Internet Explorer 7’s Kiosk Mode
IE7 does have a “Kiosk Mode” which launches the browser with no tool bars, no address bar, nothing! just the browsing window. I’ve also written a How-To for Firefox Kiosk Mode.
Method One
You can launch IE7 into Kiosk mode by adding a switch to a command line command!
- Click Windows Key+R
- Type:
iexplore -k - Click OK
To exit, simply hit Alt+F4!
The problem with this method is that people can figure out that hitting Alt+F4 will close the window, and then they double-click IE from the desktop. We can’t simply removed the IE icon because a blank desktop with no way to get back online is unacceptable! We need their website/webapp running! Here’s a way around this issue:
Method Two
We can create a shortcut to IE and pass the switch directly!
-k
- Create a shortcut to IE7 on the desktop and remove the direct link:
- Right-click and select “Properties“
- In the “Target” field, add the ” -k” operator the the command - remember to add a space before the dash:
- Hit OK!
- Don’t forget to remove all shortcuts to IE in the Start menu and the Quick Launch bar!
Known Issues:
- Now, users can still open My Computer/My Documents and use the address bar there. As I mentioned, there are many different apps that can really lock the machines down, we use Fortres at work.
- Users can open a new window, using Ctrl+N. This opens a standard IE window, tool bars and all.
- You need to adjust the popup setting in IE to “Always open popups in a new tab”.
Unfortunately this is the best, free method as of this writing - at least until someone creates an addon for IE.
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Is there a way to close IE7 after x minutes in kiosk mode?
I’m sure you could write a batch file that starts a timer ….
Or, create a batch file that kills IE and call it every x minutes….
But, no, there is not a way to kill IE from within IE.
uhhh… what about alt+f4?
What about it?
Are you referring to the post before yours or the shortcoming of this trick?
Saman,
Thanks for the great article. I was having some trouble keeping one of my public computers from being used for “non-productive” work on second shift. You’re kiosk mode article fixed that!
I have an additional suggestion for you if you are interested.
I really wanted to lockdown Internet Explorer so that the user could only use one particular website. For my example lets call that website “web.app.com”.
1.) In IE go to tools and set your homepage to be “http://web.app.com”
2.) open a DOS prompt and ping web.app.com
3.) open c:\windows\system32\drivers\hosts file in notepad and enter the IP address you got in step 2 then hit tab and enter web.app.com
3.) Change your default DNS server to be 127.0.0.1
4.) Lastly, follow your directions for setting up the PC to run in kiosk mode.
So, even if the user hits Alt-F4 they still cant go anywhere execept web.app.com.
Thanks again for your article.
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I’ve found a way to get out of Kiosk mode at all kiosks… except one.
It was running Firefox on a very very minimal linux distribution. I was stumped!
pretty cool, I never knew you could do this - I’ll have to find a use for it now
Is there a way to do this from the DOS Command ???
Thanks.
I’m sure there is, you would have to find the Internet Explorer.exe
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I was in Portugal recently using the kiosk mode on a computer. What a pain in the back side it was!
I would like to use kiosk mode for my workshop. Other than locking down the machine, as it will be available for public usage, is there a way kiosk can run after X amount of minute (say as a screensaver)? When a pc starts or reboots, I’d like to go initially to run kiosk (startup shortcut would do) and then run again if a machine is left alone for X amount of minutes (if administrator needs to run other than kiosk) of exiting kiosk mode.
I hope my question made any sense… ha ha ha. I don’t even know why I want this, but at this moment I do.
Thank you.
Clarify this for me: So you want the computer to enter Kiosk mode (no tool bars and no way to access the desktop), but also what it open for someone to use normally?
Hello
I wanna know how to make kiosk IE web page in origional position(normal IE look like)
Your reply will be highly appreciated
Thanks
Jawad Haider
Hi,
Is it possible to disable alt+f4 ?
Other question: when i run iexplore -k from a logon .bat script i still have the three small butons on the right to close/reduce/restaure teh window. Allthough the tite bar is absent.
Any idea where they come from?
Hi,
Can you configure Kiosk Mode to display only some buttons - specifically Home, Back, Forward and Refresh?
I can do this in Opera but am having issues with cookies in a specific application (my login/change user in the application does not effectively Log the old user off.
TIA,
Barry
Nope, not in IE….
But you can in Firefox!
hi
is there a way to change websites (other than clicking links) on IE kiosk mode
To solve a lot of the problems, I’d suggest replacing your shell. Instead of using the standard Windows Shell, use internet explorer as your shell and launch it in “kiosk” mode. Create a simple html menu with links to the allowed pages. You’ll also want to create a .rat file which limits access to only the pages you want to allow. BTW, allowing access to search engines is not usually a good idea. You’ll also want prevent the opening of new windows. The reason for this is, when a new window is opened in IE, it is no longer in Kiosk mode. Not sure about IE 7, though…If Microsoft made it so that any new windows were opened in Kiosk mode, life would be a lot more simple. You’ll also probably want to disable the windows key. You want to change the way people log on so that they have to hit “Ctrl-Alt-Del” to log in. You should also disable most of the functions accessed by hitting “Ctrl-Alt-Del”, like “Lock Computer”, “Change Password” and “Task Manager”. You might even want to disable “Log Off”. I’ve only touched on the subject here. There are a lot of security holes that might need to be patched.
Can anyone tell me if Firefox can be used as a shell?
Also, do new windows opened in Firefox open in Kiosk mode?
If any of you have kiosks running on a windows Domain, as ours are. then you can eaisly lock down the operating system using group policy in active directory.
Care to elaborate?
There is a setting in the User Configuration > administrative templates section. I can’t remember its exact location though. It is called “Custom User Interface”. Enable it and have it point to “c:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe” -k.
We have it set up on our domain and even are able to point it to a unique intranet page for users to look up court documents. Works like a charm and really took a bunch of the leg work out of locking down our public computers. Only problem is they can still use Alt F4.
i am running kiosk mode in a gallery where they keyboard is locked away and only the mouse is available. so of course some wise acre has to come in and use the right click to zoom in on the page or view source. its just really annoying to have to run down and adjust it once or twice a day. is there a way to disable right click?
Not sure yet - in the mean time, can you just remote in from another computer and fix the zoom problem?
Saman, it was no problem to go to the machine and fix the zoom problem. i ended up doing a reg hack to disable the right click feature in ie.
use Microsoft SteadyState, Free and it does everything to lock down PC’s
Hi! Can i have silent print feature i.e. when i print from internet explore, it must suppress the print dialog box and directly print the content to the printer. Silent Printing feature is available in firefox, how it is possible in windows internet explore 7.