VM hosted Windows images. Then when one of the images gets infected or otherwise "goes bad" you simply revert to the latest and greatest clean VM image (user data backup is still very important).
Well, this all sounds a bit overkill for childrearing, but as a 26 year old university student who knows exactly nothing about raising children as a single parent, I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt.
At any rate, all of the internet scheduling/cutting off can quite happily be done by any router running DD-WRT. Pick up an old Linksys WRT54G somewhere and you'll be fine. Set it up to use OpenDNS to filter any bad sites.
Scheduling of Virus Scanning is obviously a no-brainer as any virus scanner worth its salt will quite happily do that automatically. It's probably blaspheme around here, but for those friends with windows machines that I've had to help fix, I've actually had good luck with Microsoft's own free scanner.
As far as the hardware monitoring/log emailing, maybe just drink a beer on the porch and relax instead. Too much worry is bad for your health.
...commend your commitment to teaching your kids how to avoid and circumvent computer restrictions.
Both Windows 7 and OSX have parental controls that enforce usage times in a per-account basis, which apps can be run from these accounts, which sites can be accessed, etc. I have been using these with OSX (a good write up at http://theappleblog.com/2009/01/13/kid-proofing-a-mac-with-parental-controls/) with my 11-year old autistic boy and they couldn't be any simpler. He can only log into the machine at certain times, and I have the option to set a maximum session time per day. He can only run apps that I approve, and can go to sites only if I explicitly allow them. The bad news is that, at least in OSX, Firefox doesn't respect the parental control settings (Safari does it fine).
I checked with Windows 7 and the parental controls seem to be pretty similar. More at http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-vista/features/parental-controls.aspx
My only real annoyance is that Youtube doesn't have real content rating, which makes it a pain to filter properly. My son loves to make balloon sculptures and is always checking for new video tutorials, the problems is that while looking for these, he runs into the videos of the balloon popping fetishists. One second I am hearing a video explaining how to twist balloons into a roadrunner, next I hear a 300-pound woman in a bathing suit giggling and sitting on balloons to pop them. Gross.
Pedro
----
The Insomniac Coder
There are products you can buy that are normally used in businesses, that allow you to do key stroke logging, remote snooping the screen, etc. If you're as paranoid as the business that use these tactics on their workers then I'm you can find them with the Google. I don't expect they will be cheap, and they will require a lot of setup, you'd also have to do this away from home for obvious reasons. But if you mistrust your kids that much already I'm sure you're prepared for that.
This sort of thing sounds like it's right up your alley: http://www.softactivity.com/
Of course as pointed out above they can be circumvented with the Google too, often by the simple expedient of going to a library, or a friends house. You could of course spy on them there to, by bugging their phone, though of course if you follow down this route you'll work out that locking in their room, and home schooling them under armed guard is the only rational choice. What you're going to do in a few years once they leave home and become adults, (so called) is a different matter.
You could of course just lock them in the basement.
http://theappleblog.com/2009/01/13/kid-proofing-a-mac-with-parental-controls/
Buying a Mac is going to be way cheaper than dealing with viruses on Windows or trying to learn being a Sysadmin on Linux. Buy Mac Minis and cheap monitors/keyboards/mice or pick up a used MacBook or iMac. Look for something that has the extended warranty - hardware failures will be repaired for free. You could even consider getting them an iPad with a keyboard, and only installing the applications you want them to use.
Just keep a local account on each system with a password that they REALLY don't know, create their accounts with the instructions provided above, and you're done. For extra protection, have someone write a script for you that sends an e-mail every time the Administrator account logs in, so you can know if they have figured it out.
Also, don't bother with virus protection. Weekly backups and nightly syncing their documents is a much more realistic and effective option. Pick up a Time Capsule and their computers will backup automatically. Just make sure you restrict their hard drive quota so all of their information will fit.
Never said it did. But occasionally you have to clean the house, cook dinner, go to the bathroom. Not all of us have the leisure to hover over children all day. Especially a single parent, as referred to in the post. This is just a gateway, not a solution. It will never be perfect, and it will require an attentive parent. I would also say keep ALL of the computers in the living room. With less privacy, they are less likely to "cheat" the filters. The old "Daylight is the best disinfectant" sort of thing.
dd-wrt will do it. A trusting relationship will too. Although, it may be a good way to catalyze production of tech savy kids. They will figure out how to get around it. :D
I remember when I was a teenager.
My dad added a power on password on the basis that he utterly detested games.
The problem was he didn't even give it to my mother.
Of course one day I actually needed to print something in a fucking hurry and he couldn't be contacted so I solved the problem with a screwdriver and the motherboard manual.
Which brings up the problem of physical access.
All the software in the world is pointless if the teenager can simply swap some network cables.
virtualization will kill any game need a video card better then a basic 2d one.
Your kids don't want censorship or locked down obsolete computers. That shit will just hinder their education.
I am not asking to outsource parent responsibility to society, on the contrary. If the kids are to learn responsible behaviour, you can't just exert total control over their actions. You don't learn without the possibility to make mistakes. That's why you give them the rules, let them do their thing and occasionally check up on compliance - if they don't keep to the rules, you find out why, talk to them about that and give em a proper ass-chewing if necessary. You don't need total computer access control to teach them to use the things responsibly.
Ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.
Why would you need to hover over them all the time when they use the computer? It is a damn computer, not a table saw - think that 13 year old will be scarred for life if he finds a porn site? If he won't find it on the net due to the great firewall of the parents, he'll get it on a USB stick on the schoolyard anyway.
Ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.
This does most of what you want out of the box.
There is a nice admin interface where you can create profiles based on day of week, per MAC etc. Block certain keywords.
While I cannot imagine any one product will do all the things you mentioned as requirements, you might find most of the functions available in ClearOS (formerly known as ClarkConnect). You manage it primarily from a web-based interface which has pretty good granularity in terms of specific functions for specific users, and of course you can use the linux command line as well. These things are great for parking between the Intertubes and WinOS boxen, and I've been using them since 2003 for home and small business clients. Also, it will run on whatever ancient relic you have stashed in the basement computer graveyard. I have no connection with ClearOS other than as a user.
Twice as crazy as I would be if I was half as crazy as I am.
A decent NAT router will do all the internet control stuff you are looking for, with an interface that isn't too terrible to grok. The rest of what you're asking for starts to crank up the cost and complexity extremely fast, especially for a single parent with three teenage kids...
Really, you don't want to try to set up draconian enterprisy stuff, it's not designed for consumers, will take time to administrate, and will break on you anyway. Network control via NAT router should be sufficient. If the parent wants to be able to physically control computer use too, then set up the clients up with the hard disk in a removable bay carrier. Yank it when you want to deny access to the machine totally. Much cheaper than setting up a domain and controlling access with accounts, and more reliable.
Seriously though, today's popular computing tasks pretty much require network. The NAT router gets you enough control. All other security measures are pointless because the kids have physical access to the machines; it doesn't take much to get Ubuntu running from a USB key with a spoofed MAC address...which negates almost anything you might set up on the clients anyway (and can bypass some NAT restriction configurations anyway).
A decent NAT router will have web access logs, so if the parent is paranoid, they can check up on what websites the clients have been going to, and also block specific sites. If necessary, the NAT router can block communications by port, too, to deny specific applications from working on the network, such as msn messenger, XBOX, bittorrent, or specific game protocols. In practice though, it's a pain to change that stuff all the time.
Technology isn't going to solve the parenting problem of the parent teaching the kids what is and is not appropriate. That requires the parent doing *parenting*. You've already failed if you have to resort to logging, blocking, and physical denial to reinforce consequences for going outside what is acceptable, more than once or twice.
But if you don't put any barriers in how shall they ever learn about proxies, address spoofing, packet sniffers and all the other wonderful things involved in defeating technical parental controls?
First of all may I remind you (parent) that your kid's education is your frickin' job?! Technology is still NOT able to replace good parenting and probably/hopefully that won't be the case anytime soon. Your teenagers will find a way to break your rules sooner or later anyway so why even waste time TRYING to create such a virtual soap-bubble-castle for them? They'll only feel more controlled and repressed and that will eventually lead to more rebellious behaviour from their part - none of you would like it. They're teenagers so just DON'T FORBID them a thing in "their own" home. They're not your slaves, they're still your kids! You (and your kids) won't succeed by using technology as a replacement for a real parent!
TALK and CONNECT to your kids, teach them meaningful ways of using modern technology (or even better let them teach themselves, they probably even know already much more about technology than you do). At this age they won't listen to you anyways but maybe with a little teasing ("You'll get a new computer, if and only if ...") will make them behave for some time. Apart from all of that: Three kids fighting over one 10-year-old computer, in the year 2010, sorry, but that's just plain ridiculous! If you can't afford a life worth living for your kids maybe you just shouldn't have produced them yet.
I'm not talking VirtualBox, I'm talking something with a real hypervisor like Xen. You configure Xen for the client to get all the "juice", and maybe localize the game software. Then again, I've never tried running something like FEAR2 on a virtual client...
There is no America. There is no democracy. There is only IBM and AT&T and DuPont, Dow, General Electric, and Exxon
OpenBSD with packet filter + djbdns for dns caching and resolution.
packet filter allows rules to control local NAT and redirection of connections to/from external addresses. But this does not control clients for all of the other functions you are asking, that probably can be done with PCAnywhere or some other VNC.
However it is not a simple task, from 0 to everything works it may take many many days if you have never done it before.
You can't handle the truth.
Hehe, well, true - that might actually the best use for a setup like the one asked for. They might be more motivated in learning proper hacking techniques if they can use it to circumvent your controls.
Ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.
What they NEED to do is supervise what their kids are doing - not leave it up to the server - the kids will get around that SO quick.
All you're doing is giving a false sense of security.
Put the computers where the single parent can SEE the kids using them. And they can see each other. If you start hearing lots of giggling, check to see if they're looking at porn. Also, the kids will snitch on each other if they can see what they're doing.
I am having a laugh riot at the idea of a household consisting of a single parent, a 12 year old, a 14 year old, and a 15 year old being run as a democracy.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
I'm losing some mod points by posting this, but I didn't notice the ages here -- 12, 14, and 15? Let them have some old/spare computers if they want. Show them where to download a virus scanner and tell them that if they break anything, they have to fix it. I don't see what the issue is here. They are going to have homework the requires the Internet anyway, so shutting down access after 10pm and in the early morning is just going to hurt them. By the way, my middle and high schools implemented strict filtering schemes on their networks. We had to put a fair amount of effort into getting around them *not* because we wanted to browse facebook/myspace/b/ at school, but because we often did research for our essays on school computers, and we wanted actual, balanced evidence, rather than the limited and biased crap that the filters let through.
I do four things for my kid.
1. Install X10 controlled electrical outlets that you can control from either a secured (locked up) X10 keypad or from a secured computer interface. Nothing says do your home work like a dead electrical outlet.
2. Using third party firmware on the router, such as DD-WRT, set up iptables scripts that can either block all network traffic to the specific machine, block all Internet, block selected Internet sites, ... using a secured plink call to an on router script (see documentation on ssh and putty).
3. Set up separate non-admin accounts on each machine, one for fun and games and one for home work only. Share document storage area among the two accounts. Never give up admin tot he kids
4. Up to date antivirus software. .
Needless to say, I get lots of push back from my kid and I have not been completely successful in all four. But I have implemented enough so that he is not totally off the deep end (or so I am led to believe).
Being a parent has given me a new appreciation for functioning in a non-deterministic universe.
Good luck
-- Mache
This is one area where Linux amazingly has been lacking. Home Domain Controllers. You can create a home domain controller with features Windows has never dreamed. Its just really really, really too hard. There needs to be a Home Domain controller Application added to most Linux Distributions.
Mandriva comes close to this with the ability to setup fully functional Samba Domains stand-alone only. But if you try and configure OpenLDAP, Kerberos, Squid, FreeRadius or anything else, it becomes a time vampire to get it all working right. And its not that the software is buggy. Its that often, the software is configured badly, and not at all.
https://qa.mandriva.com/show_bug.cgi?id=58653 Take a look at this bug I filed.
I am not implying that the kids should vote on the mode of their internet use. But if you do not give them any freedom, including the freedom to violate the agreed upon rules, you do not give them any trust. How should they ever learn responsible behaviour without experiencing trust and freedom?
Ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.
//Microsoft Employee Here//
The new versions of Windows Home Server is perfect for what you want to do plus there is a great community of users who develop custom plugins for new functionality. Check out http://www.wegotserved.com/
Newegg.com has some great prices.
I'd say get them netbooks and set up a wireless router. It's more useful than a desktop PC and cheaper too. Regarding your desire for control, don't bother. If you want your kids to trust you, you need to trust them. It will work a lot better than exerting draconian control.
And if you really feel the need to punish your children for something by taking their computer away, you can just lock the netbook up somewhere for a day or two.
Proud member of the Ferengi Socialist Party.
How about getting a cheap broadband router and letting the kids chose their own computers?
You are not doing your kids any favors by monitoring everything they do, trust them to use the computers responsibly.
Keeping an eye on your kids is not the same thing as having a totalitarian regime. I think that logging what your kids do and when is completely acceptable. Whether you reveal this information to them or not is a different story.
