web filter

my sister has just bought an acer aspire one with linux, her kids will be using it as well so i am looking for a suitable web filter to install.

i know very little about computer programming so would like a nice simple download if thats possible, dansgaurdian looks a bit complicated for me, I did see on linux format wiki page a web filter called 'willow' would this be suitable for the linux light used on the acer?

or any other suggestions would be appreciated.

oh and how do you set up a new user on the acers linux os? i assume i would need to set up the web filter as a system administrator then my sisters kids would use their own user profiles so they cant bypass the filter?

cheers for any help given

dave

 

A quick look at the Willow website indicates it's fairly easy to install; without trying it I can't be sure how easy it is to run, but it looks as though it's designed to be easy to use.

I would expect you to set up things so that Willow was running by default, then override it (using your password to become root to do so) if you wanted to work outside the filter. This is likely to involve using the command line - but the problem you may have on the One is that any user can easily become root (i.e. gain administrative privileges) as its security policy is very lax, so thee si the risk that the users you are seeking to protect may work out how to remove the protection.

There are ways to change the security policy and to add users, but they are made more difficult than necessary on a Linux system by the way Acer have set things up.

I'd suggest downloading and installing Willow first to make sure you can get it working - then we can deal with additional users afterwards if it's all OK so far. You will need to have enabled advanced mode to do so; there is a thread in the beginner's forum called 'READ ME...' which tells you how to do this (among other useful stuff). If you get stuck, come back here and we can get you through it....

 

Thanks for the reply, I seem to have fallen at the first hurdle though.....

I downloaded willow and a box comes up with a list of files with the tabs at the top to add or extract???

I looked at the instructions on thier site but i dont understand anything they have written.....

http://www.digitallumber.com/software/w ... stall.html

Sorry to be so useless at this but i am used to downloading to windows where you just click 'run' 'finish' and then restart your computer.

Any help as to what to do next would be appreciated.

Thanks,

Dave.

 

Yes, they've used one of the less usual approaches to installing!

Translating a little to Windows terms, what you've downloaded is a zip file (it's actually a zipped tar file, but the concept is the same). You've effectively got it open in an unzipping utility. Did you perhaps opt to open it rather than saving when you downloaded?

If you did, re-download but save the file, then (from their website but with an additional step to avoid a possible problem) [*]open a terminal (ALT-F2, type terminal and click 'run')
[*]In the terminal, type the following commands:

Code:

cd /var
sudo tar xzvf /path/to/willow-3.x.tar.gz

The bit I've added is 'sudo' - the reason you can't just download and run a file to install something on Linux is that ordinary users don't have the rights to affect important parts of the filesystem - you have to use something like sudo to make things happen as though you were the root user.

That deals with installation. To run it, in the same terminal for the first time in case there are any errors reported, type

Code:

/var/willow/willow.py --config=/var/willow/willow.conf 

This is trying to use a standard configuration file, which I'm assuming will contain a basic working configuration. If it throws up errors in the terminal window, copy them and paste them into a message here and I'll see what I can work out!

 

yes i had previously 'opened' it instead of saving.

i'm getting errors at the first stage in the terminal......

[user@localhost ~]$ cd /var
[user@localhost var]$ sudo tar xzvf /path/to/willow-3.x.tar.gz
tar: /path/to/willow-3.x.tar.gz: Cannot open: No such file or directory
tar: Error is not recoverable: exiting now
tar: Child returned status 2
tar: Error exit delayed from previous errors
[user@localhost var]$

 

just noticed under my disk / downloads the file name is

willow-3.18.tar.gz

 

still comes up with the same error code.

 

You need to replace "/path/to/" with the location of your download (the path to the file). If it's in the usual place on the Aspire One, that line needs to become

Code:

sudo tar xzvf /home/user/Download/willow-3.18.tar.gz

 

ok that seems to have worked a long list of filtered sites came up.

i then added the next line of code and these errors came up....

[user@localhost var]$ /var/willow/willow.py --config=/var/willow/willow.conf
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "/var/willow/willow.py", line 2429, in <module>
ws = proxyserver(config)
File "/var/willow/willow.py", line 1605, in __init__
httpserver.__init__(self, config)
File "/var/willow/willow.py", line 1078, in __init__
self.logfile = Syslogger()
File "/var/willow/willow.py", line 177, in __init__
self.socket.connect('/dev/log')
File "<string>", line 1, in connect
socket.error: (2, 'No such file or directory')
[user@localhost var]$

 

Those errors seem to relate to where the software expects to find a file, but I think you'll need to find help on them from the software writers or any forum they may run, or see if the documentation covers it. I don't think it's an Aspire one thing!

 

I will try contacting the willow writers.

Thanks for all the help daldred it's much appreciated and after playing with my sisters aspire one today I think I may get myself one!

Cheers,

Dave.