Topic: Limit Internet access by time on the Internet

[Chrille]

Hi,

Does anybody know of a solution to limit different users time on the Internet? Not by hour of the day but on total "access time".

Problem.
I want to limit my sons access to the Internet, because he plays Counterstrike a lot more then we agreed on. I would like to be able to set x hours every day except on weekends where he can get y hours. I have three XP clients, with 4 user accounts on each client, in my house. It shall be possible for me to set different limits for each user (not client), i.e. 1 hour/day to unlimited access. It shall not affect the possibilities to access files in an Ibay. It would be nice if there is a "5-minutes left" warning. I'm running 6.0 and is allways connected to Internet by ADSL

Suggestions?

Regards,

/Chrille

[mbachmann]

This has been requested and there seems some solutions, albeit i don't know where exactly. Please use search function.

[Chrille]

Thanx for your reply mbachmann.

I searched this site and the Internet with AltaVista before I posted my question and I did another search this evening. There is an unanswered question in october 2001 about the same topic. The other questions/answers are about limit Internet access on:
- time of day
- Downloaded data etc.

Not on how long you have been surfing/playing

More suggestions?

Regards,

Chrille

[ryan]

Chrille,

Sarg can provide reporting for all web access.  It also shows the amount of time spent on a web site...in milliseconds...this might help you enforce the rules, but won't do the enforcing for you.....

good luck,

ryan

[Chrille]

Ryan,

Thanx for your tip.

Until now I have used SARG reports to see which sites my kids have visited and web statistics for how long somebody (in our LAN) have been active on the Internet.

The solution as you have said, gives me a chance to afterwards see their activities roughly, but doesn’t give my kids support in holding their promises    

More suggestions, anybody..

Regards,

Chrille

[Chrille]

Sorry. Not "web statistics" but "system monitor" in my latest message.

[mbachmann]

http://forums.contribs.org/index.php?topic=21589.msg85600#msg85600 (you posted here already, but i assume this contrib from Ave Loveless may be the solution). Check related devinfo-contribs thread also: http://lists.contribs.org/mailman/public/devinfo/msg07416.html

http://www.dungog.net/sme/help/ Panels, Bandwidth limiting panel. Commercial. Don't know how much.

[Chrille]

Hi again Mbachmann!

The first link is about restricting access between certain hours of the day. I tried to do a follow-up with my twist, but there was no response.

The second link is also about restricting access between certain hours of the day.

The third link is dead, but I know which program you mean. The info about it is on http://www.tech-geeks.org/contrib/loveless/SMEServer/contribs/ipblock_inet/readme.txt

Thanx for the help, but unfortunate none of the links were new to me and none were helping me with my problem.

I don't want to restrict access between certain hours of the day. I want to restrict the amount of time my kids spends on the Internet.

More suggestions?



/Chrille

[Anonymous]

The 3rd link is functional now.

On the basis of restriction between certain hours of the day maybe you could work your way through a feature which limits time amount. I have not seen this feature in squid made easy.

[Guest]

I found this one that let you limit time of day for x number of hours per day.
http://www.winglink.com/conntroll/about.php

Check it out

[shanen]

You need a captive portal.
Users must login via a web page (any web request is redirected to the login page)
Once they have sucessfully logged in, the firewall rules are modified to allow internet access.
STW for nocatauth and I am sure there are other projects like it. Nocat is for wireless authentication but it works equally well in wired scenarios. If you are serious about nocat, then I can help you as I built a test box last week on white box linux. I couldn't get tight control on user time but then I am sure there is a solution out there somewhere.
Don't bother trying this on sme server at it needs complete control of the firewall rules.

There are appliances available that will do all this but they are not cheap, however they are perfect for internet cafes and airports as they have sophisticated
billing solutions with popup boxes that count time left in seconds. Users can logout and use remaining time later.

[milend]

Hi all,

Reading the thread couple of months later I hope
that this problem has been solved.
But since nobody has posted the solition yet, I'd like to ask the same question again:

- Is there a way to impose limits on the total time that a PC can stay connected to Internet?

Chrille ,
did you manage to solve your problem?

Thank you for your comments!

[milend]

I forgot to mention that I have SquidGuard installed.
Can SquidGuard be used to block/limit internet access ?

[Chrille]

Hi Milend!

I didn't solve my problem. The solution suggested was either to much effort for getting "my kids into limits" or program for clients. I have 4 clients in my household and they will soon discover the client solution.

So, I'm still looking for a solution

 

/Chrille

[milend]

What about Abe's IPBLOCK solution?

Have you tried it?

It is not exactly what you want (it is not exactly what I want) but still it can limit the Internet usage ....

[Chrille]

Hi again Milend!

No I havn't tried IPBLOCK. Does it give you restriction to certain sites?

I use Norton Internet Security on all our clients.

   

/Chrille

[milend]

No,
IPBLOCK just limits the access to Internet from a PC specified by its IP or MAC address.
You can also specify the time interval when internet access block will take effect.

Squid/SquidGuard can be used to prevent users from accessing particular sites. (specifies by IPs or domain name)