When I was a teenager, I got in all kinds of mischief. It turns out that my parents knew about pretty much all of it, but I did not know about this at the time. They didn't interfere unless they thought that I was getting into something over my head... like when I became very depressed, for a long period of time, and I bought myself a bottle of sleeping pills. That was an important intervention.
Children have no right to privacy. Teenagers chafe at the idea, of course, but the fact is that they are children, and good parenting means making decisions that are in their best interests, not their greatest desires. When they're able to weigh their actions with the consequences of those actions (i.e., becoming an adult), then they get privacy.
When your daughter starts googling birth control, it's time to have a chat.
Doesn't matter anyway. I thought the querent was a system administrator. There's no way they could implement anything I'm suggesting without previous sysadmin experience.
They have to use a firewall regulating network traffic in order to manage what their kids do online. There's no other way. Kids will get around any client machine kludges. And whatever firewall implementation they use, they're going to have to go geek to be able to interpret/manage the network traffic.
I still think its possible for them to implement a windows server and make the clients boot off an OS image, but the administrator will have to go through geek hell to manage his users.
There is no America. There is no democracy. There is only IBM and AT&T and DuPont, Dow, General Electric, and Exxon
Hi, I'd agree with the idea of computers in a shared space as solving lots of issues. Monitoring them for hardware failures and uptime is all very weel but you're not running mission critical webservers on these units, if they crash once in a while that will also be a good life lesson to learn. I've setup openDNS on various friends systems for their kids and the free version is reasonably useful, it will give you full offsite internet logging without letting you know the individual machine thus giving you an overview without violating your users/kids privacy, at the end of the day they should be able to explore some of the web, just not the extreme stuff. Charlie
All that's being asked is to put limits on when they can use the computer and unspecified filtering for objectionable content. These are completely normal requests, no different than the parental controls built into televisions and other devices. You're jumping to conclusions as to the level of filtering that the parent is going to use. Since we all know that filtering isn't foolproof, it's more reasonable to assume that the filter will only be getting the most obvious and egregiously objectionable content. There's still plenty of room for mistakes and teaching moments.
You seem to be misunderstanding the difference between the autonomy of adulthood and the semi-autonomy of adolescence.
The last thing a single parent asking for help needs is to be put in the same camp as the Stasi. I don't think forced shutdowns at bedtime or when they're grounded rises to the level of one of the most effective secret police ever devised.
Get 3 Macs, not 3 Windows machines. There are parental controls built-in, and with Steam they run most of the same games. They also have digital media tools built-in, as well as many special subsystems related to that kind of work, which for kids that age is like the 3 R's. In college they will be using Macs, and people of their generation overwhelmingly use Macs, the skills will be more beneficial than learning Windows. There are no viruses, no scanners are needed, and they're Unix, so they are more Linux-compatible than Windows. They backup automatically to an external volume, and the kids have the Apple Store to do free seminars on whatever they're interested in.
For yourself, use Linux if that's what you're into. But your idea of computing is likely very different from your kids and their generation. They want the computer to disappear and make movies and play social games. It's a car for them, not a hot rod. And most of all, the Mac is part of this century, while Windows is literally their father's 1995 computer.
Macs are all-in-one, complete systems, and there are no low-end models, but with AppleCare you are guaranteed 3 full years of 100% operation of both hardware and software, and then when AppleCare expires, you can sell each Mac for half of what you paid for it, which you out towards the second generation of Macs and they will be cheaper than low-end Dells. So only the first generation is more expensive than low-end PC. You pay full price for your first Mac, but only half price for every subsequent Mac. Over time, not only will the resale value save money, but it comes with $1000 of software you don't have to buy later, and the reliability and lack of need for utility software and I-T time will save you money and time.
Here's the approach I will likely take once my kids are old enough to use the net:
- Negotiate proper rules with them.
- Have something log what sites they go to, when etc.
- Let them know about the logging, and make it clear that you will review the logs if there is a need to do so.
- Also, I don't believe that someone who is 12 needs unsupervised net access. Have a machine in the family room and let them browse when you're around.
Ultimately, the only common denominator for success is parenting.
.: Max Romantschuk
the computers he's trying to administer are like 10 feet away from him.
Not necessarily. Single parents tend to have a job.
If these are desktops, for "grounding" take the keyboard, mouse and power cord and lock them in your car trunk. If laptops, just lock the whole thing up.
My parents used to take away the stereo speakers as a punishment. Same concept.
For "hours of access" don't put the computers in the little darling's bedrooms, and send them to bed. That will mostly take care of filtering, too; nobody wants to be looking at porn in the family room.
When my stepson was 9 he had a computer in his bedroom. I put in a router rule to keep it off the internet but still let him print to the network printer. I don't know if he figured out how to get past it or not. The computer he could use with internet access was next to the TV in the living room.
The preferred solution is to not have a problem.
So you are ok with your kids being on AIM all day looking for older guys who make them feel special? Or surfing porn all day? Or, even doing what you want and accidentally running across goatse guy? He's not looking to be the gestapo. He's looking to have some basic protections in place to protect his children from the unsavory parts of the Internet, and to make sure that they don't abuse the priviledge of having a computer in their rooms.
Sure, he could fix this by doing what he does now, having one computer for all three in a public place. But he's trying to improve their access, not limit it. And he just wants to make sure that improvement isn't abused.
Learn to love Alaska
I could not have said it better. The proposed setup is plainly horrendous. I guess the first thing the 15 year-old will try to do is overcome the network limitations (and rightly so).
"Children have no right to privacy."
You forgot to prefix that with "In the US"...
Ezekiel 23:20
I hate to sound like an ass, but if you're so scared of what your kids are going to do when you leave for 5 minutes, you're not doing your job as a parent. If they're 2, sure, hover over them - my brother got into our fireplace and covered with ash, as well as took every big sharp steak knife out of a childproofed door in about 30 seconds of 'not there'.
But if your kids are old enough to use the internet, and you're seriously worried they'll burn the house down while you're in the can - you and your kids have a problem that a firewall won't fix.
My parents raised me with the assumption that I wouldn't pull any stupid shit, made sure I knew what was stupid, and made me dislike coming off as stupid. That's really all it took.
I have developed a truly marvelous proof of this comment, which this signature is too narrow to contain.
I would Google for information on setting up Linux and Squid on a PC that you designate as a router. I've found the following tutorial to be helpful: Linux Home Networking
I'm going to go ahead and join the folks saying you can't do all this from one app, but, for what it's worth, here are my suggestions for how to achieve your goal for free/cheap:
Hardware Monitoring: First, I'd tend to say that you don't really need this, but if you want it: http://www.almico.com/sfdownload.php Speedfan's probably your best bet, yo can configure it to send you an e-mail for events, and it also does pretty good logging and, as an added bonus, it has decent hardware compatibility. The other player is MotherBoardMonitor, but it's basically abandonware now, afaik.
For internet filtering: There's peer guardian (http://phoenixlabs.org/pg2/) or, as someone else suggested just use openDNS, the advantage of openDNS is it's very easy, the advantage to PeerGuardian is you can create exceptions.
For internet access: For this, go with almost any modern router, I personally use a WRT54g loaded with DD-WRT, I know I can force it to allow/disallow any given MAC.
For anti-virus: Pretty much any AV out there will let you schedule runs.
For setting hours the computer can be used: easiest way would be to find a computer who's BIOS lets you do that, disadvantage is that you'd need to be physically present to make an exception, or give the child the BIOS password and then change it when you got home. Other disadvantage is that it'd be some finicky research, since not all BIOSes will let you, and you'll have to find out before you buy the machines.
As far as monitoring computer status goes, I'd just install a VNC server on them (http://www.realvnc.com/) if you can't log in, the computer is asleep or off (does it really matter which?) if you can, then the computer is on, and you can see what the kid is doing.
I know this isn't really what you asked for, but afaik there's no one app to do all you want.
I needed a sig so people would know who I am, but I was too drunk to make something witty, so you get this instead.
Have you ever tried just turning off your TV and your computers, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them? - bender
I work at a school as a network admin where all the students have tablets in 7-12 grade. I get a few similar questions from parents every year, some even implying that the school caused the problems they are having at home and should fix them. The best course of action as others have mentioned is interacting with the kids. Over the shoulder parenting / net-admin works the best, if that fails taking away the computer works well too. However there are some technical solutions that I have helped some parents implement that are fairly non-techie friendly. I will say up front this will sound like a Microsoft commercial which is because it is what I have experience implementing. I am sure there are other solutions I just know this one can work. In Windows 7 it has some pretty good parental controls (http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-7/features/parental-controls.aspx) and then you can further supplement it with the Windows Live Family Safety (http://download.live.com/familysafety). These two together do a really good job of time based controls and logging, there content based controls aren't as good but are functional. As far as backup you can use a Windows Home Server (http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/winfamily/windowshomeserver/default.mspx) to handle that and it will also do some nice shared storage. The cost of this setup is really just the hardware / os and potentially the WHS box. The features are just built in and are intended to be non-techie friendly. I know they are since I have had parents implement them on their own and tell me they work.
Hoyty
Number one priority is figure out the exit plan.
In "about three years" by yer own figures, the oldest is going to be utterly and completely totally free, at college or whatever. In less than a year, total freedom for limited time periods behind the wheel, visiting stores and other peoples houses, etc.
Building a better cage is not going to help the kids relate, when they're finally released/paroled into society.
Which kids have the biggest problems at 14? The kids of "anything goes" parents. Which kids have the biggest problems at 19? The kids of overprotective parents. On average, 14 year olds can get into less trouble than 19 year olds. So, teach them responsibilities of freedom at 14 with your guidance, not 19 and alone.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
Parents should be the ones making these decisions instead of the government (Australia anyone?). This goes to the heart of the argument regarding censuring content and who's responsibility it is to decide. Adults should be able to decide for themselves and parents should decide for their kids. It is up to each parent to decide what is and is not appropriate for their kids and to determine the best way to do it. Saying that the poster is enforcing fascist policies on his/her kids is the same argument that a government uses when trying to implement censorship laws on its citizens: you know what is better for them more than they do.
As for the technical question: Most of what you want to implement can be done through an off-the-shelf router that has had the firmware flashed with DD-WRT. You can set up individual profiles for the MAC address of the kids laptops that limits the times that they can access the internet, and when you ground them you can disable access completely via their individual profile. It also has some VERY basic web filtering. You have to have/buy a router that is supported by DD-WRT, but you can get one pretty cheap. The ASUS 520GU is supported and it usually can be had at NewEgg for around $40. If want more robust web filtering you can set up a linux server and run Dan's Guardian & install Nagios for hardware monitoring.
The thing is, the requirements are extra-detailed and a little anal, which make them seem over-the-top, but they basically boil down to:
(1) Restrict internet usage to normal times so the kids don't stay up until three am on a school night. Reasonable.
(2) Revoke access as a punishment. Kids have been getting grounded for how long?
(3) Block access to some sites. Entirely reasonable if you're talking really bad sites or malware infected stuff. It doesn't necessarily equate to some active proxy reading their facebook posts. Besides, I'm sure the kids don't want to see goatse any more than you.
I'm sure plenty of good parents keep guns in a safe and liquor in a locked liquor cabinet. Obviously a gun or booze is more dangerous than the internet, I'm not trying to equate them, but there are advantages to a layered system of trust. Technology and good parenting aren't mutually exclusive.
Can you construct some sort of rudimentary lathe?
With less privacy, they are less likely to "cheat" the filters.
So what if they do? Part of parenting is letting kids figure things out themselves, and part of growing up is pushing the limits. Children need well defined limits, but it's not the end of the world if they step over them once in a while. I'd be more worried if they didn't.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Jesus Christ, yes. Don't bother trying to roll your own for this sort of setup unless you want to transition to IT as a career. The migraines you will get trying to setup a proxy and a content filter alone will take a good weekend, if you are lucky. I've used ClearOS and before that Clark Connect for years without problems.
An Education is the Font of All Liberty
OS X will do pretty much everything you've asked for, with very little work. You can use parental controls to create a whitelist for which programs and websites are allowed. You can restrict account access to specific times and days. You can use ssh or vnc to connect to each machine to remotely administer it. (OS X has a very nice, fast, VNC client and server built in.) You don't need a virus scanner, since there are no viruses in the wild for OS X. You can prevent installation of additional programs. Automatically limit access to adult websites. Restrict who they can mail and IM with. Limit computer use to a certain number of hours per day. Log what they have been doing. Receive e-mail requests to add additional websites, IM users, etc. so that you can confirm additions without having to use their computer. And if you install the istat pro widget, you can monitor all of the computer's hardware sensors, which will give you all of the rest of the info you asked for. VERY easy to set all of this up.
Logging everything they do isn't "keeping an eye on them". It is totalitarian, even if you don't like the word.
Your children are not you. The fact that you had trouble when you were a child doesn't mean that your children will. The fact that you needed that extra surveillance doesn't mean that they will. And the fact that privacy nearly got you killed doesn't mean that it will get them killed.
I believe that children, in general, do have the right to privacy. It is just that this right is "overridable" by circumstances, like a very depressed child. This is similar to declaring a state of emergency when there's a natural catastrophe; the army just takes control of the country until the emergency finishes.
Then there's the scalability: when do they get the right to privacy, according to you? When they are 18? When they leave the house?
And chat should happen *much before* you learn that your daughter starts googling birth control. I hope you just phrased it the wrong way.
