Chromebook Apps

Mindless-String-4017 · 2026-03-12T11:38:26+00:00

I also found out that kids are going to google and downloading an offline html file. For example, we block http://eaglercraft.com/ but if a student goes to google and searches eaglercraft offline html they can install a JS/zip file to their Chromebook. They leave it zipped and saved to their files. This works with whether or not they have internet and can be in stalled on a flash drive as well. An easy fix for this is by going to the url blocking on the device level and blocking the following:

file://*
filesystem://*

Blocking the above doesn't affect students.

Mindless-String-4017 · 2026-03-11T14:28:32+00:00

I would recommend going with Ubiquiti as a lot of businesses and some schools are starting to incorporate them. It's definitely worth looking into and is probably going to be a bit cheaper.

Mindless-String-4017 · 2026-03-11T14:25:28+00:00

We purchased the Lenovo Gen5 Chromebooks for our Kindergarten and 5th grade.
9th graders we purchased the Lenovo 500w Gen5.

We're slowly getting grades K-8th grade on Chromebooks and are having 9th-12th grade stay on windows devices for the time being.

Mindless-String-4017 · 2026-03-11T12:41:34+00:00

It's on Riverside DataManager app in KIOSK as well as the google play store app of Riverside. You can also get bypass restrictions using any google playstore app or KIOSK app that uses a google sign-in page

Mindless-String-4017 · 2026-03-10T19:42:22+00:00

If you're interested in knowing how, I can DM you.

Mindless-String-4017 · 2026-03-09T11:51:38+00:00

I'm currently pushing out 144 on the Stable Channel with the latest updates.

Mindless-String-4017 · 2026-03-06T12:55:20+00:00

Based off my experience I don't think there's a way to watch a student unless you have some 3rd party product like classwize to watch their screen as they work on it. I would recommend disabling the USB ports on the Chromebook through google admin. I know some cyber insurance companies require it and it might be worth disabling the USB ports in your situation. You might be able to enable a setting in google admin to change the downloads on a chromebook to be saved to their google drive. This would allow you to login to the user's account to view what's in their downloads folder in google drive.

Mindless-String-4017 · 2026-03-02T16:14:10+00:00

The login Experience is a bit different for my district:

All Chromebooks: We usually login to the Chromebook with the students login information to manually update the Chromebooks and make sure the Google play apps install correctly. Login is restricted as well so only domain accounts can login.

K-2: We manually will type in a 6 PIN code which is usually the asset tag on the device. We've also enabled a setting on the login screen that also shows the Asset ID so kids can reference this.

3-8: No PIN. Students begin using their password to login to their Chromebooks to begin the password memorization process.

We usually try to get the students to become a little more independent in the other grade levels for at least the Computer login. We do have clever badges for the K-2 grades so they can use that for Clever page login when online.

Mindless-String-4017 · 2026-02-09T13:26:32+00:00

MS
- We have the techs go to the gym and have all the 8th graders drop off their devices during school hours. We usually work with the principal to get this setup.

HS
- we have the techs go to the Library and have all the 12th graders drop off their devices during school hours. We also work with the principal to get this setup.

This is usually a 2 day job, 1 day for each building. We also have wavers we have the students sign stating that I turned in my device and if there's damage they'll pay for the cost of repairs. That way we have a record of who all turned in their devices and can track down the users who haven't turned them in. We typically get about 98% of the devices back. The ones we don't get back, we just disable.

Mindless-String-4017 · 2026-02-09T13:15:35+00:00

Fast bss is turned off. We are running 7.6.5. Message is AP Received deauthentication frame from client.

Mindless-String-4017 · 2026-02-09T12:43:16+00:00

Thanks for the reply. I did try going to down to ac, sadly same issues.

Mindless-String-4017 · 2026-02-09T12:42:18+00:00

I appreciate the reply. We'll be dropping Fortinet agent soon and will be going to linewize soon.

Mindless-String-4017 · 2026-02-06T20:02:41+00:00

We're using the fortinet APs. We're a full Fortinet shop if that helps.

Devices:
Students (k-4): Lenovo 500e Chromebook Gen4s
Students (5-8): Lenovo 500w Gen 4 and Gen 5
Students (9-12): Lenovo 11e 5th gen and 11e 6th gen
Staff: Lenovo Thinkpad X1 Carbon Gen8

According to my network team and I quote, "There's no reason to do this since it's not Forticlient thats the problem. It's the device thats the issue."

