I suspect that one of my disgrundled end user is purposely sabatoging the 5 machines in his classroom. I just finished repairing 3 of the 5 on Tuesday, and already 2 of those are not working again. I know there is some sort of software preferably freeware/shareware that tracks everything a user does on a machine, I just can't remember where I saw it. I would need it to create a log file as proof. It would also have to be something that would run without his knowing about it. Could someone please let me know what is available, and what you would do in this situation. Thanks in advance.
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I don't know what kind of "sabotage" you are referring to but if it is changing the registry or different settings, if you are using NT or 98 I would use Policy Editor.This will resrict all registry editing tools and deny access to the control panel, etc.To actually catch them,there is a lot of software out there to do this. You can go to www.snapshotspy.com for one. I haven't tried this personnaly but it can email the logs to you at certain intervals. I think about $50 Another is at spectorsoft.com (about $70) Good luck!
There you'll find a description of what it does as well as a screen shot.
Essentially, it creates a log file that logs activities that occur on the pc.
I've put it in my startup folder just to evaluate it, but I understand that probably wouldn't fit your situation. I would think that you could place it in the run line of the WIN.INI or the run line in the Windows registry. If not, you could just be sneaky and put it in the startup folder and rename it to something that is usually in the startup folder, like FINDFAST, and change the icon to match.
The only thing I can see so farthat I don't like about this program is the fact that if you do a CTRL ALT DEL, you can see SNOOP in the Close Program list. If they select it and End Task, it turns the activity tracker off.
I agree with the answers above concerning policy settings that will lock the machine down. There are also 3rd party products that revert a machine back to a preset point without reimaging. I don't know of the names. For tracking user activity try Stealth Keyboard Interceptor at the following link: http://www.zdnet.co.uk/software/internet/security/sw6.html There is a description of the software at the sight. It basically captures keystrokes and system start and close info. Good Luck
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Software that logs what end users do