View client computer status, On/off, sleeping etc.; Deny internet access, not LAN, just the web; Schedule time usage of computer, ex. 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. on school nights etc.; Force log-out and/or shutdown of clients, for grounding purposes; and Apply some kind of firewall filter for blocking undesired web content. And as the administrator for this network I would like the following options: Remote virus scanning of client machines, or scheduled task; Some kind of hardware monitor, high temp / fan speed low etc.; and Email alerts for various log files / alarms. Given the lists above I am thinking about a Linux based router/server machine and running Windows on the clients for game compatibility. I also know that a server and network boot client is possible but not sure where to start on that one."
If you used an Edubuntu Server with
I think you should be able to handle this stuff manually, but if you are not, then these are the technical controls I see as being most useful in terms of being able to administer them easily. Building the LTSP client environment was the last thing I found difficult; There is help out there. Hell, I'd help you. I hope that it's easier than the last time I did it by now, anyway. After that you get a cute and easy to use GUI for administration of client machines. The latest LTSP is supposed to make it easy to designate programs to be run on the client machines so that the server doesn't have to do heavy lifting.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
A lot of people on here are trying to give you parental advice.
That being said, here is my take on the situation and your request. Like many others I think that what you want is over the top for many reasons. The amount of time your going to spend monitoring and up keeping the network is going to be become more time than your going to want to spend, very quickly. It would be far easier for you to lay down the law with your kids and explain what they can and can not do.
I would then go with the basics.
1. A scheduled virus scan on each computer for when they are at school.
2. Router with DD-WRT so you can set Internet access permissions when you are away.
3. OpenDNS so you can restrict many sites including proxies, adult content, etcetera.
4. Rewrite dns queries to opendns.
You have to remember that your kids are going to find ways around any setup. It just depends on how much time you are willing to spend setting it up and keeping it up.
I will say that, and I'm sure many will attest to this, having your own computer at the age of 15 opens up a Pandora's Box. You are taking a huge step in giving them their own computers, let them know this.
The parent is described as "computer-handicapped", so let's put it in terms he or she will understand: Consider, instead those old-fashed toys of yesteryear. Or consider the TV which many kids of my generation had in their rooms.
Could you imagine a parent asking that his children's toys will automatically stop working on 10pm? Or that his TV cannot be turned on when the child is grounded, or perhaps show only certain channels at certain times? Or the toys checking themselves and letting the parent know when one of them gets broken?
This is all ridiculous, of course. With toys and TV you simply couldn't even imagine doing this. With a computer you can *imagine* doing it, but it doesn't mean it makes sense to do it. A child will always find ways to break such technological rules, especially if the parent is so-called "computer-handicapped".
Even if the physical access problem was solved, you would still have the problem of a very inquisitive teenager wanting to overcome rules. Try fixing *that*.
to be able to do the following via an simple application/webpage: View client computer status, On/off, sleeping etc.
Sounds like a job for a custom PHP script. You can determine On/Off by using PING tests.
Detecting sleeping status may be harder... consider using wired network connections and a managed switch with a CLI. Setup the PHP script to poll the switch for up/down status on each child's switch port.
Enable wake on LAN in BIOS resume from suspend. If port is up, but you are not seeing any packets, then it is probably asleep.
Deny internet access, not LAN, just the web
Any firewall can do this.
Schedule time usage of computer, ex. 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. on school nights etc.
You can do this with Windows group policy. "Force logout when login hours expire". However, this may hurt them if Junior is up working on a report at 10pm due tomorrow.
Doing this has consequences. You may be better off TRACKING when the computer is on, enable Windows messenger, and write a script to automatically warn kids they should log off the computer now.
Use Sysinternal tools in your script such as PKILL, PSEXEC to kill know game processes on the machine, internet explorer, etc.
Force log-out and/or shutdown of clients, for grounding purposes;
Setup a Windows 2008 server, use Windows 7 business clients. Setup a Windows domain. Give kids accounts on the domain. Join all client machines to the domain.
If a kid needs to be grounded, lock their account. And use the "shutdown -i" program to send their machine a forced shutdown.
Use group policy to configure all lockdown, including firewall settings and mandatory Windows firewall exceptions (such as your management access).
Apply some kind of firewall filter for blocking undesired web content.
Get a Beefy enough Windows server to run Untangle for Windows.
And as the administrator for this network I would like the following options: Remote virus scanning of client machines, or scheduled task
Just about any Enterprise virus scanner will do. You configure an administration server, and install clients on each client machine. Some popular ones are Eset, Trend, Kaspersky, Symantec.
Some kind of hardware monitor, high temp / fan speed low etc.; and Email alerts for various log files / alarms
Uh, these are desktop machines right? You are going to have to be very choosy about your desktop hardware there, many devices will not even support IPMI or remote monitoring.
If it does, you can probably setup monitoring using standard free tools such as Zabbix or Nagios, though configuration can be a pain. You may need a Linux machine or virtual machine somewhere to provide this.
There are some commercial monitoring products that are free for a small number of managed nodes, e.g. free versions with limit of 10 hosts. But the most important thing is your desktops and other equipment actually support collection of that info, provide it over IPMI or CIM, and that Windows WMI providers are able to access the performance/health data.
Given the lists above I am thinking about a Linux based router/server machine and running Windows on the clients for game compatibility.
Hang on... you just said you want detailed management over Windows machines? You will either have a Windows server and domain first and foremost, or you are going to have a hard time maintaining this. Almost all the software required to manage Windows clients is Windows based.
A Linux server is great, as long as it has sufficient resources to run some type of Windows server as a virtual machine.
I also know that a server and network boot client is possible but not sure where to start on that one."
That doesn't make any sense... you said you want to run Windows on the clients.
Net booting Windows is complicated; the only thing that
I can tell you from experience that although there's not much of a Disk/CPU/Memory hit, the graphics performance is seriously business only. The real work of rendering still has to be done on the host, and then it has to be RDPd to the client. It's not going to fly at all, even with LAN connectivity.
If running Windows, make sure the kids don't have admin access and you can use policies to deliver the outage times. Load dd-wrt on the home router, and that can cut off internet access.
2) Let the kids have access to the computer anytime they want. WITH the exception that you can remotely log in at any time. Install VNC server and periodically log onto the machine and see what your kids are doing. Yes it is big brother, but it also keeps people honest when they know you can log in at any time.
At most that "keeps them honest" at your house, while you are at home.
The first time I looked at a proper porn site was at a friend's house. His parents were both vicars, so they were out of the house most Sundays -- excellent! Only that time he came back unexpectedly, and treated us to a lecture on the degradation of women. I think that had more of an effect than stopping us from using the web -- after all, we had access to other Internet connections at other houses, and he couldn't be there all the time.
If only windows had something as simple as chroot.
In college they will be using Macs, and people of their generation overwhelmingly use Macs, the skills will be more beneficial than learning Windows.
I would love to see something to support this. I was on a university campus this weekend and I was curious about this myself. I actually counted PC vs Mac as I walked around and at best Mac was 20%? While I won't argue that Mac is gaining ground I would say a blanket statement like this is not quite correct. I think learning and being comfortable with technology is more important than learning either the Windows / Mac / Linux way to do things.
Also many of the implied exclusive features are built into windows as well? Lastly, um Steam I shall quote from https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?p_faqid=98
"The Mac version of the Steam client will be released in April, until that time we will be unable to provide support for Mac issues.
For more information, please read the following news post:
Valve to Deliver Steam & Source on the Mac
Please note that not all Steam games will be available on the Mac client. Availability will be determined on a game-togame basis."
Right now Steam runs 0 of the games and who knows what the future holds there.
Hoyty
Oh for a mod point...
Sewage Treatment Facilities - "Our duty is clear."
I agree but one should still be able to review logs of places the kids (or their friends) have been. I'm their parent, not just their friend.
Seriously - you're over the board.
I learned computers by having my own, and learning on my own. Without a parent trying to tell me what was right or wrong. If you don't know enough about computers to do this on your own - why not let the 15 year old admin the network until the second kid turns 15 - then leave the duties to him, until the third kid turns 15 ?
Why do you want to limit what information the kids have access to? Isn't it better that they can browse the web and learn - without being limited? Give them general parental guidance, of course.
Teach them to build character, but don't limit their exploration options.
Sure they'll get hold of things you think are unsuitable. They'll do that no matter what. What do you do if you encounter them with the Anarchists Cookbook? You _talk_ to them. You tell them how unsafe it would be for them to try those things out, and you refer them to the wikipedia article that'll tell them quite simply that most of that stuff will blow up in their faces if they ever try to cook any of it.
Let them discover the web for themselves, and discover the world around them on their own. Without artificial limits.
"Rune Kristian Viken" - http://www.nwo.no - arca
I'd suggest that if you're only having the chat after your daughter starts googling birth control, you've probably left it a little late.
But occasionally you have to clean the house, cook dinner, go to the bathroom. Not all of us have the leisure to hover over children all day.
You SHOULDN'T be hovering over them all day, not even electronically. You teach your kids what they should and shouldn't do, then you let them live and if you had reasonable rules, they'll follow them. That's responsible parenting - teaching your kids and as they get older and older, you back the fuck off and let them start making their own decisions and you trust that they'll follow the rules while you occasionally check up to see if they're doing anything they shouldn't.
The people like you who think parenting is about having 100% absolute control over every thought and action of your children is downright psychotic and only serves your own lust for power, not the needs of your children. You're not raising children that way, you're raising slaves who are incapable of making their own decisions and being independent.
"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." ~Thomas Jefferson
If I were to read between the lines, I would think this is a SOHO vendor trying to figure out to get enterprise features on an ephemeral budget. Maybe wave the magic "linux" wand and it will all get better. If your time has value, then I'd suggest picking up a fortigate 60b and a copy of Windows Small Business Server. Add the free Windows deployment services and that takes care of PXE booting across the network and setup some logmein accounts and you're done in an afternoon. On the other hand, if your time has no value, maybe you'd consider running vyatta or pfsense and ClearOS. Or if your time has negative value, you'd could piece things together yourself. Let me introduce you to OpenLdap. Meh. Or maybe it's not that negative, rather you want to learn the cutting edge and this is a learning experience, how about Fedora and the FreeIPA project, which with 2.0 will likely become the defacto standard for identity management on linux. Course doing it all in one box can get a little tough at times, but whatever. Good luck. Thanks, Doug
Implementing the "take away your ethernet cable" punishment seems more effective than kludging together some hybrid Active Directory OpenWRT API-based webpage that's may or may not be easy to circumvent and requires specialized knowledge and lots of time to administer and check up on.
I can see it now... Parent hits "shut down now" but then runs into the bedroom to see if it's working...
At which point, the power button is only inches away.... :-P
I agree that what the poster's thinking of doing is not going to work from a practical POV, with the parent not likely being capable of administering the network they want to set up. But at the same time it's irritating to hear everyone give the same generic response of "I don't agree with filtering because blah blah blah therefore I won't dignify your stupid question with an answer". I'm not a parent, and while I don't think I would necessarily filter my child's internet access, I don't agree with people intervening in how a parent/parents want to bring up their child. I don't appreciate it when the gov't sanctimoniously decides what me/my children should see/think/do, so why is it better when an individual (or group of individuals, such as here on /.) impose their moral beliefs on someone?
This smacks of the same groupthink that hates MS/Google/Apple/Company-of-the-day without any thought behind it, just because it's the opinion-du-jour on /. It's actually funny how many +5 posts on Apple topics recently have berated Apple for trying to force their way of thinking on everybody, all the while the mods/posters missing the irony in their attempts at coercing others to agree with their anti-Apple opinions, a la Fox News' tactics. Yes, there are legitimate posts with legitimate concerns, and yet they are drowned out by hate-mongering.
Anyway, with that in mind, I agree with the DD-WRT/openWRT/whatever firmware on a decent router as part of the solution. Couple that with OpenDNS, enabling it as outlined here and elsewhere, will allow monitoring of internet activity, as well as filtering based on specific address as well as generic categories of websites if that's desired. This takes much of the work out of the hands of the parent/admin.
Keep the login/passwords private/secure, as well as the password for the DSL/Cable/Fios/satellite/whatever service you use to avoid bypassing. And if there are other open wireless networks nearby you might want to either eliminate wireless adapters from the computers, or lock it down to a single network (a la the dreaded Apple's network setting in Leopard/Snow Leopard to require admin creds to change networks)
Electronic bullying can result in teen suicide. Young kids seeing terrorists cut the heads people can be disturbing. I can think of lots of things on the internet that can be as dangerous as a table saw.
K12Linux is Linux Terminal Server Project (LTSP.org) integrated with Fedora 10 and higher, in a convenient LiveUSB or DVD media installer. Since 1999 LTSP has empowered many schools and businesses with Linux-based terminal servers and thin clients, allowing low-cost clients or recycled computers to become powerful Linux desktop machines. K12Linux allows easy deployment of a Linux terminal server, capable of serving entire networks of netboot diskless clients. Clients login to the central terminal server, where they can use any Linux desktop environment (GNOME, KDE, XFCE, etc.) and most desktop applications. Significant long-term cost savings are made possible by central management of software and accounts.
I may be bad with names, but I'll never forget your IP address
If you don't allow your children adult responsibility then when they're thrust into being expected to show it they're going to be completely lost.
