Disable function key

[iamjezz]

Im looking for ideally a group policy fix as we have student's turning off the wifi on netbooks which then causes problems for the next lot of students who try and login so my thinking is by disabling the function key they wont be able to.Any ideas ?

[mac_shinobi]

Not used netbooks but I presume they have a BIOS of some description whether UEFI or similar. Think on at least normal laptops / notebooks there is an option to disable the physical switch from turning the wireless devices on or off and then just password protect the bios ?

[Garacesh]

Not used netbooks but I presume they have a BIOS of some description whether UEFI or similar. Think on at least normal laptops / notebooks there is an option to disable the physical switch from turning the wireless devices on or off and then just password protect the bios ?

 

Not here. We have the same issue (either that, or aliens) and there's nothing in the BIOS to disable the FN keys (Lenovo S10-3's), plus there's always the physical switch (which admittedly we could purposefully break, but we'd rather not..)

 

I, too, would be very interested to learn if there's a GP or script-based solution to this so we could roll it out to all of the laptops

[witch]

I'd like one too - although it is the teachers who seem to manage to turn off the wireless, or the trackpad, by touching the correct keys by accident!

[mac_shinobi]

what make and model of netbooks are they ? May be worth while booking a call with the manufacturer, they will most likely give you the best answer on how to disable FN keys ( if possible ).

 

I did find pressing FN + NumLock should disable it but then if the students google it , they may find another key press to re enable them ie FN + F11 or the likes ?

 

Different makes of netbooks seem to have different key strokes to disable / enable the FN Keys

Edited June 14, 2013 by mac_shinobi

[iamjezz]

Samsung and Stone, spoken to the companies in question and they seem to think its doable via windows but wont give any direction.

[mac_shinobi]

Only way im aware of ( at least in windows ) is if you make a utility via vb dot net / c# dot net or another programming language and using the ( I believe ) is the low level keyboard API and establishing what ascii key codes the relevant key combination produces and blocking those specific key codes

 

One way

 

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/8462871/how-to-catch-the-fn-key-in-vb-net

Edited June 17, 2013 by mac_shinobi