Tech-Hut : Your Daily Dose Of Technology!

This post is dedicated to my beloved uncle, who is too concerned about amount of time his kids spend on the computer. Its not that computer is a bad thing(infact i advocate the learning), but the addiction the computer games posses towards kids can be dangerous. It would be great If somehow he can find a way so that he can restrict the time for which the kids are online. Moreover, it needs to be inexpensive, so using costly softwares was not in the option.

If you face the same kind of problem then we've got the solution, read on.........

First thing is that you need to have a different User login accounts on the computer that the kids use (not your user Login account)

It is possible by using "Net User" Commands, please spare some time to learn little about this Net User command and its implications.


WHAT EXACTLY A NET USER COMMAND IS?

It is a command line DOS command that is used to regulate all the functions of a user account in windows platform. You can use it to create, modify, delete, change password, create restrictions etc....

First go to Start-->Run and type cmd, press enter
The command prompt will open.

General syntax of Net User command is

Net User "Account Name" /Attribute

Please note to remove "account name"(also the quotes) and replace it with the name of account you want to make changes to.
Also replace attribute with the one you want to use.... some common attributes are
/Add
/Delete
/Time

Example: If you want to add a new account abcd , the command is

Net User abcd /Add *

and to delete the account abcd, the command is

net user abcd /Delete





HOW TO CREATE LOGIN TIME RESTRICTION FOR ANY ACCOUNT?

Now that we understand the basics, lets get down to our original work, i.e creating a login time restricted accounts for the kids(or any one else)

You'll have to work from your account (i.e a administrator account)

First create a different accounts for the kids(if it don't already exists)

Go To Start-->Run and type cmd

in the command prompt type command

Net User kid /add *

this will create a new account named kid(replace the word kid in the above command with the name you want to give to that account)
It will ask for password, provide any.




Now creating restrictions for that account,

In the command prompt type

Net User kid /time:m-su,14:00-17:00

This will restrict the account name kid to login from monday to sunday between !4:00 to 17:00




You can even use specific days, like if you want then to login only on mondays use command

Net User /time:m,14:00-17:00





The time range mentioned above can be only in discrete hours, not in minutes, for example you can not choose 14:36-17:45. It can only be like HH:00-HH:00 (HH representing hours in 24 hour format)


Hope That Helps....