Reply to: Time Limits on the net

[eternalnomad]

"PC in the living-room instead of the bedroom?"

No space plus my mother in law prefers her to have it down there.

how about she just make the little darling understand that whilst living in her home she lives by her rules.

If rule say no internet after 9pm then its no internet after 9pm

Failing that......netnanny is one option....or purchase a new router with a time based lock-out (many netgear routers have this facility)

[BoredBloke]

"PC in the living-room instead of the bedroom?"

No space plus my mother in law prefers her to have it down there.

[expat]

OK, why I am asking is my mother in law fosters a child. She has got her a computer and I have given them an old router so that she can use the net. What is currently happening is this kid is going on the net when she is supposed to be in bed. What is needed is some way to ensure that the internet connection closes at say 9pm and is not available until the next day.

PC in the living-room instead of the bedroom?

[BoredBloke]

OK, why I am asking is my mother in law fosters a child. She has got her a computer and I have given them an old router so that she can use the net. What is currently happening is this kid is going on the net when she is supposed to be in bed. What is needed is some way to ensure that the internet connection closes at say 9pm and is not available until the next day. Unplugging the connection is hassle and my mother in law often forgets. What she wants is a way to set it up so that it does this automatically so it can be set up she can forget about it.

If she unplugs the connection then this kid goes off on one which is not ideal for my mother in law (the kid should be in a looney bin if you ask me!). If I can setup the kit so that it automatically does this then it takes away the 'why have you unpluged the computer' type arguments.

I did think of going down the net-nanny route but thought it was overkill for something so simple.

[NoddY]

Pick up a small form factor PC here http://search.ebay.co.uk/sff (£30-70) plus an additional network card (£25)

Install http://www.pfsense.com/ on it (£0)

and you've got yourself first class router, including a transparent web cache at application level which can restricted by time/user etc.; all configured within a comfortable web interface and running headless.

[expat]

but short of soldering it to the wall relatively easy to circumvent....

So many answers, and the application hasn't been specified yet, only its major requirement. Is it to stop the kids surfing after bedtime? Then you want netnanny or BT parental controls (or a firm parental hand). Or is it to isolate an unattended system out of its required hours? Or what?

[PerlOfWisdom]

but short of soldering it to the wall relatively easy to circumvent....

Put it in a locked cupboard.

[cojak]

but short of soldering it to the wall relatively easy to circumvent....

[PerlOfWisdom]

Plug-in timer on the router.

[BoredBloke]

Thanks for the info I'll check them out.

[OwlHoot]

Does anybody know of some means (free preferably) to force a PC to get off the net at a particular time. I have been asked to stop a PC from logging onto the net after 9pm. The PC is running XP Home (I think).

The router does not appear to have any settings which would allow me to do this.

Does your router support SNMP? If so you could write an app that connects to the router on a suitable schedule and reconfigures it in some way that disables the net connection during the times you don't want it used.

(In my previous contract, designing monitoring programs for storage and backup systems, I had to become expert in configuring and programming SNMP and WMI, fondly imagining these skills would give me an entry to network admin contracts and such like, but applying for a contract that actually involved writing an SNMP manager, which I could have done in my sleep, the stupid client reckoned I didn't have enough other networking skills FFS. So after all my hard work it appears that SNMP on its own is as much use as a chocolate teapot. )

[eternalnomad]

Does anybody know of some means (free preferably) to force a PC to get off the net at a particular time. I have been asked to stop a PC from logging onto the net after 9pm. The PC is running XP Home (I think).

The router does not appear to have any settings which would allow me to do this.

Tony,

the following software allows "timelimits" and time restrictions. Never used it personally but a mate of mine says its pretty good.

http://www.netnanny.com/p/page?sb=de...ime_management

Plus there is a free download so you can try its features before shelling out

[expat]

Does anybody know of some means (free preferably) to force a PC to get off the net at a particular time. I have been asked to stop a PC from logging onto the net after 9pm. The PC is running XP Home (I think).

The router does not appear to have any settings which would allow me to do this.

Sounds like a domestic question. Don't know details but I know that some ISPs have a "parental" option that may help.

[mcquiggd]

Take its hard drive out and a taxi home at 9pm and charge them for overtime.


Plus storage costs for the hard drive, plus insurance in case of lost data.

[madhippy]

quick and dirty (if using dhcp)

using 'at'

ipconfig /release at 21:00

ipconfig /renew when you want to get back on ...

no idea if it'll work mind ...