Looking for simple log-in program not connected to scheduler, bookkeeping program or server/ network.

[Avi Jacob]

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Hi all,

I recently became the new head of our light microscopy unit, and one thing
that jumped out at me is that we have a machine that is disconnected from
our (buggy) scheduler/ bookkeeping program (which itself is something else
I want to change, but hey, windmills later).
It is not even connected to the local network, for all sorts of reasons I
was given. (So yes, students need to copy everything to USB  disks).

Anyone can waltz in and use the microscope, with no need to log in, and I
have no way of knowing who was last.
I really don't want to make a new windows user account for every new
student.

So I need a simple log-in program with admin rights that will give me at
least a log of whom used the machine last. So I would still need to
manually  put in each new user once, but still better than adding endless
windows accounts.
Anyone?

Thanks,
Avi

[Nuno Moreno]

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Dear Avi,

honestly I would solve the network issue first, even if only connected to a facility "server"..a raspberry should be enough!!. This is something you can solve with very little money and would give you much more flexibility. After, use an ad hoc login software (www.pgina.org).

Best,
Nuno Moreno, PhD
Instituto Gulbenkian de Ciência
http://lnkd.in/6VXcrM





On 25 Feb 2014, at 21:55, Avi Jacob <[hidden email]> wrote:

> *****
> To join, leave or search the confocal microscopy listserv, go to:
> http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=confocalmicroscopy
> *****
>
> Hi all,
>
> I recently became the new head of our light microscopy unit, and one thing
> that jumped out at me is that we have a machine that is disconnected from
> our (buggy) scheduler/ bookkeeping program (which itself is something else
> I want to change, but hey, windmills later).
> It is not even connected to the local network, for all sorts of reasons I
> was given. (So yes, students need to copy everything to USB  disks).
>
> Anyone can waltz in and use the microscope, with no need to log in, and I
> have no way of knowing who was last.
> I really don't want to make a new windows user account for every new
> student.
>
> So I need a simple log-in program with admin rights that will give me at
> least a log of whom used the machine last. So I would still need to
> manually  put in each new user once, but still better than adding endless
> windows accounts.
> Anyone?
>
> Thanks,
> Avi

[Bruce Stanley]

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As Nuno suggested, getting (securely) on the network is probably the first step. Then, depending on your institution's network & computer access policies (i.e., does everyone have a password to get on to shared computers,wireless, etc.?), getting onto the network would probably allow you to have IT set up a specific domain to which you could join the computer, which would automatically use the institutional login name and password to log onto your computer (there are also ways to do that and ONLY allow specific permissions using that institutionally-assigned password to access the microscope computer, e.g., trained users). While this requires a slight bit of (IT) setup, you would never have to enter a single new username (unless you wanted to restrict access to specific people), and you don't have to deal with lost passwords etc. We do this for multiple Core Facility computers here, including Confocal microscopes.

If you put antivirus software onto the computer, and especially if the computer is inside an institutional firewall, there really is less to worry about having it connected to the network than there is having people using USB sticks (not at all guaranteed to be virus-free) to transfer their data. You can still set your update policies to "Manual" or otherwise arrange with IT to NOT have updates forced onto the computer, if that is another source of concern for putting the computer onto the network.

Once you have either done the above to set up institutional username/password logins to the computer (or entered all the usernames and passwords yourself), then it is a simple matter to get reports out of who has logged on and logged off the computer when, for example with a windows computer using a PowerShell script like the one at http://gallery.technet.microsoft.com/scriptcenter/Log-Parser-to-Identify-8aac36bd or http://gallery.technet.microsoft.com/scriptcenter/Find-user-logon-duration-667b8c48 (a good reference for using PowerShell scripts is at http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee176949.aspx).

If it is a Mac computer, just use Terminal and the command like "last >>~/Desktop/userlogfile.log" to append the list of logon-logoff activity to a file userlogfile.log on your desktop, or "ac -p >>~/Desktop/CumulUserTime.log" to get a summary of each users cumulative logon times appended to a file CumulUserTime.log on your desktop. There are also various perl and other scripts to harvest logon information from Linux computers as well, you would just have to search a bit.

You can also set any of these up so that you could remotely gather that information and store it on another computer, or have an administrative person gather that information remotely each month for billing purposes.

Only real problem with any of this is making sure that people logoff when they are finished….

 --Bruce
*************************************************
Bruce A. Stanley, Ph.D.
Director, Scientific Programs
Section of Research Resources H093, Room C1734
Director, Mass Spectrometry and Proteomics Facility
Co-Director, CTSI Translational Technologies Core Services Unit (TTCSU)
Penn State College of Medicine
500 University Drive
Hershey, PA 17033-2390
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On Feb 25, 2014, at 5:39 PM, Nuno Moreno <[hidden email]> wrote:

> *****
> To join, leave or search the confocal microscopy listserv, go to:
> http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=confocalmicroscopy
> *****
>
> Dear Avi,
>
> honestly I would solve the network issue first, even if only connected to a facility "server"..a raspberry should be enough!!. This is something you can solve with very little money and would give you much more flexibility. After, use an ad hoc login software (www.pgina.org).
>
> Best,
> Nuno Moreno, PhD
> Instituto Gulbenkian de Ciência
> http://lnkd.in/6VXcrM
>
>
>
>
>
> On 25 Feb 2014, at 21:55, Avi Jacob <[hidden email]> wrote:
>
>> *****
>> To join, leave or search the confocal microscopy listserv, go to:
>> http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=confocalmicroscopy
>> *****
>>
>> Hi all,
>>
>> I recently became the new head of our light microscopy unit, and one thing
>> that jumped out at me is that we have a machine that is disconnected from
>> our (buggy) scheduler/ bookkeeping program (which itself is something else
>> I want to change, but hey, windmills later).
>> It is not even connected to the local network, for all sorts of reasons I
>> was given. (So yes, students need to copy everything to USB  disks).
>>
>> Anyone can waltz in and use the microscope, with no need to log in, and I
>> have no way of knowing who was last.
>> I really don't want to make a new windows user account for every new
>> student.
>>
>> So I need a simple log-in program with admin rights that will give me at
>> least a log of whom used the machine last. So I would still need to
>> manually  put in each new user once, but still better than adding endless
>> windows accounts.
>> Anyone?
>>
>> Thanks,
>> Avi

[Avi Jacob]

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Thanks for the replies.

Of course the first thing I wanted to do was connect it to the network,
like the rest of the microscopes, which use a combined scheduling/
bookkeeping - log in procedure. However as I mentioned, there are
supposedly some previous issues with this specific computer and acquisition
program that created problems when they tried it. I can certainly try to
get the IT to try again, however right now this computer is simply
disconnected. Thus we cannot use the institution log-ins. Thanks for the
tip regarding the PowerShell, for a different machine that the booking
program does not work on it, although it is connected to the network.
Ill try pgina and see if that does the trick.

Best,
Avi



On Wed, Feb 26, 2014 at 5:21 PM, Bruce Stanley <[hidden email]> wrote:

> *****
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> *****
>

[Ben Abrams]

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Hi Avi,

I have found WorkTime from Nestersoft useful for this purpose.  I have no
commercial interest in this product.  One thing I would recommend if you are
using USB drives as your primary data transfer device is to disable
"autoplay" on the machine, this will reduce the chance that malicious code
gets executed when someone simply inserts their drive.

Good luck,
Ben