Real life bullying can result in teen suicide - and you can't monitor your child 24/7. Do you want to put surveillance gear on them, too? A kid doesn't kill itself after bullied one single time. If you as a parent don't realize something is disturbing your child, you have to be goddamn disconnected from the kid. At this point, it is the parents fault. On the second point, yeah, young kids seeing a beheading can be disturbing, but hardly as dangerous as using a table saw unsupervised. Besides, have you ever seen a beheading on the net without explicitly searching for it? I haven't, so gimme a break here.
Ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.
Falling down the stairs can kill!!! Outlaw stairs now! Won't someone think of the children?
Letting your kids take calculated risks is scary as hell. Not letting them eventually creates a 30 year old child. We have enough of those already.
Similar to this, my dad thought he was being smart by buying an $85 power cable with a keyed 'on-off' switch in it. The failing, however, was that we were very much a computer operating household and had dozens of regular power cables lying about. I switched a regular one in, left it there when I was done for my brother to use. Sometimes the keyed power cable would be back in place, and we'd just swap it out again. It was rather insultingly naive, and eventually it was thrown over the fence out back.
Slashdot: Where opinions are just opinions until you have mod points.
If I were to become a parent now, then I would only put these restrictions up on my teenagers to tell them: "You're restricted until you can figure out how to get around it." Because that's how I learned as much as I know now about computers.
Seriously though, forcing all of these restrictions will only cause them to resent you. If they want to look at porn then they'll find a way to get to it, if they can't find that then they have active enough imaginations and attractive enough girls at school. Sure, you can say that could happen, but at least you're not enabling it. However, talking to your children about it instead of just restricting them from it and saying that's that will help them from developing some sort of complex.
And how about this: Maybe your children are more night people than day people, as is the case with myself. This is a completely alright thing, but is for some reason frowned upon by parents who do things like restrict what hours they can be on the computer. Let them stay up as late as they want, let them sleep during the day. Soon they'll learn what they prefer. Either they'll dread feeling so tired at school because they didn't get enough sleep, or they'll miss spending time with their friends who don't keep the same hours as them, or they'll be completely fine with it.
You need to help them develop these things while under your supervision, because once they're set free in the world and not under your supervision anymore then all of these things that were taboo and inaccessible before are right there and they'll be poorly adjusted to them.
Dragon Eater, I think I noticed two specific areas you were addressing in your initial post ... the first was around setting limits around the Internet for your children and the second seemed to be more virus protection / system maintenance focused. I can share my observations with the first challenge but I haven't done much with our home network around automated maintenance. For the record, my wife and I have 3 boys in the house right now (6, 11 and 23). Our home has 3 desktops, 2 laptops and 3 netbooks ... along with about 5 ipod/touch, a Wii and WiFi enabled Nintendo DS systems.
I approached the challenge of tightening down our home network with a focus on trying to put controls on centralized hardware as opposed to managing something on every device. I settled on the Cisco/Linksys WRT610N router ($175.00) which allows me to block certain Internet sites. The Home Network Defender (HND) software, an add-on to the router, allows me to block sites from the Wii and any other wireless device without loading client software. HND ($50.00) also allows me to also schedule times for allowing Internet access. My understanding from books and other resources is that most kids tend to get in to questionable activities between 3:00pm and 6:00pm ... I've got Internet access setup so that they can only get online while we're home. We also do not allow any computers outside of the family rooms downstairs (i.e., no isolated internet, computer usage). The 23 year-old is only filtered by the router and manages his own devices. We only ask they he keep his PC and laptop locked with an account when not in use.
For virus scanning I use BitDefender (3 PC's - $50.00) . This product includes a decent amount of parental control. I'm working on setting up BitDefender in "network mode" which allows me to configure all the PC's from one location but you do have to install the software on each PC.
Network Magic Pro (8 users - $40.00) is another optional add-on for the Cisco router which creates online reports and let's you schedule Internet access times. As you can see there's not a single magic-bullet solution and some products have some overlap with others.
I'm running Windows 7 so I've installed Microsoft Family Safe Filter (free) which gives me the ability to allow and/or block specific sites. This solution is actually pretty neat since it allows the kids to easily send a message to my "MS Live" account requesting a specific site to be "opened". Along with Network Magic Pro the Microsoft Family Safe Filter provides some great online reporting.
It's not as daunting as it seems but I certainly had to spend a little bit of upfront time sorting out the overlap and getting a consistent installation on the PC's, netbooks and laptops.
And of course I help them with their homework, take bike rides, teach them the fine art of open-field tackles and maintain a healthy activity level with our local church. In the end, there is no guarantee but it's good to see other parents taking seriously the responsibility of protecting their children while they establish a character with solid morals and ethics. I pray every night that my kids will make good choices when no one else is around ... this world is going to throw them some pretty bizarre options soon enough.
I could make my own Ethernet cable (with a screwdriver as the only tool no less) when i was 12.That said , stupid filtering software does more harm than good.
Put the computer in the same room you are, and watch what your kids are doing. Oh, and interact with them too...
If you have to have some 'system' turn machines off due to grounding you have a bigger parenting issue going on.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Get a decent router and you can setup the firewall and outright block internet access easily. It is the norm that the above would be controlled via a web interface. My last 3 (cheap and basic) routers also had an option for emailing logs and alarms. It will also have site filters but this is somewhat pointless as they'll either find a way around them, or find an alternative source that in all probability would be even less desirable than the ones you knew about in order to block.
The router should also show who is connected so this can effectively monitor who is on, though they could fake it. However, every single time I've read an article about children using computers the golden rule has been to keep the computer in a public area, not in bedrooms. On the other hand the non-hardcore gamers will very probably prefer a laptop, and to be honest an internet connection and some privacy is likely to result in some hormones being saited and more relaxed teenage boy. If they're girls, do not let them have webcams...
I'm yet to try any AV software that does not come with a scheduler, they usually pester you to set this upon installation.
Whilst you can find free software through google for high temp / fan speed low etc monitoring, IMHO this specification emphasises that you've overthought this project and practical common sense has got left behind somewhere. I don't think you can buy a computer now that doesn't protect itself from overheating, the rest will sort itself out.
Scheduling the time usage of computer is a job to do in person. Don't try to abdicate that responsibility onto a computer. Regardless, such reliance is an unwise strategy since they are very likely to figure out how to completely override all your automated controls.
In short, just get a router, puts the computers in a public place and do the rest with a little trust and parenting. Kids gradually turn into adults as the increasingly gain experience with how to deal with trust, responsibility and risk. The more you coddle them the more vulnerable they will be when they inevitably find themselves in a risky situation.
You'd be surprised at how many 2 year olds can navigate themselves to youtube to look for Dora and Diego videos.
The computer will be almost useless to the kids if the networking is disabled at the firewall. Most
consumer firewall routers have network scheduling. Just turn that on and you are done. Remember
to set a password on the router.
If you want to see what your kids are doing at any point, then use a free vnc server on each of
the machines. You can control their machines with vnc too.
Just buy some simple antivirus licenses for the machines to control the viruses and find a way
to re-image the machines frequently to keep them clean if you want. You can have them keep
their documents on a share you control to lessen data-loss during re-imaging.
If they are really just working on an essay, then the cutoff on the internet will not affect that.
The hw monitoring is a feature the hardware vendor should provide.
I'd suggest that if you're only having the chat after your daughter starts googling birth control, you've probably left it a little late.
This. Would you also read her diary? Both of those is extremely intrusive and will take them about 1 minute to get around. I suggest a simple firewall to block certain sites and you unplug the internet cable to the router locked in your closed after hours. For grounding you take their flat screen monitor away. There I just saved you $600+ and hours of administering
Of course one day I actually needed to print something in a fucking hurry and he couldn't be contacted so I solved the problem with a screwdriver and the motherboard manual.
One word: Padlock.
Why don't you put a hidden gps tracker in the 15 year old's back pack? Or issue them laptops you payed a guru to pop open and inset a always on independent mic and recording part from The spy shop? It's not just about kids should have privacy, kids need privacy and they need more every year as they get older to develop and be self reliant and also to become interesting adults. You ever meet that young teenager who only thing he can talk about is what he has over heard his parents say because he's had no time to form his own thoughts? those kids are so sad.
If one wants to go this route, it can be done, but ONLY with some of the newer CPUs/Chipsets. I think they are now named Intel VT-d and AMD-Vi respectively. So far, you have to hunt for which cpu/chipsets support this. The only place it's clear that have support is via AMD's NEW Opterons, and chipsets. Consumer stuff is (especially for some reason with the Intel CPU/boards) subject to vendor whim.
If going Linux host-Linux guest via X11 you'll take a hit, but you'll still have hardware acceleration. There are a few Linux-Linux 3D solutions that don't use X, but I have not tried to mess with them.
The simple solution to the parents problem is to tell the kids what not to do, and log the computer's network activity. If they're visiting bad web sites, it'd be easy enough to find out.
When the kids know what they do is being watched, and they can get grounded, that's usually enough.
As for limiting the time they can use the computer. Why? I've spent almost every waking moment of my life in front of a computer, from age 7 to present (27). Kids are less destructive around the house when they have something to do with their time.
I once lit a patio table on fire with gelled gasoline, lit the end of a modeling cement tube on fire (very neat), sled down the steps of the deck in winter, climbed all over the roof, got buried up to my neck in sand by neighbour kids and left for half an hour, poured acid into a harddrive (it boils out as poison gas, yay), sat on a tree branch for hours reading books two feet away from a power line, etc. Guess what? Had nothing better to do at the time. My list would be a lot longer, and more imaginative, if it hadn't been for constant access to a computer.
Yeah, I still live in my parents basement. And I'm a virgin. But, isn't that exactly the protection parents want for their kids?
There will still be the older boyfriends met IRL who will make them feel special (or rather abusive boyfriends similar to their controlling dad), constant thoughts of sex, and government-recommended colonoscopies. After infancy sheltering your kids is not protecting them and is just as likely to damage them.
Don't forget to tell the neighbours that they need to encrypt their wifi or the kids will simply use that. :)
I could make my own Ethernet cable (with a screwdriver as the only tool no less) when i was 12.
...but to make up for that, your parents could sleep comfortably in the knowledge that you were unlikely to become a teenage parent :-)
In a survey of 100 programmers, 111111 thought that duck-typing was a good idea.
If you run your home network like a police state, its users will come to treat you as head of a police state. If your kids are already so screwed up that this is the only remaining option, then you need to be restrained yourself.
You're a nub. No wonder she was screwing around behind your back.
Point taken, but Reagan had it right: "Trust, but verify"
Personally, I've always found those lectures a fucking hypocrisy. By saying how "degraded" those women are, they're being nothing but a bunch of condescending misogynist, by trying to control what women are "supposed" to do with their body. It's exactly the same arguments some Muslims use to defend the obligation of the use of the burqa.
Dilbert RSS feed
If you give them Linux boxes, Ubuntu has a package called 'timeoutd' which allows you to enforce pretty flexible time-based limitations. I limit my kids to 90 minutes per day each on the computer (if they're doing schoolwork I can give them some more) and lock them out during hours they should be sleeping, etc. It's all configurable per-account, so you can easily lock one or more of them out of the computer completely for a period of time (grounding).
I've found that by putting per-user time limits on each of the kids, I actually don't have too much trouble with them fighting over the one shared machine, either. No one can hog the computer all day because timeoutd will kick them off when they hit their time limit. As a side-benefit, they've all learned the value of creating a good password and keeping it secret ;-)
Other precautions I take are putting their computer in a public area of the house and installing the DansGuardian filter. I also pay attention to what they're doing, though I obviously can't supervise them all the time.
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
So, because sheltering them is bad, you should encourage bad behavior?
Learn to love Alaska
What is wrong with just using parental control software that already exists? I know it's part of the OS on a Mac, and I'm sure there are some analogs available for Windows. You're overthinking it and trying to build the "ideal system." Anyone who has owned a computer for more than a few days realizes quickly that the "perfect system" is a myth, albeit a pretty one. You're a single parent. You have more to do than administrate 4 computers (yours and the 3 they will have). In fact, try just adding 1 or 2, it's likely they don't all need one. Just one that isn't yours. You know your kids best, but I doubt all three need to use the computer at the same time. Just my thoughts. Really, though. You're making this harder than it needs to be.
Nitewing '98
Everything works...in theory.
Our school has padlocks on the computers. Problem: The point where the locks are attached aren't as strong as the lock itself.
False choice. He said he'd rather raise a kid he can trust not to do all those things than to blindly enforce it through software. That trust is lacking in your scenario.
:gasp: teh PR0NS!
Trust but verify, and the verification is missing in his scenario.
Appeal to emotion, slippery slope. Give the kids even a little leeway and they'll kind themselves talking to Chester the Molester or browsing for
For someone that whines about rhetorical tricks, you moved to the strawman pretty quickly. For one, I never addressed the issue of them looking for porn. I only addressed accidental running across it, like with mistyped domain names being redirected to unwanted sites. You made up the part about assuming they'll be looking for porn or even if they were that it should be blocked.
And there are a number of people out there that look for youngsters to take advantage of. Whether it's a good thing or bad thing to shelter them from those is not in question (unless you are saying that talking to Chester is a good thing). But what's in question is whether restrictions to prevent it are more harmful than the chance of running into Chester. And you don't address that, and pretend that question isn't even there.
