Overview

To run Intuiface Player in "kiosk mode" means to prevent visitors from killing or switching away from a running experience in Player. It does this by preventing access to File Explorer, the taskbar, the desktop, the Action Center or any other part of the Windows operating system. Your PC will look and act like its sole purpose in life is to run your experience.

This article suggests methods for creating a kiosk mode. As you'll see, these methods are provided by the Windows OS itself, not by Intuiface. Intuiface has no built-in capability for creating a kiosk mode.

NOTE:

• Follow these directions at your own risk as this is an IT task independent of the use of Intuiface. We are not responsible for any issues that might occur in your efforts to apply the steps below. If you are even remotely hesitant about following these directions, don't do it. Find the nearest IT administrator to help you.
• This article does not address the use of Windows Embedded. Doing so is also supported but beyond the scope of this Knowledge Base. Please work with your IT Administrator if you wish to adopt Windows Embedded. For reference, lockdown features are discussed here.
• The guidance above for Windows 10 does not address the use of Windows 10 IoT Enterprise. Doing so is also supported but beyond the scope of this Knowledge Base. Please work with your IT Administrator if you wish to adopt Windows 10 IoT Enterprise.
• If you want to change windows 10 boot screen, just follow Microsoft procedure described in Customize the boot screen.

Windows Pro, Enterprise and Education

To setup a kiosk mode

The following procedure enables you to configure a Windows account so that logging into that account immediately runs an Intuiface experience within Player rather than running Windows Explorer. What you're doing is changing the Windows "shell".

Here are the steps for creating a Windows user account that logs directly into a running instance of Intuiface Player:

1. Set up a second Windows account on the target PC named something like "Kiosk User". This would be an account other than the Administrator account. this second account must have a password.

2. Login to the “Kiosk User” account.

3. Set the shell to Intuiface Player using the following steps:

   • Run regedit
     • open the Start menu and type regedit in the search bar at the bottom.
   • In the Registry Editor, navigate to the following key (this will only change the shell for the “Kiosk User" account):
     HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon
   • Right-click in the right-hand panel and select New -> String Value
     
   • Name it "Shell"
   • Double-click on the Shell key and paste the following value (with quotation marks): "C:\Program Files\Intuilab\Intuiface\Player\IntuifacePlayerApp.exe" /playLastExperience
   • Alternatively you could instead indicate the experience you want to play (do not use this option if you plan to update or deploy experiences through the Management Console) : "C:\Program Files\Intuilab\Intuiface\Player\IntuifacePlayerApp.exe" "c:\full\path to\ your experience.ifx"
   • Refer to Command line options to see all available command line options of Intuiface Player.
   • Close regedit

4. To force the autologin on the kiosk account when windows reboot:

   • in a cmd.exe execute "control userpasswords2"
   • select the "Kiosk User" for Autologin
   • Uncheck the Check-Box: "Users must enter a user name and password to use this computer"
   • click "Ok"
   • You will be prompted to enter the username and password for the account you wish to use automatically when Windows starts. Type the User name and password in both the “Password” and “Confirm Password” fields, then select “OK“.

5. Log out and log back into the “Kiosk User” account. Intuiface Player should start with the given experience.

Limitation:

• If you press the Escape key (either on a physical or virtual keyboard), Player will exit and Windows will display an empty black screen. You will have to log out/login again or start Windows Explorer to restart the Player.
  So if you have a keyboard attached to the kiosk and may wish to capture the ESC key from with the experiences deployed on the kiosk.

To unset the kiosk mode

To log out of this Kiosk User session, press <Ctrl-Shift-Delete> and select "Log off".

If you need to return to the original shell configuration or display Windows Explorer, press <Ctrl-Shift-Esc> to start the Task Manager. Select the File menu, choose New Task (Run...) and type the name of what you want to run. For example:

• regedit to delete or update the registry key we added earlier
• explorer to open Windows Explorer (this won't bring up the Start menu or taskbar)

Windows 10 Enterprise and Education

For both Windows 10 Enterprise and Windows 10 Education you can use one of the two other methods:

• the shell launcher feature as an alternative to the method described above. It is powerful but requires a good technical understanding of Windows.

• Using the kiosk wizard in Windows Configuration Designer is the most powerful way to setup a Kiosk. It offers lots of configuration capabilities.