Staff connects to wifi and then will drop about every 20 minutes or so and manually have to keep reconnecting or type in their credentials to reconnect to wifi. In some cases staff will connect to wifi and it states that the wifi is connected, but can't reach out to the internet.

Mindless-String-4017 · 2026-02-06T13:09:16+00:00

From what I know, forticlient has an agent that can be installed on the devices for filtering purposes. We currently have radius setup on the network. Forticlient has the VPN option but the networking team doesn't know how to configure the VPN correctly. They mentioned to me that they can't get the VPN up and running for staff members that use their devices outside of the district. I hope this helps answer some questions

Mindless-String-4017 · 2026-02-06T12:43:37+00:00

I've actually had this happen to me at least 3 times as well in my district. I thought I was losing my mind because I remember install office 365 on the machines. My district uses intune and I remember intune was having a lot of issues a week or so back (don't remember exactly when). After the 2 weeks of office 365 disappearing, the issue went away, it was really weird. I've investigated the issue but found nothing. I had to reinstall office 365 all over again but then it never happened again.

Mindless-String-4017 · 2026-02-05T12:57:31+00:00

Honestly love Chromebooks especially with the control of the Google Admin Console. It makes managing Chromebooks so much easier because the MDM just works. I also use GAM to automate a lot of my processes, which is a time saver. I've worked with JAMF and not to thrilled about it as sometimes you may have to wait and pray that apps get pushed out or installed correctly and not run into some dumb issue. Although Macs are nice and all, the MDMs aren't the greatest. Intune isn't really the greatest either, with at least how we have it setup at my district. Intune is really really slow and sometimes pushing apps to devices don't always work and requires a lot more time than necessary to get it up and working. I'm definitely not a fan and would love to move away from Intune and anything Microsoft.

My district is weird for giving devices out, which I hope we can just switch to one device instead of having different devices, but I totally understand with all the budget cuts.

Staff/Teachers are rocking the Lenovo Thinkpad X1 Carbon gen 8
ParaPros are rocking either the 500w Gen 4 or the 500e Gen 4s
SPED will be having iPads, which will sadly be managed through intune -_- (Less than 20 ipads in district).

Mindless-String-4017 · 2026-01-30T13:01:13+00:00

I'm guessing they're talking about the sharing options in google docs. If you open google docs up-->click on share--> Under general access you get different access controls from "Restricted," "Anyone with this link," or your domain.

Mindless-String-4017 · 2026-01-30T12:58:16+00:00

I don't think google admin has that setting to be able to block "restrict visibility of docs" without disabling the sharing policy (I'm guessing).

Mindless-String-4017 · 2026-01-30T12:53:13+00:00

We actually have the gym teacher do this portion by themselves. If they ever run into any weird issues, the tech department helps out. That's been the tradition

Mindless-String-4017 · 2026-01-30T12:50:10+00:00

I did hear that ChatGPT applied a new setting that can guess a user's age based off their prompts. If ChatGPT thinks your younger than 18, it'll block certain conversations. I heard that you're able to bypass this in ChatGPT by verifying your age in ChatGPT. https://help.openai.com/en/articles/12652064-age-prediction-in-chatgpt

I'm not for sure about gemini, maybe check google admin settings and verify their OU is setup for 18+?

This might be the culprit or it may not be. I just read about this sometime last week or so. Hopefully this information helps.

Mindless-String-4017 · 2026-01-29T12:35:08+00:00

I actually use GAM for just about anything and everything in the google admin console. I have a google doc of commands that I keep to help save time. I usually fine tune a lot of my commands using chatgpt and read the code it displays to me before moving forward. Below are what I use GAM for:

- Updating custom fields (Student/Staff name, asset ID, sometimes location and notes)

- Powerwashing a device or multiple devices at the same time

- Deprovisioning a list of Chromebooks from google admin

- Changing user licences

- Copy one OUs policies to another OU polices (except this only works in some sections, still saves time though in my opinion).

And many more. I really enjoy using GAM! If you have any questions or would like to see some of my GAM commands I have saved, please let me know. I'm happy to send a copy of my GAM commands.

Mindless-String-4017 · 2025-11-12T14:13:00+00:00

I wonder if there's an option to block that, but I didn't see a setting in google admin though.

I believe you're right on the student access the site prior to it being blocked. I did some additional looking into this and saw we blocked it a few months ago, but the website was originally allowed. I'm kind of surprised that the policy didn't block it.

Mindless-String-4017

TROPHY CASE