Backpedaling after all the hyperbole. Yep... I just wasted my time even replying to this one.
Yes, you think that showing barnyard porn to your children is a good thing because sheltering them from it is bad. You are the one launching into hyperbole about what I said, demonizing any filtering or protection at all, then pretending that "good parenting" can prevent typos that lead to typosquatting porn sites. And then have the gall to assert that I'm the one engaging in hyperbole.
Learn to love Alaska
Don't create work for yourself and reinvent the wheel... Most of what you want to do is already built in to Mac OS X.
Check out the Parental Controls - there is a good quick movie on Parental Controls that shows what can easily be done.
If you need centralised administration and monitoring of these controls, then you can use a Mac OS X Server - which can now be had in the Mac mini Server which has dual 500GB hard drives so you can mirror them and costs under a grand.
Specialist Mac support for creative pros, Melbourne
While not a beheading, I see goatse all the time without explicitly searching for it.
Well, I would if I didn't recognize a bad link for what it is. But sometimes the trolls are just a little more clever than you expected that day, or you hadn't had your caffeine fix yet.
"I'm not sure I like the fugnutish tone you used in your post!" -RogL (608926)-
Bunk. Wine is not ready for prime time.
``Tension, apprehension & dissension have begun!'' - Duffy Wyg&, in Alfred Bester's _The Demolished Man_
Hope the following helps with your issues: Client / Server: Each of the workstations can be set up to "phone home". Select the "Webmin Servers Index" option
- View client computer status: "System and Server Status"
- On/off, sleeping etc.
- Deny internet access, not LAN, just the web: "Webmin Users", can schedule time
- Block access w/Squid
- Remote virus scanning of client machines, or scheduled task;
Unnecessary if you'll put a basic Linux distro on the clients
- Some kind of hardware monitor, high temp / fan speed low etc "Hardware"
- Email alerts for various log files / alarms. "Monitoring"
Hope that helps. It's not even a steep learning curve, and you get to ignore the viruses and adware they were going to pick up anyway.
I know I might be modded down for this, but it has parental access controls that do most of what you need.
Linux has the abilities but lacks many of the tools found in Netware and NT/Windows. One of them is using time usage tools. I could be wrong and maybe there are some free tools for unix that are out there that have a nice gui to set things up which generate the appropriate shells scripts. Maybe someone replying can mention this.
Do not be cheap and just get 3 $450 netbooks for your kids and the problem will be solved.
If you have no script extensions and link firefox you can get rid of most of the security problems. Just make sure you have access to sites like coolmathgames addictingames or where ever kids go to on the net these days.
http://saveie6.com/
All these access restrictions seem a bit over the top, considering the end goal seems to be a simple time-based limit as to when people can use machines. Install $30 worth of surge protected powerbars in their rooms, and buy those cheap timers for the circuit breaker box they sell at home depot to cut the power to their rooms at certain times of day. Install a couple cheap nightlights with batteries installed in case they need to get up at night, etc.
On a separate note, check out the details (as I don't want to retype them) here:
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1487038&cid=30537220
Works like a charm. It's truly a beautiful sight to behold when the TV is off 15 minutes BEFORE the deadline, knowing that:
a) no exceptions
b) the next save spot is likely at least 20 minutes away
c) the power shutoff could "damage" the wii (until they realize the surge protector is in place for a reason, lol)
Two words: metal shears.
Either way, the father is going to know that the access protection has been compromised. So either way, the kid is going to have to explain himself, and if bypassing the access protection was not justified, the kid will likely be in a world of hurt. So I really don't see the benefit of upping the protection like that.
Actually... the padlock is probably less secure than the power on password, as it's probably much more easily picked and put back on without the father ever realizing it (as long as the father does not pick an easily guessed password).
"I'm not sure I like the fugnutish tone you used in your post!" -RogL (608926)-
So you are ok with your kids being on AIM all day looking for older guys who make them feel special?
If a teen is looking for older guys to make them feel special, she is already emotionally vulnerable and needs some help. Cutting off the computer/internet without providing some support will just make her look for someone in real life.
Or surfing porn all day?
Pretty much the same deal. Your job as a parent is not to pretend that porn does not exist, but to explain that the behaviors depicted in it are unrealistic and often unhealthy.
Or, even doing what you want and accidentally running across goatse guy?
Look, sooner or later your precious little angel will see that pic. He or she will also see many other disgusting things, both in real life, on television, and on the web. You can't prevent that, but hopefully you can give enough context to allow little Junior or Princess to assimilate it and get on with his or her life.
He's not looking to be the gestapo. He's looking to have some basic protections in place to protect his children from the unsavory parts of the Internet, and to make sure that they don't abuse the priviledge of having a computer in their rooms.
Look at the age ranges again. They're not going to accept those kinds of top-down restrictions blindly. They'll get that you don't trust them, aren't telling them what they can't see, and become naturally curious about it. And since you've given them no background or explanation at all, they'll have no frame of reference for assimilating it in a healthy way.
Can anyone help me make my own music video? I am too lazy to do it. Can anyone with common sense plan this out so I do not have to use the gray matter that god gave me? I was thinking about titling it "Boats and Loose women." Does any one have a sailboat I could borrow?
I'd suggest that if you're only having the chat after your daughter starts googling birth control, you've probably left it a little late.
On the other hand, if she's responsible enough to be thinking about using birth control, you've probably done something right.
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
Sounds to me like this was a good teaching moment. Heck, I'd be proud if my kids took it upon themselves to outsmart my security methods.
I would be severely disappointed in any kid who couldn't come up with some sort of replacement for a confiscated ethernet cable. Not saying I'd encourage them to do so, just that I'd expect it.
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
Your children have virtually unlimited time to break it.
You will not win.
All smart kids will have a spare network cable, power cable, and if possible a extra monitor well hidden. My parents gave up that stuff after discovering the uselessness.
Net filters and lockouts only stop honest or stupid kids. In the honest case, you should just trust them to better prepare them for the real world where no one looks over their shoulder.
93rd rule of Slashdot: No matter how obvious my sarcasm is, my comment will be taken seriously by someone.
If a teen is looking for older guys to make them feel special, she is already emotionally vulnerable and needs some help. Cutting off the computer/internet without providing some support will just make her look for someone in real life.
So, just to be clear, you are arguing that it's safer for them to talk to strangers online in that mental state than to not talk to strangers online?
Pretty much the same deal. Your job as a parent is not to pretend that porn does not exist, but to explain that the behaviors depicted in it are unrealistic and often unhealthy.
So that's a yes, it's ok, as long as you talked to them first about it?
Look at the age ranges again. They're not going to accept those kinds of top-down restrictions blindly. They'll get that you don't trust them, aren't telling them what they can't see, and become naturally curious about it. And since you've given them no background or explanation at all, they'll have no frame of reference for assimilating it in a healthy way.
So you are assuming that there will be no explanation. I'd agree, if you never actually speak to your children and lock them away in their room with a computer, whether there are or aren't filters won't have much effect on their mental state. I didn't think that was the choice, but when you break it down to that, then you are 100% correct. Filters are irrelevant if you never speak to your children.
Learn to love Alaska
For one, I never addressed the issue of them looking for porn. I only addressed accidental running across it, like with mistyped domain names being redirected to unwanted sites.
You said "surfing porn". Sounds like a whole lot of mistyping going on.
Switch back to Slashdot's D1 system.
I suggest you get acquainted with what a current mobo can do for security. The workarounds we are all familiar with would more likely put the machine into a brick-like state, at least until the correct password is entered.
Implementing the "take away your ethernet cable" punishment seems more effective than kludging together some hybrid Active Directory OpenWRT API-based webpage that's may or may not be easy to circumvent and requires specialized knowledge and lots of time to administer and check up on.
I can see it now... Parent hits "shut down now" but then runs into the bedroom to see if it's working...
At which point, the power button is only inches away.... :-P
Slashdot. News for nerds. Stuff that matters.
You can keep your archaic "manually remove something" and "use the power button". Let us keep our geek stuff. Some people never fully grow up into serious non-nonsense drones, and we're proud of it too.
Well, I am sure they will look for pr0n when they are old enough, no matter what. I know I did and the Internet did not exist. And those older guys looking for younger kids existed also before the Internet.
So the best thing a parent can do is prepare them for the moment that man arrives. If that means you need to spend several hours per day with your kid, though luck. It is called parenting. And don't put the PC in their room. Putting the PCs in the family room is not limiting access. Putting down firewalls and time limits is limiting.
Be there if they are. Might be that you or your wife needs to give up their job, but what do you want? Educate your kids or a new TV? Oh and don't be afraid that your kids hate you, because they will anyway (and won't). You do not need to be a friend. They have plenty of friends. What they need is a parent and Cisco is a lousy one.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
...when looking for parenting advice (or parenting-related technical advice, since people want to turn it into a parenting question), don't turn to Slashdot!
...the future crusty old bastards are already drinking the Kool-Aid.
All the software in the world is pointless if the teenager can simply swap some network cables.
I'm not sure why you think that. What teenager is going to want to be caught bypassing the punishment? Better to serve the punishment than to convince your parents a computer is too much work to parent with. (Notice you waited until you had a defensible need to defeat the password than just doing it the moment you got bored and wanted to play with it.)
My dad used to lock the keyboard when I was in trouble. I had a mechanical pencil that came with just the right sized bit to safely unlock it. Despite having this, I'd say at minimum the computer was still not in use 90% of the time the lock was engaged. Dad was home, simple as that.
Pointless? Hah. No.
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
Google is your friend:
http://www.linuxforums.org/forum/redhat-fedora-linux-help/60324-remote-shutdown-windows-linux-box.html
This is info from 2006, things may have advanced a bit more since then.
Either you trust your kids or you don't. If you don't, work on it.
"The greatest lesson in life is to know that even fools are right sometimes" - Winston Churchill
technology can help enforce it. what are you, 16?
Does nearly all, if not all, this out of the box.
or Tomato firmware
I use Tomato firmware on a 54GL for this ( + my openVPN server ) with IP/MAC bandwidth limiting , Access Control and QoS.
very simple to implement
...I obey the laws of physics....
I can see it now... Parent hits "shut down now" but then runs into the bedroom to see if it's working... At which point, the power button is only inches away.... :-P
Years ago I had a girlfriend who INSISTED upon keeping the TV remote on top of the TV. INSANITY!
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
If you have Verizon FIOS available to you, the routers included with this service cover everything you've listed and it's a fairly simple interface.
Where genius and insanity become confused true wisdom is found
Children have no right to privacy. Teenagers chafe at the idea, of course, but the fact is that they are children, and good parenting means making decisions that are in their best interests, not their greatest desires. When they're able to weigh their actions with the consequences of those actions (i.e., becoming an adult), then they get privacy.
...and parents wonder why kids go wild as soon as parental supervision is removed. How well do you think your child will cope when suddenly given privacy? You should be teaching your child how to be responsible for their own actions, gradually letting go, and stepping in less and less and only when required. That does require knowledge but your children should trust you enough to know that you're not going to use information against them. In other words you need to be their confidant, and advisor. THAT is the role of a parent. If they're too scared or think you're so out of touch that they can't come to you with a problem, you have failed.
When your daughter starts googling birth control, it's time to have a chat.
It could be (probably is!) WAY too late by then. When she starts taking an interest in boys, you should have that chat, not when she's in a flustered panic googling birth control AFTER she's gone further than she intended to with some guy.
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
One word: Padlock.
I had my first lockpick set when I was 14. Padlocks, particularly the kind typical tightwad single parents used, were no barrier to me. For $10 a week I'd pick the lock to a guy's mom's bedroom, then pick the lock to her weed storage box so he and his friends could get high. It was easy money.
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
Pfsense would be helpful. It's a handy router distribution that can be used for various relevant things, including seeing what DHCP leases are active and also be scheduling when the router will route traffic.. http://www.pfsense.org/ - I expect others have referenced it thus far??
you got a whole deal of connectivity/administration project there. quit your day job.
At home or in the work place, nothing says "I don't trust you" quite like Nazi parental controls.
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
As the OP can tell by the number of responses that actually answer the questions asked, there are numerous ways to accomplish what was asked. They are all different and all will provide most of what was asked.
What your asking for is no different than how most computer systems are configured in the corporate world. The primary difference is that most businesses have full time people to deal with issues. IMHO, if you're interested in having the computers run some flavor of windows is to use group policies to control restrictions. The downside to using any solution is that given enough time, one of your kids will either figure out how to bypass the security or one of their friends will show them how. All the windows restrictions in the world won't matter once your kid gets a copy of ERD Commander or it's newer incarnation; Microsoft Diagnostics and Recovery Toolkit.
The correct thing to do, and this was mentioned quite a few times, is to monitor what's being done on the computers. Set some guide lines and make sure that your children AGREE to the guide lines before they are allowed to use the computer. If they cross a line then you punish them. What's the sense in locking down all your desktop and laptops when the kids can use their iPod touch to hop on the neighbors open WiFi connection?
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law - Aleister Crowley
No, when your daughter starts having to Google birth control you have already failed.
....you be a parent and idk.. talk to your kids about when and what they can do online instead of doing secret things behind thier backs so they resent it because they dont know why they arent allowed. You cant automate parenting.
