[LightDM] How to set up a public computer without locking it down completely

[Robert Ancell]

Hi rdiez,

In terms of how LightDM does guest sessions, there are some files you can
modify:
/usr/sbin/guest-account creates/removes guest accounts - you could modify
that for new behaviour
/etc/apparmor.d/lightdm-guest-session controls guest permissions

You can enable guest autologin from /etc/lightdm/lightdm.conf


On 2 February 2013 04:13, R. Diez <rdiezmail-temp2 at yahoo.de> wrote:

> Hi all:
>
> I would like to set up a public Linux computer in a hackerspace, so that
> guests can browse the Internet if they haven't brought their own laptop.
>
> There is a minimum of security requirements to fullfill, but we are not
> talking about serious security here. The PC is not really private, as there
> is always a number of hackers walking around. Guests tend to be of good
> faith and they often need help using computers. If the PC gets trashed I
> hope I can re-image it pretty quickly.
>
> I've spent some time searching the Web with keywords "Kiosk Mode" and
> "Public PC", but most advice I have seen is about locking the computer
> down, but that's not what I want to achieve, I want to let the user do as
> much as possible, including (if possible) installing packages from the
> distribution's default (trusted) software repositories. I just want to
> forbid root and nothing else.
>
> I would also be nice if the PC could update itself when shutting down, so
> that it will come up again next day completed up-to-date with the latest
> version of Firefox and so on.
>
> I am thinking about creating some sort of autologin guest account. The
> trick is, when the user logs out, or maybe at next login, the guest account
> gets totally wiped out in order to start clean next time around. I am
> thinking about resetting the user's file to a known baseline.
>
> In order to prevent the guest user from being asked the typical welcome
> questions every time, I would also like to temporarily disable such account
> wiping, so that I can update the baseline used for the next wiping out at
> login.
>
> I am guessing I could add some hook scripts somewhere in the LightDM's
> configuration in order to achieve all this. Can anybody give me some
> pointers?
>
> Many thanks,
>   rdiez
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