Grayed-Out Parental Controls

[jujub123]

Hi,

I am using an iBook G4 running 10.4. I have an administrator account and a standard account. However, even when I click the lock to enable changes (from the administrator account trying to adjust the standard account), the Parental Controls tab is grayed out.

Does anyone have a clue what I'm doing wrong or have other suggestions for blocking applications?

Thanks.

 

[r0k]

Hi,

I am using an iBook G4 running 10.4. I have an administrator account and a standard account. However, even when I click the lock to enable changes (from the administrator account trying to adjust the standard account), the Parental Controls tab is grayed out.

Does anyone have a clue what I'm doing wrong or have other suggestions for blocking applications?

Thanks.

Parental Controls operates on a normal account. You have to have a "kid" account either on the machine you are sitting at or on the network. Here is a step by step to get Parental Controls working...

1 - The first time Leopard boots up, create your admin account and password
2 - Create a "kid" account that is a "managed" account not an admin
3 - switch users or log out of the kid account and log in as admin and open system preferences
4 - click the lock to make changes
5 - pick the kid's account. you should be able to set up parental controls for that account now.
6 - pick "manage parental controls from another computer" (this allows you to come in remotely and make changes without making the trip to the kid's machine)

Parental controls is somewhat of a work in progress. It is better in 10.5.4 than it was in 10.5, but it is not as bulletproof as I would like. I have seen parental controls allow things I had blocked and there was even a kernel panic on my daughter's machine when I tried to run parental controls. Both of these problems were prior to 10.5.3 but all is still not quite perfect.

 

[jujub123]

Parental Controls operates on a normal account. You have to have a "kid" account either on the machine you are sitting at or on the network. Here is a step by step to get Parental Controls working...

1 - The first time Leopard boots up, create your admin account and password
2 - Create a "kid" account that is a "managed" account not an admin
3 - switch users or log out of the kid account and log in as admin and open system preferences
4 - click the lock to make changes
5 - pick the kid's account. you should be able to set up parental controls for that account now.
6 - pick "manage parental controls from another computer" (this allows you to come in remotely and make changes without making the trip to the kid's machine)

Parental controls is somewhat of a work in progress. It is better in 10.5.4 than it was in 10.5, but it is not as bulletproof as I would like. I have seen parental controls allow things I had blocked and there was even a kernel panic on my daughter's machine when I tried to run parental controls. Both of these problems were prior to 10.5.3 but all is still not quite perfect.

I do not see the kid account option for 10.4. Am I missing something?

 

[r0k]

I do not see the kid account option for 10.4. Am I missing something?

Sorry, it's not called a kid account. I'm not in front of my Mac right now but think its called a standard account rather than an admin account. There are only 2 types of accounts in OS X. I call the standard or managed accounts "kid" accounts. That's my term. You won't find it anywhere else.