Obviously a gun or booze is more dangerous than the internet,
I doubt that.
I can know and understand all the ways in which a gun or alcohol can be dangerous and I can educate my children about these modes of danger and the appropriate measures to be taken to protect oneself against them.
The internet, on the other hand, breeds new forms of danger on a daily basis - no matter what I teach my children, they may still fall for the scam that starts going around tomorrow. Heck, I might fall for it myself. And if we're all lucky it'll only cost us some money (as opposed to stolen identities, wrecked public records, lost jobs, expulsions from schools etc).
A gun is a single thing, that behaves in a deterministic manner. "The Internet" is a billion people with all kinds of intents, backgrounds, motivations. Just mentioning that you're home alone to the wrong person can cost you dearly - and on the net you can never be entirely sure who you're talking to in the first place.
We're all born with nothing.
If you die in debt, you're ahead.
If you haven't seen people doing degrading things (presumably for money) on the Internet, you haven't surfed far, or your definition of 'degraded' is an outlier. I don't think anyone in this discussion would feel differently if it was gay porn, so I'm not sure how hypocrisy or misogyny come in to it.
Ok, I completely disagree with what you're planning morally, but if you're really into doing this; here's my views.
Internet: Use Squid on a Linux machine. Set it up with a transparent proxy and use that as the gateway. Set the linux box as a router, and have your Internet Gateway on a private network. You can easily use Squid to block at specific times, for blocking websites (including webproxies), and disabling internet per machine. It also logs everything done. If you need help with the config, Webmin is excellent.
If you're using Windows, just use the RPC calls to find out if the machine is on, you can easily get access to what's being used with various applications, or even just VNC, depending how involved you want to get. I don't know of any applications off-hand that log application usage, but shutdown/restart can be done with proper RPC; and that needent mean having a Windows Server; it can purely be done with remote user/pass set up.
There are many many apps to do remote security stuff, especially for XP; even down to spotting keypressing and scanning for text and taking screenshots automatically.
Most Linux distros make Squid easy to set up, and setting up as a router should be easy too. Transparent proxying might need some investgation; but saves doing configuration on every machine later. Locking down Windows is fairly well documented. Obviously with Windows Server, stuff like Antivirus is more expensive but easier; but most of this is possible without resorting to having a Windows machine at all, and just having a small Linux box with enough power for Squid and log files.
Obviously secure the machines down to stop proxies being used, and to stop VPNs; and it should be easy.
Dug
If you really want to run an active directory server you can but that seems a bit too ambitous for 3 clients. You can set user accounts for your children on these machines and log in remotely via "mstsc" You should be able to control internet access from your router. In windows you can also set times that users can use the internet. As for your linux server, I'm not sure what you plan on doing with that but check out FreeNAS. I think it may be a server solution that you will like, if you plan on having a machine for use only as a server. If not I would run Ubuntu and just install the SAMBA server package to make shares. But if that's all you plan on doing your Windows machines can all make files shares. Sounds like you just need to setup a workgroup with additional storage like a NAS. I wouldn't go off and spend tons of money investing in a server for 3 or 4 clients to use. That 10 year old desktop could make a good fileshare/printer share maybe add a large hard drive to it and remove all the crap except the anti-virus, then create your workgroup and your shares with file permissions. (I know it's not as cool as active directory on a domain controller but this is a home network with less than 10 clients.)
When I was 12 you needed a coax crimper and terminators. I don't miss coax at all : )
What they need is a parent and Cisco is a lousy one.
Nice quip, but completely wrong. You just made the argument that you should never put a lock on the cabinet under the sink with all the nasty chemicals because if you use a lock, then you are having that lock be the parent and that lock is a lousy parent. You don't abandon locks on dangerous chemicals because using a lock means you are a bad parent. I've taught my kids to not go under the sink. And they don't. And there's a lock on it anyway. I guess by your reasoning I'm a bad parent using a lock for a parent, but I'd rather have the lock than to find my 3 year old drank drain-o.
It's possible to use technology (like a lock on a cabinet) to assist you in being a parent.
And don't put the PC in their room. Putting the PCs in the family room is not limiting access. Putting down firewalls and time limits is limiting.
Great, so you are telling the person asking the question that they are doing wrong. "How do I fix my Toyota?" and your answer is "Screw Toyota, get a bicycle." It might be the better solution, but isn't an answer to the question asked. They want to get the PC out of the shared space. They want to get it in the rooms. So how do they do that best? Your answer? "Don't do it." I understand your answer, but it isn't an answer to the question asked, and I've been confining my comments to the question asked. If you have fundamental issues with the question itself, then everything you say is off topic.
Learn to love Alaska
How is not filtering their internet access and instead actively communicating with them about what should and shouldn't be done online encouraging bad behavior?
If you get any useful information out of this thread, I'd be interested in it as well. My 6 and 8 year old boys have been directed to some inappropriate Web sites by one of the older boys' friends. I've switched our home network to OpenDNS, but that's not the same thing as true content filtering. The computers are already in a public place, and we've spoken about the sites to avoid. Heck, it was my 8 year old who first brought up the word "inappropriate" in context. But having said all of that, an extra layer of content filtering would make me happier.
and turn the things off when you don't want them to use it.
That project you stated looks fare to complex for a single home user to manage. Yes you could get OS X/Windows 7/Linux to have schedules to shut things down, block sites etc... but really it is easier and cheaper to have a lockable cupboard and lock the computer/s up when you don't want them to be use and just make rules for your kids to follow about usage hours/grounding etc...
Don't rely on technology to parent for you (from a family of 4) you need to do it yourself. If you don't trust your kids with what they look up when you are not there then only bring out the computers when you are there.
One thing to note; children will _ALWAYS_ find a way around any security/punishment you give them (even the physical one I am talking about). The best solution to this is active parenting and trying to be an unobtrusive part of their lives
It said "windows 98 or better" so I installed Linux
Non sequitur. For one, the person I responded to said nothing about "communicating" with the children. For another, what do you do if you *know* they are doing something wrong? Let them do it anyway and live with the consequences? Or work to protect them if they refuse to protect themselves?
And it's encouraging bad behavior by setting no limits for them and giving them the access to act out on the bad behavior with no restraint, monitoring, or controls at all.
Learn to love Alaska
everything looks like a nail.
The complexity and ongoing maintenance (nevermind teaching how to actually use these things) of setting up a full group policy domain.... for 3 PCs.... to be administered by a non tech savvy, time-limited single parent...
Seriously you're so much better off teaching them a few PC basics and installing a few filters etc. on their PCs. And meatspace solutions (e.g. physically locking away PCs or kb/mice). I'm not going to get into the censorship/freedom thing, its not my (or your) kids....
Worked fine for me growing up, parents would say 'no more nintendo' and enforce it with a stick lol.
I've got to agree, especially now that you can get OSX Server in a Mac Mini relatively cheaply. I tried Windows and Linux, but (as a parent) OSX was the easiest to set up and just get on with life. The caveat is that it's only easy if everything in your house is a Mac - you may or may not want to go down that route.
You must be one of those kids who never knew that their parent's called your friend's parents and checked if you were actually there. Before the advent of the telephone, parents just talked to each other, "Hey, little Timmy said he was with you and your kid playing baseball last week, how did the game go?" Kids might not get caught misbehaving as quickly, but they still would get caught.
New technology, new times, new ways of keeping an eye on your kids. By your animosity, either your parents were quite over the line of reasonable, or you feel you were raised fine with no parental involvement so someone else's kids should be too. Both are very weak arguments.
My family fixed this by keeping all the computers in the Living room. This meant that we never had to worry about late night computer us and it would just be a quick glance over a shoulder to see what they are up to.
As a parent and as also an admin who has to worry that co-workers will act like kids, I have both some experience and some tips in this area. The most important tip is to know your kids and care about them. Train them to be safe and teach them morals. With my kids, I use the motto: Trust but verify.
All this comes with a cost of your time and effort. The tools built into the typical router can do a lot of the work for you, but you give up some control. Also, consider your target audience, if your kids are bright teenagers, then they will look at ways around the system. They will almost certainly try to browse by IP or through proxies. If this is a potential issue, then you should also look at setting up a transparent squid proxy and blocking 443 and other ports for addresses not explicitly allowed.
VNC: I didn't list VNC because I don't personally use it at the moment, but I have in the past and it can be a very useful tool. If you use it, I recommend you don't set it to run automatically, but rather start the service when you want to use it with remote commands. In a few cases I've done this so that I could monitor activity without any obvious indication.
B) Eliminate all the stupid users. This is frowned upon by society.
The majority of what you want to do can be done with little more powerful linux based home router/firewall/proxy running a third-party OS like OpenWRT, DD-WRT, or others. If you get a router with a powerful enough CPU and enough RAM, you should be able to have no problems running squid (a proxy service) to restrict access to the internet during your specified time-frames, or to revoke internet access completely (as in your example as a punishment/grounding): http://www.linuxhomenetworking.com/wiki/index.php/Quick_HOWTO_:_Ch32_:_Controlling_Web_Access_with_Squid
I would first setup each of your three systems to use MAC Address based DHCP connections to force the specific computer to get a specific IP address. This is easily done using the web-gui on most of the third party linux router OS's out there, or simply by command line using dnsmasq and editing the dnsmasq.conf file (add the following line for each host, "dhcp-host=00:00:00:00:00:00,192.168.1.10,infinite", replacing the "00:00:00:00:00:00" with the MAC address of the specific system, and replace the "192.168.1.10" with the IP address you wish the machine to use). You can also associate a hostname to that IP address, typically by editing a "hosts.dnsmasq" file and putting the IP address followed by a space or tab, and then the name you wish to use, like computer1, or server, or whatever you want to call it so you don't have to remember what the IP address to the host is, just the hostname that you gave it.
For antivirus, that gets a little more complicated when run at the router level, since you need pretty good router hardware for it to work (since it has to inspect each packet, not just read the header and pass it on to the correct system). PacketProtector is an addon/custom version of OpenWRT which does have antivirus integrated into it. However, you would be better doing this at the client level, not the network or server (well run it on the server as well, but just not as remove scans).
Your final question as to remote shutdowns, monitoring, well, you can do that pretty simply yourself just using "ping" to see if it has an IP address and if it responds, well you know it is up and running. And since you have already setup hostnames instead of just using IP addresses, it is a lot easier to just do a "ping kid1" than "ping 192.168.1.10" and know which computer that really is so that you yell at the correct offender...
We were all warned a long time ago that MS products sucked, remember the Magic 8 Ball said, "Outlook not so good"
Gee, with an intelligent, rational, calm, and compassionate response like that, I'm sure you must be an amazing parent! Not only does your adolescent insult show how in-touch you are with today's youth, you've managed to come up a solution to an eons-old problem with one word. Talk! Yes, it's so simple! You just... Talk!
We won't bother worrying about trivial details like "what to talk about" or "when" or unnecessary, complicated details like "what does this child's psyche respond to best". As long as you just talk, it's aaaaall going to be ooookay.
You could market a book on this. Of course, it would only be one word on a single page, so you might have trouble getting a copyright, but hey, as long as you're helping to mold today's youth into tomorrow's perfect leaders, who cares, right?
... sorry, but kids circumvented parents attempts to control reading material. Kids can and will circumvent any techy attempts by a parent to control things unless they are dolts and their parents are geeks. And lets face it geeks breed true. The OP says they are not computer savvy so the idea they can win this arms race is silly.
To think parenting via proxy (ho ho) works is just kidding yourself.
Build responsiblity and trust, and take their computer away for a while if they break this by failing in reasonable responsibilities you set them... like getting bad grades.
Micromanagement just means they have to develop responsibility later. They will run a system off a CD, hack the server, hack a local WLAN, take photos of themselves on their phones and MMS them, etc. etc. etc..
"So you are ok with your kids being on AIM all day looking for older guys who make them feel special? Or surfing porn all day?"
I'll go out on a limb and assume that OP would want to communicate that these are bad things.
I'm in Australia, you insensitive clod!
My kids won't be defeating parental controls [1] - we'll all be defeating overbearing paternalistic government controls. [1] although she's only 2.5, this thread has given some food for thought on how to deal with my daughter's computer useage when the time comes. Monitored freedom sounds like a sensible approach.
Wow, way to miss the joke douche. How's the sense of humour bypass working out for you.
But your douchebaggery aside, children will get a better understanding of how things work if they get to mess around with it. It is actually a good idea to give a child a semi-working machine and let them solve the problems. It depends on whether you want to raise a drone who does what everyone else does or a person who can actually use their head to get around problems.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
As has been mentioned many times by at least unity100 and BigDish in terms of effort but in the vein of houstonbofh: a system can be made to do this in a variety of ways. And maybe for younger kids some of the censorship is ok and off-the-shelf routers provide this easily. But the reality is, be a parent. If they are grounded and that is part of the grounding then take the power cords if they've proven they will use it when grounded. It is your roof they are living under, if they don't like it then suggest they find more amenable living conditions. Sorry, but I have 3 daughters the youngest 18 now and they will respect you more when you do that. I understand we want to use technology to ease our lives but raising children is not an area to do this in. At least not in this manner. If they circumvented anything I did I'd have to smile at that because could respect that. Would you rather have them discover something unseemly on the internet under your roof or would you rather have that first discovery be when they are on their own. Seems like a good learning experience with you present.
