[ale] Making kids stop being entitled slackers with free software

[Dustin Strickland]

I thought about it(my router is running DD-WRT), but I decided against
it. If he wanted to get online while everyone's asleep, nothing would
be stopping him from using my main workstation or one of the laptops
which I can't block for various reasons. I run a DDNS client, web server
and ssh server on the workstation, all of which need constant network
access(server-0 is a bit of a cripple so migrating these services would
be an issue). It would be really easy to set up DD-WRT's time-based
controls, definitely, but I require something that can be fine-tuned
a bit more, as well as some sort of per-machine override in the event
that someone who's not him wants to get on the internet after-hours or
while he's not meeting his work quota.

On Tue, 04 Mar 2014 22:57:19 -0500
JD <jdp at algoloma.com> wrote:

> Many routers have access time controls - tomato and dd-wrt definitely
> do. Seems much easier, though squid setup as a transparent proxy AND
> blocking DNS to all clients would be fun too.
> 
> On 03/04/2014 10:26 PM, Dustin Strickland wrote:
> > So, my (much)younger brother is doing middle school online. As kids
> > his age do, he has issues with motivating himself to do anything
> > other than play video games, think about playing video games, watch
> > Youtube commentators play video games, or munching on unhealthy
> > food that he will never be able to work off if he continues his
> > daily routine(while talking about video games).
> > 
> > I think I have a solution, but I would like ALE's opinion on the
> > best way to implement it. Here is a simple map of my home
> > network(using generic names, of course):
> > http://s29.postimg.org/fgrszgq4n/network_map.png
> > 
> > My goal is simple: Unless he does a set amount of work each weekday
> > when scheduled, the network will lock down to prevent him from doing
> > anything else. Also, the network will lock down at 9 PM(10:30 on
> > weekends) and unlock at 6 AM. There will be an override
> > method for everyone else. His X session will also be suspended at
> > these times on his main machine(he uses Steam), and ideally all
> > game consoles would refuse to boot as well. If Microsoft were nice,
> > they would allow you to remotely change the parental controls PIN
> > and settings for the Xbox 360 remotely so that I could automate
> > this job, but they have an extensive history of making gimmicky
> > products that are barely usable if you need flexibility, so it is
> > to be expected that they don't.
> > 
> > After getting my feet wet in the field with a quick Google search,
> > I'm thinking that I want to use Squid. I'm probably going to
> > install Xen on his main machine, workstation-0, and have a PV domU
> > take care of everything. Do you guys approaching this the right
> > way(from a technical standpoint I mean, I really don't care what
> > you think about the ethics of it), and is there any other software
> > you would recommend for this purpose?
> > ___________________
> _______________________________________________
> Ale mailing list
> Ale at ale.org
> http://mail.ale.org/mailman/listinfo/ale
> See JOBS, ANNOUNCE and SCHOOLS lists at
> http://mail.ale.org/mailman/listinfo