Yep, or use a USB wireless adapter to connect to the neighbors.
Cool! Amazing Toys.
I'll go out on a limb and assume that OP would want to communicate that these are bad things.
You'd think. But they he said he wouldn't stop them from doing anything bad with things like filters, so he'd say "that's bad" and let them do it. But he didn't address what to do if he communicated with them and they didn't listen. We either assume that they'll always listen to their parents. It's never happened, but he could be the first. Or, we could assume that he's an idiot that doesn't know how to be a good parent, but has some quips that he thinks will make him look smart on the Internet. Apparently, if you talk to your kids occasionally, you can trust them 100% and any attempt to verify that trust means you are a bad parent.
Learn to love Alaska
Disclaimer: I don't have kids, and I grew up as the computer expert in my house (I paid for internet access out of my allowance). Take my opinion with whatever amount of salt you find appropriate.
I learned growing up that I could always get access to the internet at a place where my parents couldn't reach me (friend, public library, internet cafe). I assume this hasn't changed today.
Or, even doing what you want and accidentally running across goatse guy?
Well, you know who goatse is and what he looks like. Look at the horrible damages that knowledge caused you! Wait, it didn't? Oh well; I learned about him in my secondary education ("High School", except Danish), so at an age between sixteen and eighteen. Didn't do me much harm.
So you are ok with your kids being on AIM all day looking for older guys who make them feel special? Or surfing porn all day?
Wait, does your firewall come with a "drop conversations from older guys" filter? Does it come with a "allow a little porn but don't feed porn addiction" filter?
I think the way to have youngsters avoid the bad sides of the internet is to talk clearly (no-bullshit) about what they are, why they are bad, how they work, and then about how they can be avoided.
Don't just impose a rule on them---show them the goal the rule is meant to accomplish, get them to agree with the goal, then suggest the rule to them. Especially don't have a robot (router) impose the rule on them.
He's not looking to be the gestapo.
No, he's looking for the router to be the gestapo---a faceless machinery enforcing the rules of a dictatorship.
Talk to kids. Get them to understand what the dangers are and how to protect against them. Get them to agree, first of all. Because if they don't they'll break the rule, and if they do you didn't need a rule in the first place.
I would, even if you might not like it, recommend Windows Live Family Safety. It offers great parental control options like blocking websites, reporting, time limits, gaming restrictions etc. It needs Windows Live installed, but heck I don't care as long as I don't spend too much time setting this up.
Why bother? Get three corded computers, put them in a common area, if it breaks they have to deal with.
If you're awesome, set up a Windows box, Mac, and Linux machine to expose them to all three big worlds with multiuser accounts on each.
Accept the younger generation is smarter than you and will easily circumvent any idle attempts at restriction.
Unless your genuine intent is to spur the next generation of defcon attendees, just let them learn how to compute while they still live in your house.
Before a certain age? No. I couldn't even explain it to them adequately. Once they're teens? I think it's OK for them to learn that not every unknown link should be trusted. (To be fair, Rickrolling serves the same purpose in a milder manner. I sure wish I'd learned about strange links via Rickrolls, rather than the eyefuls of various "Dear god, why??" sorts of pictures.
On the other hand, I don't plan to let them on the internet without supervision. :)
Teaching the kids how to spot a pedo on AIM is a valuable thing...
That being said:
How will the kid be damaged by the goatse guy? Having stumbled upon such things around the age of 14 I remember a mix of "what the -fuck- is that....." to "why would anyone...." to "kill it, kill it with fiiiire!" responses. :-p
Surfing porn all day? So what... There is a time and place for everything. A good fap wont kill the kid
Now, I'm neither an axe murderer or a rapist and have a healthy attitude towards most things...
When it comes to the simple act of cutting off access the simplest and most effective thing to do is just unplugging the cable at the distribution point. Very simple, no complexity.
Should the kid disobey and just replug it then deal with that. For example just take the computer for a week. Teach them the need to obey simple rules.
My parents are both teachers and personally I think that makes them more in touch with reality than most parents.
The parent who lets their 14 year old have access to unfiltered internet is not the problem. The parent that doesnt care or doesnt treat their kids right is.
Teachers get to see all the messed up kids... Some are messed up before they even get to kindergarden and the number of cases with child services involved is quite large.
None of these problems are because of the kid having a fap every now and then... or having seen the goatse man...
From how the original poster presented his issue I doubt he has anything to worry about regarding the kids. They seem to be in a fairly 'safe' home situation and giving them :-p
access to internet wont change that. Being open about what is out there is a good thing, blocking it so that they wont know what -is- out there is stupid and dangerous.
Kids will get access to unfiltered internet and having it in their own home is a hell of a lot better than finding out your 14-year old has been hanging out with that 16-year old
smoking misfit that has unfiltered internet at home
I'm getting ranty... time for work :-p
Methinks you are underestimating how the conversation would go. This looks an awfully lot like a strawman to me.
-- Linux user #369862
Lock the kids out of admin/root access on the mini.
Job done.
I run: Windows, OS X, Linux, FreeBSD. Just because you have a hammer, doesn't mean everything is a nail.
So, just to be clear, you are arguing that it's safer for them to talk to strangers online in that mental state than to not talk to strangers online?
He is arguing that it is better for the kid to get some support from her parents, since just cutting the internet doesnt deminish the need for someone to talk too, cut off the internet and dont step in, and he/she will just find someone else in real life (which might end up good, i.e. a teacher/coach, or might end up bad, a pervy teacher/coach)
Technology is no substitute for actual parenting
People, what a bunch of bastards
Methinks you are underestimating how the conversation would go.
He said he'd have a conversation but wouldn't do anything to actually protect them. How else do you think it will go?
This looks an awfully lot like a strawman to me.
Yes it does, I don't know why I got suckered in by it. He claims he'll talk to his children and that will make it so he'll never have to restrict them. What point did I get wrong?
Learn to love Alaska
Technology is no substitute for actual parenting
Ah, I got it. He was using the false dichotomy to invent a strawman to attack. No one has ever claimed that turning on a firewall means you never have to talk to your children again. But for your statement to be true, that would have to be a premise. Since it's obviously not, then I don't see what the problem is.
Why is a firewall plus talking worse than talking alone, assuming the talk is as effective in both circumstances?
Learn to love Alaska
From the website:
m0n0wall is probably the first UNIX system that has its boot-time configuration done with PHP
Remind me how this was mistaken for an advantage.
You're missing the point. If you want to restrict your kids 100% then yes filtering etc. is the way to go. I don't believe in this, as I was not raised this way. Internet use, just like other things like drinking, drugs etc. were taught by my parents through conversation. They told me, don't do those things they are bad. Some of them I tried anyway. I got drunk one night aged 14, came home, and went to bed. They scolded me, but said my incredible hangover was probably punishment enough, and left it alone. I didn't drink again until I was of age (except for the odd beer my dad would give me on special occasions at home).
I never did much in the form of drugs or smoking. My parents are proud of me for growing up and succeeding, according to their guidelines, which proves they were right. They never believed in censoring my internet. I was allowed to listen to any music I wanted even if it contained obscene words. The only thing they banned me from was war games, and violent games. Which at the time I thought was incredibly unfair, but now I see how sick the American culture is (violence is ok, bad words/tits is a big no).
You're missing the point. If you want to restrict your kids 100% then yes filtering etc. is the way to go. I don't believe in this, as I was not raised this way.
So, your point in response to the question of "I would like to set up rules and filters for my children, what's the best way?" is "That makes you a bad parent."
I don't think I'm missing the point. Why is it that when I ever disagree with someone, they assume I'm stupid. I get it. I disagree. I think that there's nothing wrong with putting a lock on the cabinet leading to the drain-o when I have small children living in the house. The technology of a lock isn't being the parent. And yes, it's restrictive. If you are really arguing that you think it's child abuse to keep your child out of the drain-o, go for it.
But whining about other people that want to prevent their children from learning that the stove is hot with a 3-week trip to the emergency room (yes, I know one that ended up that way) seems absurd. Sure, most children just get a little burn on their hand, but some manage to pull boiling liquid on themselves. Why not teach them it's hot *and* keep them away from the stove while cooking?
Learn to love Alaska
Yes. I dropped in quickly to say the same thing. Children's computers should always be located where adults will walk behind them as they go about their daily living. Occasionally discuss what is on their screen.
Your stove example works, but is not an apt simile. What TFA suggests in this case is putting up a barrier between the child and the stove, so that the child never sees or has access to the stove until he is old enough to cook on it; and then he has no idea about the nature of stoves.
I hate the concept of internet filtering (by parents or otherwise) as I believe it is another step toward turning people into drones.
I had an undroneful life even before the internet... you insensitive clod!
Locking the drain-o away is, indeed, necessary. I don't think anyone would argue that, unless the kid is 15...again it is down to age, whether they are old enough to judge. Also, drinking drain cleaner is almost always harmful, and very dangerous. Seeing goatse isn't. You do not die from seeing an anus stretched open.
Similar situation, but younger kids.
Online is a big part of what they do at school these days.
I can trust my kids, however I have no desire for them to wind up on the seamy side of the internet by happenstance, or their system to get malwared to death either.
For the windows (XP) PCs (you'll get lots of Server/Linux advice here...) we are setup as follows (note - these are all free options):
1 - DNS set to OpenDNS, and set to do some basic filtering
2 - loaded K9 (by Bluecoat) on the kids machines for granular filtering
3 - Firefox, NoScript, ABP
4 - Avast, AdAware
5 - logmein for remote access if needed
6 - systems in a public room (not in their bedrooms) so access times, overgaming, and withdrawel from family are less problematic
I find the above pretty hands-off. Once in a while (once a month...) they need to get somewhere that is blocked, but it isn't common and they just come ask one of us to open it up. I tried running them in user, and then power user, mode but that was a constant pain and I gave up on it (meh..)
as always with such advice, ymmv.
--- Mercutio was right.
Look, sooner or later your precious little angel will see that pic. He or she will also see many other disgusting things, both in real life, on television, and on the web. You can't prevent that, but hopefully you can give enough context to allow little Junior or Princess to assimilate it and get on with his or her life.
However, giving 'context' to a developing brain takes time. Just because a toddler can play on the Thomas the Tank Engine website - doesn't mean their ready to see footage of dismembered bodies
Little minds should not be subjected to the emotional trauma of visual images of crimes being perpetrated / people coming to grief etc.
This. Would you also read her diary? Both of those is extremely intrusive and will take them about 1 minute to get around. ...
Yes, she would need to learn that writing down stuff you don't want other people to read is really stupid.
Be seeing you...
...you really have trust issues with your kidlets. However, Here's something I would try.
Set up a NIS server master which also has the router/firewall/ACL/etc on it. All the kids' computers are Linux NIS clients reporting to the master server. The master server can lock accounts so they can't log in anywhere when being punished for being a kid. The server will control access times (and who can access what), plus it can act as a central storage location (in addition to the NIS profiles) for files or what have you. And since each profile is roaming, anyone can log on anywhere and still access their accounts/data/stuff. With a good and secure root password on each workstation, the kids can't install anything you don't want them to have (like torrent programs), and there are several antivirus/antimalware solutions (free) for Linux use that will serve your purpose nicely.
ClearOS (I used the earlier ClarkConnect 3.x and 4.x) was ok but a bit more than I needed (web shares and pages were more than I
needed).
I've added most of what I need on top of IPCOP. Filtering, time based controls are available.
I put in my own dhcp and dns to allow me to redirect the gateway to a non-existant IP so I can have a time period when my kid can use the network based printer and computer for homework -- but not get to the outside world to screw around with Social Networking or games... I ssh in and run a script to restart dhcp to allow access to the outside when the work's done.
Having openvpn so I can get to the home network securely was a plus.
Didn't he notice the password was gone when he came home?
No sig today...
Instead I would place the computer in one room (not their bedrooms) so you can control it, secondly I would only buy one computer, as it is not cheap these days, and I would buy one of these thin client units...from tigerdirect...
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=15398&sku=N316-1014
which allows you to set up as many people (up to 4 per unit) per one computer.
Thirdly, I would hire a geek squad dude (or put an add in the paper saying you need an admin to help quickly set up accounts on a machine for 40$) to come to my house and configure the 3 kid accounts and do all the AV install etc...
for usually about 30 or 40$ per hour, as this is child's play for a learned admin, he will set up limited accounts, and tell you how to use your system....also keep his number handy. What he will do in 15 minutes will take you all day to figure out....also
he may even be able to set up the rest of the kids consoles (if you have a wireless router) such as playstation xbox etc...
to allow your kids to access internet from their other consoles....keeping the pc time to a minimum....unless they have no consoles.
Make sure to also ask for a backup of the router configs, in case he has to come in afterwards to reset it, as it is very easy to do from a backup when someone fiddled by accident or on purpose with your router. Also backup of the pc would be nice too, into
a separate drive or partition that way if you ever get a virus and need to reinstall, you dont lose personal files because everyone KNOWS to keep their personal stuff in their personal folders on tat separate driver or partition.
I assume he banned you from ever touching any computer in his house again?
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
If I had criminal children like you I certainly wouldn't be worrying about giving them access to my computers, they could fuck off until they were living on their own.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
In any area where there is a neighborhood that will not work. We have some very good friends who are not particularly computer literate. I am very close with them and with their kids. They secured their router and put time restrictions and everythign else on them./ About a week later at 11pm I saw their middle daughter online and IM'd her "On the neighbor's router?" "Of course." I had a talk with the parents, took the kids' laptops for an afternoon. Explained to them that I now had logs of everything that was going on, just as I had done for my kids. I showed them quick excerpts from the logs. They have been good every since now that I am packet sniffing everything that goes on from within their own machines. I occasionally take a quick (and I do mean quick) look through all of the logs just to make sure that nothing particularly nasty has been happening. Aside from catching my son on porn sites, nothing really has. Ronald Reagan said it best: "Trust but verify". Kids get that. W
Lay down the rules and trust your kids to do the right thing then spy on them and cut them off for infractions.
yes, and I was vocally open about how bloody stupid the whole setup was that it had forced me to circumvent it.
why?
I didn't damage the computer in any way.
I simply fixed a time sensitive problem.
Keep in mind that my mother was also kind of pissed with him that she hadn't been given the password when he'd gone away for the weekend.
Or perhaps he isn't as egotistical as you if that's how you'd react to someone fixing a problem you've created by lack of forethought.
The kids from tfs are a little old to be worrying about drinking drain-o. I think you make sense if you change the age to like 6. Also, no access to drain-o isn't a big deal. In many places no access to internet is becoming almost a human rights issue.
>>I agree but one should still be able to review logs of places the kids (or their friends) have been. I'm their parent, not just their friend.
>So I'm assuming you're one of the power obsessed parents who uses Verizon's "family stalker" app to make sure you know when your kid is peeing and if they stopped to get ice cream or not?
No, I don't think I was a Nazi for wanting to review what sites my then eleven-year-old daughter visited on the Internet over her unfiltered connection from a computer in her bedroom.
You know what the first thing I learned by this practice? That a whole lot of people wanted to sell things to my daughter over this shiny new Internet thingy. And they were capable of doing it with unblockable pop-ups of cute animated kittens. They also wanted to infiltrate my daughter's computer with all sorts of software so they could pop up little reminders with cute animated kittens or track her browsing patterns whenever they needed to. In the end their little plans came to a halt in this household because I'm a geeky parent who uses Linux and knew how to set up a transparent web proxy. Some of these early attempts at surveillance by marketers were poorly written and caused problems with her (then XP) computer. When this happened I was able to consult the logs, see where this crap came from, and block it. Reviewing these logs really helped me understand how to begin dealing with the enormous amount of exploitative junk on the Internet that's targeted at our children.
You'll notice none of my concerns have to do with porn or predation or any of the usual subjects that come up whenever we discuss parental filtering on Slashdot. I had no qualms trusting my daughter to make the right choices for herself on the Internet because I had trusted her to do many other responsible things in her young life. I had no choice in this matter; I was a single father with a young child. That didn't mean I was going to abandon all parental responsibility for her use of the Internet. I logged her traffic for a while, reviewed the logs a few times over the first year or so, then stopped logging. She knew I was logging and knew I could block her access if I wished. She watched me review the log to help diagnose what was wrong with her computer and was happy I could use it to block some of the places that were giving her trouble.
I'm as disgusted as you are by the exploitation of fear represented by products like "family tracking" services. Unfortunately, in the current climate, fear sells. I gave my daughter a cell phone when she entered middle school to help her become more liberated not to be tracked like a lab rat. But I chose to buy her a prepaid phone from Virgin so I could control how much time she spent on the phone. Like my decision to allow unrestricted, but monitored, access to the Internet, I tried to find the right solution that maximized her freedom while not abandoning my responsibilities as her parent to help her make the right decisions.
That's called being a parent, not a storm trooper. "Trust, but verify" as Ronnie said.
As to the OP, I think you're creating a monster for yourself to manage. Parenting is hard, but you've got a lot more experience managing your kids than you have managing a complex network configuration. From what you wrote, I'd suggest the following:
1) See if you can control time-of-day access using the administrative interface of your router. That's probably the easiest method to solve that problem. My Linksys router includes this feature.
2) Take a look at Dan's Guardian as a filtering mechanism if you must have one. It'll run fine on that ten-year-old computer the kids are using now.
3) Use Firefox with AdBlock Plus and perhaps Flashblock as well.
4) Use Linux on the client computers. Yes, yes, I know, gaming, blah, blah, blah. You'll save yourselves a lot of hassle if you don't run Windows, and your kids will get acc
Forgot the computer crap and be a parent.
You don't need fancy high-tech solutions to simple low-tech problems. You want to know if your kid's computer is turned on or off? Walk into the family room and see if the kid is sitting on the computer. You want to make sure your kid isn't on the PC after 11pm? Turn off the computer.
Having a fancy software based solution for the generic single Mom isn't going to work.
Beyond that, kids aren't stupid. If you give the kid a PC that some central server monitors to see if it's turned on, particularly if it's being administered by a n0ob Mom; they are going to realize they can disable the software that provides that info to the server. Or, that by disconnecting the network cable/wireless adapter, the server views the machine as off.
Same deal with the internet. Odds are, there are unsecured wireless connections your kid can use to get on your neighbors connection and they can surf anything they want without your detection. Aside from that, unless you are going to completely cripple the usefulness of the internet; they'll always be able to connect to some proxy and get content that way.
And, whatever material you don't want them seeing on the internet - their buddy Tom, he's got a portable hard-drive filled with 400 gigs of that stuff. And he'll gladly let your kid copy it to his PC.
When I was in junior high, my and my loser friends would install Linux partitions on my family computers. With a boot disk, we could load up into Linux and access the content we didn't want our family to know about (IE - porn).
Bottom line is - this won't work. The amount of effort that would go into setting up and monitoring this system would be huge for a non-techie AND it wouldn't be effective. The better solution is to be a good parent, spend time with your kids, and realize you can't stop them from ever doing or seeing anything bad or scary on the internet.
If the parent is too lazy to do that; you are better off just installing spyware on the kid's PCs. Then Mom can get weekly e-mail of what nasty stuff her snowflakes were doing on the internet. But in either case, the kids will get around the security measures.
Shutting off internet access as a punishment is what you think of as a "totalitarian regime"? Give me a break! That's smart parenting. Perhaps in your Utopian family punishment is never needed, but in most families, it is. When kids are able to use technology to break the rules, parents should use technology to enforce the rules. That's not substituting technology for parenting, its using the tools at your disposal.
And yes, some parents feel that it's not appropriate for a 12-year-old boy to see videos of chicks being smacked around and called names while taking it up the butt. Simply telling three boys not to look at porn is not going to cut it. As a matter of fact, that's most likely going to tantalize them. Perhaps you feel differently in raising your kids, but the OP is not asking for parenting advice -- he's asking for Network Admin advice.
OP is also worried about malware, sexual predators, and phishing scams. I can't keep my parents from getting their computers infected -- much less my kids.
I'm on the Internet about 16 hours out of every 24. I can't even remember the last time I saw goatse.
If only I could mod you insightful.
I'm not sure exactly why its bad if people are willingly doing things that you consider to be degrading in exchange for some compensation.
You get a lot of that from some feminist and morality folks. They want the freedom for women to make their own choices, but as soon as they make a choice those aforementioned folks disapprove of, it's suddenly bad.
In other words, it is, indeed, hypocrisy the majority of the time.
That's not true.
The question was asking for the best course of action in a given situation. It would be silly to ignore given information because we know that some people will be offended by the appropriate response to it.
Here's what we know from the question....
* Three kids: 12, 14, 15 - The oldest is probably a sophomore in high school. Many high schools offer computer classes, including computer programming. Even if the eldest child is not a computer geek, he or she certainly has friends that are.
* Parent is not computer savvy. Needs a simple web interface to do everything. Needs everything to be setup correctly in advance and will be unable to make significant changes/updates.
* Parent wants the ability to forcefully shut down computers remotely, restrict content, etc....
Given the situation; a technology based solution is not optimal. The kids will out-geek Mom in no time flat. The only way to ensure that Mom stays in control of the PCs is to lock them down the point that they are no longer useful in any meaningful way.
Will the computers allow USB devices to be connected? If No - that's a gimped computer. If Yes - nothing will stop the 15 year old kid from brining a portable HD with 500gb of all the content the parent would want blocked. Plenty of his friends will be glad to supply the content.
If yes - nothing will stop the kids from getting a wireless network adapter and connecting to the neighbors unsecured wireless router and getting on the internet whenever they want.
Will the computers allow CD/DVDs/Floppy disks? If No - that's a gimped computer. If yes - same as above, but the size of the medium is limited.
And if the kid can plug in any of those things; he or she will be able to boot off of one of those devices. And that means they'll be able to partition the hard-drive and have their own sandbox environment that is free from the rules and restrictions imposed otherwise.
If you setup a bios password, nothing will stop the kids from opening the case and resetting the bios. Most consumer-type PCs don't have physical locks on the case.
Any web filtering you do is either going to be a strict whitelist which will gimp the usability of the web, or a blacklist. If it's a blacklist they'll have no trouble finding a proxy they can use to surf all the sites you would want blacklisted. They'll even have a friend who can show them how to do it - who will run a proxy on their home PC so your kid can connect. I did that for my buddy back in high school.
And, any local filtering you do will fail to stop anything once they kid hits an open wireless router at your neighbors house.
Beyond that, nothing stops the kid from running a cat-5 cable his computer straight to the modem - bypassing the router and the server you've got setup.
You'd need to physically secure the modem/router/server machine in a locked room that the children cannot possibly enter. Then you'd need to physically secure the insides of the computers you give them so that they cannot open the case (you'll also need to inspect the case regularly - because it's fairly trivial to cut them open anyway). You'd also need to prevent them from connection any USB device; possibly there is a bios setting for this, I've never tried. You'd need to remove any floppy/cd/dvd reading devices that are on the machine. You'd also have to prevent the installation of any software you don't approve. You'd have to prevent them from using any chat programs, because you can't moderate it and they can receive files. You'd have to block the vast, vast majority of the web because it would give them content you don't want them to have (but many of the sites you block would also have other really useful applications, aside from the content you don't like). You'd also have to either block or monitor all of you child's e-mail; otherwise his or her friends would provide the content.
Then you've got a computer that is mostly worthless, but a fighting chance of kee
Sorry, Czech Republic here. We have it in our constitution.
Ezekiel 23:20
Yeah, kids will get around things, but if they are using the pc when they shouldn't be, I'm going to know if the case is cut up or the password has been bypassed. That's half the battle.
Cheap storage VM.
Filter ads and to protect from accidents, trust kids, but verify by logging or checking PC's occasionally. Don't make a big deal about it until you see something objectionable.
Limiting night time access is probably good if your kids have a bedtime, if they are free rangers who pass out in the hallway like my neighbors 3 year old, let them have all night access since you obviously can't invest the time to parent.
Talk to your kids, teach your kids, but parenting also requires setting rules and dishing out consequences.
Nobody has mentioned thin client yet, for shame. I use NoMachine on my home server. You could limit external browsing to that machine only. Give them a published firefox session. Their PC's won't get malware and they can save file to their network drive and transfer them to their pc if need be. Teach them to save on the network, please god, teach them to save on the network...
Cheap storage VM.
but how we wish we did...
Cheap storage VM.
Buying your kids a mac is like forcing them to be left handed. It's borderline child abuse, IMHO.
Cheap storage VM.
I found I already owned a router that allowed me to control we access hours I just set static IP's on the target machines and gave them restricted access to the web...
I use OPENDNS.com for the parental controls... I direct the router to OpenDNS for its dns lookups...
and I have installed a opensource program called iTalc to monitor the users on the machines... iTalc requires a small client on the users machine and an admin install on the teachers machine... you can then view what is going on, take control of a user or shut them down...
Remember to have the kids login as users not admins... take away those admin rights!
Easy to install, very inexpensive and remarkably effective... Especially with the users knowing I can monitor what they are doing at any time, even from work... Remember you don't always have to go so far as to cut access off, often all the user needs is to know and see you have all the tools to do it.
People think respect should automatically given. I disagree. If you are not worthy of respect, your kids will not respect you. After all, in reality it is something earned. If a kid is disrespecting you, do you honestly believe being "grounded" have any positive effect? No, you would be the authority that they fight against. They wont appreciate you feed cloth and shelter them, they just think you take away what's rightfully theirs. So obviously two easy way to approach that issue. Either they are smart enough to get around your punishment, or they destroy your property and have you live through the punishment with them. Even when they hunger for approval and live through the punishment without much struggle, you still wont get the respect you want. I think disobedience and disrespect are symptoms of deeper issues when it comes to failure in parenting. A previous post made a very good point when it talked about the soviet union. The policy of the Russian government was to punish those who do not follow rules and do what they were told. Obviously it didn't work for adults, I cannot seriously consider it to be a viable option for children. Reasoning, bargaining, and positive reinforcing would make a better overall strategy when dealing with children since it worked well with adults.
Where is the "Ignorant" mod tag?
So enforcing a bedtime of 11 p.m. by turning off the router is a human rights issue?
Learn to love Alaska
check out eBox.com
i'm using it as a proxy server. took me 20min to set up.
you're a bad person and should feel bad if you think it's ok to read anyone's personal papers and effects. There's a difference in knowing someone can read it and someone will read it.